Japanese sources report in 1999 that in many places mothers just can't find the traditional hanzubon. Some stores do carry a
few, presumably for the occasional mother who still wants her son to look really smart and for the occasional school that still
requires hanzubon as part of the dress code. The shift to longer, in some cases baggy
shorts began in the mid-1990s. Japanese boys had traditionally worn short, trim
short pants. Some Japanese observers specualte as to why styles of short pants changed so
sharply in the mid-1990s and what influenced this change. There is no sure answer here, but HBC Japanese contributors have
offered several plausible theories.
One HBC contributor is convinced that the shift to longer dressier styles was pushed in
the beginning by fashion magazines and trendy boutiques. The fashion industry is
always trying to introduce new fashions to stimulate demand. Japanese boys
fashions had changed relatively little since the 1950s. As to why fashion changes
occurred in the mid-1990s is less clear.
The change in styles for dressy short pants was probably
not so much in response to American fashions but in response to
what French and Italian boys were wearing for dressup. I don't think in the
1990s there was any dressup short pants for boys in the States at all, aside
from those "little man" tuxedoes you see ringbearers wear in
American weddings today.
One HBC contributor points that the most her sons can be forced into doing for
dress-up--and that only under great duress and on exceedingly rare
occasions--is knee length khaki shorts and polo shirts. Other than
that, the normal dress for her boys is baggy cargo shorts
and overpriced athletic shoes; sweatpants or the floppy nike shorts when it gets hot.
She reports that this gives rise to disagreements with their grandmother, who still
thinks that boys ought to like nice. The HBC contrinutor repots that she
would like the boys to dress up too, but she's got more important things to
fight about with her kids, and they just scream bloody murder if you try to
get them to wear anything other than what they want to--they're 12 and 9,
by the way). So there is no "dress-up" wear for Japanese designers to look
to in the States.
While American fashions affected dressd styles little. American casual clothes have
had a major inpact. It must be remenmbered that American boys did not begin to
commonly wear short pants until the late 1970s and 1980s. Many of these casual
short styles were picked up amd became popular in Japan.
The American fashions appear to have affect clothes for elementary boys indirectly.
One HBC contrinutor believes it worked by influencing
older boys (teens) to wear the ghetto style abominations, then their
younger brothers wanted to dress like that too. So you get the situation
where boys who are choosing their own clothes (a majority, but not as much
as in the States) are wearing American-looking fashions. Boys whose
mothers choose their clothes wear a more Euroepan looking neat, knee-length
style. Mothers who would like to dress their children traditionally now have
difficulty finding the trim fitting short shorts, and even when they can are
understandbly reluctant to subject their sons to the risk of teasing from
classmates who have no memory of dressy short shorts and associate them
strictly with uniforms.
In France and Italy boys do still dress. There are clearly dressy styles.
Japanese sources report that in any
reasonable sized book store in Japan you can find the big Italian
children's fashion magazines right there beside the women's and men's.
The Japnaese tend to be sensitive to what foreingers think
about them. Many worry about differences between Japan
and other countries. I think that fashion designers and commentators began
to notice that Japanese boys were strangely dressed, by global standards,
or behind the times.
One HBC contruibutor remembers as far back as 1989 periodically seeing
boy models in fashion magazines dressed the way no Japanese boy actually
dressed in those days--the longish shorts popular in France and
Italy. "Huh, where did that come from?" she remembers thinking. She visited a
very trendy children's boutique in the Ginza back in 1992 when boys were
all still in short shorts, but this store was selling the longish French and
Italian things. She said to the very fashionably attired saleswoman, "I
don't want these foreign-style shorts for my son. I want traditional
Japanese short pants." The saleswoman said, "what is traditional Japanese short
pants?" quite huffily as if the mother was an ignorant babboon. The mother said, "nice and
trim and short". The saleswoman sniffed, "Oh but boys are now wearing longer
shorts", which was palpably not true as she could have easily ascertained
by simply walking over to the window.
Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Site:
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Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Japanese pages:
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