Revisiting the Past: Chinese Hanfu Fashion Explored Through Cultural Memory

This paper explores the revival of hanfu fashion in contemporary China through the theories on cultural memory. We examine how hanfu functions as a dynamic site of memory preservation and identity formation, mediated through material objects, inscription-based records, and bodily practices. Drawing on theories from memory studies, we look at distinctions among different types of memory and taxonomies of forgetting to demonstrate how the hanfu movement mobilizes both remembering and forgetting to construct a culturally rooted Han Chinese identity. We argue that the act of wearing hanfu, including clothing, accessories, and engaging in related rituals and imagery constitutes an embodied performance of tradition and sustained collective memory through habitual practices. Simultaneously, strategic acts of forgetting, both state-led and community-driven, erase revolutionary histories and downplay non-Han cultural intermingling, enabling the construction of a purified and authentic Han identity grounded in cultural continuity. We also draw parallels between the cyclical nature of cultural memory and the logic of embodied fashion to examine the intertwined relationships among past/present, and collective/individual expressions. While theories in cultural memory provides a valuable framework for interpreting hanfu, the theories Eurocentric roots and limited engagement with digital-era practices reveal important theoretical gaps. This study contributes to broader understandings of how cultural memory is performed, transformed, and contested through hanfu fashion in contemporary non-Western societies.