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Abstract

The absence of comprehensive educational theory regarding dress codes results in deference to community norms as a way to determine implementation and compliance. Implementing dress codes ultimately results in inconsistent practices and violations of students’ rights. To the detriment to student learning, dress codes disproportionately affect girls and students of color embodying them as sexualized and inferior. Females are treated like objects while males are assumed to be incapable of controlling their sexual desires. School dress codes have been adopted as a means of controlling student behavior without fully exploring the relationship between curriculum and virtue. The current inconsistent dress code policies in schools violate curriculum theorists’ calls for a caring, democratic classroom environment. As part of the hidden curriculum in schools, dress codes serve to perpetuate oppression of females and minorities, thereby promoting the hegemony of the white male.
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A Curricular Critique of School
Dress Codes
Gretchen Marie Whitman #
Published online: 05 Feb 2020
$Download citation %https://doi.org/10.1080/00098655.2020.1721415
Abstract
The absence of comprehensive educational theory regarding
dress codes results in deference to community norms as a
way to determine implementation and compliance.
Implementing dress codes ultimately results in inconsistent
practices and violations of students’ rights. To the detriment
to student learning, dress codes disproportionately aect
girls and students of color embodying them as sexualized
and inferior. Females are treated like objects while males are
assumed to be incapable of controlling their sexual desires.
School dress codes have been adopted as a means of
controlling student behavior without fully exploring the
relationship between curriculum and virtue. The current
inconsistent dress code policies in schools violate curriculum
theorists’ calls for a caring, democratic classroom
environment. As part of the hidden curriculum in schools,
dress codes serve to perpetuate oppression of females and
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2/24/20, 3(18 PMA Curricular Critique of School Dress Codes: The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas: Vol 0, No 0
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minorities, thereby promoting the hegemony of the white
male.
Keywords: Curriculum theory, dress code, student rights, stereotypes
Introduction
At the beginning of the Back-to-School season there are
dozens of news stories about students being “dress coded”
for various infractions. For example, at the beginning of the
2019–2020 school year, a South Carolina mother argued
against the school dress code because it unfairly targeted
her daughter for wearing yoga pants to school without a long
t-shirt covering her bottom (Associated Press 2019). The
common intimation is that when students are punished for
dress code violations, teachers are “slut shaming” girls by
saying that their clothing is “disruptive to teaching and
learning” (Dockterman 2014, 1). Such a practice sends a
message to girls that they are to blame for male students’
and teachers’ inability to keep their eyes to themselves
(Bates 2015). Punishment for dress code violations makes
girls feel guilt; and in the event of a sexual assault,
“conditions boys to victim-blame women later in life”
(Dockterman 2014, 1). Dress codes are an integral
educational practice because they set standards and are
laden with meaning, yet curriculum theory largely ignores
their existence.
Hidden curriculum
According to Aghasaleh (2018), many school dress codes are
a form of oppression, disproportionately targeting females
and minorities. This practice “means some bodies are more
privileged over the other” (p. 102). A focus on students
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wearing yoga pants, tight jeans, spaghetti straps and the like
has made girls feel ashamed of their bodies. In essence girls
are being told that they are disrupting the educational
experiences of other students, boys in particular. In addition,
many minority students are further marginalized when they
are punished for wearing hooded sweatshirts or saggy jeans.
This situation is best summed up by Aghasaleh’s assertion
that “dress codes convey sexism with a male center gaze and
racism with White middle-class norms that serve as a hidden
curriculum with inherent biases” (p. 94).
Dress codes are established in order to enforce order and
decorum, however there are double messages being sent.
This implicit “slut-shaming” of girls through school-
sanctioned dress codes is a prime example of Michael
Apple’s concept of the hidden curriculum which refers to “the
norms and values that are implicitly, but eectively, taught in
schools and that are not usually talked about in teachers’
statements or end goals” (Apple 1979, 84). By reinforcing this
notion that girls need to cover up, schools are telling girls
that they need to be ashamed of their bodies.
Coupled with the hidden curriculum present in dress codes
is the idea of hegemony, which “implies that patterns in
society are held together by their tacit ideological
assumptions, rules if you will, which are not usually
conscious, as well as economic control and power” (Apple
1979, 86). This invisible oppression relegates girls to a
subordinate position in both their treatment vis-à-vis dress
codes and the elevation of boys’ educational experiences
above their own.
By considering that girls’ clothing can distract boys from their
studies is an aront to boys by suggesting that they are weak
and unable to control base, animalistic urges. To place the
education of boys in the crosshairs of the dress code debate
is unfair not only to girls, but it assumes that boys are
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Apr 2010
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Dressing “in
code”:
Clothing
rules,
propriety,
and
perceptions
Regan A. R.
Gurung et al.
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Issue 5
Published online: 8
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Article
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incapable of controlling sexual desire and therefore need to
have temptation locked away from them. Furthermore, it
ignores the fact that like all humans, boys have the ability to
reect on their actions, make decisions and apply reason.
A study of high school dress codes in the District of Columbia
found that African American female students are more
frequently cited for dress code violations (Barrett 2018).
These students are implicitly being told that their education
is not as important as their male and white counterparts.
According to Lovell (2016), the practice has been ongoing
since the 1960s when “schools recognized the power of strict
gender-specic and class-specic dress codes in suppressing
youth anarchy” (p. 77). A focus on adolescent girls’ clothing
sexualizes them thereby creating an environment in which
students are made to feel unworthy or uncomfortable,
eectively robbing them of their innocence.
Wesley Null (2011) states that “the relationship between
virtue and curriculum making has not been explored, and
the curriculum eld has suered for it” (p. 269). Likewise,
school dress codes have been adopted as measures of
controlling behavior without fully exploring this relationship
between curriculum and virtue. Aristotle’s concept of virtue
holds that it “separates humans from animals because it
requires reason, a capacity that animals do not possess.
Aristotle furthermore maintains that virtue is a characteristic
of our souls, not an excellence of the body” (p. 266). Divided
into two categories, the moral and the intellectual, virtues
encompass such notions as courage, friendship, practical
wisdom, intelligence, theoretical wisdom, science, art,
generosity, faith, hope, love, moderation and justice (Hendry
2011; Noddings 2012; Null 2011). The ideas that education
should promote the intellectual, physical and moral self;
include essential topics of study; and a mutually benecial
relationship between teacher and pupil, have become the
foundation for Western education (Hendry 2011). For
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centuries scholars have studied the teachings of Aristotle
and one of his “great legacies is his lasting inuence on
moral education” (Noddings 2012, 166). It is from this legacy
that school dress codes need to be examined and
administered. When an adversarial relationship is being
fostered through issues of control over student dress, the
question needs to be asked: What virtues are school dress
codes teaching children?
Letter of the law
While the matter of school dress codes has escaped the
critical gaze of curriculum theorizing, the area of law has
been grappling with this issue with regard to students’ rights
under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The First
Amendment protects citizens’ freedom of speech and
expression, while in terms of dress codes the Fourteenth
Amendment involves issues of personal liberty in which the
Equal Protection Clause is commonly invoked (Smith 2012;
Wilson 1998). The most well-known case involving the First
Amendment and school dress codes is Tinker v. Des Moines,
393U. S. 503 (1968). In this case, students were suspended
because they chose to wear black armbands to school as a
way of protesting the Vietnam War. The Supreme Court
“agreed with the students and held that they had been
suspended in violation of their rights” (Wilson 1998, 3).
Other noteworthy issues involving school dress code
violations have involved hair length, T-shirt slogans, and the
wearing of earrings to show gang aliation. In these cases
the decisions have been largely split. Historically when dress
codes have been challenged on the grounds of the First
Amendment, courts have upheld a school district’s right to
maintain health and safety of students. The courts have
aorded more protection to issues concerning symbolic
Disciplining
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Body:
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Transference
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for School
Dress
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Meredith Neville-
Shepard
Women's Studies in
Communication
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1
Published online: 10
May 2019
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''In this article
Abstract
Introduction
Hidden curriculum
Letter of the law
The behavioral
caveat
Is there a solution?
Conclusion
References
expression and less to dress and grooming (Lunenberg
2011). When deciding whether student dress is acceptable,
courts tend to “distinguish between dress codes that
regulate the medium of expression rather than the contents
of the message” (Weisenberger 2000, 7). Courts often defer
to the rulings of Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, 484U.S. 260 (1988)
and Bethel v. Fraser, 478U.S. 675 (1986) in which free speech
was challenged. Neither case had to do with dress codes,
however their rulings distinguished between speech that is
political, vulgar/lewd/oensive, and school sponsored (p.
4). Essentially, schools must determine whether the free
speech on a T-shirt is protected and to what extent that
protection applies to students (Mitchell and Knechtle 2003).
However, the bottom line is that the courts defer to the
school districts in their goal of “maintaining an educational
environment conducive to learning and in teaching students
community norms” (Wilson 1998, p. 4).
The troubling issue here is the continuity of community
norms. When “the court eectively adopts a ‘majority rules’
approach in determining what are appropriate values they
must recognize and protect” (Smith 2012, 257) it essentially
marginalizes segments of the student population. The
question arises of what the community considers a “norm”
and who decides on these norms. In most cases it is the
majority culture that determines these norms, therefore,
“the dominant elites consider the remedy to be more
domination and repression, carried out in the name of
freedom, order, and social peace” (Freire 2000, 78).
The Fourteenth Amendment has been the best avenue for
legal challenges to school dress codes in cases involving
transgender students. In Harper v. Edgewood, 655F. Supp.
1353 (S.D. Ohio 1987) students were prohibited from
wearing clothing to the prom that was typically worn by the
opposite sex. In another situation, Youngblood v. School
Board of Hillsborough County, 02-1089-24 (M.D. Fla. 2002) a
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girl’s yearbook photo was deleted because she chose to
dress in clothing considered more appropriate for a male.
Even though the case settled out of court, this complaint is
indicative of many situations in which “even where a school
permits a student to wear gender nonconforming clothing,
school dress codes are sometimes applied in a
discriminatory way in specic situations, such as yearbook
photographs” (Franson 2013, 5). In the case of Pat Doe v.
Yunits, 001060A (Mass. Cmmw. 2001), a Massachusetts
middle-school student was subjected to daily dress code
screening because after being diagnosed with Gender
Identity Disorder, the biological male student identied as
female. The school found the student’s desire to wear female
clothing to be distracting. The student led a suit against the
school and was supported by the courts on the basis of the
Fourteenth Amendment as well as Title VII of the Civil Rights
Act of 1964. By forcing these dress code standards on the
child, the school was found to be in violation of both the
student’s right to free expression and subjecting her to
sexual discrimination. While the student was adjudicated,
the bigger picture here, points to the fact that such
“heteronormative structures are limiting” (Sumara and Davis
2013, 315). Furthermore, by continuing to force students to
dress in a manner antithetical to their personal identity,
schools can do irreparable harm to a student’s identity
development.
According to Chickering’s Theory of Identity Development a
person’s “identity includes comfort with body and
appearance, comfort with gender and sexual orientation, a
sense of one’s social and cultural heritage” (Evans et al. 2010,
68) among other things. Without being able to attend to
these issues at a young age, a person could face identity
crises later in life causing crippling eects to both self-
esteem and interpersonal relationships. If a dress code’s
purpose is that a school “provides the foundation that
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supports all children in their development as lifelong
learners and contributing members of the community”
(Massachusetts Executive Oce of Education 2015), then by
subjecting students to such scrutiny does not meet the mark.
These legal cases create situations in which the students are
made to feel abnormal, such that “usually the ‘deviant’ label
has an
essentializing
quality in that a person’s (here, a
student’s) entire relationship to an institution is conditioned
by the category applied to him… and is usually viewed as
morally inferior” (Apple 1979, 135). Dress is eectively a way
in which young people in particular, express themselves and
to come under attack for it is destabilizing (DaCosta 2006;
Wilson 2012). Smith (2012) writes that “the proered intent
of school dress codes is to keep students safe and focused
on their work. While this is a valid and necessary objective,
there is a ne line between preventing distractions and
infringing upon constitutional rights” (p. 252). It is essential
that these cases of discrimination be settled not only by a
court of law but prevented in the rst place by well-thought
out policies based on informed theory.
The intention of dress codes is to protect students and to
maintain a conducive learning environment free from
distractions, however, many of these so-called infractions
seem to be more about maintaining social norms and
ignoring diversity (Lindsay 2015). In continuing to ignore
students’ rights to freedom of individual expression of
individuality, gender and religious preferences, school
districts are complicit in this hegemony that aids the
“reproduction of society, its class structure, cultural
variations, (and) institutions” (Grumet 1988, 4).
The behavioral caveat
Not all issues related to school dress codes are related to
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suppressing of student self-expression or the sexualizing of
girls. In some instances there may be a real need for dress
codes in order to maintain actual law and order of the
schools. According to Holloman et al. (1996), “minimal
empirical research exists about the relationship between
dress and behavior among youth in the school setting” (p.
270) however, many urban schools have dress codes in place
that restrict what students can wear in an eort to stop
students from displaying gang aliations. In addition, some
schools ban the wearing of certain expensive clothing items
so that students will not fall victim to theft. Clothing with
inappropriate slogans or depictions gives administrators just
cause for having students change their clothes. Few would
argue that obscenities in a school setting infringe on a
student’s rights to free speech.
All this being said, there still exists prejudice when
implementing dress codes. The wearing of certain colors or
styles of clothing at schools has been prohibited among
African American students, but white students at the same
schools have been allowed to wear these colors or symbols
(Herbon and Workman 2000). It has been noted that many
“dress codes may contain an inherent racial bias because
they tend to focus on clothing associated with African-
American gangs while ignoring other groups such as white
supremacist gangs” (Wilson 1998, 1). There is little evidence
showing a direct correlation between student dress and
violence, or even a reduction in gang membership, yet many
schools continue to restrict the wearing of earrings among
males and certain expensive clothing items (Holloman et al.
1996; Herbon and Workman 2000). Many of the preferred
clothing items and hairstyles worn by African American
students dier from the white, middle-class social norms
and therefore this “often causes undue and disproportionate
attention to be directed toward the dress-related behavior of
African American youth” (Holloman et al. 1996, 272).
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Is there a solution?
Researcher Diane Gereluk (2006, 2007) has grappled with the
issue of dress codes in both Canada and the United States.
She stated that “decisions regarding dress rest primarily with
those who are in oce at a particular time” (p. 644), and
furthermore, “few guidelines are available to help educators
and policy analysts to deal with these matters in a more
consistent way” (p. 644). Gilbert (1999), on the other hand,
suggested several principles to consider when implementing
eective dress codes. While Gereluk looks at this process
from the viewpoint of an educator, Gilbert provides a legal
lens. When taken together, a framework for administrators
to use when creating dress codes emerges. Dress codes
should:
Maintain health and safety of students
Minimize learning disruptions
Prevent intimidation, harassment, and oppression
Give consideration to students’ gender identity
Undergo continuous review for relevance
Recognize that style of dress is not a speech act
Be age appropriate
Ignore hair length as an issue
Finally, school administrators should be able to provide a
clear rationale for each guideline.
Increased scrutiny of student dress codes and the
subsequent punishment of students, girls in particular, has
led to some changes. The majority of these changes are the
result of activism on the part of students, parents, and
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school personnel. For example, Neville-Shepard (2019)
explains that a high school in Evanston, Illinois enforced an
equal treatment policy stating that individual students and
teachers are responsible for controlling their own reactions
to student dress without infringing on a students’ rights to
self-expression.
As opposed to mere dress codes, some (e.g., Holloman et al.
1996; Wilson 1998; Workman, Freeburg, and Lentz-Hees
2004) have studied the use of school uniforms. Embraced
back in the Clinton administration, school uniforms were
deemed as “a means of reducing and preventing dress-
related violence and other problems in public schools”
(Holloman et al. 1996, 268). Advocates see uniforms as
having an equalizing eect on students. Implemented in
such a way that all students wear the exact same thing
regardless of ethnicity or gender, creates a gender-neutral
dress code that leaves little room for self-expression, but
also leaves little room for interpreting, what some consider
arbitrary rules.
Conclusion
In the absence of comprehensive educational research and
theory school administrators are given little guidance on
developing school dress codes. They are given no choice but
to turn to case law and community norms to determine
these policies. Some current some dress code practices in
school districts sexualize young girls and further marginalize
minority students. Based on current news articles as well as
the case law, it is evident that a disproportionate amount of
dress code regulations target girls and minority students.
This has a tendency to send the message to these students
that they are inferior or outside of the accepted cultural
norms of the community. Dress codes are often applied
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inconsistently among dierent groups of students,
particularly African American students. In so doing, school
administrators are reproducing an oppressive class structure
that has existed for centuries. Because dress codes are an
undertheorized curricular practice, there needs to be
continued scrutiny of their implementation.
While there is no clear-cut answer to this issue, it is
important that dress code rules are applied thoughtfully,
fairly, and within the connes of students’ constitutional
rights.
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... Inevitably, teachers' attire passed through the same changes. Dress codes were created to eliminate this chaos and restore order in classrooms, although there are studies which also advocate for the negative effects of dress codes in schools (Whitman, 2020). ...
Article
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Introduction Generally, people do judge a book by its cover. The purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of teachers’ attire on students’ perception of 34 psychological dimensions. Methods The research is an experiment, with self-reported data, in groups, based on a questionnaire. The participants were 173 students (Mage = 12.16, SD = 1.74) from Suceava, Romania. Two groups of students were asked to listen to a sample lesson of a therapeutic story, narrated by a teacher. One group was given a picture of the attractive teacher and the other group a picture of the unattractive teacher, and were told that the teacher who is narrating is the teacher in the picture. After listening to the same story, the respondents had to answer a questionnaire about teachers’ personality and characteristics. Results The results indicated that when the teacher is perceived as being more attractive, the students have a greater openness for school activities, the evaluation of the teacher’s personality is more positive, the evaluation of the teaching effort is more positive, students expect a higher grade, and the perceived age of the teacher is lower. Discussion The article underlines the role of clothing in molding student’s perception and raises questions about dress codes in schools. Implications for school context are discussed.
... Failure to have appropriate representation of women, girls, and minoritized individuals within the guidelines also evidences a sexist men-centered gaze and racist white-centered orientation that maintains bias and a hidden curriculum within the policy arena. As found elsewhere, this undervalues Black and Brown girl SEL and eventuates in their bodies receiving disproportionate disciplinary consequences for personal dress (Aghasaleh 2018;Whitman 2020). ...
Article
Social emotional learning (SEL) aims to promote student well-being, including healthy relationships that are free from harm like gender-based-violence (GBV). We investigated U.S. SEL policy through the lens of GBV, and how policy in the New York State (NYS) context operates to actualize or constrain SEL aims. To do so, we developed and applied a novel feminist critical policy analysis (FCPA) heuristic. Key findings revealed that the NYS policy neglected to address GBV experienced by adolescent girls, and the overall absent presence of gender within the policy underscores concern for implementable SEL best practices. We conclude with implications for research, policy, and practice.
... Dress codes have long been a controversial policy that disproportionately target girls-black girls particularly. 37,38 This study suggests body size is another crucial dimension for the negative impact of dress code policies. On the other hand, positive facets of the school environment included health curricula focused on healthy behaviors, PE classes with the freedom to choose between activities, and body size diversity amongst staff. ...
Article
Background: Schools are crucial for preventing negative health outcomes in youth and are an ideal setting to address weight stigma and poor body image. The current study sought to examine and describe the nature of weight stigma and body image in adolescents, ascertain aspects of the school environment that affect body image, and identify recommendations for schools. Methods: We conducted 24 semi-structured interviews with students at 2 high schools in 2020. Qualitative data were analyzed using inductive coding and an immersion/crystallization approach. Results: Students did not report weight discrimination or harmful body image messaging from teachers or administrators. Physical education (PE) class and dress codes were 2 instances where covert weight stigma appeared. The most common forms of peer weight stigma reported were weight-based teasing and self-directed appearance critiques. Students recommended that schools eliminate dress codes, diversify PE activities, address body image issues in school, and be cognizant of teasing within friend groups. Conclusions: Weight stigma presents itself in unique ways in high school settings. Schools can play a role in reducing experiences of weight stigma and negative body image. Weight-related teasing within friend groups was common and may not be captured in traditional assessments of bullying. More nuanced survey instruments may be needed.
Article
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In this paper drawing on a study about school dress code policies and related issues—such as multiculturalism, racism, sexism, and homophobia, in the professional discourse—I show how similar the two patriarchal and White supremacist structures of education (school) and law enforcement (police) work. I argue that sexism, racism, homophobia, and classism in formal and hidden curriculum could be as mortal and brutal as it happened in cases of Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, and others. Dress codes convey sexism with a male center gaze and racism with White middle-class norms that serve as a hidden curriculum with inherent biases. That is, not acting White, not being lady-like, wearing butch-tomboy or ragged clothing, is disruptive to academic success. Discussing a dress code in a high school in a working-class Black community, I argue that like police officers, educators tend to make dangerous judgments about bodies. Finally, to stop the harmful reproduction of such judgments, I suggest what Judith Butler calls “subversive repetition” and “subversive citation” (Butler 1990, p. 147) which allows resisting the everyday experiences that produce oneself to address the question that how can we, as teachers, school administrations, and teacher educators, resist those practices that produce our bodies as vulnerable and potential victims and others’ bodies as dangerous and potential violators. To problematize, to conceptualize, and to enhance the above-mentioned argument, I will draw on several feminist frameworks such as performativity (Butler 1990), intersectionality (Crenshaw 1989), and objectification (Fredrickson and Roberts 1997).
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This paper traces the origins, tactics, and reception of teenage feminism between the late-1960s and mid-1970s. Letters and essays written by teenage girls during this time demonstrate how girls saw feminism as a tool to challenge gender role socialization and build a supportive and collaborative community of girl activists within this revolutionary context. When compared to male or adult peers, teenage feminists during the Second Wave were perceived as illegitimate and inconsequential (Graham in Young activists: American high school students in the age of protest. Northern Illinois University Press, Dekalb, 2006]. These perceptions have inadvertently positioned teenage feminism as a post-Second Wave “girl power” movement (Snyder in Sisterhood interrupted: from radical women to girls gone wild. Palgrave Macmillan, New York City, 2008; Siegel in Signs 34(1):175–196, 2007]. However, using primary sources written by girls, this paper illuminates how teenage and adult feminists created space within the women’s liberation movement to identify, discuss, and combat the particular gender oppressions experienced by adolescent girls. Through consciousness-raising groups, essays, and direct actions, teenage feminists focused on the materiality of sexual objectification and gender discrimination. Framing their own form of body politics, they fought against sex-specific dress codes, sex segregation in schools, courses, and sports, as well as lack of access to sex education and birth control. Teenage and adult feminists argued that these gendered customs trained girls for subservience that prevented them from attaining full citizenship. Vivid personal narratives by girls illuminate the impacts of feminism on their gender identity and relations. Ultimately, by challenging age divisions between the adult-dominated face of the Second Wave and the girl-focused Third Wave, this paper uses the voices of teenage girls to shed light on an earlier movement of “girl power” that has yet to be excavated.
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There is great discrepancy in how schools enforce their dress codes and uniform policies. Schools also vary in the rationales they provide for banning certain kinds of clothing. These rationales include protecting students' health and safety, minimizing social class indicators between students, and creating cohesion and uniformity through a dress policy. As of late, schools have been faced with an increasing amount of controversial cases where schools have banned certain student clothing symbolic of their political, social, or religious identity. I wish to highlight three cases of this kind: a British girl who won the appeal to wear the jilbab 1 to school, American students who were banned from wearing political t-shirts to school, and English and American students who were banned for wearing Rastafarian dreadlocks. I have chosen these three cases to elucidate the way in which these symbols represent religious, political, and social forms of identity.
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Debates about the use of school uniforms in public schools have received much attention in the last few years. Many educational stakeholders believe that uniforms may curb negative behaviors associated with student dress such as teasing, absenteeism, tardiness, gang-related activity, and school violence. One primary argument espoused by opponents is that uniforms interfere with students' right to choose their dress-a violation of students' First Amendment right to free speech. This article describes selected constitutional issues related to the use of school uniforms with a focus on the First Amendment and concludes with implications for uniform policies in public schools.
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Based on an examination of news coverage from 2013 to mid-2018, this article analyzes rhetoric in favor of school dress codes policies. I illustrate how women’s bodies are problematized in order to manifest grounds for regulating female attire. By employing pragmatic lines of argument, pro-dress code rhetors foster what I term consequential transference. Because pragmatic arguments rely on identifying consequences, questions of agency are implicit, as presuppositions of who is responsible for the consequences are embedded into the fabric of the discourse. In this case, dress code defenders paint female immodesty as responsible for several harmful potentialities, including negative social judgments, sexual harassment, and the distraction of male students in the classroom. I assert that pragmatic argumentation is a serviceable tool for underwriting misogynistic culture because consequential transference warrants female regulation and punishment by diminishing the accountability of other actors.
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Among contemporary schoolchildren, wearing certain items or brands of clothing, particularly those associated with celebrity status or gang membership, is accompanied by serious problems including peer competition and ostracism, theft, assault, and even murder. Increasingly, dress code and uniform policies have been implemented in public schools to reduce and prevent such problems. This article describes the nature of dress-related conflicts for Black public school students and parents across socialization and contextual settings. Casting the issue holistically as a health and safety concern, it examines the implications of policies and practices that have been offered to address these problems.