Anyone active on TikTok is familiar with the “clean girl aesthetic”.
It features popular influencers with slicked back buns, gold hoop earrings, glossy lips, and buttery skin. Its most known participants are white women who generally fit into Eurocentric beauty standards.
Despite its recent popularity, its origins are widely unknown.
The “clean girl aesthetic” style began with Black and Latina communities in the 1990s. Items such as large hoop earrings date back to working-class minority communities in the 20th century – in particular, the Latino “chola” subculture of Southern California (Ocampo, 2020). Associated with the jewelry is the sleek bun style adopted by many current influencers. For decades, Black and Latina women have worn low buns slicked back with hair gel (some with laid edges).
The origins of this style clearly date to communities of women of color, yet most TikTokers give no credit or reference to its history.
When the style first became popular among women of color, it was a heavily marginalized subculture. White people deemed Latina women wearing large gold hoops as “trashy”. Black women were called “ghetto” for slicking back their hair into buns.
One might consider Stuart Hall’s notes on binary oppositions as a mode for understanding racialized discourse in popular culture. “There is the powerful opposition between ‘civilization’ (white) and ‘savagery’ (black)” (Hall, 1997). The concept of binary oppositions applies to the historical origins of the “clean girl aesthetic” – for decades, it was deemed “low culture” by white people. It was viewed as “trashy” and “uncivilized” (language which plays into notions of white ‘civilization’ in opposition to black ‘savagery’). Women of color were otherized and treated as opposition to “white culture” because of the style many of them sported.
His ideas of stereotyping also apply to the ways in which women of color were treated for their aesthetics. He describes “stereotyped” as “reduced to a few essentials, fixed in Nature by a few, simplified characteristics” (Hall, 1997). In this case, Black and Latina women were reduced to the simplified characteristics of their appearance – their identity was minimized to their look, primarily known by its hoop earrings and slick buns. He notes several examples of Black people being reduced to caricatures based on a few physical features essentialized by white artists. Similarly, the “clean girl aesthetic” was once a caricature for women of color.
However, this aesthetic did not remain marginalized for long. It has since been coopted by white influencers who profit off the look that women of color were once berated for. Due to its explosive popularity as a TikTok “trend”, many white women (particularly those whose main source of income is social media) have hopped on the bandwagon. They gain views, followers, and likes from it – which then leads them to brand deals and money.
The obvious difference in how society receives the look can be attributed to the racialized dynamics of popular culture and mass media. Often, the work of people of color is appropriated by white influencers, usually without credit. Famous TikTokers are known to post videos dancing to choreography made by Black artists without acknowledging the work of the original creator. It is no secret that white influencers profit off the work of people of color – and the clean girl aesthetic is no exception.
Understanding the trend’s racialized history is the first step towards a more equitable TikTok platform – and some examples of resistance are already here!
On May 27, 2022, a Twitter thread by @dizadior was posted, eventually receiving over 90,000 likes. It read ““Clean Girl” aesthetic but make it black ✨, a thread:” and featured pictures of Black women participating in the look. This is a direct resistance to and subversion of the current image of the clean girl – instead of thin, white women with straight hair, it featured Black women with natural curls.
This thread is an example of digital alchemy, a term coined by Black feminist Moya Bailey in 2021. She describes it as a “praxis designed to create better representations for those most marginalized, through the implementation of networks of care beyond the boundaries of the digital from which it springs” (Bailey, 2021). It is focused on subversion of typical representation of certain trends – this thread does exactly that, by rejecting the Eurocentric beauty standards that currently engulf the aesthetic.
She specifically discusses the idea of defensive digital alchemy, which is a response to and rejection of misogynoir in the media. This Twitter thread is an example of this subset of digital alchemy, as it is a reaction to and calling out of the appropriation and exploitation of women of color’s style by white influencers.
These forms of digital alchemy are powerful. It is a method for transforming oppressive media platforms into sites of education and social justice.
Works Cited
Ocampo, S. (2020, November 15). Sandra Ocampo. La Gente Newsmagazine - University of California, Los Angeles. Retrieved October 17, 2022, from https://lagente.org/caught-in-a- loop-an-appropriation-of-hoops/
Hall, S. (1997). Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices. Newbery Park, CA: Sage, pp. 225-249
Bailey, M. (2021). Misogynoir transformed. New York, NY: NYU Press. Pp. 1-34.
I loved how you formatted your assignment to mirror an authentic blog post, with strategically varied paragraph lengths! I think your connections to the readings are incredibly strong, particularly regarding Stuart Hall’s notion of binary oppositions as it relates to the “clean girl aesthetic.” You also did a great job of explaining how this “trend” has come from the margins to the center, along with the actionable effects of this appropriation. If you hadn't been constrained by the word count, your blog post could have benefited from a discussion that parallels coolhunters’ appropriation of marginalized groups’ culture for profit, as explained by Powers. In this case, White, primarily female, influencers build their brands as trendsetters on social media by neglecting to credit its origins in “Black and Latina communities in the 1990s.” In doing this, a cycle of appropriation continues since White followers of these influencers, who are also often uninformed of the roots of the “clean girl aesthetic,” continue to repost or wear this style without adequate credit either. In Powers’ discussion, corporations exploit fringe groups through coolhunting; in this instance, it is instead TikTokers that appropriate, resulting in the harmful labeling of them as trailblazers. I also liked that you talked about Bailey’s idea of digital alchemy in your blog post, for it gives readers a more optimistic view on countering appropriation and hearing Black voices. I think that Bailey’s term “misogynoir” could have been incorporated as well, nevertheless, you did a wonderful job explaining defensive digital alchemy as an outcome of the new, complex visibility of the “clean girl aesthetic.” Well done!
ReplyDelete– Ella Blank
Hi Rebecca! I really enjoyed reading your article on the “clean girl aesthetic”. When you mentioned “white influencers who profit off the look that women of color were once berated for,” it made me think of Gladwell’s and Powers’ remarks on “cool-hunting”. In this case, the white appropriators would be the early adopters, who are acting as innovators. Even though the Black and Latina communities are the real innovators. Although TikTok’s widespread reach has many benefits, I think a drawback of the “TikTok tabloid” is that it promotes coolhunting and appropriation because everyone watches everyone and has access to everything. Since everything on TikTok is free, and virality is very common, the “clean girl aesthetic” spreads so fast without paying homage to the original innovators and is perceived to be a product of white people. Additionally, I think about how the beauty industry has excluded Black and Brown people. For example, Glossier is a makeup company that prides itself around a very clean and natural look, pretty much the clean girl aesthetic. When the company first came out, I remember being very frustrated with the limited Skin Tint (foundation) range for darker tones while there was a larger range for the lighter ones. I remember, for a while, a black creator made an Instagram called @glossierbrown that featured Black and Brown people trying on the company's products since the Glossier websites mainly featured lighter-skinned women as their models. I think that is another great example of digital alchemy which, in my opinion, could be seen as a mix of generative and defensive digital alchemy.
ReplyDelete-Msangwa Ogada
Hi Rebecca,
ReplyDeleteGreat job on your blog post! You did a nice job of explaining the origins of the ‘clean girl aesthetic’ and its incorporation into mass media while discussing its implications. I enjoyed your discussion of Bailey’s defensive digital alchemy as Black women are participating in their version of the trend to react against misogynoir and shift attention away from the rigid beauty standards set by the aesthetic and more toward the redefinition of the aesthetic that is more universally representative. While the inclusion of digital alchemy in this blog post provides an optimistic outlook that Black women can disrupt the spotlight of problematic images that media perpetuates, I think it is extremely important to stress the fact that this ‘aesthetic’ did originate from marginalized subculture in the 1990s and was appropriated into mass media, as you mentioned.
Your discussion of the ‘clean girl aesthetic’ being a “heavily marginalized subculture,” with origins in “Black and Latin communities in the 1990s” before it could be constantly found on Tik Tok’s feed, has parallels to the job of a coolhunter, discussed in Powers’ On Trend: The Business of Forecasting the Future (2019). Many times, coolhunters would look to the edges of culture (i.e., marginalized groups) and incorporate their practices/ideas into mass media (Powers, 2019). While it is the role of these coolhunters to dive deep in order to provide businesses with insight on the latest and most exciting products and ideas, in this situation of the ‘clean girl aesthetic,’ Tik Tok influencers have looked to the margins to take practices of Black and Latina Women and bring them to the center of popular culture. These marginalized communities are left feeling helpless in the mainstream of capitalistic culture as influencers profit off of formulating their brands to fit the ‘clean girl aesthetic’ without paying any homage to Black and Latina communities. Had there been more space in your blog post, I think it would’ve been applicable to draw on the concept of coolhunting and how it relates to your argument, but again, nice job – I enjoyed reading your thoughts!
- Lauren Krasilovsky
Work Cited
Powers, D. (2019). On Trend: The business of Forecasting the Future. Chapter 3: Cool Hunting. Champaign, IL: Univeristy of Illinois Press.