Sunday Series: Fabric and Porcelain

This week's Sunday series features two prose poems.
____________________________________________________

Fabric has been a metaphor for fate
since civilization bothered to record

I do not weave
I do not design

I collage the things that happenstance threw my way
Someone else made it

Does it still say "me?"
Who said it first in the manner that I mean it?

Maybe if it's my perceived will,
but still,

there's nobody new under the sun.

____________________________________________________

Warning: this second poem contains attempted humor, cursing, and adult themes.

____________________________________________________

Lolita Promotes Feminism in U.S. Society: Conclusion

Previously in this series: Connecting Fashion and Feminism

Disclaimer: This argument paper was written for my English class in May, and I've been arguing with myself over whether or not to put this out in public since then. I did my best to educate myself in these topics within a short time span. All content is truthful as best as I could research. If any of the information in this series is wrong, please respectfully inform me specifically what is wrong so that I may look into it and correct it.

Lolita fashion’s dramatic contrast to common western wear has a powerful effect that can be used to affect social awareness in much the same way that Slut Walk makes people curious enough to ask “what’s that?” Dozens of modern subcultures and styles are represented in the Slut Walk, from lolitas to goths to punks, who have all grown to learn of rape culture through the excuse that something as “simple” as what they wear is an invitation for rape, harassment, and discrimination.

Besides movements like the Slut Walk, punks have also been a part of affecting social change since its conception in the mid 1970s. While punk does place an emphasis on non-conformity, educated punks are not against uniting for common causes, and in fact have made huge progress when gathered, Dawson Barret wrote in his article, DIY Democracy: The Direct Action Politics Of U.S. Punk Collectives: “The politics of punk institutions effectively place the movement into a broad narrative of participatory democracy in America activism that spans from early 1960s groups like Women Strike for Peace, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and Students for a Democratic Society; to Women’s Liberation organizations in the late 1960s and 1970s, to the global justice movement of the 1990s and 2000s. In addition to sharing a common tendency toward direct action politics, punk rock, is also, by definition, a participatory movement” (Barrett). Gregory Graffin, Ph.D, lead singer and songwriter of the American punk band Bad Religion, said in Flavorwire’s article “What is Punk”:

Punk is: the personal expression of uniqueness that comes from the experiences of growing up in touch with our human ability to reason and ask questions; a movement that serves to refute social attitudes that have been perpetuated through willful ignorance of human nature; a process of questioning and commitment to understanding that results in self-progress, and through repetition, flowers into social evolution; a belief that this world is what we make of it, truth comes from our understanding of the way things are, not from the blind adherence to prescriptions about the way things should be; the constant struggle against fear of social repercussions (qtd. by Hiebert).

As you can see, this movement eloquently stands for the individual’s journey to accomplish precisely what, in the grander scheme of things, every progressive equality movement is trying to accomplish. It is more recent, and therefore more evolved, than the flapper movement, which required women to stand together as a group against sexism in order to achieve social privileges. Whether you like the music or the now associated substyle is irrelevant. Punk brings the battle for social justice down to the individual in order to break apart blind (not educated or circumstantial, let that be clear) social conformity.

Billy Joe Armstrong, singer, songwriter, and instrumentalist of Green Day said “A guy walks up to me and asks ‘What’s punk?’ So I kick over a garbage can and say ‘That’s punk!’ So he kicks over a garbage can and says ‘That’s punk?’ and I say ‘No, that’s trendy!’” Increasing diversity and inserting our own educated ideas into the world is almost as important as educating ourselves and working with society in order to better it. This effect, rather than being lost in translation through the ambiguous nature of fashion, is instead intensified by its open interpretation.

Perry R. Hinton, an independent academic researcher, made a great connection in our perceptions of the same observed object changing based upon our cultural lense:

Social representations can change due to the processes of social conventionalization, which can involve assimilation to existing cultural forms, simplification, elaboration, and social construction. Thus, representations change within a culture in accordance with the changing characteristics of that culture. It has been shown that British views of Zen Buddhism and Japanese schoolgirls as represented in British popular culture differ from their Japanese representations in accordance with these processes.

Kiisel put it succinctly: “As uncomfortable as it may be, we are under the microscope every day. Our employees, our colleagues, and our customers judge us by how we look, how we dress, our table manners, our grooming, and sometimes even how we do our job.” Clothing is the most ambiguous and receptively ambivalent representation of ourselves we can make. In the United States today, a short skirt may be cute to one person and a signal of sexual promiscuity to another. The biggest statement we can make with fashion—within limits legal and practical considering our bodily protection—is to dress for ourselves with abandon and make the unusual usual, breaking stereotypes and educating others in the process. In this way, we will slowly mould perceptions into something less shocking and more usual. It is not only our privilege to express ourselves both artistically and with awareness of the strength of our influences, but our duty as human beings to act in a way which will spread acceptance of diversity… Even if it begins as “just clothes.”

Sources can be found here.

Temporary Inconsistent Hiatus

The internet is out at my parents' house until I leave for home on the 31st, so there will fewer, if any, guaranteed posts outside of the giveaway until the 1st of September. I'm situated outside of walking distance from stable internet, and have not rented a car for this trip. Thank you for your understanding and patience!

New Sunday Series: Putting Literary in Lolita

Taking time to reflecting on life in general through writing is an excellent way to process experiences. Keeping a journal doesn't provide the same strength in benefit, since one records new things as they happen without giving them time to sink in (and you've seen how bad that is for writing if you've seen my oldest blog posts). How can you if you want to record all of an event's details before they're forgotten? To learn anything, the subject in question must be revisited, thoroughly examined, and analyzed. If one can't learn something as straightforward as algebra without these things, then understanding our own personalities and experiences will be impossible without this kind of focus.

So what's this reflective writing doing here on a style blog?

I'll remind you, respected reader, that the difference between fashion and style is the difference between reaction and action. This is not a fashion blog promoting the newest releases of lolita brands, even if that sometimes happens. This is a style blog, where clothes serve as a self-expressive art-form, an ambiguous language, and an ambivalent reflection of clothing's existence in our society. The Literary Lolita, in other words, is taking Sundays to get literary and explore the self that is so often expressed in lolita style.

All entries are poems, short stories, or non-fiction essays authored by me (Rhon C.) unless otherwise stated. If you are interested in submitting your own piece exploring the connection between self and style, contact me through the The Literary Lolita's facebook page. If it is put up on this blog, you will be credited and linked according to your preference.

The first post has been placed under the following cut for those who are only viewing this post to find out what the Putting Literary in Lolita series is about.

On Being a Girl

Lolita Promotes Feminism in U.S. Society: Connecting Fashion and Feminism

Previously in this series: Origins of Fashion

Disclaimer: This argument paper was written for my English class in May, and I've been arguing with myself over whether or not to put this out in public since then. I did my best to educate myself in these topics within a short time span. All content is truthful as best as I could research. If any of the information in this series is wrong, please respectfully inform me specifically what is wrong so that I may look into it and correct it.

To better understand the effect of lolita fashion on the modern world, it is best to look at what changes have recently occurred thanks to earlier alternative culture. Fashion culture mixed with feminism started a crawl towards women’s equality: the first generation of feminists (including Gibson Girls who embraced androgyny, updos, and calf-length skirts for the sake of practicality  in the 1900-1910s) had won women the right to vote; their daughters, the flappers, took gender equality onto a social level by bobbing their hair, sexualizing their appearances, wearing makeup (which had, prior to this era, been considered for prostitutes), smoking (which in particular was only for men) and drinking not only in public but in the presence of men, and having sex as they wanted (Erenberg). The flappers created dating, the most common form of courtship in the United States today, and got rid of calling, a formal affair whose sole end purpose was for marriage (Clement). The flappers openly disdained prior female constructs, having recently come out of a time in which many women had gained socio-economic benefits from becoming part of the workforce out of necessity when the men were away fighting in World War I. The less extreme flappers simply enjoyed the freedoms of shedding their corsets and wearing short hair, further spreading the influences and acceptability of a woman dressing and acting, publicly, for herself (Fass). The roaring 20s was flooded with the carpe diem philosophy left over from the realities of the war, and the quote by Lois Long, the most infamous and celebrated flapper, reflects it frankly: “Tomorrow we may die, so let's get drunk and make love” (qtd. in Gill). Women in this time undoubtedly experienced the most social freedom of any women in the United States until that point.

Photo of Lois Long from the Metropolitan Museum of Art's website

With the progress made since then, some try to argue that women have achieved gender equality. Straight from the Women’s Bureau in the Department of labor, one can find “Women [in 2010] accounted for 51.5 percent of all workers in the high-paying management, professional, and related occupations,” and young women in 2010, between the ages of 16 and 24, made 95 percent of what men of the same age made. Not only was female employment higher than men’s, women went from being nearly equal in numbers of enrollment in colleges (98 percent enrollment equality in 1994) to surpassing them at 114 percent ten years later (Lopez, Barrera). While it is true we have made leaps and bounds in gender equality over the last hundred years, the United States still has a long way to go before reaching complete gender equality. Legally speaking, many issues regarding employment, wages, and education have been addressed (similarly, despite young women approaching wage equality, women collectively in all age groups in 2010 still only make 77 cents for every dollar a man made for the same work, according to the U.S. Census Bureau). Where we still see major problems in gender inequality is in modern society and popular culture. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, 85 percent of the people who are victims of domestic abuse are women, and much of that abuse is sexual. To date, 17.7 million women have been either raped or have had someone attempt to rape them according to the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network (RAINN).

There are no tasteful pictures for any of these points.

Not only are nine out of ten rape victims female, but “The majority of sexual assault are not reported to the police (an average of 60 percent of assaults in the last five years were not reported).1 Those rapists, of course, will never spend a day in prison. But even when the crime is reported, it is unlike[ly] to lead to an arrest and prosecution. Factoring in unreported rapes, only about 3 percent of rapists will ever serve a day in prison” (RAINN). Social psychology tells us that our social interactions center around two primary needs: to be correct, and to be liked. The problem here goes beyond even the rape itself—it demonstrates how deeply ingrained and cyclical sexism towards women is in both men and women by illustrating the problems of victim blaming as a common psychological phenomenon, which is an offshoot of humanity’s tendency for “belief in a just world”  (Sta˚hl , Eek, Kazemi). Victim blaming allows us to maintain our belief in a just world (the defensive attribution in which people assume that everyone “deserves” what happens to them whether good or bad), reinforcing our instinct to see causality in coincidence, and filling in the gaps of our knowledge so that we feel secure in the world around us so that we can believe we are correct (Azar).

Even worse, the effects of conformity concerning discrimination is astounding, as shown with the Milgram and Zimbardo studies. This is not to say that people merely conform out of pressure from masses (although we can, have and will likely continue to) but there are two important factors to consider in these types of conformity: informational conformity occurs when one isn’t certain about particular information and looks towards the majority answer as a basis of information, such as when a large group of 20 people face a certain direction in the elevator and a newcomer enters, 95% of the time he or she will face the same direction as the group of people in the elevator; in the Milgram study, which has been reproduced numerous times, 60 percent of people will conform to an authority figure (in this case, a man in a white lab coat) even if they believe they are killing an innocent person with electrical shocks for an experiment (Holt). Essentially, we blind ourselves to the realities of rape by either denying it or blaming the victim, and find comfort in our concurrence with society, which is already shaped to accept those beliefs. If we are a fair and equal society, how can these things possibly continue to happen at such astounding rates? And what does fashion have to do with worldwide movements like the Slut Walk, a peaceful protest held annually to educate people about sexism, and how do either of those things fight for the human right to be judged as an individual?

Ashnu at Slutwalk NYC

Fortunately, in our social progress, we are fighting many of these natural tendencies to conform to an outdated patriarchal norm with education and movements such as the Slut Walk, which originated in Toronto, Canada and is now held in over 200 countries. Slut Walk’s numerous pickets include sayings as blatant as “there is no excuse, the solution is obvious, just don’t rape people.” This decidedly feminist equal rights movement also seeks to inform the public about privilege: white, male, class, heterosexual, and able-bodied privilege, which many U.S. citizens don’t even recognize as being benefits. Heather J., who never provides her full last name, captures its essence in her blog post on the official SlutWalk Toronto website:

Privilege is something we have that gives us built-in advantages in life over others. Privilege being ‘built-in’ is precisely why we do not see it or how it operates unless it is pointed out to us or we are forced to encounter it somehow. The nature of privilege is that it is an inherent part of someone’s existence, so there’s not an obvious way to recognize, understand, and discuss privilege with others unless you actively seek this out” (J.).

Sources can be found here.

LBC: A Bird Inspired Coordinate

This week's Lolita Blog Carnival Theme is "A Coord Based on a Type of Bird." I chose an owl for aesthetic purposes and because I absolutely adore the Roman Goddess Minerva and all of the symbology that owls commonly carry.

Top right picture from RedBubble

When I think of owls, I typically think of Spotted Owls, Barn Owls, Grey Owls, and Great Horned Owls. I left Spotted Owls out of this coordinate to work with three varying shades of gray, gold, and ivory in a sort of generic owl blend.

For the actual coordinate itself, I started out with Michael's Blessing and added ivory and gold around it to make the jsk's central color stand out. The four pieces on the left are all BtSSB.

I read that this jsk is bright green, but since I've yet to obtain it and every single picture I've ever seen of it shows it to be silver/gray, we'll switch and say that I'm actually planning it around a green owl—if it is, in fact, green. If you own it in this color way, please let me know what the jsk's true color is!

Lady Victoria's Afternoon Ribbon Bonnet gives a large, round effect to the outfit while the soft lace provides a feathered effect.

The blouse and the shawl are from the Sonnet for Juliet series, in ivory. The blouse's high collar and jabot create a dignified appearance, and its transparent princess sleeves are reminiscent of wings. The shawl rounds out the shape of the coordinate and layers it appropriately.

Victorian Maiden's Rose Bouquet Tights elegantly balance the lace from the top.

Vivienne Westwood heels create pop without being overbearing.

The book clutch from could easily be replaced with a plain gold clutch, if you prefer.

A handmade mouse skull necklace makes the coord finish saying owl.

After expanding my wishlist by eight items, a corresponding makeup idea came to mind. An owl's most distinguishing feature is its face, after all!

Gunmetal grey provides a contrast between the ivory bonnet and the face. A short wig would be even more owlish, but this long one is more elegant and won't blend in to the jumperskirt.
Like an owl, the nose and lips (well, beak) should not stand out very much. A smooth, matte lipstick in a nude tone will make room for the eyes to stand out. Peachy orange shades of blush help the soft, rounded look. The invisibles, eyeshadow primer and setting spray, aren't shown. I like Urban Decay.
There are a dozen dozen eye-enlarging tutorials on YouTube, but if we're doing owl I say go huge! Or don't, if you're mellow like that. Whatever. Using a light cream or white eyeliner along the waterline and maybe even a little under it will definitely make the eyes look bigger, but adding a gentle brown line under that will make the eyes huge, which is what I'm going for here. A dramatic liquid line in black along the top edges and winged out a bit can be blended outwards with a brown pencil. Pat a bit of light brown shadow above the lid to provide contrast for the gold shadow, which should be applied in gradation from light on the inside to darker on the outside of the lid. Glue on some extreme lashes, and bamf!

That's how you become a lolita owl.


Other Lolita Blog Carnival posts for this week's theme:
Fawn and the Frills
A Sweet Lolita's Disney Life

Parasols: Vital or Frivolous?

For the particularly curious, here is BBC's history of parasols.

Parasols are an impressive upgrade to any lolita coordinate. They could be considered an elaborate sister accessory to sunglasses in mainstream fashion―both in terms of usefulness and visual touch. While they are not necessary to complete a coordinate, they enforce the lolita aesthetic while protecting the user from the sun and rain. You can also use parasols to smite your muggle enemies and participate in lolita duels.

Most brand parasols are made out of umbrella fabric, although they (and by they I mostly mean Victorian Maiden) still occasionally release chiffon and pure lace parasols. Brands also occasionally release clear umbrellas which are useless for blocking the sun, but adorable for resisting the rain. The following collage is an excuse to post my parasol/umbrella wishlist along with two examples of the parasol's effect on a coordinate.

Top right picture sourced here, and bottom right here.

If I didn't already stick out so badly at my college, I would happily carry a parasol with me everywhere I went. Instead, I carry mine back and forth from my house to my car, where it sits folded most of the time. That brings up an interesting question: when do you find it appropriate to use such a conspicuous accessory? Would you only use yours for meets and rainy days? Do you carry a spare in your car? Let me know!

Lolita Promotes Feminism in U.S. Society: Origins of Fashion

Previously in this series: Introduction

Disclaimer: This argument paper was written for my English class in May, and I've been arguing with myself over whether or not to put this out in public since then. I did my best to educate myself in these topics within a short time span. All content is truthful as best as I could research. The origins of lolita fashion, addressed in this post, is certainly going to be an arguable point, but it was the clearest answer I could provide from a source which has yet to be disproved. If any of the information in this series is wrong, please respectfully inform me specifically what is wrong so that I may look into it and correct it.

The University of Florida conducted a study indicating that humans have only been wearing clothes for 170,000 years. That may seem like a long time until one considers that humans evolved out of having thick full-body hair a million years ago, which leaves hundreds of thousands of years for naked people to stroll the Earth. Humans only began wearing clothing during the ice age when warmth was vital to stay alive (Torrent).

Anthropology loosely fills in the gaps of unearthed frozen clothing and renaissance paintings to indicate that hoarding has always been a symbol of status, and the better off one was the more they were likely to have. This makes the first fashion a collection of furs from animals that one killed themselves, with leaders displaying the most fur for both warmth and to display competency. It is interesting that to think in a modern, and much more modest, society we depict cavewomen as more thoroughly clad than their loinclothed male counterparts, even when sexualized. Leaders from tribal chiefs to kings to aristocracy have always set the standard for what is most appropriate or valuable to wear, and it is really only within the last hundred years that fashion has changed “powers.” Fashion, as an artform more than a necessity in contemporary society, is in the hands of fashion designers: artists whose work is the aesthetic nature of modern dress (Hansen). Not all of these fashion designers are big named brands, however. Many modern fashions from goth to glam are born in sync with subcultures.  

 Most of these subcultures (and their correlating substyles) were born directly out of a particular group’s desire to make a change in—or at least make a place for themselves within—society, from flapper to punks. Japanese lolita fashion combines historical styles and progressive feminism in a way which both completely defies subculture with its street fashion roots and creates community by drawing together people with similar interests in fashion. Rather than focus on a specific set of rights, music, or designers, lolita fashion was born in the late 1970s (though the style wouldn't become firmly distinguishable until the very late 80s) in Japan through teenagers who were drawn together through nothing more than the look itself. Specifically, it was created by teenage girls struggling financially and ideologically in Japan’s economic downswing following World War II (Hinton). It began as a fashion sister bridging goth and prairie styles, with elements of punk and dramatizations of western historical fashions such as victorian and rococo. Initially, each outfit was hand-sewn or coordinated in such a way that no two wearers would look alike. Despite later mass production's influences, the lolita community remains resistant to becoming a subculture because its origins consist of fashions that were carefully created by and for the individual.

Certain founders of the fashion created brands for themselves, and their combined popularity, alongside increased capacity for production, has unified the lolita look into something much more cohesive and easily recognized. Some of these brands include Baby the Stars Shine Bright, Innocent World, Angelic Pretty, and Victorian Maiden. Meetups often focus on events that fit the aesthetic of the style, but members of the lolita community remain intensely diverse with no political, musical, or other symbolic subculture tied to the style. Observers and participants of lolita fashion struggle against being stereotyped and categorized according to their appearances while continuing to categorize themselves and others as a side effect of the brain’s methods of classifying, a trait leftover from our caveman fur fashion days. This makes it an ideal candidate for wearable social progress by highlighting both human individuality and our natural tendency to assimilate with and generalize one another.

Next in this series: Connecting Fashion to Feminism

Sources can be found here.

LBC: My 3 Favorite Hairstyles (combining other fashions with lolita)

When it comes to lolita hairdos, my general motto is the bigger the better. If you've seen any of my vlogs in which I enthusiastically dork out, you can imagine my reaction to Gothic Lolita Wigs' Rhapsody series. Thick, easy to style and maintain, and highly voluminous in an array of fabulous colors? I have a hard time being satisfied with just one.

Pictures taken from Gothic Lolita Wigs, pictures are of models Amara von Nacht and Alexa Poletti 

There's nothing wrong with the assorted lolita standards: curls of varying tightness, frequent straight bangs and the occasional dutch braid. I love these and will continue to use them off and on, particularly with wigs.

Magazine (GLB?) scan, hairstyle.com, and Rococo Soul

But I get tired of seeing the same things repeatedly, particularly with hair. I like big, bold, and vibrant variety. There have been a small handful of people who rock their alt hair with lolita, and that is heartening. There really isn't enough of it. There's not enough cross-over, not enough personal touches, and not enough crossing from "x-fashion" to "personal style." A rampant fear spread (partially, no doubt, due to internet bullying) about doing lolita "right," and it didn't stop at making sure you had a proper petticoat and a blouse under your jsk. If you stick to a single element in an aesthetic it will never grow or change. It will become stagnant and die. You know what hairstyles I'd love to see worn more with lolita? Alternative hairstyles.

I've gone to meetups to hear lolitas talk about their concerns of the fashion being diluted, as if somehow that will make the speaker's own clothes lose meaning to them. Certainly you don't want negative misinformation to be spread about something which you're a part of; no one wants to be judged inaccurately based on a wrongfully formed schema. The thing about schemas is that each individual's is going to be different. That's how it works. 

Gregory Graffin, Ph.D, lead singer and songwriter of the American punk band Bad Religion, said in Flavorwire’s article “What is Punk”:
Punk is: the personal expression of uniqueness that comes from the experiences of growing up in touch with our human ability to reason and ask questions; a movement that serves to refute social attitudes that have been perpetuated through willful ignorance of human nature; a process of questioning and commitment to understanding that results in self-progress, and through repetition, flowers into social evolution; a belief that this world is what we make of it, truth comes from our understanding of the way things are, not from the blind adherence to prescriptions about the way things should be; the constant struggle against fear of social repercussions.

Based on that definition, if you take anyone's definition, personal style (not dictated fashion) is punk. Being a fashionista, doing your own thing, and choosing your own path after you've educated yourself thoroughly on the "rules" is punk. If in the end you decide that formulated coordinates are your jam, great. If in the end you break down some walls to make what you wear fit your ideals, great. If it no longer fits in the lolita box and become lolita-inspired instead, that's just fine. I hope that everyone who reads this is a little bit punk at heart.

This week's Lolita Blog Carnival participants:
Doll Life
A Little Bit of This... A Little Bit of That Too
Northern Star

My Favorite Lolita Headwear

Generally speaking, bonnets and elaborate rectangle headdresses make my heart do backflips. This is both awesome and bad for my health. Watch the video to find out which pieces I like most in my closet.

Rhon's Guide to Getting the Most Out of Your Taobao Order

Choose Between Convenience and Savings:
How much is saving really worth to you, and how fast do you want your stuff?
Frugirls has very low service fees and discounted EMS shipping, but communication and money transfer (they don't do paypal) can take several days not including the order processing. You don't get updates as to where an item is, if it is in stock or needs to be made, unless you ask.
My-Lolita-Dress costs a lot more per item, but the shipping is about the same price and the cart system is very nice to use (though I suggest putting everything in the wishlist first as the site will spontaneously log you out and empty your cart if you're not fast enough). Their communication is faster and more clear than many other services' communication, and the items you order can arrive as quickly as three days provided everything's in stock. They also accept paypal and can order things for you from taobao that aren't available on their site, and work with people who have limited time to complete coords.

Group order:
Even if you only have three people to split the order with, it will help with shipping costs.
Most shopping services' carriers charge between $20-30 for sending a package at all (even if it's only a pair of socks) and then charge according to the weight afterwards.

For example, using EMS, a 5 kg (11 lb) package from frugirls costs a $5 fee, basic postage charges of $23.33, and then $56.25 for the additional weight for a shipping total of $84.58. Let's say you ordered 10 pairs of shoes altogether that all weighed the same, so weight-wise each pair of shoes is $5.63 extra.
We'll say your friends ordered 3 pairs of those shoes each.
From here you can choose to split the fees and basic charges by how many people ordered (certainly the easiest when there's more than three people) or according to the number of items you each purchased.
If you split the fees and basic charges between three people, you will save $18.89.
Enough for a purse, a wig, or most of a petticoat.

Dedicated Self Control:
Pick things carefully, compare it to what you already have or to what your goal was when you started shopping on Taobao, and do your best to stick to that. As an impulsive shopper, I would say that I have lost considerable amounts of time and money on things that I thought were fantastic at the moment but completely didn't fit my wardrobe or even an area that I was looking to expand.

The cliche quality over quantity is perfect here. It's easy to snatch 5 pairs of cheap wrist cuffs, and three purses that are only $13 each when you run the price through Google's currency converter. Then, overlooking the shipping and service fees, I'd delightedly boast "look how much I got!" Later it sinks in that I could have gotten a dream jsk for all of my uncontrolled clicking.

7,000 Hits Lolita Giveaway: Wigs and Lashes

Sentimental Giveaway Intro or Why are You Doing This?
I feel very small in the world of blogging. This blog started out as the personal journal of an ita and is only now transforming into something palatable and worth reading. Going through it, there was much that needed to be set to private or deleted entirely. The newer posts may still be a bit awkward as this blog grows a solid voice, but the explosion of readership has reinforced my determination to bring you better content on a reliable schedule.

I am aware that upcoming feminist posts on this blog may drive some readers away, and to those people I wonder:
How you can participate in a style which is frequently mocked and have no concern for the societal behaviour which causes people to mock it? Shouldn't you and I be free to wear lolita as we please without being harassed or afraid? We shouldn't be embarrassed for expressing ourselves in a safe, stylistic manner. We should be empowered by it.

With that said, it's giveaway time!

The first item is a brand-new-with-tag Summer Bob wig and wig cap in black by Gothic Lolita Wigs (who in no way endorsed or promoted this giveaway):

The second item is a brand-new-with-tag wig from Enew. It does not come with a wig cap:

The third item is a set of ten false eyelashes off of eBay, and an envelope and sheet of stationery paper by BtSSB (which you don't get to see because it's a surprise):

Rules:

There will be three winners. The first winner drawn gets first pick, and so on.

Winners will be announced on September 1st.

You must be following The Literary Lolita either through facebook or through the Google followers option on the left bar of the blog, as that is the only way I'll know you're really following it.

You enter by signal boosting this post. You may signal boost/reblog in more than one place to increase your chances of winning.

• A tumblr reblog is worth two entries, but you must be following The Literary Lolita on tumblr as well as either on facebook or Google. Multiple reblogs will still only count as one entry. Likes on tumblr do not count. 
• A facebook share is worth two entries. Multiple shares will still only count as two entries. Likes on facebook do not count. 
• A link to this giveaway from your (non-tumblr) blog is worth three entries. Don't blog the giveaway more than once. You must send me a link to your blog with the link to this page.

The maximum number of entries is seven.

You must have a home address or PO box that I can send your package to.

If you do not live in the United States it may take until the end of September for your prize to be sent due to extra shipping fees.

By reblogging/sharing this entry and participating in the giveaway you are either over 18 years of age or have parental consent to receive one of the giveaway items.

Lolita Promotes Feminism in U.S. Society: Introduction

Disclaimer: This argument paper was written for my English class in May, and I've been arguing with myself over whether or not to put this out in public since then. I did my best to educate myself in these topics within a short time span. All content is truthful as best as I could research. The origins of lolita fashion (which will be addressed in this series' future) is certainly going to be an arguable point, but it was the clearest answer I could provide from a source which has yet to be disproved. If any of the information in this series is wrong, please respectfully inform me specifically what is wrong so that I may look into it and correct it. Until then, please enjoy the hook:

I am a lolita. I wear the volumized, knee length skirts and frills of lolita fashion most days mostly because I like it (and who doesn't like feeling good in their clothes?) and partially because our choice in clothing makes a broad visual statement about us as individuals, whether we like it or not. It doesn't help my case that lolita fashion was created and named “lolita” in Japan, where the meaning (which is essentially youthful and cute) skewed from the connotations “lolita” possesses in the western world (seductive pre-teens). Even people who don't know the name of the fashion are so befuddled when they see the silhouette created by a lolita’s petticoat that it takes courage to wear the rest of the fashion’s mainstays—head bows or bonnets, large waist-ties tied behind the back, and dress prints that may be adorned with carousel horses or sweets or fairy tale themes. What do you think of when you picture these things? If you are like most Americans, you will think of either victorian-era children or dolls.

Japanese model Misako Aoki, an icon of lolita fashion, taken from her blog “ribbon-misa.”

The American public’s reaction to seeing adults in these clothes is not always positive. Most Americans are seeing something new, unusual, and very distinct. I have now gotten so used to strangers taking pictures of me that I am familiar with the strange silence that comes from people taking breaks in their conversation to angle camera phones my way—followed by a tiny bee-beep-chk sound. I recently went to a local restaurant, Brother’s Burritos, and heard the awkward pause in a man and woman’s conversation (the conversation, additionally, had not been at all quiet and I could hear them talking about me) fast enough that I was able to spin around and smile for the picture. They were so shocked that neither of them were able to speak for several seconds. I made a statement with my clothes when I got dressed that morning, and here, two people were giving me their responses.

This essay will assist those unfamiliar with fashion’s socio-psychological effects in learning how the clothes we wear every day make broad statements about our personal beliefs regarding our places as individuals and collectives within society. Lolita fashion is, unintentionally, a tool that emphasizes the purpose of subculture and fights the damaging consequences of mass conformity to damaging social norms simply by appearing the way it does. It is easy to say “they're just clothes, they’re not that important,”  but take a moment to honestly assess the last time you reacted to how someone else presented themselves. Did you unthinkingly roll up your window because someone with a red shirt and gold-plated teeth walked by? Perhaps it was more subtle: you felt confident that someone was responsible because his shirt was pressed and his shoes were clean. Most fashion historians and enthusiasts can arrive at the conclusion that fashion has both reflected and shaped society since humans began wearing clothes, and the truth is that psychological science agrees.

Next in this series: Origins of Fashion

Sources can be found here.

LBC: My Most Versatile Lolita Item (and best impulse buy)

This week's Lolita Blog Carnival theme coincided (as they often do) with one of F Yeah Lolita's 52 week lolita challenges: The Most Versatile Lolita Item I Own. 

My most versatile item is this BtSSB brown cardigan with detachable faux fur collar. I was in the San Francisco store looking to buy a jumperskirt and got the cardigan instead.

Spills typically don't show up on brown, and varying shades of brown in a coordinate look more organic than careless. It can be worn with sweet to add a chocolate theme, with classic as gorgeous neutral, or as a gateway between the two.

On casual days the cardigan can be worn in warm weather with the sleeves rolled. I roll the sleeves under and then flip them up so that the seams don't show. It also keeps them up better, except when it's not on an arm, in which case it flips back down again. I also push up the sleeves unconsciously while I'm writing and mistake the bulges for muscles when I pass the mirror. 

The GLW wig can also be worn in warm weather. Click here to be the one who wears this brand new wig in warm weather.

 For daily wear I frequently use it to tie my coordinates together and tone down or provide a point of contrast for pinks. You can see here that the cardigan prevents the wig from blending into the jsk like some kind of awkward hair-cape.

I call this coord chocolate strawberry.

The cardigan is really on a whole new level with the faux fur collar attached. It classes the entire coord up while still going with my primarily sweet-classic closet. In fall and winter it's an easy seasonal touch, and adds a surprising amount of warmth to the cardigan.

Other participants in this week's Lolita Blog Carnival theme:

The Bloody Tea Party

Alice in Lolitaland

Fire Extinguisher: Whimsical Adventures of Me

Smithsonian

Thank you, as always, for supporting this blog with your readership.