When the summer sun heats up houses and city asphalt, there is nothing more natural than to take off your extra clothes … But not at work. Why, going to the office, we have to dress against the natural desire to undress?
The height of summer brings with it an amazing state, similar to a slight intoxication: our complexes melt and gradually evaporate from the heat, giving way to the desire to get naked. Even those who work in the office, the heat gives rise to the desire to reduce clothing to a strictly necessary minimum. To some of us, these half-conscious desires seem liberating; to others, shameless. Why, then, what looks quite decent in a resort town is considered unacceptable in a metropolis even on the hottest days? Why do many institutions have to comply with the prescribed dress code, and in some offices you can not go, for example, without pantyhose even on the hottest days?
man in a case
In terms of temperature at work, summer is one of the most challenging times of the year. It’s either too cold (air-conditioned) or too hot because the sun is beating down mercilessly through the window pane. Even when the city is in the mid-XNUMXs, established work etiquette or unwritten rules force us to “keep up appearances” and leave light tops with open backs, translucent skirts or comfortable shorts for vacations. What is it – production necessity or social atavism?
“The fact is that society needs people who live by certain rules,” explains social psychologist Yulia Fedotova. – Among my acquaintances there are many Americans who love comfort and prefer informal clothes. They go to work in shorts and T-shirts, and there they change into a duty suit. Because a person in slippers and shorts or in a light dress represents the intention to relax and unwind. If he appears in this form in the office, his colleagues will be unbalanced, will be distracted from the case. For the same reason, it is forbidden to wear various sexy things – this can cause uncontrolled fantasies, associations, etc. Moreover, in order for nothing to distract employees from work, it is necessary not only to minimize sex appeal in a suit, but also to minimize any individuality that always, against our will, causes various emotions. “The meaning of this is,” says Yulia Fedotova, “as soon as you work, nothing should distract you, every hour of yours is counted. Therefore, in some institutions they resort to uniforms. A man in a uniform ceases to be an individual in some way, expresses consent to be completely controlled.
Dressed in power
“Everything is under control” – this is the message that the strict dress code of officials, politicians, civil servants, bank employees is intended to convey to us. “At the same time, it can be noted: the higher the social ladder a person occupies, the more closed his clothes will be,” says Olga Weinstein. “This situation persists at all times: we can see both in ancient Egyptian frescoes and in Byzantine mosaics that people invested with power, as a rule, wear layered clothes, while slaves and commoners are more often depicted naked – an open body is vulnerable.” The modern analogue of such multi-layered clothing is a formal men’s suit, real body armor, consisting of a shirt, trousers, jacket, tie, vest.
Body control
The well-known saying “they meet by clothes” has a deep meaning. “Clothes express a special mood, the colors we choose also carry certain non-verbal signals,” Yulia Fedotova continues. – In the offices of respectable firms, people try to look serious, inspire confidence and demonstrate this through appearance – through control of their emotions, desires, needs. Thus, closed office clothes in dark colors, tights and closed shoes symbolize the suppression of one’s bodily desires, concentration and discipline.
These official or unwritten rules are especially important for those who intend to make a career. A young secretary girl can afford some frivolity in dress, but then she is unlikely to be able to achieve promotion. “Back in the 70s, the American researcher John T. Molloy formulated the universal rules of decency in office clothes,” says culturologist Olga Weinstein. His book Dress for Success (Warner Books, 1988) is still a bestseller and has gone through many reprints. The ideas expressed by him are still relevant today: service clothes should be closed, it is better to avoid flashy colors; erotic accents in appearance are inappropriate. The best option for a woman is a dark blue suit with a skirt, to which a fresh blouse is put on every day. Such clothes are comfortable, do not constrain the body, but are not sexually attractive. Within many institutions, there are special internal circulars that spell out an acceptable dress code. For example, from Monday to Thursday it is customary to dress strictly formally, and on Friday you can afford the casual option: for a man, this is the absence of a tie, trousers and a pullover instead of a suit, sometimes even jeans and a polo shirt. The basic idea is that weekend-ready clothing can be less formal, but by no means more sexy.”
For administrative use
So, clothing not only protects us from the cold, it also has an erotic function: it is designed to make us attractive in the eyes of the opposite sex. According to Olga Weinstein, this function is completely suppressed in a service suit. “Here we can recall the ideas of the British anthropologist Mary Douglas (Mary Douglas): a person has two bodies – physical and social *. According to Douglas, the physical body represents the biological aspects of our nature, while the social is determined by the role that a person plays in society. The function of the service suit is to completely suppress all manifestations of the physical body and highlight the social as a sign of society’s complete control over the biological principle.
The fact is that the physical body (especially the female one) inspires unconscious horror due to the potential fuzziness of the “blurring” contours. This is the fear of the flow of liquids: blood, saliva, tears, urine, sweat. Body hair is also labeled as a sign of uncontrolled biology. This is exactly what the service suit is intended to hide: for example, a men’s shirt should be buttoned up, a sleeveless blouse that opens the armpits is unacceptable for women, it is advisable to wear tights even in the heat. It is as a sign of control over the body that we use deodorants, do hair removal.
Game of strip
Judging by the abundance of naked bodies on the catwalks, fashion from year to year is becoming more and more “undressed”, exhibitionistic. Do these latest fashion trends promise that everyday “office” clothes will give us more freedom? According to Olga Weinstein, conservative brands that create service clothes and runway fashion are practically parallel worlds: “The service dress code is very conservative and is not influenced by fashion. Despite the fact that on the podium we can see jackets worn over a mesh T-shirt or even on a naked body, in combination with shorts and open sandals, in the office such experiments will be perceived with bewilderment. It is still unacceptable to wear a jacket over a short sleeve shirt. Office clothes are more comparable with wedding or church ones; in terms of conservatism, they can be compared with folk costumes.”
Nevertheless, the fashion that allowed flip flops and gauze shirts to be worn in the city partly reconciles decency and naturalness. Drop by drop, her influence seeps into the most conservative areas. “The rules of decency are historically relative and subject to change depending on the cultural norms of the era,” explains Olga Weinstein. – For example, in the 1960th century, it was indecent for women to wear closed pantaloons under a crinoline, since they were considered an element of men’s clothing. Pants were indecent for women in the Soviet Union until the mid-XNUMXs, but in accordance with modern logic, they are perceived as completely normal, as they cover the body more completely. However, jeans on the hips, from under which thong shorts peek out, the demonstration of an open belly is still by no means welcome. Now, even in institutions where very formal dress is adopted, both women’s trousers and open shoes are acceptable – if they are elegant. If a woman in the office wears open shoes and shows her legs, then it is desirable that she does epilation and pedicure, that is, she controls her body.
Resort customs
In contrast to the city, which tunes in to a busy work schedule, in the resort area people feel so relaxed that local authorities are forced to invent various administrative measures “to maintain order.” So, for example, in French Deauville, a decision of the municipality adopted in 1996, it is forbidden to walk around the city with a naked torso or in swimsuits. Failure to comply with the regulation is subject to a fine of 10 euros. In most Mediterranean coastal cities, the authorities were forced to develop a kind of clothing minimum for visiting retail outlets and restaurants. And the beaches in Florida are patrolled by the “morality police”. Its representatives may require that a person sunbathing topless wear the top of a bathing suit.
* M. Douglas. «Purity and Danger». Routledge, 2002.