Indonesian Fashion: Trend in Cultural Shift Towards 'Becoming American'

Categories: America

The multicultural makes Indonesia rich of culture which is it already famous in the other countries. According to a survey in 2010 from BPS (Badan Pusat Statistik), the central agency of statistical, Indonesia has 1.340 tribes and about 2.500 languages. The amount of the languages that own by Indonesia is the greatest in eastern countries. It proves the multicultural of Indonesia that makes Indonesia different from others. Indonesians also known as their good attitude, behavior and manner. Which is, they still can hold the harmonization of their attitude, behavior and manner even they come from different co-culture.

They live in harmonization based on the norms from their own tribes. It also strengthened because they hold in the high esteem of the catchword Bhineka Tunggal Ika' which means diversity in unity. It also become one factor why Indonesia get a lot of attention from the other country. One sector of Indonesian culture that attract foreigners especially westerners is on fashion.Indonesia has traditional clothing that varied from one region to another.

Get quality help now
writer-Charlotte
writer-Charlotte
checked Verified writer

Proficient in: America

star star star star 4.7 (348)

“ Amazing as always, gave her a week to finish a big assignment and came through way ahead of time. ”

avatar avatar avatar
+84 relevant experts are online
Hire writer

Formerly, traditional clothing is the one and only fashion that exist in Indonesian society. Each region and group ethnic will wear their own traditional clothing. They respect on traditional clothing and of course proud of it. The custom of wearing traditional clothing in Indonesia is slowly vanish. Indonesian tend to wear the basic clothing such as shirt and pants or skirt. They no longer wear the traditional clothing since post-colonization era and liberty.Todays, in the development of globalization era, there are a lot of people come from many countries to develop their business in Indonesia.

Get to Know The Price Estimate For Your Paper
Topic
Number of pages
Email Invalid email

By clicking “Check Writers’ Offers”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy policy. We’ll occasionally send you promo and account related email

"You must agree to out terms of services and privacy policy"
Write my paper

You won’t be charged yet!

Some of them are from western countries. They usually run their business in industries sectors of food and fashion. It can be seen by the high amounts of foreign brands in those sectors. Unconsciously, it makes Indonesian people being consumptive toward foreign products. The rapidity of information from internet also affect the Indonesians to be more consumptive. They tend to follow the new trend and what is happening in the internet. As the example we can look at the fashion sector, the countries which have four seasons will launch the different style and collection of clothing in every season. Which is, the collection that launched every season is suitable from the condition and the weather in its season.

However, Indonesians who live in tropical country which has only two seasons follow that kind of trend. For example, they use the summer clothing collection in dry season. Which is, the weather in dry season is not that hot like the summer season in western countries.In addition, we know that the summer clothing collections mostly use thin cloth and the design is revealing too much part of body. From this sector, we can look the change of Indonesian that they are no longer respecting the norm on their society. Formerly, they wear kind of clothing that do not showing their body too much. They are respecting the norm that wearing such kind of clothing is considered as bad thing. Meanwhile, it is very different condition that now people wear such kind of clothing without hesitation. They are not paying attention to the norm that exist in Indonesia anymore. They tend to follow the western trends.Furthermore, from this exposure we know that Indonesia is experiencing a cultural change. The change that happen is not from the fashion sector that have been explained in above paragraph but also from food sector, behavior and lifestyle. They tend to adopt the western culture which is it may inappropriate with Indonesian culture. It may have different customs and norms in the Indonesian society.

Nowadays, problem that arising in the cultural shift of Indonesian is people follow a new trend to be American. They change their identity as Indonesian. In addition, they also change in their attitude, behavior and lifestyles.Therefore, this scientific paper will discuss the cultural shift that happened toward Indonesian in fashion sector. This paper will discuss why and how the Indonesian cultural shift occur. Why they tend to be American and how the process of change takes place.2. The Issues2.1 Practical IssuesDespite the amount of traditional clothing that Indonesia has in every region and ethnic, Indonesians now prefer to use common clothing that westerners wear. The kind of clothing is not traditional anymore, the clothing that they wear are such as T-shirt, Hoodie, jeans, mini skirt, hot pants, crop T-shirt, and sleeveless shirt. They follow the current trend in fashion, especially foreign fashion style. It can be happened since fashion development in Indonesia are developing hugely.

Many of western brands entering the fashion industries in Indonesian market. Whereas, the company that run their business in Indonesian fashion is quite excessively. According to the data that shown by the Ministry of Trade of Republic Indonesia, Indonesia own about 2,5 million companies as a part of creative sector, at least 1,3 million are in fashion (TREDA, 2009).Based on the amount of companies in Indonesian fashion industries, it can be seen fashion industries in Indonesia contribute some money to the country's foreign exchange. The data also reveal by the ministry that in 2002 until 2006, the creative sector contribute about 6.3 percent of the national income, it is around IDR 104.68 trillion, absorbing of 5.4 million labors and ranked top five among Indonesia's export commodities. Creative industry export about IDR 70 trillion over the same time, with the peak reach IDR 81.5 trillion in 2006 (TREDA, 2009). However, the export commodities may not proportional with the import commodities in the same sector.

Since, there are many Indonesians who tend to be consumptive of fashion from foreign country. Because of the massive flow of goods, people, information and capital across huge areas that we called globalization, fashion in Indonesia start to have a shift from traditional become modern. The effect of globalization also makes them more commercial, more urban and more international. That is why the taste of Indonesians about fashion slowly change like westerners.The trend of outfit of the day' or OOTD in social media among the teenagers also one of the impacts of globalization itself. Teenagers, especially teenage girls compete each other to use hashtag outfit of the day (#outfitoftheday, #ootd) and showing their trendy and latest fashion style. In their OOTD they will get dressed like westerners, wearing tight clothes and clothing which has design that expose the part of the body. Which is, it not suitable with the norms and customs that prevail in Indonesian society. Wearing such kind of clothes is considered as a bad thing. In addition, it also breaks the eastern culture, that we know the way they get dressed is such as an eastern should do, covering the certain part of the body properly and not revealing the body too much.Furthermore, the shift of Indonesian culture occurs because of the tendency of Indonesian following the world trend. They tend to follow the trend western countries in many aspects, include in their fashion.

For example, the trend of fashion in bridal and groom. Since, most of western country does not have various traditional clothing, they prefer to wear suit and gown for the wedding ceremony. They also disposed to wear tis kind of clothing to attend the formal invitation. Because of this kind of phenomenon, commonly Indonesian will wear suit and strapless gown for their wedding. As the time goes by, the number of groom and bridal who wear traditional clothes for their wedding is slightly decreasing. Whereas, people in the previous time prefer to wear traditional clothes for their wedding, since there are many kinds of traditional clothes in Indonesia. Thus, the phenomena above show that Indonesia is experiencing the cultural shift from time to time. 2.2 Theoretical IssuesCulture is everything that dealing with the human behavior, attitudes, lifestyle and how someone live their life in their society with the other cultural bearer. Furthermore, culture refers to numerous aspects of life, include many things that we consider it as ordinary things. According to Linton that was cited on (Pearson) the common habits and behaviors is considered as culture, but the totality of life also includes not only what the people do, but also how they commonly think and feel. In addition, culture is a set of learned behaviors and ideas (including beliefs, attitudes, values, and ideals) which are the characteristic of a certain society or other social group.

Updated: May 03, 2023
Cite this page

Indonesian Fashion: Trend in Cultural Shift Towards 'Becoming American'. (2019, Aug 20). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/becoming-american-in-the-way-get-dressed-a-new-trend-in-indonesian-cultural-shift-essay

Indonesian Fashion: Trend in Cultural Shift Towards 'Becoming American' essay
Live chat  with support 24/7

👋 Hi! I’m your smart assistant Amy!

Don’t know where to start? Type your requirements and I’ll connect you to an academic expert within 3 minutes.

get help with your assignment