The Fabric of Conformity, Appearance as Social Text

“ What mockery to prate of the equality of the sexes when one sex possesses the freedom of uniform, and the other is the slave of ever-varying costume! Think of the great portion of a lifetime we women are condemned to spend merely on keep-ing our sleeves in style! Talk of our playing with scholarship or politics when we are all our days panting disheveled after scampering Dame Fashion, who, all our broken-winded lives, is just a little ahead! Yet dress-reform is the first article in our creed of antipathies, and I, for one, am last of ladies to declare myself a heretic. ”

“ What sense, what manliness, what dignity, is there in allowing a "fashion-designer" to thus have the opportunity of ruining our health? Let us radiate our positive repudiation of such insane follies, of such sins against our bodies, and in our dress, our food, our social customs, be ourselves in a kindly, unselfish, unobtrusive manner.
Wherever fashion dictates in matters of dress, of personal custom, there you find at once a restricted and "provincial" people. For fashion compels adherence to her silly commands, hence picturesque individuality disappears. ”

“ Why may not a beautiful head of hair be dressed flowingly, because the fashion favours the people who have no hair at all? Why may not a plain dress set off a fine figure, because the mode is to leave no unbroken line or sweeping drapery anywhere? And I might go on endlessly."
"I can't tell, I am sure," said Miss Julia; "but if one lives in the world, it won't do to defy the world. ”

“ Whether, to wear a head-dress, however, depends not alone upon fashion but upon the individual. If the type of hair ornament at the moment in fashion is becoming, wear it, especially to balls and in a box at the opera. But if it is not becoming, don't.
Ladies of fashion, by the way, do not have their hair especially dressed for formal occasions. Each wears her hair a certain way, and it is put up every morning just as carefully as for a ball. The only time it is arranged differently is for riding. An informal dinner dress is merely a modified formal one. ”

“ If one of these prohibitions be binding upon nations of the present age, the others are not less so. To the second objection, it may be said that beauty and grace in matters of dress are determined by no rules, and if the fashion of men's clothes be awkward it can easily be improved.
Women who prefer the gown should, of course, consult their own pleasure by continuing to wear it; while those whose preference is a male dress, ought not to be blamed for adopting it. ”

“ The uniformity of costume appears to represent uniformity of sentiment and to ensure a sort of harmony amongst the convives. What society really cares for is harmony; what it dislikes is dissent and nonconformity. It wants peace in the dining-room, peace in the drawing-room, peace everywhere in its realm of tranquil pleasure. You come in your shooting-coat, which was in tune upon the moors, but is a dissonance amongst ladies in full dress. ”

“ No two people are suited to exactly the same costume; and the more society develops the more the individual shows a desire for individuality in dress. No nation with a sense of beauty will ever consent to eternal sameness. ”

“ What would become of our equality if one man or woman were allowed to swagger about in golden hair, while another had to put up with carrots? Men have not only got to be equal in these happy days, but to look it, as far as can be. By causing all men to be clean shaven, and all men and women to have black hair cut the same length, we obviate, to a certain extent, the errors of Nature. ”

“ If fashion be followed from no higher view than a selfish love of being admired, then the feeling is wrong."
"Can we follow fashion with any other end?"
"Answer the question yourself. You follow the fashions."
"I think but little about them, Mary."
"And yet you dress very much like people who do."
"That may be so. The reason is, I do not wish to be singular."
"Why?"
"For this reason. A man who affects any singularity of dress or manners, loses his true influence in society. ”

“ A certain proportion of people, on the other hand, think of style in dress as a sort of self-advertisement, a matter of force and emphasis, a question of flamboyance and the dernier cri. And there are still others who, with a finer conservatism, understand style to be that rare art in dress which effects a perfect compromise between the prevailing fashion and the personality, and which unerringly chooses, in color and in form, the garment best designed to suit, most completely and at the same time most unobtrusively the individual need. ”

“ Children of both sexes always wear the hair short like the men; but as the girls grow up, they allow the hair to grow, and permit it to flow over their shoulders on either side of the face. They do not part it, but bring it down over the forehead, and cut it in a straight line just above the eyebrows. When they marry, they allow the whole of the hair to grow, and part it in the middle. They do not plait or otherwise dress it, but merely allow it to hang loosely in its natural curls. ”

“ The Professor himself expressed it almost in those words: “It is because of the infinite variety of type and the complexity of modern life which the individual is called upon to encounter, that a sort of fancy dress has to be worn by all of us, as a necessary shield to our individuality and our privacy. We cannot go through the complex process of adjustment to each new type that we come across, so by common consent, we wear our domino, and respect the unwritten laws of the great bal masqué that we call society.” ”

“ The common people roll their plaits around their heads, like a turban, and shave the front of the scalp. Young persons who insist on remaining single, or bachelors arrived at a certain or uncertain age, and who have not yet found a wife, secretly cut off their hair, or get it done by fraud, in order to pass for married folks and avoid being treated as children. Such a custom, however, is a gross violation of morals and etiquette. ”

“ And this order and dignity must be taught them by the women of the upper and middle classes, whose minds can be in nothing right, as long as they are so wrong in this matter as to endure the squalor of the poor, while they themselves dress gaily. And on the proper pride and comfort of both poor and rich in dress, must be founded the true arts of dress ”

“ The Desire for Recognition. This wish is expressed in the general struggle of men for position in their social group, in devices for securing a recognized, enviable, and advantageous social status. Among girls’ dress is now perhaps the favorite means of securing distinction and showing class. A Bohemian immigrant girl expressed her philosophy in a word: “After all, life is mostly what you wear.” ”

“ A girl’s dress is suddenly lengthened, her hair is put up, she is allowed to wear jewels, she kisses her sovereign’s hand, a dance is given in her honour; abruptly, from her seclusion in the cocoon state of the schoolroom, she emerges full-blown into society. But the custom, with its half-realized savagery, is already dying, and with boys it does not obtain at all. ”

“ Fashion is daring, and every now and then announces some startling innovation in the way of gay street-dress. But the public sentiment of refined people is so definitely fixed in favor of quiet dress for public thoroughfares that these "daring" fashions soon become the sole property of the ignorant class.
Dress for church, or for business, should be plain in design, and subdued in color; and for most occasions when a lady walks to pay visits or calls, a plain tailor-made costume is most suitable. Carriage dress may be gayer in colors, and more dressy in style of cut and trimmings. ”

“ They frequently dedicated it to the gods, on important occasions of marriage, victory, escape from death and danger, and the burial of friends. Different styles of wearing the hair, was resorted to for denoting the various grades, or positions in life, of the people, some wearing it quite long, others short, and some dressing it in a peculiar manner,—each style, or length, being according to the condition, wealth, or social standing of the wearer. ”

“ Such a gathering usually brings together a significant part of one’s personal world. Well chosen jewelry will confirm a woman’s standing in that community, and it will be a source of gratification to her husband and to her hosts if she is tastefully adorned. Wearing one’s best jewelry and finest gown is a gracious way of paying tribute to one’s hostess, as well as doing one’s duty as a guest, to help make the party a success.
At the dinner party a parure, a matching ensemble, is quite attractive. ”

“ Do not confine your attention to dress to your public appearances. Accustom yourselves to an habitual neatness, so that in the most careless undress, in your most unguarded hours, you may have no reason to be ashamed of your appearance.—You will not easily believe how much we consider your dress as expressive of your characters. Vanity, levity, slovenliness, folly, appear through it. An elegant simplicity is an equal proof of taste and delicacy. ”

“ To make of it an occasion for ostentatious change in her way of living seemed to her as unnatural as is the practice of the barbarians in our midst who use a wedding—that most sacred and private event in a young girl’s life—as an opportunity for display of the coarsest and crudest character. To rivet the attention of friends on bride and bridegroom is to offend against the most delicate susceptibilities of modesty. ”

“ The recessional is played, and the procession goes out in reversed order. Bride and groom first, then bridesmaids, then ushers, again all taking pains to fall into step with the leaders.
On no account must the bridesmaids walk either up or down the aisle with the ushers! Once in a while the maid of honor takes the arm of the best man and together they follow the bride and groom out of the church. But it gives the impression of a double wedding and spoils the picture. ”

“ A bridesmaid may have assumed the obligations of that honor, and then found that, for personal reasons, they were distasteful to her. She should not, however, permit herself to fail in one iota of her duty. The always-remembered disappointment of the bride, or bridegroom, if either bridesmaid or best man should fail, at a time when life should be as full of happiness as it possibly could, should more than offset the pain of even difficult control on the part of the chosen friend, in order to carry out his or her obligations satisfactorily. ”

“ During the whole of the marriage day the bride must be as mute as a statue. If she says a word or even makes a sign she becomes an object of ridicule, and her silence must remain unbroken even in her own room, though her husband may attempt to break it by taunts, jeers, or coaxing, for the female servants are all on the qui vive for such a breach of etiquette as speech, hanging about the doors and chinks to catch up and gossip even a single utterance, which would cause her to lose caste for ever in her circle. ”

“ White is for the girl-bride only. The woman who marries for the second time indulges in none of the age-old customs that the first bride does. She does not wear a white veil; she does not carry orange blossoms; she does not have flower girls or pages or bridesmaids. The more inconspicuous the second wedding is, the more it is in accordance with the rules of etiquette.
The bride-for-the-second-time may have a maid of honor only on one occasion. If she has a church wedding and invites numerous guests, she may have a maid of honor to precede her to the altar. ”

“ No matter how young or "natural" and thoughtless she may be, she must, during the ceremony and the short time that she stands beside her husband at the reception, assume that she has dignity.
It is not by chance that the phrase "happy pair" is one of the most trite in our language, for happiness above all is the inner essential that must dominate a perfect wedding. An unhappy looking bride, an unwilling looking groom, turns the greatest wedding splendor into sham; without love it is a sacrament inadvisedly entered into, and the sight of a tragic-faced bride strikes chill to the heart. ”

“ A modern wedding is one of the most intricate and exhausting of social customs. Young men and women of our better classes are now forced to devote a large part of their lives to acting as brides, grooms, ushers and bridesmaids at various elaborate nuptials. Weeks are generally required in preparation for an up-to-date wedding; months are necessary in recovering from such an affair. Indeed, some of the participants, notably the bride and groom, never quite get over the effects of a marriage. ”

“ Thus, marriage is looked upon as an inevitable fate by both sexes.
In a country like Japan where ceremony envelops every phase of life, such an important event as a wedding is, as may be expected, governed at every step by strict etiquette, and to celebrate it in proper style one needs to call in a regular professor of etiquette. But though weddings in high society are still perplexing tangles of formalities, the tendency to-day among the middle classes is to strip them as much as possible of unnecessary ceremony. ”

“ The dress worn by a guest at a wedding may be as rich as desired, but should not have a bridal appearance. Sometimes a recent bride wears her own wedding gown at a friend's wedding; but it is in better taste not to do so, nor in any other way to invite comparisons. The bride should be permitted to be the conspicuous figure at her own wedding, and while her friends may pay her the compliment of wearing handsome toilettes on that occasion, still, other women should dress just a little less elaborately, rather than commit the solecism of "out-dressing the bride." ”

“ A man’s clothing is his defence; but with a woman all dress is adornment. Nature decrees it; adornment is her instinctive delight. And, above all, the adorning of a bride; it brings out so charmingly the meaning of the thing. ”