A Collaged Analysis of Dress Codes
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The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of Arts and Architecture THREE CODES: A COLLAGED ANALYSIS OF DRESS CODES AND ART CLASS ASSESSMENTS IN A U.S. HIGH SCHOOL A Dissertation in Art Education and Women’s Studies by Amy Albert Bloom © 2014 Amy Albert Bloom Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2014 The dissertation of Amy Albert Bloom was reviewed and approved* by the following: Christine Marmé Thompson Professor of Art Education Dissertation Adviser Co-Chair of Committee Yvonne Gaudelius Professor of Art Education, Affiliate Faculty in Women’s Studies Associate Vice President and Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education Co-Chair of Committee Charles Garoian Professor of Art Education Jacqueline Reid-Walsh Associate Professor of Education, Affiliate Faculty in Women’s Studies Graeme Sullivan Professor of Art Education Director of The School of Visual Arts Graduate Coordinator *Signatures are on file in the Graduate School ii Abstract In this dissertation I examine two common practices within a U.S. high school: dress codes and grading within an art class. Viewing the practices as aesthetic judgments that are regulatory and disciplinary, I layer and collage them in text form and in visual form, to analyze their effects within school. I interviewed young women to gather their memories of dress in high school. I also solicited stories about their use of drawings both inside and outside of art class. These stories create a narrative of how girls present themselves through dress and art production according to their perceptions of what is important within the school structure; but also how they use dress and drawings for their own purposes of pleasure, informal communication, and achieving goals. I interviewed art teachers to gather similar stories; to develop a picture of the ways teachers imagine their performance and appearance are judged by themselves and others, and how this relates to the judgment of their ability as a teacher. Layering the responses shows how teachers and students are enmeshed in practices of shaping each other’s perceived value, partly through what I call school aesthetics. Using feminist methodologies allows questioning and disrupting of the traditional authoritarian position of the expert, and in turn of the teacher as expert. Pushing this disruption, I argue that the practices analyzed here produce divisions among students, and between teachers and students. Using Foucault’s theories as a methodology of “pointing-to” areas I believe are useful to examine, I raise the question of whether these repetitive dividing practices are intrinsic to our systems of education: routines that continually re-form students into hierarchies of knowers and non-knowers, those who belong and those who are outliers, as the knowledge and behavior deemed essential shifts with the perceived need for divisions. iii The third code I explore regards the formal code of the dissertation. I consider the aesthetics of knowledge production and I present part of my research in the form of collage, zines, and comics; advocating non-traditional, multi modal forms of research as valid and potentially useful to high school students and teachers. key words: aesthetics, art education, dress codes, grading, high school, knowledge production, zines. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures…………………………………………………………………… vii Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………… viii Chapter 1. Introduction…………………………………………………………. 1 Introduction to the Introduction: My Old School………………………………… 1 Introduction: Two Stories ………………………………………………………… 6 Kasey’s Dress ……………………………………………………………… 6 Roxanne’s Drawing ………………………………………………………… 7 School Aesthetics ………………………………………………………… 8 Chapter 2. Methods……………………………………………………………… 15 Collecting Conversations and Analyzing Them With Caution.......................... 15 Talking to Girls………………………………………………………….... 18 Talking to Teachers…………………………………………………….… 21 Autoethnography, and Teachers as Insider Researchers ……………………… 24 Texts & Gathering ………………………………………………………… 25 Collage & Layering……………………………………………………….. 26 Chapter 3. The Foucault Toolbox ………………………………………………… 30 Chapter 4. The Dress Code: Protecting Us From Girls’ Dangerous Bodies ……. 37 Sweatshirt Monsters…………………………………………………………… 44 The Annotated Dress Code Begins on the Next Page………………………… 52 Chapter 5. A Short Genealogy of Girls’ Advice Literature, For Girls and Other Interested Parties………………………………………….. 67 The Bestsellers of Dr. Gregory & Reverend Fordyce………………………… 71 Periodicals & Christian Tracts………………………………………………… 76 Girls’ Diaries…………………………………………………………………. 79 Comic Books and Magazines………………………………………………… 80 The Second Wave & Girls’ Voices…………………………………………… 82 Chapter 6. The Ideal Schoolgirl Zine……………………………………………. 88 The Ideal Schoolgirl Zine Begins on the Next Page………………………….. 95 Chapter 7. The Art Classroom as Freedom: Realities and Myths……………….. 107 Sam’s Gift Cards……………………………………………………………… 112 Feminist Zines & Good Taste………………………………………………… 116 Divergent Art in School Spaces……………………………………………… 126 v Chapter 8. Stories We Tell in School, and Some Myths…………………………. 133 Re-Education………………………………………………………………….. 138 The Importance of Flair………………………………………………………. 140 Teacher Flair………………………………………………………………. 143 A Teacher’s Reputation: A Teacher Zine ………………………….……….… 145 The Teacher Zine Begins on the Next Page ………………………….............. 150 Student Flair…………………………………………………………………… 161 Chapter 9. Pleasure in Clothes and Making: A Dubious Art Education Instructional Goal and An Exercise in Arts-Based Research…………. 164 Make Your Own Girl Teen Fashion Can!!!......................................................... 167 Detailed Instructions for Girl Teen Fashion Can, Just Like the One Shown…... 171 Chapter 10. A Lesson in Division…….…………………………………………… 173 Beaver’s IQ Test……………………………………………………………….. 175 Poor Kids………………………………………………………………………. 180 Lynda Barry’s Education………………………………………………………. 184 Chapter 11. Conclusions & Findings………………………………………….… 189 Findings: The Dress Code………………………………………….……....... 189 Findings: The Dress Code & Drawings..….………………………………...... 191 Findings: Teacher Positions.…………………….……………………...…..… 193 Taste.…………………………………………………………………..…... 193 Zines.…………………………………………………………………......... 194 Teacher Independence..…………………………………………………..… 194 Findings: Arts-Base Research……………………………………………....... 195 Loose Ends, Tied and Untied.……………………………………………….… 197 References…………………………………………………………………….. 201 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1-1: Pink card reads: “Bottom of skirt. (arrow) Skirt measurement card. Student should be kneeling straight. Floor. (arrow)” Yellow card reads: “The genuine, bona-fide, two-inch skirt card. Made in Taiwan.” From The OnLion blog of The Lovett School in Atlanta, GA. in a post by student Antolina Ramirez (2008)………………………………………… 5 Figure 1.2: Hasenpfeffer: Rabbit and Bear, parts one and two. ………………….. 13 Figure 1.3: Hasenpfeffer: Rabbit and Bear, part three……………………………. 14 Figure 3.1: “All shorts, skirts, skorts and slits in the skirts must touch the bottom of the fingertips with arms fully extended.” ……………………………… 36 Figure 4.1: The Annotated Dress Code Begins on the Next Page…………………. 52 Figure 6.1: The Ideal Schoolgirl Zine Begins on the Next Page………………… 95 Figure 7.1: My (Beloved) Aesthetic Education…………………………………… 110 Figure 7.2: In the Classroom: Whose Aesthetics?..................................................... 111 Figure 7.3: Dutch Book/ New Museum………………………………………….. 123 Figure 7.4: Learn to Knit…………………………………………………………. 131 Figure 7.5: Hate to Knit…………………………………………………………… 132 Figure 8.1: High School…………………………………………………………... 137 Figure 8.2: The Teacher Zine Begins on the Next Page…………………………… 150 Figure 9.1: Girl Teen Fashion Can!!!...................................................................... 163 Figure 9.2: Fashion Can Side 1 …………………………………………………. 169 Figure 9.3: Fashion Can Side 2 ………………………………………………….. 170 Figure 9.4: Fashion Can Lid, and the Original Girl Teen Fashion Can………….. 172 vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In this dissertation, I argue for allowing students’ desires to shape their learning. That’s just what my committee did for me in permitting this alternative presentation. Tina Thompson is exactly the adviser I needed–calm, supportive, and encouraging. I was incredibly fortunate to have her in my corner. Her ideas about the education of our youngest children have had a profound effect on my thinking about the education of teenagers. I’m grateful for my meetings with Yvonne Gaudelius in her cozy office in Old Main, where she continually asked just the right questions to move my work forward, and served as an excellent role model to boot. I will be forever in debt to Jacqueline Reid-Walsh for introducing me to Girlhood Studies, a field I had no idea existed, and one that will keep me busy forever. I’m indebted to Charles Garoian for a souvenir sketched analysis of my work on a crumpled napkin from a campus restaurant, and many other encounters that left me muttering (in a good way) and arguing with myself (standing in for Charles) to comprehend a bit of theory. Marilyn Stewart and Peg Speirs, my professors from Kutztown University, encouraged me to pursue my Ph.D. It took a long time, but I finally listened to them. The students and teachers I interviewed are all busy people who have work of their own to attend to. But they kindly agreed to take the time to share their school experiences with me. Their contributions form the heart of this research, and I hope I’ve done them justice.