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ClothesMaketheLawyer 13 - 12 May 2008 - Main.ClaireOSullivan
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I am having trouble understanding what is at the crux of the discussion, in class and in the comments on Mina's paper, about clothes and class. I see that we categorize each other according to socioeconomic status, based on our clothes. Yet, Eben observes that it is a rare law student who dresses properly for an interview (I, for instance, know next to nothing about suits, let alone the nuances of buttons and collars). So we can assume that many incorrectly attired law students are offered jobs anyway, and learn to dress properly for their respective jobs once they already have them. It follows then, that I wear will depend on what I do, and not vice versa. If I change jobs, my clothes will change. So if clothes are not a bar to raising one's socioeconomic status, but rather an indication of that status once attained, where and when does the relationship between clothes and class become important? | | |
-- BarbPitman - 11 May 2008 | |
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To clarify my original question: I'm wondering what the significance is of the relationship between clothes and class. Is it that clothes make class distinctions visible, and therefore more rigid? Is it that it speaks to a desire to reinforce class distinctions even as we pretend we have moved past them?
My problem with the answers I came up with was: if we assume that class is defined mostly by job, and we don't start "dressing the part" (because we don't know how to) until we already have the part, then clothes are not a bar, or a guaranteed entry, to any particular class. So it would seem that clothes bear very little on our ability to move within the social strata. But I may be making too much of that. What do other people think about this?
-- ClaireOSullivan - 12 May 2008 | | | |
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