Introduction

Identifying the social, cultural, environmental and economic impacts of the fashion, textile and apparel industries requires interdisciplinary research.  There are countless touch points along these supply chains, as well as within each lifecycle stage of the products they produce. While the impacts of these industries may be positive and/or negative, it is important to recognize their complicated nature. Internationally, key players are working tirelessly to facilitate interdisciplinary research and learning for change.  This lesson hopes to introduce you to these players. Reach out to them and connect.

The learning materials, activities and assignments for this lesson are positioned within the context of a single basic cotton T-shirt.

Objectives

• To direct learners to key players working to promote human rights and environmental protection within fashion, textile and apparel industries.
• To encourage learners to reach out to key players within the responsible fashion community.
• To connect the various touch points along the supply chain of fashion, textile and apparel industries.
• To empower learners to become more educated on the impacts of fashion products and systems.

Freemind // Experiments in Interaction

We have embedded Freemind (below), an interactive online learning tool, into this lesson, so that you may explore various key players throughout the industry working to facilitate responsible fashion systems.  Explore the map, a work in progress, to discover organizations that may interest you, based on the category of specialization for which we have them listed. Click on the red arrows to be taken directly to their websites.

Click here to download this lesson: Lesson 2: Key Players

Mary F Hanlon

Mary has a PhD in Sociology from University of Edinburgh, researching responsible fashion and transnational labour rights activism in the wake of the Rana Plaza building collapse in Bangladesh.