cast(e)-off clothing

24 ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY VOL 21 NO 3, JUNE 2005

CAST(E)-OFF CLOTHINGA response to K. Tranberg Hansen (AT 20[4])

Karen Tranberg Hansen’s contribution addressedpertinent issues concerning the global trade insecond-hand clothing. Overwhelmingly con-ceived of as a flow of goods from the developedto the developing world, Hansen’s research intothis trade has largely been concerned with ques-tioning widespread perceptions of the negativeeffects of the so-called ‘dumping’ of (our) ‘rub-bish’ upon developing economies. By analysingthe cultural construction of demand at the locallevel, she aims to refute some of the more pro-tectionist claims that such trade threatens thesurvival and growth of indigenous textile indus-tries and reinforces patterns of national eco-nomic dependency. For those on the lowestincomes, she argues, buying affordable second-hand clothes opens up a democratized space forself-fashioning otherwise unavailable because ofthe higher costs of locally produced clothing.

Whilst my own research into the recycling ofclothing in India indeed supports these conclu-sions, the study of the complex trajectories ofclothing there from acquisition to discarding tototal recycling suggests that this topic alsoimpinges upon several wider anthropologicalconcerns, for example how we formulate andproject our self-image and the social construc-tion of belonging, the relationship betweenexchange, dirt and boundaries, and cultural con-structions of value (and waste) in the context ofglobal material flows.

That cloth is a basic unit of exchange withinand between families and networks of kin is ananthropological commonplace, and despite theever increasing numbers of middle-class urbanIndian women going out to work and earningsalaries, it remains a definitive means ofacquiring one’s wardrobe and placing one withina network of intimate sociality in India. At theopposite end of the scale, the global productionand trade in textiles links the factory weaversand garment-makers in India to end consumersabroad through negotiation of the ever changingdemands of fashion and the market, amongmany other factors. If cloth both embodies andconstitutes relationships marking gender, statusand identity between bride and groom, mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, then equally itspresence and translation across such interna-tional networks in the global economy makesthose wider power relations manifest, and prob-lematizes essentialist notions of cultural bound-aries and material exchange. The study of thesecond-hand clothing trade enables us to bringboth perspectives into focus at the same timethrough the cross-cultural classification andrecuperation of once-intimate rubbish.

By tracing initial processes of consumption,circulation and discarding through the manage-ment of Indian family wardrobes, it emerges thatthe dynamic construction of self relies not somuch upon ‘keeping-while-giving’ as in thepropensity for gifts to be made in anticipation of

the impermanence of the bought or gifted cloth.During the year wardrobes are constantlyreplenished as new gifts are given and old onesare handed on to younger relatives and servants.But at periodic intervals, unwanted clothing isgot rid of, stripped of its particularity and com-modified, whether through barter or gift.Entering the marketplace, it is bought up byentrepreneurial dealers who recombine ele-ments, creating new looks and products by cut-ting up and restitching, changing cut, form andornament according to fashion, retaining somefeatures whilst obliterating others. Whether soldon to the poor, refashioned for export to ethnicboutiques in the West, or marketed as an antiqueto the Indian élite consumer, clothing is firstturned back into cloth and then once morebecomes clothing, materially reconstituting theconsumer within a new framework of relation-ships. For example, the élite Indian shopper in afashionable south Delhi boutique would not nor-mally dream of wearing the cast-off sari fromanother woman outside her immediate family,and such an exchange would be inconceivable interms of potential pollution. But the invisibilityof the market sanitizes, and designers refashionsaris into smart salwar kamiz (tunics andtrousers), managing to sell them within a newmoral framework by marketing them as posi-tively conforming to both contemporary‘modern’ ideas of environmental recycling and‘traditional’ (Indian) beliefs in reincarnation.

But the breakdown of clothing into fibres, itsfundamental constituent parts, takes this processone step further, revealing with startling claritythe importance of breaking images for recyclingand recuperation. This recombination of ele-ments can be found in the Indian shoddyindustry (where clothing is completely destroyedin order to permit the reclamation of its con-stituent fibres). It depends upon importingmountains of slashed cast-off woollens from theWest, called ‘mutilated hosiery’, and enables thefibres to be reclaimed and spun for weaving intonew products such as blankets and suiting. Asour once-treasured jumpers from Calvin Klein,Gap or Marks and Spencer are chopped up bywomen squatting on vegetable cutters, one ofthe by-products of the process is piles of labelsfollowing this brand destruction – the globalname-tags which could triple or quadruple theprice of a plain blue sweater.

At no point in the process are the garments,wool or blankets washed, and the end productsare thick with grime and grit to the touch, oftensmelling of the motor oil added during thepulping stage. However, it is not the actual dirtbut the fact that they are recycled which must becleansed from the end product. Having removedall visible traces of their origins, the manufac-turers successfully reclaim and ‘Indianize’ thefibres through the choice of designs woven intothe fabric of the blankets themselves (see thebaby blanket pictured in Hansen’s article, forexample). Overwhelmingly the blankets feature‘traditional’ Indo-Persian motifs such as vases of

flowers, which have their roots in both classicalHindu and Buddhist architectural art from atleast the first century AD. Your blue Gap jumperhas been transformed into a carpet of flowers ona blanket lying across the bed of an Indianfamily. The trade between India and the devel-oped world reveals that these material flows canrun in unexpected directions, with Western cul-tures importing used Indian saris in the form ofhalter-neck tops and skirts, and Indian busi-nesses producing cloth adorned with traditionalAsian motifs from once branded Western goods.It is in the materiality of fibre, cloth and image,and its continuous transformation throughdestruction and reassembly, that the second-handclothing trade reveals ongoing processes of cul-tural translation, re-presenting graphic newimages of cultural difference in the transitionalhere and now.

Lucy NorrisUniversity College London

ucsakln@ucl.ac.uk

HIV/AIDS - NEW QUESTIONSA response to Tony Barnett (AT 20[4])

Recent comments by Tony Barnett concerningthe challenge the worldwide HIV/AIDS pan-demic poses for anthropology are indeed appo-site, and I applaud his call for anthropologists toaddress one of the most pressing health andsocial issues of our time. However, I would addto his comments the suggestion that our failureto become involved and to take a more activepart in responding to the AIDS epidemic hasserious implications for the discipline as a whole,and that these warrant urgent consideration.

Parker (2001) and Schoepf (2001) claim thatanthropologists have made a significant contri-bution to our understanding of the HIV/AIDSepidemic, and (to focus solely on regions outsidethe West) certainly some seminal anthropolog-ical works have taken up AIDS-related issues insub-Saharan Africa, Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, Nepaland other countries. Even in mainland SoutheastAsia (where I work) it is possible to point to ahandful of substantial anthropological worksdealing with HIV/AIDS issues. And, of course,in all regions anthropologists have made a con-tribution – albeit one constrained by the interestsof their employers – working as consultants withthe many local and international bodies involvedin the response to AIDS. Yet viewed as a whole,over the more than 20 years that AIDS hasbedevilled human societies, the work of anthro-pologists can only be judged to be thin on theground. To take the example of the Thai AIDSepidemic, the one with which I am most familiar(Fordham 2005), the work of anthropologists islargely (if not totally) submerged in a mass ofsocial science research produced by researchersfrom disciplines such as biomedicine, publichealth, social demography, epidemiology, socialgeography, social economics and even nursingstudies, conducting research in areas that only a

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