Property Of
In “The Uniform: A Sociological Perspective.”, Nathan Joseph and Alex Nicholas define the uniform to be a costume or device defining boundaries, distinctiveness, or uniformity that works to eliminate “conflict” and conform to the goals of members of a group.
Uniforms serve various functions: it both exposes and disguises statuses, reject individuality, and can certify legitimacy. The utilization of school uniforms also results in symbolic communication across the different social groups inside and outside of the school system.
For example, the ideas of social class and economic capital are communicated through the enforcement of uniforms at the university level in Thailand. The cultural representation it gives of a particular group of individuals belonging together as a unity and the overwhelmingly positive views students have toward the university uniform generate affirmation of social class. At the same time, acceptance of and wearing the uniform shows a level of obedience to the rules that were put in place by the superiors and shows respect for the institution.
Foucault also compares the “oppressive classroom dynamic” to military infrastructure and how the authoritarian leader disciplines the young. Foucault takes the isolation of students from society to assure control over them and describes such actions as “enclosure.” The enclosure enables the authorities, the instructors, and the institution to gain control over the students and creates an environment that would be dedicated to working in order to increase the productivity of the students who occupy the space.
Furthermore, school uniforms manipulate how the students behave in the learning environment of the school. For example, female students would have to be aware of how they sit every time in the classroom due to the skirts they must wear. As some schools have stairs that the students must pass through to get to their next class, female students have to worry about if their undergarments will be visible to those walking behind them.
A uniform that was meant to rid all distractions and maximize productivity in a space that was also designed as a productive workspace is potentially part of what is hindering the students from working at their full potential.
My thesis “Property Of” investigates how articles of clothing, particularly school uniforms, can be a tool for those with power to impose their ideologies on the collective students to hold power over, overly sexualize and dehumanize them.
This thesis redesigns the school uniform (for the US, Thailand, and Japan) to make the argument that the choices we can or cannot make about what we wear and the deliberate designs of the uniforms result in the enforcement of power.
Furthermore, the project works to highlight the inequality between genders and the restriction of movement by the female school uniform by over-exaggerating the given rules to make them unavoidable or by denying the constraints given by the institutions. Short skirts are cut even shorter to limit mobility. Bows and frills that are meant to add a required sense of femininity drawn out to a point beyond function.
A format of the storefront will be used to display these redesigned uniforms to attract consumers in order to sell a product or message within the society where ideas are being spread through commercialized items. Much like how Marcel Duchamp had done in his Lazy Hardware storefront display, the window becomes a frame for the collection of work, and the storefront window display becomes a physical manifestation of the exaggerated ideas presented, becoming a framed stage drawing the public to dive deeper into the issues of sexualization within school systems.
“Property Of ” is meant to make people uncomfortable in hopes of spreading awareness and starting a conversation on feminism and the battle of women against the patriarchal culture that has objectified them. The project proposes uniforms as fashion and brings to attention the commercialized aspect of fashion and the structure of power reflected in the designs.
