Is cultural appropriation always a bad thing?
I know that there are many cases when it is bad because it is racist and ignorant; for example, Urban Outfitters branding every stereotypically Native American-looking thing “Navajo” demeans the actual Navajo nation and reduces it to a shorthand for “ethnic stereotype”.
BUT I think there are some forms of cultural appropriation that are not as offensive because they do not capitalize on racist stereotypes. For example, the hip-hop/BBOY culture that is currently very popular in parts of East Asia (especially Japan and South Korea, as far as I know). The fascination with hip-hop and African-American culture is just part of a larger infatuation with American culture, especially in Korea. For example (this is just an example I know that meeting 5 Koreans does not inform me on the entire nation) at a summer camp I went to last year there were 5 Korean teenagers, each of whom owned more American memorobilia than the entire camp combined, all of which they’d bought in Korea (this was their first time in the US). I remember one girl had a bag that said all over it “NYK Denim est 1641”. Clearly the manufacturer was thinking of NYC, and no such label as “NYK Denim” actually exists (nor NYC Denim as far as I know). I didn’t feel at all offended by that bag, just amused. I don’t think Korea’s cultural appropriation of American, particularly African-American, culture is necessarily a bad thing. I think that negative cultural appropriation exists when the appropriated culture is stereotyped and degraded. I guess the fundamental question is: do you think one culture can appropriate another without stereotyping it?
