Bevin's Stuff

shoomlah:

torayot:

nextian:

shoomlah:

Multiculturalism for Steampunk is starting up a weekly art challenge, and it looks promising. SO EXCITED. I’ve had a bunch of ideas for non-Western steampunk outfits floating around in my head, and it’s nice actually having a weekly deadline to motivate me to finish some of them.

This is pretty subtle in its steampunkery (read: no extranneous metal bits), but I was just trying to bring in a few western/Victorian elements to traditional Indian clothing- legomuttoned sleeves, the double breasted, collared choli, and adapting the churidar into buttoned spats.

…Also a sweet hat.

-C

I think there are some colonialist questions that get raised when you incorporate specifically British Victorian elements of couture into Indian fashion? A few?

Buuuuuuut I would fight a man on a grizzly bear for this lady’s comic.

I am so glad you said this. I thought I was alone in this. British Empire, anyone? Company Rule? British Raj?

Dear internet, I shan’t assume that you all know about the British Empire. I know not everyone has the same education and it’s problematic to assume this.

But know that British rule in India lasted from around 1757 to about 1948, and that the relationship between the coloniser and colonised is extremely complicated, and still very much has real lived effects today. Sure, the outfit and character look beautiful, but I just don’t think you can go around mashing up Victorian fashion with Indian clothing just for surface steampunk elegance without encountering some problems. I can appreciate the visual qualities, but the history and meaning causes some concern.

/inb4 people start screeching that I am ~*oversensitive*~ and can’t enjoy anything :-{D

No screeching, I promise!  No such thing as being oversensitive with this sort of thing.  I tried to avoid choosing anything specifically British (or any of the imagery specifically associated with colonization/”exploration chic”, things like khaki and piths), and tried to make it seem like the character had agency.  I definitely don’t want to pretend I’m creating this in a void, that there aren’t historical and cultural contexts surrounding the politics of dress, but was trying to integrate elements that didn’t overwhelm the original culture.

Granted, I am of the opinion that Steampunk that erases past racial greivances (i.e. alternate history where white people are awesome and never did anything wrong and we’re all best friends) is kinda shitty and naive- that’s why I drew this as a character, and not as a costume design for something I would wear (as a white chick).  If one were designing a Steampunk world, it would be unfair to assume that this cultural crossover didn’t happen and wouldn’t have existed, but I honestly apologize that the original post might make it seem like this was drawn solely for aesthetic purposes- and I’d like to address that and make it clear that I am definitely trying to keep context in mind, and am happy to be called out like this.