Hailing itself as the inventor of women's jeans, Levi's celebrates the 75th anniversary of women in denim.

First introduced to male laborers in California in the 1850's, jeans became a symbol of empowerment for women as an alternative to more feminine clothing. Levi's says, "People could tell a lot about a person just by looking at their Levi's® jeans - in the 1930s and 1940s, the waist, hip and length information was included on the waistband patch of every pair of women's jeans." Never before had a woman's value been so publicly reduced to the measurements of their body!

Obviously popularized by teenagers (See: Rebel Without A Cause), they are ubiquitous in America today. From loose-fitting, high-waisted jeans in the early years to the skin-tight, low-rise, objectifying period, to even the fake embrace of masculinity through the marketing of the "boyfriend" jean, denim and American women are now inseparable.

Still, the annual production of denim jeans requires 20 million kg of indigo dye, for which the treatment process exposes workers to such toxic levels of chemicals that their life span while working in such conditions is 5-7 years. Additionally, Levi's continues to exploit its workers in the production process, especially women working in un-unionized textile factories.

Thanks, Levi's, for the reminder that jeans have shaped women's lives in different ways: for the global North, they can be a symbol of empowerment or of objectification, while in the global South, they continue to be an oppressive means of employment.

• Tags:
• Advertising

View Original Post at feministing.com