Sukeban Girls: This Series Reinterprets 1970s Japanese Schoolgirl Gangs in New York City

Words: Upasana Das

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Two schoolgirls lean on each other with their eyes closed, city lights like muted stars behind them. Sandy Liang bows on their head, they open their eyes, their thoughts seemingly far away. The video repeats like a GIF, as the girls stand against the cityscape. Creative director Anna Theroux Ling had worked with the model Minami Gessel previously and a few years ago, Minami approached her about a project on a modern interpretation of Sukeban Girls, a term which was used to refer to girl gangs in 1970s Japan, who they see as It Girls in their own right. Last year, a random conversation with her friend Emily May Jampel, a film director made Anna feel that it was the right time to embark on the project. 

‘Sukeban Monogatari’ portrays certain glimpses from the lives of two schoolgirls, taking the form of short moving images or even GIFs. Creative directed by Anna and directed by Emily, this photo and video project was exhibited at Nowhere, New York. Here, the two creatives get into a conversation about being sukeban, school uniforms and It girls.

Polyester: Who were the sukeban girls, historically? 

Emily: Historically “Sukeban” refers to a specific subculture of girl gangs that became popularised in Japan during the 1960s and 1970s. Often translated as “delinquent girl”, the sukeban were groups of teenage girls who rebelled against mainstream forms of femininity and gender norms. They were known for rebellious activities like shoplifting, smoking cigarettes and wearing school uniforms with long skirts instead of the popularised mini-skirts, where they would hide weapons like knives and razors and commit petty crimes.

How did you adapt the concept of sukeban girls to present day? 

Anna: Coming from a different culture and adapting myself to New York, and really creating a life for yourself takes a lot of energy. I think the sukeban culture and how they were going against society and fighting for their own rights – there is a parallel between that attitude and the will to fight for yourself. That’s a motto we can all relate to – everyone who was evolved. 

Did you choose locations that felt like a pocket of Tokyo in New York? 

Emily: We had to set aside time to seek out places that did not feel so New York with a capital N. New York is so overphotographed, it’s so recognisable, so we looked very specifically for all locations. 

Anna: Yeah, I grew up in Japan, so I was quite specific about some of the choices. A lot of them were very neutral places, whether it was between city and suburb – and I think there’s something really nostalgic about that, because everybody comes from different places and there’s something really comforting to be familiar with a space – whether that’s a big white sky or staircase. Just the form of a staircase (it could belong anywhere) was important to me. I wanted the space to feel timeless and spaceless. 

Did you go through films or archival photographs for this? 

Anna: I think Emily pulled a lot of film references and I pulled more photos. Since I grew up in Japan, I would type in very specific keywords to show what exactly I want – the kind of fashion trends that were happening when I was growing up there in the 2000s, and some of the girl culture of the time, what kind of keychains would these girls have on their backpacks, or how they would wear their socks because they way they would wear their socks meant so many different things at the time. I grew up in Yokohama and Tokyo and at that Jaru culture was huge. That was almost like the valley girl energy, which I was fascinated by. How these girls would put on a lot of makeup, do their hair, roll up their skirts to be shorter and loose socks dragging on the floor is cooler. 

Talking about school, what were your own growing up experiences like in school? 

Emily: I grew up in Honolulu, but my dad grew up in Tokyo – but I spent a lot of time in Tokyo, and I did a homestay at Tamagawa Gakuen in Tokyo, in middle school. I did a homestay exchange with a student there. I was so obsessed with the aesthetic of the schoolgirl uniform, and I remember during the homestay, I got to wear this uniform and it felt so exciting, and kind of what Anna was saying earlier, you customise it day to day in small ways. Sometimes you can wear a tie, but on other days, there’s a clip-on bow you can wear instead, and you can wear it with a blazer, or you can do a sweater – I was obsessed with those. My grandparents on my mom’s side are from Hong Kong and they’re tailors, so they run a store for school uniforms. I was surrounded by this, but I never had to wear one myself. Growing up in Hawaii, I was a just a big nerd, super shy, hung out in the library and was friends with my English teacher – so, was very antisocial (laughs). 

Anna: I was probably similar to Emily. I wasn’t really interested in subjects other than art. YouTube really influenced me. Back in 2008, there were just girls on there doing makeup or putting outfits together for fun. Definitely the blog days and Tumblr – just so obsessed with that. 

Did a talk with Minami on sukeban girls lead to this project? 

Anna: So me and Minami are both mixed Asian. We are culturally Japanese at different levels, and we’ve bonded over how as plus-sized women and being Japanese, there’s some complexity there and initially she had asked if I would be in it as a model, with her. I never really fantasised about being in uniform. I know a lot of people that grew up outside of Japan can fantasise about it, but because I grew up with it, it didn’t really cross my mind. But her point of view being like, I’ve never seen myself in Japanese pop culture like a chubby girl wearing a uniform – or if it is, it’s a fetishized thing. There’s a lot of us that want to own what we want to wear, how we want to be seen and our attitude towards life can be shown in a sukeban attitude.

What mood were the girls in? What were they thinking? 

Emily: We really wanted to build these full lives and worlds of the characters of these two girls, and so we talked about backstory and tried to tailor these characters that Sam and Minami were portraying towards what we felt was a bit of their natural inkling and vibe. Our thinking was they’re besties and they have that attitude of uh, it’s summer, we’re bored, we don’t wanna be in school. Maybe Minami is the friend who’s the more badass one. She’s smoking and Sam is the more reserved one. They do have the sad girl affect – like we’re trying to be badass, but part of that is performative. They’re trying to inhabit that the way when you’re a teenager, you’re trying to come off a certain way, but like at the end of the day, and we try to show this in the moments they’re by themselves – they still teen girls who have desires. They’re just searching for something, and we tried to make those emotionally come across in each scene. 

Yeah, why were they ten seconds? 

Anna: I wanted it to look like it could be a spec for a commercial – a teaser to something bigger, how a trailer is for a movie or TV commercial. There’s something more than just a photo, especially with trends of reels and TikTok – it was a very modern way of shooting. 

What would the film be about? 

Emily: My version of this is like a schoolgirl version of “Water Lillies” by Celine Sciamma, which is also where some of the inspiration came from. There is a still from that film where it’s a girl from the suburbs, in her room – leaning back on the carpet and the fan is blowing. I feel we did a very Japanese version of that! 

Anna: I can see this is their last summer together and they’re going through their internal emotions, just like how we all did when we were graduating high school – kind of a very transformative year, and painting that in a longer format, and just the personal turmoil of being a young adult girl going into the world. 

Sukeban girls were wearing a lot of makeup in the ‘70s. How did you create the look of the girls? 

Anna: Because they were high school girls, I wanted it to be realistic, because technically they were still in school. They weren’t actually doing bad things – it was more the attitude. Again, considering not to completely replicate the ‘70s and trends at the time. To keep it modern was important, and they could have done the makeup themselves! 

Talking about It Girls, what’s an It Girl like for you? 

Anna: For me it was like Lizzy McGuire. That probably showed my age a little bit! 

Emily: In school, I was obsessed with Zooey Deschanel. I think I probably tried to dress like her – got bangs that looked really bad in freshman year. 

Anna: Honestly, like Gossip Girl, and that whole era. Very different context, but there is the same essence of hierarchy and rebel.