The reading came alive for me this week due to an unfortunate pants incident I had while out shopping. My most comfortable (and clearly fatigued with age) pants met their maker just as I was about to head into a grocery story many miles from my home. The rip, which had been caused by one of the pockets getting caught on a corner of my car door as I enthusiastically swung it shut, was wide, gaping, and too large to ignore. After a moment of panic, I pulled my shirt as far down over my pants as it would go, strategically placed my purse over the offending tear, and marched myself into the discount clothing store which was conveniently located in the same shopping complex. One trip around the store, one visit to the changing room, a minor entanglement with the clerk who had a hard time removing the security tag from a pair of pants physically located on the buyer, and I walked happily out of the store to enjoy a scandal-free afternoon.
With Bendix's Authenticity on my brain, the tag on my new pair of blue jeans caught my eye. Lucky Brand's antiqued tag boasted a certain rustic appeal, with an antiqued yellow coloring and sepia-colored text decorated with a black-and-white sketch of a woman in what appears to be a 1940's-style pants suit, brandishing the ubiquitous A-Okay hand signal (whose wholesomeness is a US interpretation -- the gesture is quite offensive elsewhere). The woman is white, wasp-waisted with well-formed bust and hips. She sports glowing hair, cheeks and smile. On the bottom of the tag, Lucky Brand assures me my new pants are "Guaranteed Traditional." I wonder. Is this a money-back guarantee? What makes these pants traditional?
Curious, I decide to look up the company, which conveniently can be found at www.luckybrand.com. On the page titled "Our Story" (http://www.luckybrand.com/About-Lucky-Brand-Jeans/about,default,pg.html), Lucky Brand weaves its tale for me. Despite the mid-century iconography on the tag, I learn that the company began in Los Angeles, CA in 1990. They admit their clothes are "vintage-inspired," and use terms like "character" and "soul" to describe their clothing. Lucky Brand designers are "inspired by amazing nature" (must be those lovely smoggy Los Angeles mornings?) and boast that their clothing can be purchased "all over America."
Reflecting on Bendix's discussion on the search for American authenticity, I examined Lucky Brand's iconography with a critical eye. Clearly Lucky Brand is calling on historical imagery to grant the idea that the company is older than its years. The woman, seated on a haystack or perhaps a grassy sidehill, reflects a rural setting rather than the Los Angeles megalopolis. I question to whom these pants are marketed. If this is a reflection of American values and American iconography, what does "America" mean to the Lucky Brand company? I see no evidence of Black or Native American imagery, much less Hispanic or Asian. Bendix observed that 19th century American quests for "folk" felt uneasy about Europe's use of a romanticized notion of a racial other that could provide some essential secret key to understanding an authentic self, particularly because the Native American and African-descent communities were a vivid, perhaps threatening, reality in the Americas (p. 72). Thus, the American "aesthetic of the common man" was built around white, rugged, rural settlers.
I see this nineteenth century value system reflected on this tag. Whether Lucky Brand realizes it or not, it appears to be pulling straight from Emerson (is this the "Guaranteed Tradition?"). What is most intriguing about this tag is what it does NOT represent, and how deeply it cuts into the national racial divide. According to the 1990 Los Angeles county census, the Racial/Ethnic Composition was 40.83% Caucasian white (non-Hispanic or Latino). Black/African Americans represented 11.2%, Asians 10.44%, Native Americans/Alaskan or Hawaiian Natives, less than 1%, and Hispanic/Latino 37.81% (http://www.laalmanac.com/population/po13.htm). By 2010, the non-Hispanic/Latino whites had dropped to 27.79% of the population, with a corresponding increase in the ethnic and racial "others" that made the 19th century academics nervous. Clearly, the makers of Lucky jeans chose to create an image not representative of either the local or national racial reality, and wanted to market to a select crowd that would respond to a nostalgic image of a rural, healthy, country-bred, A-Okay, wasp-waisted white Caucasian woman. I can't say this message would have enticed me to buy their jeans. In fact, if I had paid much attention it might have served as a deterrent. On that particular day, however, I was simply grateful for the … er, coverage.
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