Gwen Stefani Criticized for Saying She Thinks She's "Japanese"
“I said, ‘My God, I’m Japanese and I didn’t know it,” the musician said of her Harajuku era.
Can a white individual identify as Japanese? Gwen Stefani seems to think she can, as she said in a recent interview that she feels a deep connection with Japan and its Harajuku subculture, a comment that has unsurprisingly led to online backlash.
The Italian-American musician, who spoke with Allure ahead of the launch of her new beauty line GVXE, said Japanese culture has been a huge influence in her life. She brought up that her father’s job at Yamaha, which had him travel between California and Japan for almost two decades, was what sparked her love for the country.
“That was my Japanese influence and that was a culture that was so rich with tradition, yet so futuristic [with] so much attention to art and detail and discipline and it was fascinating to me. I said, ‘My God, I’m Japanese and I didn’t know it.’” According to the interviewer Jesa Marie Calaor, an Asian-American writer, Stefani continued on to mention that her love for Japanese culture is “innocent” and that she is a “super fan.”
The 53-year-old responded to the criticism she’s received regarding cultural appropriation over the years, regarding her 2004 album Love. Angel. Music. Baby. as well as her Harajuku Lovers fragrance line. “If [people are] going to criticize me for being a fan of something beautiful and sharing that, then I just think that doesn’t feel right,” she told me. “I think it was a beautiful time of creativity… a time of the ping-pong match between Harajuku culture and American culture. [It] should be okay to be inspired by other cultures because if we’re not allowed then that’s dividing people, right?”
Stefani has since received criticism online for her response to the cultural appropriation accusations. “Gwen Stefani telling an Asian-American interviewer that she identifies as Japanese is the kind of oblivion I’m trying to channel in this dark cruel world,” one wrote. Another added, “It is disappointing that Gwen Stefani is choosing to double down on her Orientalism in 2023. I remember how uncomfortable her ‘Harajuku Girls’ era made me almost 20 years ago, but it wasn’t so easy to share those feelings pre-social media.”
You can read the full interview on Allure.
