An Analysis of Japanese Fashion in Australian Print Media: (Re)presentations in Newspapers and Fashion Magazines

In Australia, it is assumed that Japanese fashion is widely appreciated, but this proposition of collective understanding was unsupported by scientific evidence until this research was conducted. In this investigation, I examined ways in which Japanese fashion is presented in Australian print media. This type of study is a conventional method in fashion research, as exemplified in the work of the cultural anthropologist Alfred Kroeber and the cultural theorist Angela McRobbie in more recent times.1 To assess the presence of Japanese fashion influences in Australia, both broadsheet newspapers and fashion magazines have been considered. Newspapers were selected to examine how the Australian general public is informed about Japanese fashion, whereas fashion magazines were consulted as the main source of information for the fashion-conscious sector. In particular, The Australian and The Age were chosen as samples for my newspaper analysis; these two dailies are viewed as rivals and are based in different Australian cities, owned by different media corporations, and represent different political attitudes. For fashion magazines, Cosmopolitan, frankie, and Fashion Journal are believed to best reflect the Australian fashion media landscape. Cosmopolitan is a mainstream, internationally syndicated 'glossy' fashion magazine, and it is the most popular fashion magazine in Australia according to sales figures. frankie is an alternative Australian-produced magazine that caters to an artistic, niche audience. Fashion Journal is a free fashion magazine that is distributed on the 'street.' After conducting a comprehensive media analysis over the selected 2012 publications, I have discovered that the vast majority (85.3 per cent) of Japanese items in the selected Australian publications displayed positive images of Japanese fashion, confirming the hypothesis.