Abstract
This dissertation examines portrayals of clothes made from wool, cotton and silk in works by three modern Japanese women writers: Hayashi Fumiko, Hasegawa Shigure, and Koizumi Kikue. By analyzing portrayals of clothing and textiles and contextualizing them in modern Japanese society, this dissertation aims to see how women writers used textiles and clothing as motifs in their work, how these textiles and clothing conveyed various aspects of their fictional characters, and how these textiles and clothing represented ideas such as modernity, nostalgia, and imperialism. This dissertation argues that textiles and clothes that are based on wool, silk, and cotton tell stories not only about the fabrics themselves but also about their wearers. Moreover, as modern Japan experienced rapid change both domestically and internationally, the wearers depicted in the texts were inevitably impacted by large-scale phenomena such as capitalism, social movements, imperialistic invasion, the Second World War, and the American Occupation.
Committee Chair
Rebecca Copeland
Committee Members
Jamie Newhard; Ji-Eun Lee; Lynne Tatlock; Michiko Suzuki
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Author's Department
East Asian Languages and Culture: Japanese
Document Type
Dissertation
Date of Award
12-18-2024
Language
English (en)
DOI
https://doi.org/10.7936/w22d-2s02
Recommended Citation
Henares, YuNing, "Wool, Cotton, and Silk: The Language of Fashion in the Works of Three Modern Japanese Women Writers (1920-1952)" (2024). Arts & Sciences Theses and Dissertations. 3382.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.7936/w22d-2s02