Clothing has its own meaning in communication. We are being judged by our clothing every time we come in contact with someone. Human communication is accomplished by two ways, one third by words and the rest by nonverbal communication (Hickson, 1989). Clothes serve to be protection, social identification, sexual attraction, and many other services. Someone’s clothing can be different compared to others. Their clothing is based on their age, gender, occupation, personality, and values. According to William Thourlby, there are ten decisions that people around someone make based on their clothing along (Hickson, 1989). The ten decisions are:
Dress codes in middle and high schools are a form of discrimination against teenage girls in today’s society. Parents and students all over the country argue that dress codes are directed mainly at girls and are a blatant example of gender inequality. The idea behind the strict enforcement of a dress code is that it will teach self-respect and raise moral standards for the students. However, when the reason for many dress code violations is questioned the rationale is often to prevent distracting the male students. Young women across the country are being shamed and punished for wearing what schools consider immodest and being a distraction to their male peers. This discrimination against female students results in their clothes being strictly regulated and dress coded more often than male students’ clothes are. The enforcement of these discriminatory dress codes has become a form of public humiliation for female students. Theoretically, a dress code makes sense and should be effective. In reality, it does not affect how students dress but causes a distraction and interruption of a girl’s education.
In Zhou, Li’s article “The Sexism of School Dress Codes,” she explains how the dress codes are diminishing children's self-esteem and, is mostly sexist towards girls as well as the LGBT community. To reach a wide audience including students, parents, and high school administrators, she relies on a wide variety of sources from high school students to highly credited professors. Zhou creates a strong argument against strict dress codes and encourages audience to take a stand against out of date dress codes that schools implement, using the rhetorical tools ethos, pathos, and logos to advance her argument.
Throughout time clothing has been an important part of individual’s lives often reflecting one’s culture and personality. People use clothing to express themselves and to help others see who they are. One particular group of people that uses dress as a way to express who they are and how they feel are black women. In the seventies black people were finally allowed to attend mostly white universities, although this was a huge step forward, black women did not feel like they fit in. Black women and men decided to turn to clothing and their appearance in order to find a sense of self in a world surrounded by whites. Tanisha Ford presented “Liberated Threads: Black Women, Style, and the Global Politics of Soul” explaining why dress matters to black
Throughout history, women have been victims of oppression no matter what religion or background they come from. They have learned from a young age, that their appearance is important to fundamentally be happy in their life. The topic of oppression in woman leads to controversial discussion not only to scholars but women of all parts of the world. How a woman presents herself through appearance and clothing targets her in a society obsessed with each other’s business. In today’s society, whether we can help it or not, men are treated differently than women. There seems to be different “rules” associated with the acceptable ways they should dress as opposed to the strict rules that apply to women. Women who are westernized
In today’s world social media, television programs, and the Internet in general seems to define and set a model for how people should act, dress, and unfortunately in the end is a large defining factor in how young adults believe their bodies should look. This social setting is exactly what Susan Bordo is discussing in this particular writing. However, this social
How does somebodies attire effects other people’s judgments of them? More specifically, how does attire of women influences others judgments? These are questions that take root from evolving problems in the world today. It is hard to give an honest answer because it is an opinionated argument. However, appropriate attire policies is a growing problem for society, there is a growing demand for equality in male and female attire. The argument is expressed in an article written by Laura Bates called, “How School Dress Codes Shame Girls and Perpetuate Rape Culture”. The problem is that women are expected to dress in a way that is socially acceptable. Socially acceptable means that, females must dress in a way that protects and covers the female anatomy. This argument that Bates explains, expresses a pathos appeal because you are allowed to understand the point of view of those who have been victimized by dress codes. The article also gives an ethos appeal because the article makes a person question their morale value. Questioning whether dress codes are equal or unjust and sexist. Reading the argumentative peace it is obvious that Bates stands against sexist dress codes.
This set of photographs shows couples from the project “Switcheroo.” The clothing in which the couple wears expresses defining gender qualities. Dresses are viewed and labelled as feminine while pants and dress shirts represent masculinity. These photos contribute to Margo DeMello’s perspective on the gendered nature of men’s and women’s clothing. Both models can express their gender through their facial expressions, stance, and posture.
“BEFOR I CAN TALK TO YOU, PEOPLE SHOW THEIR SEX, AGE, CALSS, POSITION, WITH WHAT THEY ARE WEARING. ALL THIS IS REGISTERED UNCONCIOSLY“ Those words said by Alison Lurie in the language of clothes (1992), reflect perfectly the main point of my research. The society we are now living is an extremely conscious society regarding body image and the way we are presented to the exterior. We found an obsessive trend on wanting to look like celebrities by having certain items or looks and in relation to that a fear of not being percepted the tight way. This is where we found relation to how clothes are part of a conversation we haven 't started and are a form of expression. As there will be explained further on, we use clothes as a sign of our identity,as a way of representing ourselves and stand out from the crowd and also influence on how we appear in front of others making them (clothes) a huge part of our non verbal communication. This essay will discuss the ideas behind self -expression and the role of clothes has changed in that mater thought time.
In our society, there are norms of what is considered to be feminine and what is to be considered masculine, but how are these norms constructed? Through the use of toys, books, and clothing, children are socialized into their “appropriate” gender. These objects provide influence over behavior and appearance, showing boys and girls what is appropriate for each gender. After some investigation it was found that the toys, books, and clothing that children use not only foster the norms of gender behavior and appearance, but also construct gender roles in their young minds.
During our life we construct many different identities of who we want to portray ourselves as to the rest of society; fashion plays a vital role in generating who we are. With the ideas from Storry and Childs they state that “the way that we dress can either serve to confirm or to subvert various facets of our identities, such as our gender,
As stated before, psychology is a form of self-expression, and a form of visual communication. The way one dresses may put one in a fashion subcategory. These subcategories are thought of as a whole and are subject to judgment and discrimination of sorts. For example, a person with many tattoos and a vintage style of clothing may be viewed as a “hipster”, and hence the viewer may assume many things of the individual. The fit of garments say many things about oneself. Made-to-fit clothing on men in the business world is more respectable than non-tailored clothes. With women, skirt suits create the balance between attractiveness and masculinity in order to appear respectable, much more than the overly aggressive pant suit. One may see the effect of clothing when one researches on how to dress for an interview in order to make an impression upon the hiring manager.
Ever since their invention many centuries ago, clothes have been used as a way of communicating. The message communicated relies on a number of factors including the social background of both the communicator and the receiver, and the context in which the message is communicated. Although at times the exact message or symbolism one is trying to portray may not be clear, it is evident that clothing has long been embraced as one of the best ways to project one’s desired personal image to those around them.
Children learn at a very early age what it means to be a boy or a girl in our society. As children grow and develop, the gender stereotypes they are exposed to at home are reinforced by many elements in their environment and are thus perpetuated throughout childhood followed by adolescence. One major societal issue uprising with the way children are raised in today’s society is the gender specific dressing for boys and girls. The history with gender specific dressing is a one sided masculine enforced point of view for centuries. As children move through childhood and into adolescence, they are exposed to many factors which influence their behaviors and attitudes regarding gender roles. It is difficult for a child in today’s society to grow to adulthood without experiencing some form of gender bias or stereotyping. The question lies whether the view of gender specific dressing shall change or stay the same. As society continues to evolve and grow so does the tolerance of new uprising views for the general purpose of equality and freedom to do as pleased. Children regularly learn to adopt gender roles which are not always fair to both sexes. These attitudes and behaviors are generally learned first in the home but then reinforced by their environment, school experience, and media viewing. Nonetheless, the strongest influence on gender role development seems to occur within the family setting. Culture, values, and beliefs are the parents early role for passing on, both overtly
To gain knowledge of how we communicate to others through the way we dress, we have to first understand what identity is. Identity is what we choose to represent ourselves as, be that a gender identity, a sexual identity; it is completely up to the individual as a person to make that choice. Identity forms the basis of one’s pride and being accepted socially only adds to that ego and integrity. The psychology of the matter is the way we dress is more or less based on our moods, habits, inspirations, past, present and future. The character of a person is reflected in the way that they dress, Clothing can act as a simple glance into someone’s life, as we are already know that different clothing can represent different means of culture; Clothes are used a language to communicate with society and to commonly let them know what you want to be viewed as.