Cultural influences in the clothing of Avatar: The Last Airbender 🌪 

I'm a simple gal, I see a video about Avatar AND fashion? I click.

I literally just watched ur atonement vid earlier today and found it SO insightful and then u went ahead and dropped this aghhhh thank you loved this!

I just found your channel and holy heck this is awesome! Super well made, you put a lot of time and research into this. Also a really fun topic! Your voice is nice to listen to as well :)

I loved this vid it was so informative and really shows where the different inspirations came from in ATLA and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I think in Avatar they did a great work with the costumes, as I understand for Mina's video, for example the Ba Sing Se clothing representing the last period of a so restrictive era was so powerful for the representation it had in the serie

16:05 If I remember correctly, the creators did say that the Fire Nation uniforms were originally going to look even more like samurai armor with segmented arm and shoulder guards, but got changed last minute to the cleaner pointed shoulders we see in the show because those were easier to animate on a regular basis.

Amazing video ! Live the concept, hope you continue to give us similar content :)

Who wanted to be katara when they were young? 🙋‍♀️

Damn.... So many cool infomation! Congrats on all the work, girl!

i just found ur channel and i’m obsessed 💗💗💗. keep it up !!!!

It took a quarter of the video just to get into the topic. I get disclaimers, but it was a bit of a drag.

thank u

I was going to watch Avatar, but I moved to an area where Netflix is unavailable, so... >:I However, Katara's (dunno if that's right) outfits and hairstyles are super pretty, and I love the idea for the water tribes.

The question is can you really cultural appropriate in a completely fictional world, I think not really

I saw avatar and subscribed. thank you

I’d kill to have an ATLA for Africa

I loved hearing you talk about non western fashion history. I feel like there’s a bit of an absence of this side of fashion history content here on RU-vid.

i think the show is very respectful and kinda empowering to lots of asians, i really loved the show as a child

Finally, someone that doesn't just say ''the fire nation is Japan''.

Katara's batrodhal necklace is acutally based on south asian tradition of giving a necklace(called Mungalasuthra) to a bride on her wedding day to show she's married

Just a heads up most of the character designs were made by Korean animators and in fact not just by the two "white dudes" - that's especially why there's a lot of Korean influence in the clothing.

Thank you so much for not leaving out all the Southeast Asian influences in the Fire Nation! ❤️❤️❤️

Avatar wasnt drawn in America by Americans. Yes the story was created by american men and approved by them but the majority of Avatar was animated & drawn in South Korea by JM Animation.

I hope this won't sound weird but I love hearing you talk

There’s a difference between cultural appropriation and appreciation

One thing that I don’t see many people discuss when it comes to Avatar fashion is that the civilians on Kyoshi Island wear clothing that is heavily Ainu-inspired. The Ainu are an indigenous ethnic group in Japan, located in Hokkaido and also stretching to areas that are technically controlled by Russia. Due to the proximity to the Southern Water Tribe, we can see that the climate of Kyoshi Island is fairly cold, although the geographic location is kind of flip flopped.

Anyone who thinks Avatar the Last Air Bender (the animated series) is cultural appropriation just because the creators are WHITE are just plain WRONG. An immense amount of research and care was taken into account in designing each nation, their culture, and fighting style and is a celebration of the culture as well as a wonderful bridge show to introduce young children to other cultures and anime.

For those who are interested, _Five Thousand Years_ is a RU-vid channel dedicated to Chinese history, and has many great videos on the clothing of different dynasties. Plus, most of it is in English and the videos that aren't have English subtitles. The woman behind it is Chinese (though she lives somewhere else) and truly has a passion for the subjects she covers. There are many interesting tidbits about daily life in ancient China that you would never learn from a history book. I highly recommend it!

I'm indigenous and I can't speak behalf of the other represented ethnicities within the show, but speaking on behalf of my own opinion as an indigenous person from Canada I don't personally see any of the broad representation found through the series to be overtly offensive. I think to have represented indigenous ethnicity to an educational standard would have been impossible within the confines of a made-up world because there are hundreds if not thousands of individual nations with their own unique culture and so that just couldn't have translated and may have actually been more offensive to fantasize very real conflict in more specific detail. I think the important parts to have represented to avoid any toe stepping is something they already did effectively which was to very overtly showcase the clothing and culture as unique to one group of peoples. Having people walking around in traditional clothing for the sake of a fashion statement, having it incorporated into the aesthetic of the show in a willy nilly or purposeless way would have been overtly appropriating and they didn't do that. Both the Northern and Southern water tribes had separate cultures and dress. The clothes were worn by only those originating from those nations, and they accurately represented a conflict that is not very adequately represented in today's society. A lot of people don't know this, but The First Nations in Canada is a group of nations who were first to sign treaties with the Canadian government, they have a disproportionately loud voice in comparison to their contemporaries and would often be more fairly recognized by the Canadian government because they were first to (more eagerly than others) work alongside them. They were still treated unfairly, but significantly better by comparison and were quicker to develop to 'catch up' with Canadian society and so deemed more 'civilized' by the average white citizen. This was actually really nicely showcased in the show despite it being a made-up universe, more in-depth in Korra. I'm not offended by the creators borrowing these themes. I think they did a good job of rewriting real-world themes in a way that can get children excited and intrigued by them. Edit: With all of that said, I know a lot of people are debating what indigenous groups were specifically referenced and whether they were Mongolian, or North American, but the clothing in my opinion isn't specific enough to really tie it to any one region other than broadly northern indigenous. There are PLENTY stylistic choices that were made to point at their clothing being closely modelled off of the Inuit or other northern north American ethnicitie's traditional clothing and culture as well as Mongolian specifically, but like I said, I think it's better they went this route in designing the traditional wear than narrowing it down. Just imho

I'm not a costume designer, but I'm an animator, and the most likely reason why the monks aren't wearing maroon is because of Aang's character design and also western color psychology vs. eastern color psychology. In the East, orange and reds are associated with peace, but in the west, reds are associated with passion, anger and authority, it stands to reason that this is why the Fire Nation were predominantly red, as they are the big imperial colonizers in the story. Likewise, the Air Nomads stand for peace and balance, it would be logical to conclude that they would be wearing white if we are going by western color psychology, but I suspect that Aang's character design came before the rest of the Air Nomads, and as he is such a youthful and joyful character, they went with a yellow color scheme, as this the color that represents these things in western color psychology.

this may not be your thing but I'd LOVE to see more of your personal style (amazing video btw)

okay but the way katara looks beautiful in every tribe's clothing, sis can turn a look.

It does make sense that the fire nation would take a little inspiration from multiple places given they've invaded everyone.

I personally view it as cultural appreciation rather than cultural appropriation.

pakistani here, I loved this series as a child, and even though my culture wasn't represented in it, as an asian and a brown skinned girl, I felt represented and empowered

The Water Tribes are also heavily influenced by Inupiat and Yup'ik groups, with many of the parkas in the show looking like Yup'ik "fancy parkas" as much if not a little more than Canadian Inuit regalia. The fur trims are also very similar to what you find on the trational parkas in Nome. I find one of the best ways to find images of Inuit/Inupiaq/Yupik traditional clothing is to search specifically for photos of these people from, say, the 1930s or before. Also really good for finding traditional tattoos, hair styles (like looped braids at the side of the head or two braids merging into one worn at the front of the body), and jewelry.

I'm so tired of everything being called appropriation without anybody knowing what exactly is appropriation...

Loved this! I've watched a lot of fashion history videos, and it's almost all centered on europe and the united states. I've seen a liiitle bit about Japanese streetwear, but that's mostly it when it comes to clothing from asian cultures. I appreciate all of the research you did for this, I certainly feel more informed.

I think it would be cool to see how the Sandbender outfits draw from Middle Eastern and North African culture as well

Honestly I feel they just showed the beauty of the Asian culture

Just the information in this video alone shows that so much research was put into ATLA. Mike and Brian definitely made this show out of appreciation of Asian cultures. I know I can’t speak for all Asians, but being Asian, I love seeing the blend of their influences and Asian influences.

i would love to see a korra fashion influences vid!! lots of early 20th century USA influences i think

I know cultural appropiantion does exist, but I don't think Avatar do it. I understand cultural appropiation as when someone appropiates the intellectual property of a culture without acknowlegde the inspiration. For example, a fashion designer went to Mexico, stoled indigeous designs, call them their own, sold them and made money at expense of a culture she didn't bother to understand. But avatar never said asian culture was their own, a lot of asian people work in the design of the characters and the production, in some way this series educated a lot of people and was pay homage to the culture.

adding onto the souteast asian influence in fire nation costuming - SE Asian styles are typically shown when they're in the fire nation colonies. this reflects that the fire nation emulates the qualities of an empire, where the colonies are poor and the royals have vacation houses there. many SE Asian countries were colonized by imperial powers and further dominated and disempowered through cultural and military influence, so i think they made that distinction in clothing intentionally to show the imperialist character of the fire nation. overall, excellent video as always! big fan

I've never heard anyone claim that there was cultural appropriation in Avatar. I love that there is zero western culture within it, and that they did thorough research to be accurate.

I thought they producers worked with Asian people on this show.

Thank you. Someone who doesn't just say "The Fire Nation is Japan" Also, a lot of people missed Ursa's hairstyle we see in one episode during her wedding that was Korean Influenced. That show really just mashed everything together. Well, I'm not mad at it though.

Why does everything have to be problematic? Brian and Michael clearly love and respect Asian and indigenous cultures. They made a beautiful show with NOT A SINGLE WHITE PERSON. And did it with respect and great care. I am so damn tired of people getting upset over everything. 😤😤

as a Tibetan i really appreciate that you included information about Tibetans since not much know about our religion

I’m white so I’m not really sure if this is a valid opinion, but how would ATLA be cultural appropriation? The creators were white, but I believe they worked with a lot of South Korean peers in the creation of the show (but I could be remembering wrong?). I understand cultural appropriation when someone dresses or expresses a culture as if it is their own, but it’s not as if the characters in the show actually wearing this influenced clothing and reading Chinese scripture are white. They have typical anime eyes, so it’s not exactly expressed there, but they are heavily implied to be from a blended culture deriving from several different SE/E Asian countries. I feel like the creators didn’t claim a culture as their own, but made a creative and fresh concept from Eastern influence, which was a breath of fresh air compared to the typical Western influence that’s still in pretty much every cartoon today. I guess those are just my thoughts, idk

loved this vid!! the costume design is one of my favorite parts of atla and i loved all the real life examples you showed here as well as the inclusion of the materials used! super informative and interesting :3 also im watching this with a migraine and ur voice is v soothing hahah good job!

i’m cambodian and when i saw that the fire nation clothes were inspired by traditional cambodian clothes i was so happy

Many of the character designs were made by the South Korean animators, so the white creators didn’t appropriate anything.

This is MY NUMBER 1 SHOW. Aang inspired me so much as a kid, the action, the raw emotions omg it was too much

It’s so frustrating that if people make films only about European nations, it’s exclusionary and racist, but if they make films about non-European nations, it’s cultural appropriation and racist. We can’t win.

I love this video!! I also noticed sokka’s sword master’s outfit looked like an ao dai

Personally, I think that Zuko's clothes in season 3 looks a lot like the clothing of the yakan tribe of the Philippines.

u pronounced “deel” kinda like “dale” (i expected it lol) but the “ee” is pronounced like “æ” and “l” is more sharp :)

Everytime i hear cultural appropiation my ears bleed, it's so stupid, but anyways, nice clothes

based on your love for 30s fashion, i think youd enjoy analyzing the fashion of korra since its inspired by the fashion of the 20s and 30s

i personally don’t find the show to be culture appropriation as I feel that a lot of care and research has gone in to the clothing styles for each of the four nations. I am Asian but I do not speak for all Asians as that is just my opinion

One thing I like about Avatar is that it was set in a general Asian-centric imagined world that had a strong presence in the west, and it portrayed the characters as powerful and capable.

5:16 it might be because airbenders wouldn't want to be associated with firebenders

I don't mean to come off as rude or ignorant, but what things were misrepresented/appropriated in ATLA? It's a fictional world that drew inspiration from many different sources, and I don't quite understand why that's a bad thing? Sure, the creators were not Asian or Indigenous, but I thought that they did a good job at respecting the cultures that they borrowed elements from. The show was not set in any specific country, but rather a fictional world, which is why I can't understand how someone could be offended by it. Again I'm sorry if this comes off as rude, I'm just a bit confused.

I’m Chinese and my family (especially my Grandma loves this show because of how beautifully it portrays different Asian cultures. What separates this as appreciation rather than appropriation is the care and research put into it, and the positive and respectful portrayal rather than a lazy cheapening.

I love this sm! Also Xiqiong Ruqun is pronounced 'She Chee-ong Roo Choon' and I'm so glad the hanfu revival is coming back in China again, I love it so much. Also, I'm super impressed by the creators of the show - they managed to take elements from so many parts of asian culture, it's awesome to see these countries also being represented, even if they're not 'represented' in exactly the same way.

Also in The Search, Zuko’s mom was wearing wedding attire that resembled Korean clothing

I love the fact that ATLA has no white culture.

I really dislike the words "cultural appropriation". It is a positive word with such negative meaning. Seeing how these American white dudes took the time to make their clothes this accurate besides avatar being fantasy is showing how much they respect these asian cultures. If I could I'd ban the misuse of "cultural appropriation" because people use it as a synonym for cultural disrespect even when people are actually researching and respecting cultures. I never heard somebody call Disney disrespectful either though they are extremely inaccurate but ey it seems to be ok for people to be white and not researching about their own culture... Now these white people actually make something accurate and everybody (mainly Tumblr as far as I can tell) suddenly scream cultural appropriation *facepalm* In the end race doesn't say anything about quality and as far as I read in the comment section nobody really ever has an argument besides: because the directors were white, the voice actors were white, there is little English information (as seen in the video it seems to be enough though), someone who doesn't come from a culture has to make mistakes (but were are those?) All of this is empty criticism based on the race of the directors. In fact this is what I call racism. Never have I heard about any heavy mistake they made that would justify this.

I just wanted to add, as I recently did some reading on Inuit clothing, they had a set of winter parkas made from caribou, but also a lighter, waterproof parka made of sealskin for use in summer months. The sealskin is waterproof!

I was not expecting to hear Mongolian influences in Avatar,,, Katara's summer outfit was my favorite as a child and it was likely based on my own culture? Wow

Please please please keep making videos, i like it so much and find them so interesting! And just seeing your aesthetics is so inspiring for me while i want to find and create mine too, love from Russia and thank you😘 Ps how did you know that avatar is my favourite tvshow!😉

Honestly so glad I stumbled on this channel,,,, I've honestly been waiting for such in-depth videos about influences in fashion and costume design and these videos have been everything!!! Keep doing what you're doing, loving the content :') also love ur personal style and makeup!!

finally some agrees with me that the fire nation has no japanese influence or culture (aside from there political structure) at all

That is a long a** disclaimer .... Girl just do yo thang!

Also, in the fire nation, there the Agni Kai taken from Indian fire god Agni.

I'm a simple gal, I see a video about Avatar AND fashion? I click.

Yay avatar!! Zuko is my favvv! Like ur style and channel ☺️

I see that the majority of the comments are about cultural appropriation. Of coure that is an important topic to discuss about, but the only thing that I want to say is that I really appreciate this video!! I learnt so much and its all soo interesting!! You explained it so very well!! Thank you for this video!!

The Air nation is inspired by Tibetans and the Fire nation by Chinese. The fire nation’s conquest & persecution of the Air nomads is representative of the Chinese invasion & annexation of Tibet in 1950 and its ongoing cultural genocide. Majority of the air nation’s population were monks & nuns. Similarly, a large percentage of the Tibet’s population was monastic prior to the 1950s. There were about 6000 monasteries before but after the cultural revolution 90% of monasteries were destroyed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). If that isn’t similar to the fire nation wiping out the entire air nation idk what is. Virtually all air nation characters have Tibetan names (Pasang, Pema, tashi, yangchen). Ang’s grandson in legend of Korra is specifically named after the 14th Dalai lama, Tenzin Gyatso. The whole reincarnation process of the avatar is all based off of the Dalai Lama’s actual reincarnation processes. If you read the comics, they also use tibetan ritualistic objects and say Tibetan words. So when Ang is saying that his goal is to save the air nation and bring peace to all four kingdoms, it’s hard not to compare that to the Dalai Lama’s struggle in saving the Tibetan people and finding a peaceful solution. As a Tibetan myself, all of this is so obvious when watching the show but many ppl don’t know about China’s imperial expansionist journey (invading Tibet & East Turkestan) and only think of Japan when they think of imperial expansion. Again, the air nomads are Tibetan and the Fire nation’s ppl are Chinese

they did a really good job in designing the characters!! i think most asians, including me, feel represented and empowered through this show, instead of being offended by it. i can only speak for myself as a person of chinese heritage, as you can't call something cultural appropriation if you're not part of that culture. and you also did a good job in researching all of these information!! thanks for the video, it was very informative and fun to watch!

Two white guys make an amazing cartoon that impacted the lives of all children that watched , not a show made for white people for white people to make fun of anyone , this gave off a positive affect on kids and gives representation... But oh it's insensitive...

the fire nation head piece is also seen in korean culture. thank you for a wonderful video. much love.

Thank you for also mentioning indigenous cultures in the influence of the Avatar the Last Airbender

Wow ! Such a cool idea for a video and a channel ! Can't wait to see more stuff like this and your last video !!!

Not only were they trying to keep the main characters from the fire nation unique, I also think that they didn’t want to overtly vilify any specific culture. Of course some real world cultures influence the Fire nation (esp. Japan) but by making their culture more ambiguous than the others, it avoids the messy implications of painting a culture that way.

The Chinese are somewhat fire nation because when the Dalai Lama was being reincarnated the Chinese were looking for it too and also the Dalai Lama ran away from home when the Chinese attacked. Notice how similar that was to aang’s story?

huh your room gives me earth kingdom vibes also I thought you had more subs lol but you have one more -3-

Ah! If you ever watch Korra I really hope you give it it a fair shot! There was a lot of shady business from Nick to the Korra team. Like one example is that they were told Korra was only green lit for 1 season. I just love Korra and it holds a special place in my heart. And I think Korra was never given a fair shot but much of the avatar “fandom”. That’s just my 2 cents tho. LOVED the video. Both educational and super fun. Thank you for uploading !!

Not people trying to fucking cancel avatar. Cultural appropriation are u kidding me? Y'all ever watch fucking starwars.

one thing yall need to remember is that this show is a fantasy land that takes inspiration. i definitely think it was appreciation personally, and dont see how it would be orientalism bc it was obviously influenced and researched and had SOLELY asian characters. however, it isnt a b o u t asians, it's just heavily inspired by several asian cultures. i dont see the problem with blending different cultures a little bit bc it isnt this is china or this is japan, its just each nation is inspired by that. if they did the same thing but made it ABOUT being asian and called each nation china, japan, etc. that would come across as problematic and extremely lazy, but its just inspired. appropriation is just taking a culture otherwise hated for yourself and making it trendy while villainizing the original people who the certain thing belonged to. i truly dont see how you could make a fantasy series based on asia in a different way without specifically naming each thing china or native tribes or japan. they did their research and had asian consultants.

Thank you so much for doing the research and explaining these beautiful culture!!! I love the video.

Interessting video! But HOW the fuck is "Avatar" cultural appropriation?? Is it opressing different asian cultures? Is it mocking them? It's like saying you can't enjoy pizza unless you're Italian or Wiener Schnitzel and Kaiserschmarn unless your Austrian. Or listening to Beethoven unless your're german. It's not insulting a culture, it's embracing a culture.

How is it cultural appropiation though. Someone explain to me

Why would you even include the part about cultural appropriation, lots of time was put into adding different fighting styles for nations and then you say culture got appropriated just because 2 white guys were apart of the production. tf

Where on earth do you get your fabulous clothes???? Your whole bedroom is my dream aesthetic, including your style 🤩

As a Japanese I never thought the fire nation was aesthetically Japanese. I feel like everything is just a mixture of different cultures and that’s cool because after all it’s a fantasy. It doesn’t have to be culturally accurate.

Fun fact: in the scene where the airnomads put objects in front of avatar aang to see if he was reincarnated that scene was based on Dalai lama when he was reincarnated

Honestly your comment about cultural appropriation in the beginning kinda rubbed me the wrong way. I'm not American so I don't really understand the concept behind it, and if I got it completely wrong please correct me. So first of: what does skin colour have to to with culture? So they're white, and that's why they must be bound to only "white culture stuff"? But there are so many different cultures where people are "white" (same with Asian, black etc.). German, French, British, Norwegian, Italian, Finnish and many more. So because he's white he's just limited to that? But then you'd say one of my best friends who has chinese origins shouldn't be allowed to wear a Dirndl in germany, even though she's german, because of her "origins"? I hope you do know what that reminds me of... Or is it because he's American? In that case there's no real culture of his own to take inspiration from, without "appropriating from" another, everyone in avatar the last airbender would 've been wearing jeans and t-shirts. Honestly it sounds more like the new fancy way of segregating people because of their skin colour/origins....

C'mon, why is everyone acting like special snowflakes because of the "cultural appropriation". 🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄 People are just ruining fun.