School Uniforms: New Materialist Perspectives (The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education) 3031329384, 9783031329388

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THE CULTURAL AND SOCIAL FOUNDATIONS OF EDUCATION SERIES EDITOR: JESSICA HEYBACH

School Uniforms New Materialist Perspectives

Edited by Rachel Shanks · Julie Ovington Beth Cross · Ainsley Carnarvon

The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education

Series Editor

Jessica Heybach Aurora University Aurora, IL, USA

The Palgrave Pivot series on the Cultural and Social Foundations of Education seeks to understand educational practices around the world through the interpretive lenses provided by the disciplines of philosophy, history, sociology, politics, and cultural studies. This series focuses on the following major themes: democracy and social justice, ethics, sustainability education, technology, and the imagination. It publishes the best current thinking on those topics, as well as reconsideration of historical figures and major thinkers in education.

Rachel Shanks  •  Julie Ovington Beth Cross  •  Ainsley Carnarvon Editors

School Uniforms New Materialist Perspectives

Editors Rachel Shanks School of Education University of Aberdeen Aberdeen, Scotland Beth Cross School of Education and Social Sciences University of the West of Scotland Paisley, Scotland

Julie Ovington School of Education and Social Sciences University of the West of Scotland Ayr, Scotland Ainsley Carnarvon School of Education University of Aberdeen Aberdeen, Scotland

The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education ISBN 978-3-031-32938-8    ISBN 978-3-031-32939-5 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG, part of Springer Nature 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: © Peter Dazeley / Getty Images This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Contents

1 Introduction:  The Threads of School Uniforms Woven in/with/through Countries  1 Rachel Shanks , Julie Ovington , and Beth Cross 2 ‘Matter  Matters’: The Importance of the Material World and Tinythings 13 Julie Ovington 3 ‘It  doesn’t end at the cuffs’: The Discordant Discourse of Uniformed Performance in the Caribbean 31 Beth Cross and Ainsley Carnarvon 4 Intervening  in School Uniform Debates: Making Equity Matter in England 49 Sara Bragg and Jessica Ringrose 5 Pupil  Participation in Secondary School Uniform Policies in Scotland 67 Rachel Shanks 6 School  Uniforms in Ireland: The Intersection of Religion, Class and Gender 81 Majella McSharry

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CONTENTS

7 Students’  Appearance According to School Regulations: A Polish Case Study 99 Anna Babicka-Wirkus 8 Why  Do Girls Have to Wear Ties at School in the UK?117 Rachel Shanks 9 Social  Class and School Uniforms: A Zimbabwean Case131 Aaron T. Sigauke 10 The  Materiality and Materials of School Uniforms at a Local and Global Level143 Rachel Shanks and Ainsley Carnarvon 11 Conclusion:  Looking back to look forward157 Rachel Shanks , Julie Ovington , and Beth Cross Index165

Notes on Contributors

Anna Babicka-Wirkus  is an associate professor of education, a director of the Institute of Pedagogy at Pomeranian University in Słupsk (Poland). She holds an MA in Pedagogy and Sociology. She is the winner of the Children’s Rights Ombudsman’s Award for the best doctoral dissertation (2014) and the Award of the Minister of Education and Science for significant achievements in the field of scientific activity (2021). She is also the author and coauthor of numerous scientific publications in the field of school, resistance in education, respect for children’s and human rights, and a critical discourse about the university. Anna dressed for school in Poland Kate  Boldry  has worked at IOE, UCL, since 2015. She works in initial Teacher Education and is a tutor on the Social Science/Psychology PGCE and the Secondary Teacher Education Programme (STEP). Her research and teaching interests lie in social justice, critical pedagogies, ally-ship and inclusion. Kate was a sociology and psychology teacher for 14  years before moving into Higher Education. She was Head of Department and Head of Faculty in a vii

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number of schools in London, as well as being a mentor for PGCE student teachers. Kate, aged 14, in secondary school uniform in England Sara  Bragg is Lecturer in Sociology of Education in the Institute of Education, UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society, and Programme Leader for the MA Social Justice and Education. She is an experienced qualitative researcher, focusing on issues of youth, gender, sexuality, education, student voice and participation, and creative methods. Sara wore a uniform to school until sixth form. This is Sara during sixth form

Ainsley  Carnarvon is a researcher and Digital Education Strategic Programme Manager at the HMFC Innovation Centre in Edinburgh, Scotland. His work involves creating digital education opportunities for the youth of Edinburgh, with particular focus on BAME, neurodivergent, and other underrepresented groups in STEM. His research focus is in Curriculum and Pedagogy with special interest in Diversity and Inclusion and post colonial education in the Caribbean. Ainsley attended secondary school in the south of the island of Trinidad. He lived the experience of being sternly disciplined for using a belt that was wider in width than preferred (as seen in the picture), despite it being his only option due to financial constraints as common with many families

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Beth  Cross is a lecturer in the School of Education and Social Sciences at the University of the West of Scotland, UK. She researches the interface between formal and informal learning contexts and is particularly interested in dialogic methods of exploring learner identities, strategies and trajectories. She has taught in the areas of community education, social policy and children’s services in England and Scotland and worked with a number of creative interdisciplinary projects that involve visual and dramatic arts in order to expand the modalities for deliberation and participation. Beth Cross grew up in rural Kansas; she wore a uniform for band and basketball Amelia  Jenkinson  (she/her) is the cofounder and former CEO of School of Sexuality Education, a UK-based relationships and sex(uality) education charity. She is the Executive Director of the Sexually Transmitted Infections Education Foundation in Aotearoa New Zealand. Amelia (bottom right) with her two sisters in primary school

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Majella McSharry  is Lecturer in Sociology and Global Citizenship Education at the School of Human Development, Dublin City University. She is Chairperson of the Professional Master of Education (Post-Primary). Her main research area is concerned with the construction and articulation of gender through embodied praxis, with a particular focus on school sport, school uniforms, power and decision making. Majella in school uniform for Ursuline College Sligo, 1997

Julie  Ovington is a lecturer and Programme Leader at the University of the West of Scotland in the School of Education and Social Sciences. This work follows on from a career in family support within communities and in nursery and infant schools. Ovington completed her doctorate at Northumbria University in 2019. Her thesis explored the affect of school readiness in the classroom based on the lived experiences of two-year-old children. The study drew on a range of theories and philosophies including materialism and posthumanism. She continues to research in early education and what it means to be an academic in creative ways. Julie went to school in the Northeast of England, and when she first started school, uniforms were not required. The uniform introduction coincided with the opening of a new building and the amalgamation of the infant and junior school

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Jessica  Ringrose is Professor of Sociology of Gender and Education at IOE, UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society. She is an internationally recognised and cited expert on gender and sexual equity in education. She has worked with a wide range of global and UK stakeholders (UK Home Office, Department for Education, Ministry of Justice, Mayor of London and many more) to shape gender equity in policy and practice in areas such as sex education, sexual violence, body image, online safety, LGBTQ+ rights. She received the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Distinguished Contributions to Gender Equity in Education Award 2020. Jessica grew up in Canada and did not wear a uniform to school. This was taken when she was 11

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Rachel  Shanks is a senior lecturer in the School of Education at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. She has been researching school uniform since 2019 and is particularly interested in how it can be made affordable, comfortable, rights-respecting and sustainable. This research includes school clothing grant in Scotland and school uniform banks. She leads interdisciplinary courses on sustainability and teaches research methods, in particular qualitative data analysis using software. Rachel grew up in the north of Ireland and had to wear a uniform to primary and secondary school

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Aaron  T.  Sigauke is a member of the Social Sciences Education team in the School of Education, University of New England (UNE), New South Wales, Australia. Aaron started his teaching career as a high school teacher in Zimbabwe and then a lecturer at a teacher training college. Still in Zimbabwe he joined the Faculty of Education as a lecturer at Midlands State University (MSU) and later the University of Zimbabwe (UZ) before commencing PhD studies at the University of Aberdeen (Scotland, UK). After a Teaching Fellowship at the University of Aberdeen, in 2012 he joined the School of Education at UNE. This passport photo is Aaron when he had just finished his Cambridge ‘O’ Level studies (Form 4) Alison Wiggins  (she/her) is Subject Leader for the PGCE in Social Sciences and PGCE Psychology programmes at IoE-UCL and leads work across Secondary ITE on PSHE, RSE and Anti-racism. Her research interests are focused on issues of race and gender equity, and she is working with colleagues on cross-institutional research projects focused on the racialised experiences of Minority Ethnic student teachers and is working to develop an RSE specialism for all PGCE students through her collaborative work with the School of Sexuality Education. She hopes that one day she might get around to completing her PhD! Alison in Year 8 at Brentside High School in art class with her Malcolm X necklace over her uniform

List of Figures

Fig. 2.1 Fig. 8.1

Snapshot of keyrings on children’s bags Secondary school uniform in Scotland

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction: The Threads of School Uniforms Woven in/with/through Countries Rachel Shanks , Julie Ovington , and Beth Cross

With contrib. by Ainsley Carnarvon

Whether the grouping is poor children benefiting from the auspices of charity schools, walking around as emblems of the school benefactors’ philanthropic reputation or the dress attire of Eton that epitomises a life of privilege, uniforms in schools have embodied class distinctions and R. Shanks (*) School of Education, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] J. Ovington School of Education and Social Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Ayr, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] B. Cross School of Education and Social Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Paisley, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_1

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habituated those wearing them to their place in a stratified societal order. The custom-designed uniforms of English grammar schools marked them out as a cut above those of secondary moderns and meant those who made the cut intellectually, nevertheless, were made to feel inferior if more economical substitutions were made to specific items, such as coats. Although school uniforms date back to the sixteenth century (Stephenson, 2016) it is at the onset of the massification of compulsory education that the role of uniforms becomes most strongly aligned with the nation-building projects of European empires. The defeats in the Napoleonic Wars spurred on nation-building projects in Germany, playing a crucial role in engendering a conformist, disciplined attitude amongst the general population. The key mechanism for developing this was the introduction of statutory schooling for all children. Known as the Prussian model, like a range of military advances, this industrialised technique was soon replicated across Europe. The school uniform was a primary weapon in this cultural revolution. The pedagogy that accompanied it sought to raise awareness of conceptual thinking and instil a capacity for logic but crucially to harness these capacities to the nation state, ‘The citizens should be made able and willing to use their own minds to achieve higher goals in the framework of a future unified German nation state’ (Fitsche, 1922, p. 21). The prominent role of uniforms within youth culture is featured in iconic images of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, before abruptly disappearing in Western European democracies in the wake of World War Two (WWII) as the lessons on the excesses of nationalism were felt most keenly. Whereas Britain, and its Commonwealth countries, emerged from WWII with its allegiance to uniforms intact. The adoption of school uniforms in Britain interweaves with the management of the empire. Within elite schools, where the officer class was developed, uniform’s first role was to distinguish scholarship students from fee-paying and the class demarcations these represented. The cadet corps within schools starting with Eton strengthened the association between the military and school uniform, as ‘Denotation of rank through braid, buttons, and ties were all common in the military and similar symbols of prowess and authority were adopted by the majority of public schools’ (Stephenson, 2016, p. 75). Uniforms remain steadfast within former British colonies and Britain’s Imperial imaginary to a far greater degree than in other European countries, who have more quickly come to terms with their past. Uniforms played a key role in the colonial

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regimentation of education and, like the British flag, played a focal emblematic role. Schools were sites of heightened ritualistic ceremonies of loyalty complete with pledges to the colonial power and standing to attention for uniform inspection in front of the colonial flag. Since their inception in education, school uniforms have served a similar function as military uniforms have in war: to clearly identify a group’s loyalties and purpose and to inscribe identity upon the group members. It has been suggested the wearing of a school uniform can foster a team culture and prevent bullying. For example, a United Kingdom (UK) report investigating Attitudes to School Uniforms found nine in ten teachers agreed uniforms reduced bullying. The report also states that seven out of ten children felt that wearing a school uniform supported them to fit into the school culture (Trutex, 2017). Additionally, parents said the use of uniforms made their life easier. However, these claims bear further examination given counterclaims that rub up against these assertions (Cunningham et al., 2010; Page et al., 2021). The school’s role of ‘indoctrination of community values’, and where it is seen as the school’s responsibility to ‘instruct students about the constraints of appropriate behaviour’ (Workman & Studak, 2008, pp. 295–296), becomes more pronounced. As inequality divides become ever sharper, a picture that emerges is that students associate the uniform with discipline and some young people equate uniforms with being ‘treated like wee kids’ (Gow & McPherson, 1980, p. 54). Conversely a school’s relaxing of uniform policing can be regarded as evidence of treating young people more like adults. The polarised debates for and against school uniforms and what they ‘do’ for children and young people mean this area of interest continues to be topical. Understanding how children and young people experience school uniforms is of more importance given the statistics. In the Trutex (2017) report, 98% of secondary schools and 79% of primary schools in the UK which responded had implemented a uniform into their school policy. Looking back over three decades in which neoliberal agendas have been on the ascendancy, uniform and its place within discourses have become embedded within school economies and marketisation strategies. School uniforms become a mobilised brand. Fuelling a global economic market estimated to achieve a growth of over £12 billion by the end of 2022 (The Business Research Company, 2022).

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A wide range of research on behaviour change and developing social skills argues that young people do better when supported to make better choices around behaviours (International Federation of Red Cross & Red Crescent, 2013; Maticka-Tyndale & Barnett, 2010) including bullying, when they have a supportive context in which to do so, rather than when the occasion to make choices is removed from them by conformity. One could argue that school uniforms in effect impoverish young people’s opportunity to learn how to be part of diverse communities in which differences are respected. More focused accounts that detail young people’s lived experience of bullying in relation to school uniform highlight that small markers of individuality become heightened, causing bullying about appearance merely to shift focus onto details of appearance or defects in the uniform (Spencer, 2007). The relative conformity of appearance can make deviations from it stand out more glaringly, in some cases exacerbating the problem and compounding the impacts of poverty on young people’s educational experience and thereby their attainment, to say nothing of their wellbeing. Closer scrutiny of disparities between the theory of uniform’s advantages and its effect in practice reveals further systemic disadvantage in terms of gender (Crockett & Wallendorf, 1998). Even the milder version of regimentation of clothing, that of dress code, served to penalise girls to a greater extent than boys and legitimated a discourse in which a woman’s attire could be used as evidence against her in terms of gender-based violence. As Spencer (2007) argues, female school uniforms play a particular role in visualising identity constraints and circumscribed identities. They act as a ‘spoken visual that places girls’ bodies in particular roles and reinscribes a gender binary. Taylor and Fairchild (2020) argued that there are potential micro-practices at play in educational institutions that reflect a complex ecological institution whereby gender inequalities become enacted and materialised. These begin with the cleaning of buildings, those that do the work, which then ripples out to role-play areas, reading mats and much more. Raising the question of how, and to what extent, school uniforms reproduce gendered discourses and potentially aid in the reproduction of inequalities. Given these considerations, rather than providing any advantage, it is worth asking whether uniforms in effect disadvantage young people in important ways. This disadvantage is not arbitrary or accidental but takes on further meaning when viewed from the broader systemic frame of post-­ colonial critique. Uniform and empire are inextricably interlinked within the hierarchical mechanisms of exploitation and subjugation. To see the enduring imprint of the systems the British Empire forced upon their

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colonies, one need look no further than the school gate. What makes this interlinkage so enduring is that school uniforms are emblematic of the promise of promotion on the empire’s terms. Colonial practices and logic are taken up and worn with the uniform, becoming inculcated, in Foucault’s terms, as the editor within. Fannon characterises the colonised who have assimilated themselves with the colonising culture as divided against themselves in such a way as to paralyse the very critical faculties their emancipation requires (Impedovo & Ferreira-Meyers, 2021). The erasure of culture and identity, even the erasure of young bodies and their deaths, is deeply intertwined with the ‘civilizing mission’ of colonial schools and the uniformity they exacted, as the scandal of Canadian residential schools for Indigenous children is now revealing (Austen & Bilefsky, 2021). In a detailed analysis of school uniforms in Scotland, Friedrich and Shanks (2023) detail the way in which school uniform policies in Scotland are entangled with neoliberal governmentality which is consequential for the human body. The prescription of what one should be wearing is heavily toned by a policing of behaviour that serves to enact a hierarchical infrastructure of conformity. These characteristics of power emphasise the operation and mandating of surveillance power in schools, irrespective of the autonomy and choices young people may wish to exercise. Not only is the ideology of power and control interwoven in the materiality of school uniforms it is extended to include more-than-human matter such as identity cards and school bags (Happel, 2013). Suggesting the rise of technological advances and complex systems employed within schools extends the surveillance of appearance beyond material clothing to the body itself, by employing biometrics (Bryce et al., 2010). As socio-material frames of analysis have become more important, this book focuses on a key aspect of young people’s experiences of schooling. There has been some academic debate on school uniform in both Australia and the USA in relation to gender, and in the USA in relation to academic achievement, reducing violence and gang culture and the effects of dress code discipline on race and class. However, the legacy of the British tradition of school uniform remains under-explored. Coming together as an eclectic scholarship the contributors engage with theory, policy formation and lived experiences differently. Giving rise to diverse and engaging contributions, to disrupt the dominant narrative of control, discipline and neoliberal logic with a sense of urgency. Thus, we bring together a posthuman and materialist approach to understanding the various legacies and

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controls being exercised through school uniforms. The book brings together accounts from the Caribbean, England, Ireland, Scotland and Zimbabwe to illustrate this colonial legacy. As well as looking at the potential ways that school uniform could be decolonialised, the book also considers the degendering and decarbonisation of school uniform. In Chap. 2 ‘“Matter Matters”: The Importance of the Material World and Tinythings’, Julie Ovington traces how the taken-for-­ grantedness of school uniforms has now begun to take hold in early years settings in England. The school readiness agenda that early years education providers focus on is similar to the workplace readiness or employability discourse that some secondary schools display in Scotland (Olsson & Shanks, 2022). Furthermore, it has been argued that uniforms materialise sex and gender for girls (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020). Whereas, in the early years, uniforms transform younger children into school pupils and then secondary schools attempt to transform teenagers into workers. Ovington goes on to explain how everything can be understood as a body, and this can help us to see beyond the binaries of subject/object and animate/inanimate and understand all the encounters that happen between different bodies whether they are keyrings, children, bags or uniforms. In Chap. 3 ‘“It doesn’t end at the cuffs”: The Discordant Discourse of Uniformed Performance in the Caribbean’ by Beth Cross and Ainsley Carnarvon, the focus is not only on an imperial gaze continuing to subjugate from a faraway time and place but also on who benefits from school uniforms being worn. They highlight themes of humiliation and harm in the interviews they conducted and not only the costs in economic terms are considered but also the cost of not confirming to uniform rules. These rules were not limited to the items of uniform; they also included how the clothing was worn. Only looking at colonisation and whiteness is regarded as not the only story here as pride in appearance may be a system of self-care from before slavery. Influences from both Africa and Britain are considered alongside current practices and changes in policy at a national level. Weaved into this chapter are references to literature, lyrics and Caribbean ways of knowing and doing. From the Caribbean we turn to England and debates about policies and practices around school uniform and in Chap. 4, entitled ‘Intervening in School Uniform Debates: Making Equity Matter in England’, Sara Bragg and Jessica Ringrose with Alison Wiggins, Kate Boldry and Amelia Jenkinson provide an account of how they have attempted to contribute and intervene in these debates. Their focus has been on uniforms and

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gender and in particular the role of uniform in sexual abuse and harassment. They discuss the enforced gender binary within school uniform discourse and how this inequality even relates to the expense of girls’ uniform in comparison with boys. While participants in their work did not question uniform per se they did query the implementation of it. They refer to the cost of wearing uniform for girls, both in financial terms and in relation to being inspected. They note the classism that also exists with appearing middle class being the norm and difficulties for those who had more than one protected characteristic. The one-size-fits-all box of school uniform can be difficult to contain oneself in, and when young people don’t fit, they end up breaking the rules. They argue that rather than being about rules school uniform should be about wellbeing. Their work has led them to create guidelines for schools, parents and pupils, which they hope can create an attunement to uniforms and change. From policy in England, we then move north to Scotland and Chap. 5 by Rachel Shanks: ‘Pupil Participation in Secondary School Uniform Policies in Scotland’. Secondary school uniform policies are used as the raw material or data for analysis. There is an assessment of the extent to which young people can influence the micropolitical consequences for their bodies in the assemblage of school, teacher, parent, pupil, body, clothes and policy. While many policies refer to consultation and involvement there are only a few instances of pupil participation in deciding the school uniform. From Scotland we then move across the Irish Sea. In the UK most girls do not have to wear skirts or dresses to school because they are in co-­ educational or mixed schools, and it is now recognised that if boys can wear trousers to school then girls must be allowed to do that too. In Chap. 6 ‘School Uniforms in Ireland: The Intersection of Religion, Class and Gender’, Majella McSharry points out that in the Republic of Ireland there are many single-sex, girls-only schools, and they can insist on skirts for their pupils as there is no sex discrimination if there are no boys at the school wearing trousers. She highlights how the Department of Education in Ireland has tried to reduce the cost of school uniform, but many schools seem to have ignored this directive. She points to possible reasons for the continuing presence of school uniforms in Ireland with it being part of the Celtic Tiger’s focus on professionalism and the global marketplace. One episode is analysed to exemplify national debates on what uniform can and/or should do. An interesting contrast is made between the ‘skirted’ schoolboys in the nineteenth and early twentieth

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centuries in rural Ireland and the way that boys’ only option is to wear trousers at school today. For girls in Ireland the right to wear trousers is still being fought  for. From a personal perspective Majella recounts her visits to hundreds of schools and the first impressions she obtains as soon as she sees what the children and young people are wearing. This can include exclusive ties which show who is playing for the rugby team, and ties will be returned to in Chap. 8. Next though we go to Poland and the history and current state of play with school uniform there. In Chap. 7 ‘Students’ Appearance According to School Regulations: A Polish Case Study’, Anna Babicka-Wirkus details the changes from compulsory uniforms before 2008 to the present day. The uniform situation differs between state schools and private Catholic and community schools. In all the schools, whether uniform is mandated or not, provisions on dress and/or uniform ‘create a space for discipline’. These dress code policies all aim to discipline the bodies of the school students and thus repress their individuality and freedom of expression. The state and non-state schools are contrasted as the former appear more relaxed about appearance but a vagueness to the rules and requirements creates its own regime of power, while the non-state schools detail what to wear even down to the students’ underwear. We then move to ties and in Chap. 8 Rachel Shanks asks ‘Why Do Girls Have to Wear Ties at School in the UK?’ This chapter focuses on the requirement for girls as well as boys to wear ties at state secondary schools in Scotland. In an analysis of every publicly funded/state secondary school in Scotland (n = 357) it was found that 90% required pupils to wear a tie as part of their school uniform. This requirement to wear an item of male dress which is worn by almost no women and less and less men is questioned in terms of the materiality of the tie and what it does to girls who have to wear them. It shows that the male body is the norm from which to decide what a uniform should comprise as well as presenting a class-based model of clothing on all pupils. In Chap. 9 we return to the colonial past and post-colonial present by looking at ‘Social Class and School Uniforms: A Zimbabwean Case’ by Aaron Sigauke. What uniforms do from a social class perspective is considered with a particular focus on post-colonial Zimbabwe. The school uniform market and supply chain emphasise social class tensions within education. The imposition of a uniform also shows how school authorities attempt to create a given common (uniform) identity in contrast to the diverse identities that exist among the student population. The exclusive

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supplier arrangements in place in many schools in Zimbabwe are put under a spotlight and highlight the economic materialities of school uniform. This issue is also explored in Chap. 10 ‘The Materiality and Materials of School Uniforms at a Local and Global Level’ by Rachel Shanks and Ainsley Carnarvon. In this chapter they consider uniform in terms of it being comfortable, affordable and sustainable. They look at the local situation in Scotland but also the wider affects of the school uniform market, in particular in relation to workers’ rights and possible pollution and environmental degradation. Comfort here is used as a generic term to include the physical comfort of children wearing the uniform items and the comfort of those producing the clothes. School uniform is seen by many as a leveller, but if it is expensive it puts further material pressures on those who have the least resources. The production of school uniform can lead to contamination of land and impact workers’ health. Then at the end of the life cycle of school uniforms, they may be sent to a lower-income country and pollute the water table or have other deleterious effects. We all have varied experiences of uniform and dress codes while at school. We have included photographs of contributors to this book so that you can see how each of us dressed for school at one point in time. The editors hope you will discover something of interest in the chapters that follow. It may be something that chimes with your experiences of ties and blazers, or it may be a peak into an unknown world of white socks and black shoes.

References Austen, I., & Bilefsky, D. (2021, July 30). Hundreds more unmarked graves found at former residential school in Canada. The New  York Times. https://www. nytimes.com/2021/06/24/world/canada/indigenous-­c hildren-­g raves-­ saskatchewan-­canada.html Bryce, T., Nellis, M., Corrigan, A., Gallagher, H., Lee, P., & Sercombe, H. (2010). Biometric surveillance in Schools: Cause for concern or case for curriculum? Scottish Educational Review, 42(1), 3–22. https://doi.org/10.116 3/27730840-­04201002 Crockett, D., & Wallendorf, M. (1998). Sociological perspectives on imposed School dress codes: Consumption as attempted suppression of class and group symbolism. Journal of Macromarketing, 18(2), 115–131. https://doi. org/10.1177/027614679801800204

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Cunningham, C. E., Cunningham, L. J., Ratcliffe, J., & Vaillancourt, T. (2010). A qualitative analysis of the bullying prevention and intervention ­recommendations of students in Grades 5 to 8. Journal of School Violence, 9(4), 321–338. https://doi.org/10.1080/15388220.2010.507146 Fitsche, J. G. (1922). Addresses to the German Nation, 1807. Second address: “The General Nature of the New Education”. The Open Court Publishing Company. Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2021.1931813 Gow, L., & McPherson, A. (1980). Tell them from me. Pergamon Press. Happel, A. (2013). Ritualized Girling: School uniforms and the compulsory performance of gender. Journal of Gender Studies, 22(1), 92–96. https://doi. org/10.1080/09589236.2012.745680 Impedovo, M.  A., & Ferreira-Meyers, K. (2021). Authority, collective learning and agentic action in teaching: tracing a pedagogy from Franz Fanon. Education in the North, 28(1), 135–152. https://doi.org/10.26203/agdv-­0563 International Federation of Red Cross & Red Crescent. (2013). Promoting a culture of non-violence and peace through Youth as Agents of Behavioural Change Toolkit. https://www.ifrc.org/ Maticka-Tyndale, E., & Barnett, J.  P. (2010). Peer-led interventions to reduce HIV risk of youth: A review. Eval Program Plann, 33(2), 98–112. https://doi. org/10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2009.07.001. Epub 2009 Aug 3. Olsson, A., & Shanks, R. (2022). Employability and school uniform policies: Projecting the employer’s gaze. Childhood, 29(4), 628–645. Page, G., Power, M., & Patrick, R. (2021). Uniform mistakes: The costs of going back to school. A Covid Realities Rapid-Response Report. Nuffield Foundation. https://www.york.ac.uk/media/policyengine/documents/CovidRealities-­ UniformMistakes.pdf Spencer, S. (2007). A uniform identity: Schoolgirl snapshots and the spoken visual. History of Education, 36(2), 227–246. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 00467600601171468 Stephenson, K. (2016). ‘It’s not for the sake of a ribboned coat!’ A history of British school uniform. Doctoral dissertation, University of York, Etheses. White Rose. Taylor, C. A., & Fairchild, N. (2020). Towards a posthumanist institutional ethnography: Viscous matterings and gendered bodies. Ethnography and Education, 15(4), 509–527. https://doi.org/10.1080/17457823.2020.1735469 The Business Research Company. (2022). School uniform global market report 2022. https://www.thebusinessresearchcompany.com/report/school-­u niform-­ global-­m arket-­r eport#:~:text=The%20global%20school%20uniform%20 market,at%20a%20CAGR%20of%209.6%25 Trutex. (2017). Attitudes to school uniforms. https://www.trutexbtru2u.co.uk/ wp-­content/uploads/2017/06/Uniform-­Research-­Report-­29_6_17.pdf

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Wolfe, M.  J., & Rasmussen, M.  L. (2020). The affective matter of (Australian) school uniforms: The school-dress that is and does. In Mapping the Affective turn in education (pp. 179–193). Routledge. Workman, J. E., & Studak, C. M. (2008). Use of the means/ends test to evaluate public school dress-code policies. Educational Policy, 22(2), 295–326. https:// doi.org/10.1177/0895904806289208

CHAPTER 2

‘Matter Matters’: The Importance of the Material World and Tinythings Julie Ovington

Introduction matters of “fact” (so to speak) have been replaced with matters of signification (no scare quotes here). Language matters. Discourse matters. Culture matters. There is an important sense in which the only thing that does not seem to matter anymore is matter. (Barad, 2003, p. 801)

Adopting and promoting the use of school uniforms in the United Kingdom (UK) has continued to polarise opinions and discussions on their intended use, benefits, environmental impacts, and the discourses they perpetuate. As outlined in the introductory chapter of this book, there is an ever-present military undertone that school uniforms exude (Stephenson, 2016), carving out and shaping individual identities via inscription to a set of institutional educational beliefs. Thus, promoting

J. Ovington (*) School of Education and Social Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Ayr, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_2

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homogeneity and a universal presentation(s) of children and young people in education. Uniforms are sold to parents under the guise that they promote better behaviour, tackle material poverty, and reduce stigmatisation and bullying. However, research suggests that this is not the case (Education Endowment Foundation, 2021; DeMitchell, 2015). Nevertheless, the use of school uniforms is now commonplace in the UK. Together with a rise in demand for early years education strongly linked to the government’s promotion of free early education for children as young as two-years-old (Gibb et  al., 2010), it is no surprise that the promotion of uniforms has permeated preschool settings. Ranging from private provisions to state-led institutions, and it is now widely accepted that educational settings promote school uniforms and associated accessories, such as coats, hats, and bags, across all levels of education. In this chapter, I focus on early years education and school bags as a way to trouble the dominant discourse of school readiness. This facilitates a space for new voices to emerge by revealing what matter matters to children. The school bag will be explored as a site of resistance that children use to enact social activism to push back against the neoliberal capitalism regime. Drawing on field notes from research that took a ‘material turn’ (Reddington & Price, 2018, p. 2), I think differently about school readiness by thinking-with posthumanist and materialist theories (Ovington, 2020). The research geographically spanned Scotland, Tyne and Wear, County Durham, Cumbria, and London, and involved classroom observations with children ranging from two to when children reached the end of the Early Years Foundation Stage, the reception year, at aged 5 (Department for Education, 2017). The observations revealed that children engage in political acts to maintain their individuality in the backdrop of homogenising practices (Giroux, 2015) in/with/through keyrings to ‘emerge with agency’ (Ovington, 2020, p. 154).

(Uni)forming School Readiness Simply saying the words ‘school uniform’ conjures up mental images of ties, shirts, monograms, and blazers, which is now synonymous with education in the UK. Historically, uniforms date back 500 years with a variety of nuanced meanings related to identity, social class, and reinforcing gender ideologies. Although it is acknowledged, the exact date that uniforms first emerged is nebulous (Stephenson, 2016). The ‘uniformity’ of school uniforms in education did, however, become commonplace by the

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twentieth century, with the regulation of style, colour, and the naming of specific clothing items per gender (Smart, 2016). In England, although there is statutory guidance on the cost of school uniforms (Department for Education, 2021), the use of school uniform in institutions remains as non-statutory guidance. Principles for adopting a uniform policy is devolved to governing bodies at a local level so that: duties are placed upon all governing boards by statute to ensure that school policies promote good behaviour and discipline amongst the pupil body. We [Department for Education] strongly encourage schools to have a uniform as it can play a key role in: • promoting the ethos of a school • providing a sense of belonging and identity • setting an appropriate tone for education. (Department for Education, 2021, n.p.)

Government assimilation of the wearing of school uniforms with behaviour, appropriateness, and discipline positions the uniform as a material driver for these qualities to be established. In particular, the tone of education co-implicates school uniforms and school readiness, creating conditions for continuous power struggles in education (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020). Both concepts lean into each other to drive academic performativity and curate competitiveness so that individuals can compete in the long term within a global market, defined as the pursuit for ‘economic welfare’ (Baumann & Krskova, 2016, p. 1004). Unpacking this further supports an argument that discipline, at the micro and macro levels of educational infrastructures, informs a code of conduct for learning to promote readiness for later life achievements (see Olsson & Shanks, 2022). School readiness has a long-standing place in the politics of ECEC. The international influence on the readiness discourse can be traced back to intervention programmes such as Head Start in the United States of America. Affecting policies in England over time ensure that educational provision would provide ‘the right foundation for good future progress through school and life’ (Department for Education, 2022, p.  4). Strengthening the rationale for an ‘early is better’ approach in ECEC to ready children. As a concept school readiness has gone from one of implicit meaning with no clear definition to one that is explicitly mentioned in policy with a clear framework for assessment (Ovington, 2020). In 2019,

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a debate on the ‘First 1000 days of life’ in the House of Commons listed school readiness as one of three key priorities for England,arguing ‘Government should lead by developing a long-term, cross-Government strategy for the first 1000 days of life, setting demanding goals to reduce adverse childhood experiences, improve school readiness and reduce infant mortality and child poverty’ (House of Commons, Health and Social Care Committee, 2019, p. 5). The report went on to argue that, at the time, one-third of children were not meeting good levels of development when assessed against the Early Learning Goals, learning objectives that are embedded in The Early Years Statutory Framework (Department for Education, 2017). By bringing the Early Learning Goals into the debate, the government provided educators with explicit methods for assessing school readiness in practice. Adding to long-standing concern/debate, children were arriving at formal schooling not ‘ready to learn’ (Bingham & Whitebread, 2012, p. 6). In response, the government expanded subsided education and rolled out free Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) for two-year-old children to improve school readiness (Gibb et al., 2010). The move has been seen as a ‘political push’ to formalise learning (Cronin et al., 2017, p. 88). Cementing a readiness discourse that has uniformed early education as a product, which can enhance academic performance and increase later life success (Burgess & Earnst, 2020). Outlining a rhetoric of ‘investment and return’ in ECEC to influence the development of ideal citizens (Adriany, 2018). The material uniform-ing of children within a school readiness agenda is what Davies and Bansel (2007, p. 248) consider a ‘reconfiguration of subjects as economic entrepreneurs’. Heavily influenced by neoliberal logic. The supposed choice to wear or not to wear a uniform, or to take up or not to take up the two-year-old offer, suggests that there is ‘free choice’ that can empower parents to become proficient in furthering their individual interests for the good of their families (Rose, 1999). In effect, this dichotomy positions citizens who can successfully be both consumers and consumed to achieve the desired aims of the state (Hopkins, 2018). A form of neoliberal governmentality that provides the conditions in which parents freely drive gains for their own human capital (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). This is evidenced by the promotion of uniforms in educational settings whereby parents maintain the vision of the institution by purchasing and enforcing the wearing of the uniform. A scope of preschool uniforms,

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using publicly available websites, shows how the wearing of uniforms in ECEC settings is currently encouraged: There is a noncompulsory uniform of blue t-shirts, sweatshirts, fleeces and hoodies with the Preschool’s logo, which encourages children to feel part of the Preschool family and helps prepare them for wearing a full uniform when they move on to school. A uniform is a practical, warm option and means that best clothes are not spoilt. Recent feedback from parents has suggested that due to the range of messy activities we offer, they prefer their children to wear a cheap uniform as opposed to their good clothes. Our nursery uniform is optional and can save arguments over clothes choices in the morning! Polo shirts, jumpers, cardigans and waterproof coats as well as ‘back pack’ type bags embroidered with our school logo are available from Cre8tive Graphics. We encourage the wearing of a school uniform because it promotes a strong sense of identity. By combining the use of a uniform with the ‘earlier is better’ rhetoric materialises children as adults in the making, in the same way Wolfe and Rasmussen (2020) argue that uniforms materialise gender and sex for girls. It is therefore possible to argue that ECEC is aligned with the central tenants of Human Capital Theory (Moss, 2019), wherein the democratic process of free choice is illusionary, as outcomes and achievement hold court. Swaying the decision-making process to align with ascribing to institutional values whereby the child is constructed as a ‘knowledge producer’ (Moss, 2007, p. 230). Parental preoccupation here focuses on the universal ideal image of the child as a successful learner and embodies the construct of a supportive parent who dutifully engages in home-school contractual learning agreements. Yet this fails to acknowledge the will of the child and their autonomy for embracing their identities and individualism. An argument that is echoed by the words of Needham and Ülküer (2020), who call for education to be reclaimed as a matter of social justice. As Sims (2017) argued, neoliberalism has had a devastating impact on ECEC because of how language holds a privileged position, capable of reinforcing what Foucault (1980) calls ‘regimes of truth’ that drive standardisation ‘positioning children as investments for future economic productivity’ (Sims, 2017, p. 1).

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Reclaiming Identities The circulating regimes of readiness truths, together with the suggested benefits of school uniforms, are nothing short of repressive measures. A way to challenge and work beyond these confines can be inspired by Freire’s (1988) work Pedagogy of the Oppressed, in which a call for a new language emerges. One that provides a way for pedagogical practice and power to collaborate so that learners, in this case, children, can identify as critical agents with the power and authority to call into question the actions of others. Having a voice, and being able to use it, continues to be an ongoing concern for children, despite the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. As Spyrou (2017) argued, we cannot simply ascribe voice or agency in matters that implicate the child, and in the majority, children have no voice in or on policies. The voices that are heard are infused with institutional and cultural norms that serve to strengthen the dominant discourses. We can delineate this by adopting a pedagogy of resistance, which involves a shift in consciousness through pedagogical interventions that speak to individuals in ‘ways in which they can recognize themselves’ (Giroux, 2022, p.  188). Shifting consciousness in this way aligns practice with relational ontologies as a way to rethink ongoing issues as part of wider concerns that do not start with, or end with, the child. With consideration of children’s participation-with the formation or introduction of policies, such as uniforms and readiness, towards a more fluid and open encounter (Spyrou, 2017). Reconceptualising children’s participation with/in/through relational ontologies means that we can no longer consider the body and other things as separate entities. A way of thinking that we have come to rely upon, because of cartesian dualisms (Barad, 2007), which have shaped discursive values of the right and wrong ways to learn. The binary has become engrained in education, and Biesta (2015) explains this has cemented learnification as a self-directed human-only undertaking that is ‘haunting’ education (Ceder, 2019, p. 21). Instead we need to notice and accept the interrelatedness of all things and bodies if we are to understand how we come to know ourselves and our identities. Achievable by appreciating the complex ways in which bodies interact with environments (Hickey-Moody & Page, 2015) by taking a ‘material turn’ (Reddington & Price, 2018, p. 2). The material turn here draws on the work of Deleuze and Guattari (1987) to argue any item of a school uniform is a body, anything is a body, a pencil, an outfit, glitter, or glue. Myers (2020, p. 104)

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calls these ‘tinythings’ and explains the disruption they can cause is disproportionate to their actual size. Reimagining bodies as more-than-human means that agency can also be rethought in order  to transcend the subject/object divide. Barad (2007) explained existence is not individualistic; our human bodies are entangled with other bodies, things, and matter that intra-act, a reframing of interactions. The intra-activity leads to a lively ontology where meaning and matter come into existence. Resulting in ‘ongoing reconfigurations of the world’ whereby all bodies not only emerge with agency (Barad, 2007, p. 141), they also have the potential to ‘affect and be affected’ (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p. xvii). Defining affect can be problematic and difficult to summarise quickly and effectively. A useful way to understand affect comes from Massumi’s translation notes of Deleuze and Guattari (1987): AFFECT/AFFECTION.  Neither word denotes a personal feeling (sentiment in Deleuze and Guattari). L’affect (Spinoza’s affectus) is an ability to affect and be affected. It is a prepersonal intensity corresponding to the passage from one experiential state of the body to another and implying an augmentation or diminution in that body’s capacity to act. L’affection (Spinoza’s affectio) is each such state considered as an encounter between the affected body and a second, affecting, body (with body taken in its broadest possible sense to include “mental” or ideal bodies). (Massumi, as cited in Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, n.p.)

More simply put, affect ‘is not what it is, but what it does—which we can analyse and describe’ (Strom & Mills, 2021, p. 190). Influencing the provocation—what tinythings affect, or are affected by, uniform-ing school readiness? Moving beyond the human also provided me with the space to rethink what it means to have a voice. To date, there has been a fixation on the spoken voice. To disrupt this, I harness the work of Mazzei and Jackson (2012, p. 747) to seek out voices ‘in ways that are meaningful as noiseless’. I insist that all bodies have a voice and frame ‘voice’ as an ‘emergent and unpredictable process involving fleshy bodies, more-than-human elements and the vitalized intertwining of discursive, ideological and sociomaterial relations’ (Chadwick, 2020, p. 1). It is the voices of the intra-acting bodily tinythings that will be listened to, addressing the previous points from Spyrou (2017) and Giroux (2022). It is these voices that will reveal what matter matters to children in ECEC.

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(Silent) Disruptors at Sites of Resistance My fieldwork on school readiness involved visiting various settings, conducting informal and formal conversations about the concept ‘school readiness’  with practitioners and parents, and observing children in ECEC. Putting to work Tsing’s (2015) art of noticing during the observations was a way to think-with the histories of education, school uniforms, and school readiness. Noticing is a way to question colonial practices embroiled in buildings and practices, opening these up to notice ‘open-­ ended assemblages of entangled ways of life’ (Tsing, 2015, p. viii). It was this provocation to think-with colonial practices that led me to notice the way in which children intra-acted with school bags, an interrelatedness with matter. It was particularly these tinythings of the school uniform that children used to challenge the authoritative nature of ECEC and having their identities squash[ed] and squeez[ed]. The school bag became a site of resistance challenging the power dynamics at play amidst the direct, and undeniable, instruction to wear a school uniform (Cañas, 2017) made possible through the everyday keyring. The school bag became a space for a creative nonverbal protest that spoke of power (hooks, 1990), achieved by the intra-action between the child and the keyring(s). It is not unreasonable to question whether these small and seemingly mundane acts of entangling with keyrings can challenge authoritative power, either consciously or subconsciously. Here, I turn to the work of Blyth to argue that children are aware of the epistemic injustices levelled against them as ‘They are thus denied on three counts: ethically for being wrongfully excluded, epistemically for being wrongfully mistrusted, and ontologically for being wrongfully positioned as a lesser being’ (2015, p. 7). More importantly, as pointed out by Murris (2016), injustices are inflicted on children in education because of the adultmorphic claim of what counts as real knowledge and what is worthwhile. The impact of this extends to what is heard and considered worthy by the adult, silencing (some) human and more-than-human voices. The continued passing on of specific knowledge(s) via curricula, the selective nature of listening to certain voices, and the top-down pressure of adult-led agendas are ontoepistemological injustices—‘structural and systemic discrimination of children’ (Murris, 2016, p. 36) that call for moments of resistance to move beyond developmental discourses. I return to this in the final stages of the chapter to consider a way to move beyond these injustices by (re)imagining the curriculum.

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Keyrings on school bags (Fig. 2.1) were observed at every stage of education, up to and including the end of the reception class. In the traditional sense, it could be argued that the keyrings could be considered a transitional object, as theorised by Winnicott (1953). During developmental phases, the transitional object is a projection of an external reality, creating an illusionary experience with a unique value to a child. The object provides a sense of reassurance during varying emotional states, allowing the child to gain a sense of control and/or security. Historical research (reflected in Lehman et al., 1995; Passman, 1987) has shown that children are more likely to engage in unfamiliar or unknown situations when they use a transitional object. It is here that I depart from traditional thinking to argue that keyrings are tinythingly bodies with the ability to affect and be affected, enabling the child and the keyring to emerge with agency. The key, child, bag, uniform, and discourse of readiness reflect a ‘thing– matter–energy–child-assemblage’ (Malone et  al., 2020, p.  196) by ‘link[ing] elements together affectively to do something, to produce something’ as they intra-act (Fox & Alldred, 2017, p. 403). Embodied in comments made by a parent at a setting when discussing the importance of the object, and what it enabled and/or afforded:  ‘it’s funny how …

Fig. 2.1  Snapshot of keyrings on children’s bags These images were specifically chosen to ensure the anonymity of the settings involved in the research could be maintained. Furthermore, the active choice not to use the school bag gave further weight to enacting resistance by the child-tinythingassemblage

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always carries a dinosaur, uses it and roars gently when he meets new people, roars loudly when he’s not happy’. Moments such as this are alive with thing power, a function of the collective, ‘the curious ability of inanimate things, to animate, to act, to produce effects dramatic and subtle’ (Bennett, 2010, p. 6). Here, the keyring is understood as an actant that calls for children to engage in specific acts; agency is therefore distributed within the assemblage. That is, not to say that the thing-power assemblage was stable, a matter movement was occurring simultaneously. What I mean by this is that the thing–matter–energy–child assemblage was both resisting the uniform-school-readiness discourse and embodying it, moving between moments of activism to acceptance. I will now explore some matter-moments, drawn from fieldwork, where children were called to act with activism.

Turning to Notice Thingly Power My presence in most classrooms piqued intrigue and wonder. A natural inquisition on behalf of the children to discern who I was and why I was there. Some would ask outright and engage in conversation; others would watch from afar observing my movements. The one thing children were keen to do was share pieces of who they were with me, fragments of their identity. During moments of free play and during guided times, such as tidy-up time, I would often be called by a ‘come see’ provocation. Led by the hand of a child I would be taken to their pegs, where they would proudly show me their things—school bags adorned with keyrings. The keyrings silently disrupted the class schedule, opening up a space to allow for the children’s autonomous movement, affording them the agency to exercise their right to challenge and resist the everyday practices of learning in the classroom, and conforming to the uniform. The thingly power called for the child, giving them the confidence and autonomy to abandon the rules and requirements of the task at hand. A moment that could be considered as defiance by some. The tinything bridged the gap between me and the children, flattening and collapsing hierarchies of power. I describe the keyrings as ‘performative agents’ (Lenz Taguchi, 2010, p.  10) with the force and power to change thinking with/in/through material-discursive practices to (re)construct discourse. The keyring– energy–child assemblage entangled to create something new, a new construct of what it means to be a school-ready child as a social and political act—calling for change. There was a continuous flow of energy between

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the child and the keyring in a stolen, or rather claimed, moment of time. With an intensity that sped up the child’s talking, their urgency to show and tell, and an unpredictable storying of the keyring on their bag (Grosz, 2008). It was this flow of energy and intensity that enabled the agency to transcend human will and be distributed between the human and more-­ than-­human. As Lenz Taguchi (2010, p. 27) explains, ‘Agency is enacted through changes and displacements in these iterations as a resistance from within the collective discursive production of ourselves and others’. Souto-­ Manning argues, in/with/through these playful moments children enact change, rehearse learning, forge communities, and challenge fairness ‘which will later be (re)named [as] justice’ (2017, p. 787). The call for social justice by the performative agents was to rethink school readiness by considering what bodies, human and more-than-human, can do together when entangled. The keyrings positioned the children’s subjectivity in conjunction with making meaning of education, yielding the potential to leave a mark on the histories of the school readiness debate. The keyrings also drew children together, resulting in a wider sharing of stories that united the children in a commitment to add more to their bags, and to share and swop keyrings. A sharing of agential realism as they collectively embodied the more-than-human matter and discursive thinking, the keyring  became ‘representational, discursive and invitational (i.e.) a resistor and trigger for other activities’ (Harwood & Collier, 2017, p. 345). In conversation the children would ask each other ‘how many have you got?’, or say ‘look at mine!’, ‘have you seen this one?’. The keyrings acted as an impetus for conversation that moved beyond their thinglyness, toward the sharing of information the children then linked to their learning. Lenz Taguchi explains this ‘is the material-discursive forces and intensities that emerge in the intra-actions in-between the child and the materials in the room that together constitute the learning that can take place’ (2010, p.  36). For example, the keyring enabled the children to make unsurprising and creative connections that were rich and diverse, ranging from the weather to literacy. These were  unnoticed agentic moments of their readiness, that felll beyond the scope of what counts as learning. Made possible by the distribution of agency within the thing–matter–energy–child assemblage. It was not always what the children said, it was the actions that went with their words, that rippled between all the bodies present. Hands would move to mouths, backs would hunch up, eyes would scan for educators, and jingling sounds were all colliding materials known as ‘agentic rustle[s]’

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(Lenz Taguchi, 2010, p. 35). A continuum of inseparable relations as a covert dance in the cloakroom. Haraway (2016) describes this coming together as kin-shipping, making oddkin—a way of sensing other ‘bodies always on the move, bodies always in action, bodies always doing, and bodies always in organization and, processually, always becoming, never (fully) organized’ (Gale, 2019, p. 64). A common worlding as conceptualised by Taylor is a ‘dynamic collectives of humans and more-than-­ humans, full of unexpected partnerships and comings together’ (2017, p. 78). It is on this premise that thinking with keyrings can have an impact on pedagogical practice and the discourse of readiness.

Thinking Differently Re/turning to the earlier challenge of moving beyond ontoepistemological injustices in ECEC, what can we learn from the thing–matter–energy– child assemblage and the not-so-silent disrupters? The keyrings directly challenged the prescription of the school uniform and the mandating of a school bag emblazed with a logo. These seemingly insignificant acts strip children of any projection of their personalities and uniqueness, constraining children’s lives. Children are homogenised as products of the school, ready to be consumed by the curriculum. What matter, or knowledge, counts as right or wrong, or worthy of inclusion, in the process of learning is predetermined and organised in a linear way so children can get from point to point in their learning. All serving to perpetuate the developmental human-centred discourse education has come to rely on. As it stands, school readiness is a uniform(ed) way of controlling how education is enacted in early years education and fails to include the child and the voices of others. A common worlding framework could support pedagogy to depart from the entrenched ways of doing education. By using real-life encounters with objects, spaces, and places, we can follow the thingly power of matter and the more-than-human. A collaboration of intra-actions and curiosities to make a pedagogical shift away from ‘self-serving human preoccupations’ (Taylor et al., 2021, p. 74). A common worlding approach recognises that children grow up and encounter the world in ways that are diverse, complex, and ecological. The key axioms include fostering a creative and curious pedagogy that is fluid and moves beyond prescribed curricula to think and learn with the world around us. With the recognition that there is more than one way of knowing, a relational force that is

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orientated collectively. A further disruption of the subject and object. Removing prescriptive curricula and fixed developmental milestones for learning would be to embrace a not-yet-known journey that strips away the competition and pitting children against each other. Ultimately removing unnecessary league tables and the influence of Human Capital Theory and neoliberal logic. Finally, embracing the uniqueness of the human and more-than-human school uniforms would no longer be required to present a singular view of what it means to learn and know. What truly matters to children is tinythings.

References Adriany, V. (2018). Neoliberalism and practices of early childhood education in Asia. Policy Futures in Education, 16(1), 3–10. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 1478210317739500 Barad, K. (2003). Posthumanist performativity: Towards an understanding of how matter comes to matter. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 28(3), 109–131. https://doi.org/10.1086/345321 Barad, K. (2007). Meeting the universe halfway. Quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Duke University Press. Baumann, C., & Krskova, H. (2016). School discipline, school uniforms and academic performance. International Journal of Educational Management, 30(6), 1003–1029. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEM-­09-­2015-­0118/full/html? skipTracking=true Bennett, J. (2010). Vibrant matter: A political ecology of things. Duke University Press. Biesta, G. (2015). What is education for? On good education, teacher judgement, and educational professionalism. European Journal of Education, 50(1), 75–87. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejed.12109 Bingham, S., & Whitebread, D. (2012). School readiness: A critical review of perspectives and evidence. A TACTYC Research Publication. https://tactyc.org. uk/wp-­content/uploads/2014/09/Bingham-­and-­Whitebread-­2012.docx Blyth, C. (2015). International schools, teaching and governance. An autoethnography of a teacher in conflict. Palgrave Macmillan. Burgess, E., & Earnst, J. (2020). Beyond traditional school readiness: How nature preschools help prepare children for academic success. The International Journal of Early Childhood Environmental Education, 7(2), 17–35. https:// files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1255000.pdf Cañas, T. (2017, June 27). The sector must change the terms of enunciation. Brokering Intercultural Exchange. https://managingculture.net/2017/06/27/ tania-­canas-­the-­sector-­must-­challenge-­the-­terms-­of-­enunciation/

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Ceder, S. (2019). Ice/water: Giant’s kettles and Arctic childhood. In Social, material and political constructs of Arctic childhoods: An everyday life perspective. In P.  Rautio & E.  Stenval (Eds.), Social, material and political constructs of Arctic childhoods. An everyday life experience (pp. 35–47). Springer. Chadwick, R. (2020). Methodologies of voice: Towards posthuman/n voice analytics. Methods in Psychology, 2. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.metip.2020.100021 Cronin, S., Mulhaney, G., & Pearson, M. (2017). The political child. In A. Owen (Ed.), Childhood today (pp. 88–100). SAGE Publications Ltd. Davies, B., & Bansel, P. (2007). Neoliberalism in education. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 20(3), 247–259. https://doi. org/10.1080/09518390701281751 Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus. Capitalism and schizophrenia. Translated from the French by B.  Massumi. The University of Minnesota Press. DeMitchell, T. A. (2015, December 15). Does wearing a school uniform improve student behavior? The Conversation https://theconversation.com/does­wearing-­a-­school-­uniform-­improve-­student-­behavior-­51553 Department for Education. (2017). Statutory framework for the early years foundation stage. London: Crown Copyright. Department for Education. (2021). Guidance. School uniforms. https://www.gov. uk/government/publications/school-­uniform/school-­uniforms Department for Education. (2022). Early years foundation stage profile handbook. Retrieved October 6, 2022, from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/ government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1024319/ Early_years_foundation_stage_profile_handbook_2022.pdf Education Endowment Foundation. (2021). School uniform. https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-­evidence/teaching-­learning-­ toolkit/school-­uniform Foucault, M. (1980). Truth and power. In C.  Gordon (Ed.), Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings 1972–1977. Pearson Education. Fox, N. J., & Alldred, P. (2017). Mixed methods, materialism and the micropolitics of the research-assemblage. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 1(14), 191–204. https://doi.org/10.1080/13645579.2017. 1350015 Freire, P. (1988). Pedagogy of the oppressed 20th-anniversary. Continuum. Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630 6.2021.1931813 Gale, J. (2019). Worlding with objects. Departures in Critical Qualitative Research. https://pearl.plymouth.ac.uk/bitstream/handle/10026.1/17557/ DCQR%20Published%20PDF%20Sept%202019.pdf?sequence=1 &isAllowed=y

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Gibb, J.  M., Jelicic, H., La Valle, I., Gowland, S., Kinsella, R., Jessiman, P., & Ormston, R. (2010). Rolling out free early education for disadvantaged two year olds: An implementation study for local authorities and providers. Department for Education. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/ uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/181502/DFE-­RR131.pdf Giroux, H. A. (2015). Dangerous thinking in the age of the new authoritarianism. Paradigm Publishers. Giroux, H.  A. (2022). Pedagogy of resistance: Against manufactured ignorance. Bloomsbury. Grosz, E. (2008). Eight Deleuzian theses on art. In B. Herzogenrath (Ed.), An [un]likely alliance: Thinking environment (pp.  46–51). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Haraway, D. J. (2016). Staying with the trouble: Making kin in the Chthulucene. Duke University Press. Harwood, D., & Collier, D.  R. (2017). The matter of the stick: Storying/(re) storying children’s literacies in the forest. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 17(3), 336–352. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468798417712340 Hickey-Moody, A., & Page, T. (2015). Making, matter and pedagogy. In A.  Hickey-Moody & T.  Page (Eds.), Arts, pedagogy and cultural resistance: New materialisms (pp. 1–21). Rowman & Littlefield. hooks, b. (1990). Marginality as a site of resistance. In R. Ferguson, M. Gever, T. Minh-ha, & C. West (Eds.), Out there: Marginalization and contemporary cultures (pp. 341–343). MIT Press. Hopkins, K. (2018, March 12). Research matters. Education, employment and youth: Contemporary attitudes towards post-16 and post-18 education. British Educational Research Association. https://www.bera.ac.uk/blog/education-­ employment-­and-­youth House of Commons. Health and Social Care Committee. (2019). First 1000 days of life. Thirteenth Report of Session 2017–19. https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201719/cmselect/cmhealth/1496/1496.pdf Lehman, E.  B., Arnold, B.  E., & Reeves, S.  L. (1995). Attachments to blankets, teddy bears, and other nonsocial objects: A child’s perspective. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 156(4), 443–459. https:// w w w. p r o q u e s t . c o m / o p e n v i e w / 5 8 d e f a 6 b 2 5 a 1 4 b 1 b b f 3 6 a 1 e f 9 b 2 cd0c6/1?pq-­o rigsite=gscholar&cbl=1818970&casa_token=aFkJ5 F Q l O E s A A A A A : Z 2 P z X v i N c 1 O P u Y N d e R q -­d k F B K x G D 6 W Q p Q _ LWDWUMgpX8kpyJ2q6xWtfAUeCtGYNBGztO5Hc95UE Lenz Taguchi, H. (2010). Going beyond the theory/practise divide in early childhood education. Routledge. Malone, K., Tesar, M., & Arndt, S. (2020). Theorising posthuman childhood studies. Springer.

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Mazzei, L. A., & Jackson, A. Y. (2012). Complicating voice in a refusal to “let participants speak for themselves”. Qualitative Enquiry, 18(9), 745–751. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800412453017 Moss, P. (2007). Bringing politics into the nursery: Early childhood education as a democratic practice. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 15(1), 5–20. https://doi.org/10.1080/13502930601046620 Moss, P. (2019). For an education that sees children as more than ‘human capital’. Open Democracy. https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/ for-­an-­education-­that-­sees-­children-­as-­more-­than-­human-­capital/ Murris, K. (2016). The post-human child: Educational transformation through philosophy with picturebooks. Routledge. Myers, C. (2020). Interview with Casey Myers. In C. Diaz-Diaz & P. Semenec (Eds.), Posthumanist and new materialist methodologies research after the child (pp. 101–111). Springer. Needham, M., & Ülküer, N. (2020). A growing interest in early childhood’s contribution to school readiness. International Journal of Early Years Education, 28(3), 209–217. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669760.2020.1796416 Olsson, A., & Shanks, R. (2022). Employability and school uniform policies: Projecting the employer’s gaze. Childhood, 29(4), 628–645. https://doi. org/10.1177/09075682221108838 Ovington, J. A. (2020). Turning to notice a colourful perspective: (Re)presenting two-year-old children’s lived experiences of school readiness (Publication No. 28433331). Doctoral dissertation, Northumbria University. Northumbria Research Link. Passman, R. H. (1987). Attachments to inanimate objects: Are children who have security blankets insecure? Journal of Clinical and Consulting Psychology, 55(6), 825–830. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-­006x.55.6.825 Reddington, S., & Price, D. (2018). Pedagogy of new materialism: Advancing the educational inclusion agenda for children and youth with disabilities. International Journal of Special Education, 33(2), 465–481. https://files.eric. ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1185590.pdf Rose, N. (1999). Powers of freedom. Cambridge University Press. Sims, M. (2017). Neoliberalism and early childhood. Cogent Education, 4(1), 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1080/2331186X.2017.1365411 Smart, M. (2016, August 22). The school uniform where did it all start? http:// www.ace-­e mbroidery.co.uk/news/article/8/the-­s chool-­u niform-­w here­did-­it-­all-­start Souto-Manning, M. (2017). Is play a privilege or a right? And what’s our responsibility? On the role of play for equity in early childhood education. Early Child Development and Care, 187(5–6), 785–787. https://doi.org/10.108 0/03004430.2016.1266588

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Spyrou, S. (2017). Time to decentre childhood? Childhood, 24(4), 433–437. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568217725936 Stephenson, K. (2016). It’s not for the sake of a ribboned coat! A history of British school uniform. Doctoral dissertation, University of York. Etheses. White Rose. Strom, K., & Mills, T. (2021). Affirmative ethics and affective scratchings: A diffractive re-view of posthuman knowledge and mapping the affective turn. Journal of New Materialism, 2(1), 188–199. https://doi.org/10.1344/jnmr. v2i1.33382 Taylor, A. (2017). Romancing or re-configuring nature in the Anthropocene? Towards common worlding pedagogies. In K. Malone, S. Truong, & T. Gray (Eds.), Reimagining sustainability in precarious times (pp. 61–75). Springer. Taylor, A., Zakharova, T., & Cullen, M. (2021). Common worlding pedagogies: Opening up to learning with worlds. Journal of Childhood Studies, 46(4), 74–88. https://doi.org/10.18357/jcs464202120425 Tsing, A. L. (2015). The mushroom at the end of the world. Princeton University Press. Winnicott, D. (1953). Transitional objects and transitional phenomena. The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 34, 89–103. https://icpla.edu/wp-­ content/uploads/2012/10/Winnicott-­D .-­T ransitional-­O bjects-­a nd-­ Transitional-­Phenomena1.pdf Wolfe, M.  J., & Rasmussen, M.  L. (2020). The affective matter of (Australian) school uniforms. The school-dress that is and does. In B. Dernikos, N. Lesko, S. D. McCall, & A. Niccolini (Eds.), Mapping the affective turn in education: Theory, research, and pedagogy (pp. 179–194). Routledge.

CHAPTER 3

‘It doesn’t end at the cuffs’: The Discordant Discourse of Uniformed Performance in the Caribbean Beth Cross

and Ainsley Carnarvon

Those who are daring to … talk about a national being must never forget that the history is the living garment of a nation. Norman Manley1 Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, None but ourselves can free our minds Bob Marley

B. Cross (*) School of Education and Social Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Paisley, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] A. Carnarvon School of Education, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_3

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Uniform as Colonial Export One of Britain’s colonial exports, part and parcel of its ‘civilising’ influence, was the martial importance of a spotless uniform. Whilst its military presence has retreated, this British legacy lives on in Caribbean schools. As with other marks of culture, an emphasis on the performance of school uniform remains where back in Britain its significance has waned. For Caribbean children school uniform inspections at the beginning of the day, standing to attention in front of the flag, replicate martial practices as part and parcel of school discipline. The resemblance of this practice to those on slave plantations also bears attention. The pressures to maintain this appearance despite a range of formidable challenges, environmental and economic, reproduce in microcosm the plight of Caribbean communities on the world stage. The ‘colonial space has been left intact to continue with its imperializing gaze, scripting and regulating the ‘other’  ’ (Simmons & Sefa-Dei, 2012, p. 69) even as these imperial practices are enlisted in aid of nation building. Children have to show up more polished, more pristine, regardless of home electricity and water supply or the state of the roads. In some cases, fording streams, or travelling several miles in overcrowded minibuses pressed up against market traders, they must still appear for uniform inspection as if they stepped out of shop windows. Not only the uniform itself but one’s entire appearance comes under inspection; in fact, our examination of policy and practice has found that interpretations of good grooming, with hairstyles, are a particular point of cultural contestation. In this chapter we adjust the lens of our examination to focus in on the lived experience of school uniform in communities that face the exigencies of being on the harsh end of IMF trade terms (Clegg & Gold, 2011). We draw on Taylor’s (2016) posthumanist methodology for examining ‘what we know’ as an ongoing act engaging with layers of agential artefacts, texts and beings. We come from different backgrounds, having researched and lived on different Caribbean islands using different methods and theoretical resources. Beth has experienced uniform policy as a parent in Jamaica, Ainsley through his entire school career in Trinidad. With these contrasting experiences, together, we examine Caribbean uniform policies, the critical reflections of those who experience uniformed school lives, depictions of this within Caribbean literature (Kinkaid, 1986) and social critique (Cooper, 2007; Meeks, 2000). In doing so we consider the effects of what Foucault (1984, p. 180) has termed ‘pastoral power’: a power that

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relies on the idea that ‘it’s for your own good’, this rigid way in which different types of bodies in space and time express and establish hierarchies and territorialities in the minds of subjects, that their docility may improve them (Allen, 1998, p. 284). In working with Foucault, it is important to consider Fanon’s understanding of the embodiment of racial subjugation, as his Caribbean experience is a key constituent of the argument he articulates. Fanon draws on Merleau Ponty, to argue our comportment in the world is through our corporeal schema, that is, how our senses come together to form our sense of our place in the world. Merleau Ponty agues there is free agency to adapt this corporeal schema through our body’s ability to both disclose and transform the historical world. In so far as an embodied subject is able to step back from the phenomenal field, participate in and alter intentionally her historico-cultural horizon, she is free; in so far as her capacity for expression and her ability to reconfigure her own history and given context are denied, her freedom is significantly diminished and, in some cases, almost eradicated. Fanon extends this argument emphasising that a crucial impingement on such freedom for colonial subjects is the history of black people that is simultaneously erased and rewritten by the white imagination (Nielsen, 2011, p. 367). However, Nielsen would argue both Fanon and Foucault stress repeatedly, even though our own subjectivities are constituted in part (both positively and negatively) by others, the present social order is not a necessary order; rather, it is historical and contingent, open to alteration and even transformation. The question then becomes what agency instantiated in what choices are possible within school cultures both for educators and for students. We look at how these colonial practices projected into Caribbean spaces rub up against local dilemmas, demands and dexterity. These are striated spaces (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) with conflicts and contradictions. We suggest a different kind of entanglements (Spector & Kidd, 2019) is long overdue. The Caribbean school uniform has a particular place within global flows of knowledge, services and goods that involve local economies, relations and practices. School uniforms are mandatory across much of the Caribbean whether parents rely on the Chinese-based Alibaba website or local tailoring family businesses. We argue, however, that the emphasis on grooming cannot be read simply as a colonial imposition but must be understood within more complex historical forms of resistance and resilience. There is an ongoing clash between different discourses of self-­ development particular to the Caribbean. The discourse of ‘upliftment’

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(Henry, 2000; Sealey, 2018), which has long sought to emulate European standards, contrasts sharply with older informal forms of cultural resistance in which embodied practices, self-respect and self-worth take a decidedly different form (Meeks, 2000).

Servitude Folded Within Fiction As has been observed within educational research (Clough, 2002), some issues are too contentious to be addressed head on; they are better revealed within the folds of fiction. We begin by working with the traces of experience folded into Jamaica Kinkaid’s fictional hypothesis A Small Island as a form of found ethnography. This provides a contextual critique that brings the issues within our participants’ reflections on the routines and rituals of the school uniform into strong relief. A Small Island began as a letter to her editor wherein she explains why it is impossible to continue to write about her small island childhood home of Antigua. Taking us on a tour of the island through a tourists’ eyes she argues by contraries, drawing the readers’ attention by telling them what they must not notice, must not question: You pass a building sitting in a sea of dust and you think, it’s some latrines for people just passing by, but when you look again you see the building has written on it PIGGOTT’S School … (you pass by the library) This building was damaged in the earthquake of 1974. Repairs are pending. The sign hangs there and hangs there more than a decade later, with its unfulfilled promise of repair and you might see this as a sort of quaintness on the part of these islanders … but you should not think of the confusion that must lie in all that and you must not think of the damaged library … you needn’t let that slightly funny feeling you have from time to time about exploitation, oppression and domination develop into full-fledged unease … You must not wonder what exactly happened to the contents of your lavatory when you flushed it… . it just might graze gently against you ankle as you wade carefree in the water … but the Caribbean Sea is very big and the Atlantic Ocean is even bigger; it would amaze even you to know the number of black slaves this ocean has swallowed up. (Kinkaid, 2018, pp. 8–15)

It is as if she is adopting the polite graciousness of a host that asks you to overlook shortcomings, except for the subtext which accompanies it. Christian (2019) more directly names what is at stake here. She asks us to recognise that global whiteness has a deep and malleable persistence

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through which it dominates, ‘in all national racial social systems, even those that are ostensibly without white bodies and white institutions… . that reproduces itself through contemporary structural practice’ (Christian, 2019, p. 179). Through Kinkaid’s tour of the island, we see these structural practices. Yet, why this should be so, haunts the circuitous tour of the island. Racism is not named as such but attributed to bad manners. The marginal status of the island is accentuated by the kind of English that end up here, ones that are seen, not as racist, but as being bad mannered, who require a convoluted logic to accommodate into the aspirational compass that remains fixed: Maybe they weren’t from the real England at all but from another England, … not at all from the England we were told about, not at all from the England we could never be from, the England that not even a boat could take us to, the England that, no matter what we did, we could never be of. (Kinkaid, 2018, p. 29)

As has long been argued (Gilroy, 1995), the Caribbean precedes other industrial contexts and is a site where the embodied experience of exploitation in the service of global markets is keenly felt. As we have argued elsewhere (Cross, 2006) tourism through its exclusive resorts and even more exclusive cruise ships in many ways re-enacts a narrative of servitude, forcing many in its employ to effect performances of servitude. Survival requires one to look aside to pretend relations are amiable when they are predicated on anything but the reciprocity and equality of friendship. Kinkaid encapsulates this contradiction in the following observation: People cannot see a relationship between their obsession with slavery and emancipation and their celebration of the Hotel Training School (graduation ceremonies are broadcast on radio and television). (Kinkaid, 2018, p. 55)

Here we want to open up the chapter for those beyond the page who may want to enter into discussion, who may have grounds and grounding to offer (Rodney, 1969). What can be said, what would be said about tourism practices resemblance to past forms of servitude, if the terms of engagement were open for debate? Coming back to Foucault’s concept of pastoral power we would also ask: for whose good?

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This is an important question to think with, whilst taking into consideration, then, the demands placed upon children in terms of school uniform. As Sefa Dei (2018, p.  117) argues this places students within ‘particular struggles at the curious interface of skin, body, psyche, hegemonies, and politics’.

Lived Experience of Unquestionable Ritualised Humiliation We turn now to the accounts of lived uniform experience of subordination. It is one thing to theorise about the constraints of a historical-­cultural horizon and its role in constituting our subjectivity; it is quite another to learn in detail of the visceral practices through which uniform discipline is enforced across the Caribbean. Qualitative interviews (Berg, 2004; Lobe et  al., 2020) were carried out with participants of previous research in Jamaica and Trinidad, selecting those who would have different perspectives on the topic from different time periods, class positions and geographic locations. A total of eight interviews were carried out, following Ellis (2016) with care to explain fully the purpose of the interviews, to gauge the participants’ ongoing assent to discuss the topic and to effect an ethic of care during and after interviews. Respondents have been anonymised, represented here by the initial R for respondent, and the number of interview in chronological order. We are aware the observations shared with us will be read very differently depending on if the reader’s own education was colonised or colonising. Some will be shocked that such practices persist, whilst others may note them with a wry smile of recognition. Themes of humiliation and harm resonated strongly across experiences shared with us. All interviewees attested that there was a strong emphasis on uniform and appearance and that this was a core element of their school experience. Some participants accepted this as necessary and saw its correlation with employability as advantageous. Others questioned both the means and the ends. All interviewees remarked that the cost of uniforms posed challenges to parental budgets. Some questioned who benefited from the costs, and in this brief story, the cost of not conforming is also highlighted: You had to buy the badge, you had to buy the tie from them. And if you and if there was anything wrong you had to spend the whole day in the office or were sent to home. (R1)

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What is significant within participants’ recollections is the importance placed not just on the uniform but also on how it was worn and the body itself as an extension of the uniform. School uniform as a pretext to exact punishment that took the form of humiliation was a strong theme in respondents’ comments. This could take the form of being made an example of in front of the gathered school community: I remember lining up every single morning in primary school in assembly and they would make sure that the prefects check everyone … one by one … check for proper uniform, short nails, proper ribbons etc. If you didn’t have the correct uniform, they used to pull you out and put you in front of the full assembly so that everyone could see you. That was really embarrassing. (R2)

This humiliation is made possible with the collusion of everyone else subject to it, their collusion with the regime expressed through laughter at the subject singled out: Mom would always press and lay out my uniform from the night before. Pressing it was necessary because if it wasn’t done, the other children would make fun of you and the teachers would have something to say. Some of the children who didn’t have electricity and came with ruffled uniforms they would always be laughed at. (R1) So, to be getting licks … and seeing everybody else covering the mouth and laughing quietly at me … I can’t ever forget that. (R5)

Humiliation was not only visual but included carrying out forms of physical punishment that caused, at the least, discomfort and the occasion for continued ridicule throughout the school day and, in some cases, extreme distress. I remember one of my friends from [school name] went with braid in her hair. Because they thought that braids was a look that didn’t go with the school image, they made her miss class and take it down—to loose every single one of those plaits and she cried a lot about that because she was humiliated. (R3) If you pressed and seamed your shirt collar, that was also against the rules because the shirt collar according to them, must lie down flat on your shoulder. If you or your mother or whoever press your shirt and seam the collar,

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they will pull you out of the assembly line, make you bend over by the tap, and put water on your shirt collar and rub it until that seam comes out. (R4)

In some cases, the humiliation extended to the destruction of property deemed to be incorrect: I remember that if you did come with a black shoe, but it had like just one white NIKE tick on it, they will come with black paint and paint your shoes with regular house paint so it did damage your shoes. They would pull people out again in front of classmates, make them take the shoes off and paint it so you would see a line of shoes just drying with paint while people just stay in their socks. (R2)

The scrutiny of accessories to the uniform led to forms of exclusion: Even for school fieldtrips belts, ribbons and shoes must be 100% to the school requirements else you will not be allowed on the bus to go to the fieldtrip. (R3)

And even severe consequences to their educational progression: For national exams also, children must wear the correct uniform 100% else they will not be allowed to write the exams. I’m not sure how a ribbon in your hair will influence the exams but if you are not in uniform, then you can’t sit the exams. (R3)

One respondent was more explicit in his critique, questioning the purpose of this emphasis on conformity of appearance: and I don’t find learning should be … yuh know … based on a shirt being in your pants. For me, I don’t think it have anything to do with learning. I don’t know if the government thinks that it should just have some type of standard or level … but nobody never explained why you had to do those things for the uniform. (R5)

Embodied Pride as Enduring African Heritage In examining the lived experience as it contrasts to policy, what gives rise to this particular emphasis on grooming—is it the persistence of global whiteness, an attempt to beat the white man at his own game? Or are there

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other cultural considerations to bear in mind? Caribbean literature is replete with examples of African Caribbeans contrasting their hygiene to those of the coloniser. In Annie John Kinkaid observes: the only thing she didn’t like about English people: they didn’t wash often enough or wash properly when they finally did. Mother had said, ‘Have you ever noticed how they smell as if they had been bottled up in a fish?’ (Kinkaid, 1986, p. 36)

Embodied practices of beauty belied the racial slurs equating skin colour with dirt. It is not only Jamaica Kinkaid who observes the slatternly hygiene of white colonialist held up as betters. Such critique is in the mouths of characters in historical novels and attests to the maintenance of self-defined standards through generations of deprivation and exploitation. Often it has been said that whites may be richer, they may have clothes that are made out of much more expensive material, but they do not bodily take care of themselves and present themselves as well as Africans manage to do, despite all their disadvantages. The importance of wearing the uniform, not in a sloppy, slouchy way, may incorporate elements of self-care—elements of self-care that survived the slavery trauma and continue to this day. So it is important to note that pride in appearance isn’t all about slavishly mimicking colonial masters. Slavery took much away from people on many levels. All people had left was what they carried within their bodies, in some respects, their practices of self-care, their stories, music and dance. Coming from communities that had long thrived in the tropics, they valued the health of their skin as an important protector in a climate where infection is lethal. As we examined these possible historical roots of present-day practices, Ainsley reflected on his own experience: It just made me think back to when I was (first abroad at university living in shared accommodation). It was the guy from Senegal, myself and two others from Mexico and one from Lebanon. And in terms of the way we took care of our bodies, the guy from Senegal had very similar practices to me and the others, they didn’t. And I remembered him calling me out of my room one night, asking me when you shower you don’t, you know, do particular things, you don’t rub yourself with cream and all that. I’m like, yeah, I do these things. That’s normal. And the other guys who weren’t black, they were like, ‘We don’t do that. No, that’s not normal’.

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So, we were saying, but how is it that? The two black people doing the same things, you are from Senegal, I’m in the Caribbean, but we have the same practices. So now it’s kind of a moment for us thinking, like, how is it that that happened? And then for the others who are not black, they seem to not to have this … I guess it’s just part of the code here with that, that look and that image. It is a marker of prestige. And I think if you don’t have much else to set yourself off it’s how people socially locate themselves. That’s why you make sure, really from head to toe. It’s not just the uniform, it’s the actual body. I think there are practices that survive slavery that also find their instantiation in the cleanliness and the presentation of self. Because when you are wearing the uniform, it’s not just it doesn’t end at the cuffs, it is about how you present yourself—how your hair is, how your skin is, how everything is.

However, further historical context makes the picture more complicated when we look at the other bodily practices that are also part of the African legacy: stories, music and dance. It is important to note that the first forms of resistance to slave culture took the form of costume. The slave uniform was an unbleached rough spun off-white, and it was the only material they were allowed to wear. The first celebrations slaves were allowed to attend at Christmas and Ash Wednesday became occasions to wear colourful, highly decorative clothing (Braithwaite, 2003). The income from informal market trading, where slaves could trade the produce of the small gardens allotted them, was used to resource the costumes that for a few days a year would set them apart from their slave identity (Beckles, 2002). These carnivals on the eve of Ash Wednesday, or in Jamaica, the John Connu pantomime at Christmas time, provided cover for the first slave revolts (Williamson, 2004). And with the costumes came a potent multi-faceted disruption to decorum: dance. In Trinidad the dance form, whining, plays a central role in Carnival. And though Carnival takes place only two days out of the year, whining seeps into everyday life, as do its counterparts on other islands. Whining is not only a form of pleasure but an assertion of an independent aesthetic value system (Cooper, 2007). Carnival as reworker of otherwise intolerable conditions has many sights of repurposing, none more ingenuous than that practised by the archipelago’s youngest inhabitants within the margins of the school day. As we draw the threads of this chapter together it is useful to draw on Kinkaid’s novel, Annie John, where she illustrates the tensions between imposed imperial school norms and a local aesthetic of communal and

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self-­expression. Kinkaid sets the scene by detailing the meticulous attention to uniform and the associated behaviour and deportment required whilst wearing it. Recreation was to be carried out: in ladylike recreation—walks, chats about the novels and poems we were reading, showing each other the new embroidery stitches we had learned to master in home class or something just as seemly. (Kinkaid, 1986, p. 79)

Kinkaid juxtaposes the high expectations of uniform appearance with the delight taken in subverting them. She locates this activity at the margins of the school grounds, signalling its rupture of the bounds of decorum: most of us would go to the far end of the school grounds and play band. In this game, of which teachers and parents disapproved and which was sometimes absolutely forbidden, we would place our arms around each other’s waist or shoulder, forming lines of ten or so girls and then we would dance from one end of the school grounds to the other. As we danced we would sometimes chant … at other times we would sing a popular calypso song which usually had lots of unladylike words to it. Up and down the schoolyard away from our teachers we would dance and sing. (Kinkaid, 1986, pp. 79–80)

There is a certain relish with which the disarray of uniform is detailed as these activities draw to an end. At the end of recess, we were missing ribbons and other ornaments from our hair, the pleats of our linen tunics became unset, the collars of our blouses were pulled out, and we were soaking wet all the way down to our bloomers. When the school bell rang, we would make a whopping sound as if in a great panic and then we would throw ourselves on top of each other as we laughed and shrieked. (Kinkaid, 1986, p. 80)

Kinkaid’s humorous depiction encapsulates playful traditions  that Ainsley remembers from his own experience of school in Trinidad and that Beth observed frequently in Jamaica. As Ainsley remembers: You know, you get in trouble for it because on a regular day, winning shouldn’t be done in school. But yes, it’s part of the culture. It is part of being Trinidadian. To the point where people say if you cannot whine you aren’t a Trinny.

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But we always knew what parts of the ground to go play on that, you know, you don’t have the line of sight. And we would whine just playin’, that’s part of who we are.   I remember even in my niece’s time which is much more recent, they had a song. It’s a game that they play: My mother sent me to school. The teacher called me a fool. my boyfriend tell me to whine So I whine like a ball twine   and then they have to start whining. That’s the game.

This playful practice, we argue, is part of young people’s strategies for contending with the impossible terms of success that they are set. Forms of cultural assertion have further embodied forms. The development of Rastafarian culture can be argued to be the latest form of resistance that traces its roots back to African heritage (Ford, 2004). Rastafarianism that draws on Marcus Garvey’s argument that Africa not Europe should be emulated, and its interpretation of Ethiopian versions of Christianity wherein hair is the embodiment of strength, has led to the development of dreadlocks as a culturally emancipatory embodiment of self-respect. The opening shot of a Canadian documentary which examines the importance of braids in First Nations’ culture, Braves Wear Braids (Starlight & Starlight, 2022), features a young African man with dreads, making exactly this point from another site of colonial imposition.

Uniform Policy and Public Debate: Walking a Fine Line The cultural significance of dreads is important to bear in mind as we turn to examine policy statements in reference to school uniform in both Trinidad and Jamaica. In both countries uniform codes extend to all aspects of appearance and are explicitly argued to play an important role in setting school culture. The preface to the 2021 guidelines produced by the Jamaican Ministry of Education state: Dress and grooming form a critical part of student development and are closely linked to character development. (MOEYI, 2021, p. 2)

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Curiously, the ministry contrasts equal access to education with a need to maintain a learning environment, as if grooming, in posing a threat to that environment, serves as grounds for being excluded from that access: the MOEYI must ensure that all students have equal access to education but must also ensure that a proper learning environment is maintained and that the discipline to secure this is assured. (MOEYI, 2021, p. 2)

The principles enumerated include respect for institutional identity, ethos and tradition, the best interest of the child and respect for inclusion. How these competing interests are weighed up, the documents concludes, must be decided by each individual school in consultation with its stakeholders. In Trinidad the National Code of Conduct stipulates that the parent’s first—and can we infer foremost?—responsibility is to uniform their child: The parent/guardian is responsible for: 1. Making sure the student attends school daily and on time, properly attired in full uniform and equipped for effective learning to take place. (Ministry of Education of Trinidad and Tobago, 2018, p. 14)

It is interesting that the code presumes an understanding of ‘appropriate’ that brooks no exception. No details seem to be necessary as to what is deemed appropriate, so well understood are its requirements: Failure to wear the prescribed school uniform and to be appropriately groomed as set out by the individual school rules is a violation of the National School Code of Conduct and will warrant the appropriate consequence. (Ministry of Education of Trinidad and Tobago, 2018, p. 23)

However, with schools being situated in different parts of the country where there are cultural differences among the communities (some communities are predominantly Indian, some black, some upper class, religious affiliation, etc.), might this have an impact on the standard or rather personal preference of grooming and discipline set out by the school? In Jamaica cultural assertions of identity at school have opened a debate of national prominence. At issue is children who, instead of succumbing to the torturous, scalp-pulling ordeal of braiding, or soaking their hair in all manner of chemicals, are daring to wear their hair in dreads. In 1978

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the practice of refusing to admit Rastafarians to Primary Education, or suspending them if admitted, unless they agreed to cut their hair, was found to be unconstitutional. However, in 2021 this ruling was challenged. The Supreme Court of Judicature of Jamaica held that a school policy prohibiting dreadlocks as a hairstyle does not violate constitutional rights, including to self-expression, of the child. The case hinged upon the parents being unable to prove their child’s hair was ‘worn with intent’ of religious significance (Columbia Global Freedom of Expression, 2020). This clash in embodied practices is not the only incident in recent years in Jamaica. In 2017, seeking to enforce grooming standards, three teachers restrained and forcibly trimmed a student’s hair. They were subsequently arrested and charged with bodily assault (Loop News, 2017). That they were charged indicates that parents are willing to challenge uniform norms. The incident led to two rounds of nation-wide consultation of stakeholders and the rewriting of national guidelines on grooming (MOEYI, 2021, p. 9). Public discourse still seems to emphasise the importance of school culture to the exclusion of cultural practices that children may bring to school with them. In August 2022 at a gathering of head teachers in Jamaica, the keynote speaker is reported as urging students to ‘respect the culture of the school’ whilst seeming completely oblivious to the culture that educators may need to consider respecting within the study body. The speaker, in a common rhetorical feature in Jamaican public fora, quotes the country’s beloved singer Bob Marley, ‘if you give an inch, they take a yard’, without, it seems, reflecting on the singer’s iconic dreadlocks (Hutchison, 2022). These issues are also live in Trinidad, for example, the girl that had to take out her braids because it was not appropriate based on the standards of the upper-class school that she attended—might this mindset have some links to the colonial residue that still exist among the Caribbean in which anything closer to black and negro (slave) is of a lower class and less acceptable than that of white and European mannerisms?

Discussion as Grounding In closing we note that the continued emphasis on a uniform embodiment of school culture has also been noted in other sites of Britain’s imperial project, namely Smruthi Bala’s (2022) ethnographic work in India. This is of sociological significance, for a principal method through which

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dominant groups elicit the subordinate’s cooperation is by co-opting their lived experiences: It works primarily by inserting the subordinate class into the key institutions and structures which support the power and social authority of the dominate order. It is, above all, in these structures and relations that a subordinate class lives its subordination. (Hall & Jefferson, 1976, p. 39)

We are concerned that these uniform practices, which seems to perpetuate past harm, impact on the quality of education in the Caribbean and the degree to which it can open up possible futures. To articulate this, we close by relating our actual discussion as we worked on the article, partly in a nod to the Caribbean practice of grounding (Rodney, 1969), a form of oral reasoning together. Ainsley: One of the things also that did pop up from one of the same persons I was interviewing and talking to, he was asking what do you really think is the whole reason and purpose behind having to wear the uniform? And his perception is that even though no one said anything directly, what he believed is that the purpose is to make you be a more upstanding person. His way of describing is to give you that poise, elegance and that class that you need. But what was interesting,—And he thinks that that is beneficial for the workplace in Trinidad specified in Trinidad—but then he went on to say because in Trinidad, when you’re going to work, you can’t have your hair out as Afro even if you’re black and most people are. There is a high percentage of black people. That’s still not accepted. You have to look a particular way and act a particular way. So, I did ask, this way, that you said you have to act, is that naturally you? And it’s like no, you need to act as someone else to make it in Trinidad. So, the school by enforcing these rules—he even used the description, ‘you had to be more British’. I was surprised to hear that. Beth: No one should have to learn how to alienate themselves. But if one has to succeed, is it still possible to have experiences that mean that alienation is not totalising. How is that navigated so there is still space in some aspects of their life to choose who they are? Thinking back to the court case which has disallowed children to wear dreads to school, how can one know what one believes without the space to practice faith? As Stuart Hall (1988) draws on Gramsi to argue, the ‘organic’, that is, our sense of the world and our place in it that comes from embodied everyday experience, is where assertion of identity begins and to prohibit it foreshortens ones future, rather than protecting

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it. We create conditions, to reference Lovelace’s (1979) Trinidadian novel, where ‘the dragon can’t dance’. Ainsley: I agree, it starts from a felt moment and it’s interesting that children find spaces for those felt moments of—umm, authentic expression that are not dictated from afar and part of a very long regime of deculturation. Thinking about it, we always did try to find a way, you know, to do what you want to do. As you rightfully said, to express yourself, just have fun and having fun is just being your authentic self because most of the time when you dress and you go to school and all of that, you’re not being your authentic self. Through detailing particular uniform practices, drawing on Kinkaid’s disruptive use of fiction and reflecting upon the implications of current controversies, we hope we have brought the impact of pastoral power on a Caribbean child’s corporal schema into sharper focus. It may be clearer now what is at stake in the Caribbean when one dares to assert: I am not a prisoner of History. I must not look for the meaning of my destiny in that direction. I must constantly remind myself that the real leap consists of introducing invention into life. In the world I am heading for, I am endlessly creating myself. (Fanon, 2008, p. 204)

Note 1. Rex Nettleford, ed., Norman Washington Manley and the New Jamaica: Selected Speeches and writings 1938–68 (Trinidad and Jamaica: Longman Caribbean 1971, p. 113).

References (MOEYI) Ministry of Education, Youth and Information, Jamaica. (2021). Student Dress & Grooming Policy, Policy for Public Institutions. Allen, A. (1998). Power trouble: Performativity as critical theory. Constellations, 5(4), 456–471. Beckles, H. M. (2002). “War dances” Slave leisure and anti-slavery in the British-­ colonised Caribbean. In V. A. Shepherd (Ed.), Working, slavery, pricing freedom: Perspectives from the Caribbean and African Diaspora (pp. 223–226). Ian Randle Publishers. Berg, B. (2004). Qualitative research methods for the social sciences 5. Teaching Sociology., 18. https://doi.org/10.2307/1317652

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Brathwaite, E.  K. (2003). The “Folk” culture of the slaves. In G.  Heuman & J. Walvin (Eds.), The slavery reader. Routledge. Christian, M. (2019). A global critical race and racism framework: Racial entanglements and deep and malleable whiteness. Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, 5(2), 169–185. https://doi.org/10.1177/2332649218783220 Clegg, P., & Gold, P. (2011). The UK overseas territories: A decade of progress and prosperity? Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 49(1), 115–135. Clough, P. (2002). Narratives and fiction in educational research. Open University Press. Columbia Global Freedom of Expression. (2020). Vigo vs Board of Management of Kensington Primary School. https://globalfreedomofexpression.columbia. edu/cases/virgo-­v-­board-­of-­management-­of-­kensington-­primary-­school/ Cooper, C. (2007). Erotic Maroonage: Embodying Emancipation in Jamaican Dancehall Culture, Proceedings of the Ninth Annual Gilder Lehrman Center International Conference at Yale University. The legacies of slavery and emancipation: Jamaica in the Atlantic World, November 1–3, 2007, Yale University New Haven, Connecticut. Cross, B. (2006). Infinite rehearsal of culture in St. Catherine Jamaica: Heritage as tourist product implications for Caribbean pedagogy. Pedagogy, Culture and Society, 14(3), 315–328. Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1987). A thousand plateaus. University of Minnesota Press. Ellis, C. (2016). Compassionate research: Interviewing and storytelling from a relational ethics of care. In I. Goodson, M. Andrews, & A. Antikainen (Eds.), The Routledge international handbook on narrative and life history. Routledge. Fanon, F. (2008). Black skin, white masks (Rev. ed., R. Philcox, Trans.). Grove Press. Ford, J. (2004). Representations of deference and defiance in the novels of Caryl Philips. In S. Courtman (Ed.), Beyond the blood, the beach and the banana. Ian Randles Publishers. Foucault, M. (1984). Truth and power. In P. Rabinow (Ed.), The Foucault reader. Pantheon Books. Gilroy, P. (1995). The Black Atlantic. Verso Press. Hall, S. (1988). The hard road to renewal. Verso Books. Hall, S., & Jefferson, T. (1976). Resistance through rituals: Youth subcultures in post-war Britain. Hutchinson. Henry, P. (2000). Caliban’s reason: Introducing Afro Caribbean philosophy. Routledge. Hutchison, B. (2022). Educator urges respect for culture in schools’ grooming policy. Jamaican Observer, August 11. https://www.jamaicaobserver.com/ news/educator-­urges-­respect-­for-­culture-­in-­schools-­grooming-­policy/ Kinkaid, J. (1986). Annie John. Penguin Publishers. Kinkaid, J. (2018). A small place. Daunt Books.

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Lobe, B., Morgan, D., & Hoffman, K. A. (2020). Qualitative data collection in an era of social distancing. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19. https://doi.org/10.1177/1609406920937875 Loop News. (2017). Vauxhall High Teachers arrested after shaving students’ head. Loop News. https://jamaica.loopnews.com/content/vauxhall-­high-­teachers­arrested-­after-­shaving-­students-­head Lovelace, E. (1979). The Dragon can’t dance. Andre Deutsch. Meeks, B. (2000). Narratives of resistance, Jamaica, Trinidad, The Caribbean. The University of West Indies Press. Ministry of Education of Trinidad and Tobago. (2018, May 25). National School Code of Conduct. Policy Documents. Retrieved January 23, 2023, from https://www.moe.gov.tt/policy-­documents/ Nielsen, C. (2011). Resistance through re-narration: Fanon on deconstructing racialized subjectivities. African Identities, 9(4), 363–385. Rodney, W. (1969). The groundings with my brothers. Bogle-L’Ouverture Press. Sealey, K. (2018). The composite community: Thinking through Fanon’s critique of a narrow nationalism. Critical Philosophy of Race, 6(1), 26–57. Sefa Dei, G. J. (2018). “Black Like Me”: Reframing blackness for decolonial politics. Educational Studies, 54(2), 117–142. https://doi.org/10.1080/0013194 6.2018.1427586 Simmons, M., & Sefa-Dei, G. (2012). Reframing anti-colonial theory for the diasporic context. Postcolonial Directions in Education, 1(1), 67–99. Smruthi Bala, K. (2022). Clean bodies in school: Spatial-material discourses of children’s school uniforms and hygiene in Tamil Nadu, India. Children’s Geographies, 20(6), 803–817. https://doi.org/10.1080/14733285.2022. 20593 Spector, K., & Kidd, B. G. (2019). Diffracting: The ungraspable in-between of posthuman literacies. In C. R. Kuby, K. Spector, & J. Johnson Thiel (Eds.), Posthumanism and literacy education: Knowing/becoming/doing literacies. Routledge. Starlight, J., & Starlight, C. (2022). Braves Wear Braids. https://www.feralfawn. ca/braves-­wear-­braids Taylor, C. (2016). Edu-crafting a cacophonous ecology: Posthumanist research practices for education. In C. Taylor & C. Hughes (Eds.), Posthuman research practices in education (pp. 5–24). Palgrave Macmillan. Williamson, K. (2004). Re-inventing Jamaica history: Roger Mais and George William Gordon. In S. Courtman (Ed.), New perspectives in Caribbean studies: Beyond the blood, the beach and the banana (pp.  387–406). Ian Randle Publishers.

CHAPTER 4

Intervening in School Uniform Debates: Making Equity Matter in England Sara Bragg

and Jessica Ringrose

With contrib. by Alison Wiggins, Kate Boldry, and Amelia Jenkinson

Introduction School uniforms have perhaps always been caught between competing debates. Currently in England, there may be a trend towards schools engaging in draconian policing of school uniform. Some analysts relate this to the increasingly privatised and corporate nature of English schooling (Kulz et al., 2022). News media, aware of the ‘click bait’ value of such stories to create debate among readers, regularly report on schools that position staff at their gates or classroom doors to monitor uniforms,

S. Bragg (*) • J. Ringrose Centre for the Sociology of Education and Equity, Institute of Education, UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society, London, UK e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_4

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sending large numbers of students home (sometimes even on their very first day of secondary schooling) or putting them into ‘isolation’ for uniform infractions. School leaders are quoted as defending this in the name of creating fairness (sameness as an equaliser), raising standards, setting clear expectations, ‘freeing’ teachers to teach, rule-following as a valuable life lesson and so on. On the other hand, parents and students are sometimes represented as questioning the relevance of correct uniforms to learning, and flag concerns about their cost. We have also seen high-­profile news items about uniforms as sexist and debates around whether girls should have to wear skirts or boys should be able to choose to do so. What receives less attention in popular debates are the equity dimensions of uniform policies and practices in relation to diverse students and how a series of intersectional power relations around class, Britishness, culture, race, context, heterosexuality, cisgender rules and more come into play through the typically ‘sex’-segregated uniform. This chapter explores our experience working on a collective staff-student project at UCL that attempted to contribute to and intervene into these ongoing debates about policies and practices around school uniform. Shared narrative accounts of experience showed again and again how uniforms matter. We document the co-production of alternative guidance for schools and young people to make uniforms more inclusive, and we discuss how this guidance has gone out into the world (made waves, had impact) and what we know of how it could have, and has, been used by parents, staff and students. We theorise uniform—and the entangled phenomena of policy-­ teachers-­ gates-uniform-students—as part of the material-discursive practices of schooling (Barad, 2007). Student subjectivities are constructed through connections and linkages with other bodies, things both human and nonhuman, that are both in and productive of spaces in the institutional assemblages of schools (Ringrose & Rawlings, 2015). Uniforms co-materialise power relations in school settings, to produce what comes to matter through intra-actions with intersectionally positioned bodies, school space, policies and more (Bragg et al., 2018; Ringrose et al., 2019; Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020).

Background: Uniforms and the Mattering of Gender Equity Awareness of sexual abuse in schools has been increased by the website Everyone’s Invited, founded in June 2020, which invited young people to upload anonymised accounts of experiences in and beyond schools. It

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received over 50,000 UK-based contributions and named over 3000 schools. In response, in England, the Schools Inspectorate Ofsted produced a Review of sexual abuse in schools and colleges in June 2021 (2021). However, apart from a single mention of girls reporting that they felt unsafe wearing their school uniforms in town, and two brief references to upskirting, the review does not consider school uniforms as a contributor to a culture and climate that condones sexual harassment. (By contrast the Welsh equivalent, Estyn, does include a section on uniform in its own report published later that year (2021).) Ofsted’s oversight alerts us to the gaps in mainstream understanding around how clothes, bodies, culture and histories intra-act to produce power and privilege in complex ways, with women’s and girls’ dress consistently scrutinised, regulated, policed and used to blame them for their own victimisation (Ringrose & Renold, 2012). Our perspective, backed up by a comprehensive research base on ‘rape culture’ (Phipps et al., 2018), is that specific and gendered dress codes and uniforms are inequitable in practice, can contribute to a climate of sexual harassment and reinforce gender binaries. Academic research into school uniform reveals its links to sexual harassment, gender/sexual binaries, hierarchies and exclusions in schools (Bodine, 2003; Edwards & Marshall, 2020; Happel, 2013). However there is a gap between these findings and routine practices within schools which position uniforms primarily as an issue of rules to be followed (Raby, 2012). This chapter discusses a community-engaged learning project at the Institute of Education, University College London’s Faculty of Education and Society. UCL funding brings staff and students together with community organisations to work on issues with real-world relevance and impact. In this case, the project team consisted of authors Sara Bragg and Jessica Ringrose, who are academics teaching and researching education and gender equity; Alison Wiggins and Kate Boldry who teach on the Postgraduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) teacher education programme; and Amelia Jenkinson, co-founder and former CEO of the education charity School of Sexuality Education (SSE). Our team previously worked together to produce a Good Practice Guide for teachers on the Relationships and Sex(uality) Education (RSE) curriculum (Jenkinson et al., 2020), now listed in UNESCO’s Health and Education Resources library. SSE reaches many thousands of teachers and young people in schools across the UK through its work providing RSE workshops in schools; training staff, parents, future teachers; working with teacher trade

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unions; and contributing to conferences. Amelia’s observation—that school leaders and staff were surprised when SSE proposed reviewing school uniform policies as part of work towards gender equity, inclusion and safeguarding—sparked our application. The project aim was to create a pathway for critical connection between the gender theory covered in academic teaching, which problematises binary approaches to gender and interrogates the misogyny of gendered dress codes, and the practices of primary and secondary schools, and to incite positive change through developing alternative guidance for schools. The project ran three online workshops with over 40 participants during the summer term of 2021, and a launch event attended by over 100 teachers, school staff, parents and others in Autumn 2021. We recruited students from secondary and primary PGCE and postgraduate Masters’ programmes (including in Social Justice and Education, Sociology of Education, Policy Studies in Education, Education, Gender and International Development). Student teachers, lecturing and research staff all had experience in a wide range of schools. Some participants were parents and shared their children’s current experiences. Some Master’s students were previously teachers. There was a broad international mix, including some from European countries where schools do not have uniforms at all. Although also diverse in terms of sexuality, the group was predominantly composed of those identifying as women with men in a minority. The project practised a form of consciousness raising, benefitting from the diversity in the room and creating space for participants to share views and consider differences and similarities across time and place. The first workshop in particular invited reflection on personal experiences. The second analysed both academic research and existing school policies. The third began to formulate key take-homes and alternative policy suggestions. Follow-up meetings finalised the guidance documents drafted by SSE  (Bragg et  al., 2021), which now sit on the SSE website (https:// schoolofsexed.org/guidance-­for-­schools). We used an online anonymous noticeboard platform to generate data. Note-takers summarised discussions from small and whole group discussions, and individuals could provide direct comments themselves. Due to the nature of the process, when these are cited here, they can only be designated by workshop number (W1, W2, W3).

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Starting Points: Policing Gender and Uniform Participants agreed that rigid uniform differences enforcing gender binaries were problematic. The perspectives that were shared echoed many of the arguments in a report for the Department for Education that focuses specifically on the issue of gender and uniform (Let Clothes Be Clothes, 2021). School uniforms for girls are often more expensive; tights rip more easily and must be replaced more often than trousers, while skirts appear more likely to be branded than trousers. Cheap blouses tend to be thinner and more see-through than equivalent shirts. Rules also embed masculine norms, for instance that boys’ hair should not ‘touch the collar’ or bans on ear piercings, and one participant recounted how he had been made to shave off his moustache in school (W2). However, rules for boys generally lack the element of shaming that girls experienced, which we discuss below. Participants narrated how they or their peers suffered from the imposition of a gender binary in uniform, when this did not match how they felt about themselves: “no recognition of gender as a spectrum” (W1). Some had found this deeply distressing. Gendered uniform policies are difficult for non-binary, gender-questioning or transitioning students who are made to exist within a system of boy/girl. The enforced binary undermines schools’ rhetoric of inclusivity and LGBTQ+ support. Rationales for uniform also enforce gendered notions of difference and problematic assumptions about sexuality and responsibility for behaviour. Most commonly, skirt lengths are monitored—actually measured against feminine body parts (Ringrose & Renold, 2016)—on the grounds of the effect short skirts/girls’ bodies would have on boys and men (using discourses of female ‘modesty’ and avoiding ‘distracting’ men) or ‘Teachers (female) shaming students for wearing too-short skirts, saying that when we left the school and went on the bus “men would look up our skirts”’ (W1). An international example was of loose sportswear uniform in schools being presented as ‘preventing sexual harassment’, a construction that clearly blames clothing and its wearer for harassment. In Belfast, a local journalist was claimed to have written about ‘Catholic men waiting outside Protestant schools because Protestant girls had attracted their attention “via short skirts’(W1). Many recalled how skirts rendered them unsafe when wearing them because of a hostile heteropatriarchal public sphere: ‘I would be catcalled by adult men in my uniform on my walk home’ (W1). In these examples we can see how gender binary uniforms create a range of issues around bodies and clothes, particularly centred around

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how the skirt and its historical connections to femininity stand as a key marker of sexual difference that has also been fetishized in some contexts, leading to state-sanctioned solutions to hide the female body and to widely condoned and normalised forms of harassment, sexism and sexual violence. Despite the imposition of sex-segregated uniform clothing in most contexts (other than China), one interesting feature of our discussions was the common agreement amongst many participants, even those who had experienced non-uniformed schooling, on the broad acceptability of uniforms in principle. Their justifications tended to emphasise an equity perspective: uniforms as a leveller, as affordable and as convenient, avoiding the need to select or over-think what to wear. Some described ‘loving’ or being ‘grateful’ for uniform as a release from fashion diktats, the need to wear cool clothing and peer scrutiny (W1). One person argued that they continued to be more productive, even when working at home, when they dressed smartly as their sixth-form had required (W1). The majority of comments therefore focused on enactment of uniform policy: the practices schools used to enforce adherence to standards. It was clear that these overly impacted on those gendered as women and girls. Practices ranged from surveillance, measuring, to body-shaming: “We had to kneel and have our skirt length measured if a member of staff deemed it too short which was always embarrassing and demeaning”. (W2) “We had to line up at the front of the class to compare acceptable and notacceptable skirt length”. (W2) “Girls who develop early will have their uniform policed before/worse than those who don’t”. (W3) “Cat called by grown men … as a child didn’t think anything of it, but thinking as an adult. Boys throwing water to make shirt see-through—never reported it. Shorts under skirt because boys would pull up skirt, never reported it… just accepted it. If bra could be seen you were labelled a slut”. (W1) “Male teachers commenting on girls’ uniforms, including the colour of their bra”. (W1)

Breaking apart the practices above we see bodies being measured by rulers (Renold, 2018) to see if the material skirt reaches the subjectively defined ‘correct’ length, a practice that converges with morality lessons for women in wider social practices that condone ‘rape culture’ (Mendes

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et al., 2019). We see material lines being enacted in school space, where children are lined up (similar to livestock) to compare and measure and police (Ringrose & Renold, 2016). We can also hear the audible sensory cat-calling and commenting upon bodies being judged and shamed in public spaces (Berger-Correa & Ringrose, 2023) with non-uniformed clothes like bras and shorts being regulated through the material intra-­ actions between the rules, the enforcers and the (feminine) bodies inside the uniforms. These school rules are discursive (Raby, 2012) but also materially enacted through the range of practices described in brief above. Discipline centres teacher control rather than student autonomy or comfort. A participant recalled detentions even in winter for wearing tights under sports tracksuits to stay warm. Taking examples that also involve masculine-presenting bodies, rules are constantly having to be negotiated about what clothes should be worn independent of the conditions, for instance, blazers that must not be removed even in hot weather. Boys might be ordered to tuck their shirts in or do up their top buttons, and some male participants recounted disturbing comments by peers and male teachers about their bodies. However, on the whole there was agreement that there was less surveillance, material monitoring and embodied sanctions upon boys, since uniform ‘infractions’ were treated as less serious. Boys were also allowed or even implicitly encouraged to shame and harass girls (pulling their bra straps, commenting on underwear colour, touching them under skirts, calling them sluts, placing pencils on seats)—perpetuating an idea of men having dominion over girls’ bodies. Although many schools now offer trousers for girls to wear, the tightness of those trousers is routinely monitored and disciplined. We heard stories about how what was being mocked, disparaged and commented on were students’ bodies and factors not within their control, particularly in relation to body weight and shape, rather than their uniforms. Enactment pressed down on students’ everyday lived experiences, making some school spaces no-go areas (such as when staff police uniform in queues for canteens). It was repeated that there were no channels to report poor behaviour, whether on-street harassment or by boys (and some girls) and even by teachers in school. As research has documented, gendered school uniforms are essentialising, enforcing notions of gendered differences as immutable (Happel, 2013; Let Clothes Be Clothes, 2021; Stephenson, 2021). However, it was clear from discussions that there were no simple solutions: in the UK, for example, proposals for generic sports-wear-like uniform for

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all have often seemed to offend a classed sense of professionalism. In some schools, gender-­neutral uniforms have already been introduced in ways that appear well-intentioned but are problematic in practice. For instance, schools can masculinise the whole uniform by enforcing trousers for all, limiting girls’ choices more than boys’, without regard to girls’ own preferences, and sometimes justifying this in ways that support rape culture myths (such as describing skirts as ‘indecent’ or ‘immodest’). “‘A friend chose not to wear trousers because you could hide more of your body in a skirt’”(W2). Alternatively, a gender-neutral uniform policy might state that students can wear anything from the clothes available, so that boys can in principle choose skirts and girls trousers. But without addressing social conventions and local gender cultures, that shift may feel too uncomfortable and fail to effect change in practice.

Moving Towards Intersectionality: Race, Sexuality, Class, Neurodiversity Our documents were produced and circulated at a particular moment in the UK. Government guidance appeared to support recognising LGBT perspectives (for instance, in the statutory Relationships, Sex and Health  Education curriculum in England), and the Equality Act 2010 (EA) protects from discrimination on the basis of ‘protected characteristics’ including disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation. The EA imposes a public sector equality duty, which arguably might encourage more progressive approaches both by individual schools and by local education authorities. The Black Lives Matter movement helped create an environment conducive to awareness of racialisation and discrimination, while students at Pimlico Academy in London had conducted a successful campaign earlier that year around a number of uniform and other issues including a racist edict attempting to ban hairstyles that ‘block the view of others’.1 All this supported our argument for a more inclusive, intersectional and equity-oriented approach and the idea of guidance to support student agency. Discussion consistently raised issues entangled with sex-gender creating complex assemblages of concerns. For instance, participants flagged particularly the (more zealous, sexualising and body-shaming) policing of black girls’ bodies, and thus how it enacts ‘uncomfortable reorganizations’ (Tamura, 2017) of acceptable and unacceptable ways of being, making

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some bodies both more visible and simultaneously marginalised and in the wrong. Bodies, hair and skin colour are all rendered unentitled to inhabit— belong to—the space of the school in the same way as the dominant white normative body. Uniform policies that state students must have ‘natural hair’ or must not have ‘extreme haircuts’ or ‘non-traditional hairstyles’ are often loaded with racist connotations about what constitutes ‘acceptable’ or ‘professional’ hair. straight hair. Banning temporary henna hand tattoos ignores that these are an important part of cultural and religious practice. “Uniform policy more strictly enforced among black students in a predominantly white school; was it about curvy body types (recent experience as a teacher prompted this thought)”? (W1) “Afro hair accused of being ‘messy’—major impact on sense of personal identity and how acceptable natural hair was. Couldn’t have braids.” (W1) “At my school we had to wear black/navy or ‘skin colour’ tights—a Black peer was told that she had to remove and change her tights because hers were brown— the colour of her skin. This really drove home to me (at the time) that the experiences of Black peers was much worse than mine”. (W1)

Some participants knew children with neurodiversity who found some fabric of school uniforms intensely uncomfortable. Others noted how students with acne wear make-up primarily to hide scars. Class is not a protected characteristic in the Equality Act, but socio-­ economic inequalities have been highlighted by both the Covid-19 pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis in the UK. Uniforms impose a range of material hurdles depending on the social location of families/students. One participant shared that in Shanghai, private elite schools had European-­ style uniforms that were very different from those of public schools, so privilege was immediately visible in public spaces. We discussed the challenges for disadvantaged families of the costs of specialist items, gender disparities in terms of items required to be bought from specialist suppliers or more widely available, the financial burden of distinctly gendered uniforms that cannot be handed down across genders and the struggle to find shoes acceptable both to schools and to young people for wearing outside school. Several recounted the stigma associated with ‘tatty’ second-hand uniforms or of being bought clothing in large sizes so that it wouldn’t have to be replaced, exposing the myth of egalitarianism. It was noted that the Covid-19 pandemic had led some schools to allow students to wear more comfortable sports kit—such as tracksuits—all day when they had

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sports lessons, opening up for debate whether such clothing styles could be made permanent. However, participants also noted the overwhelmingly middle-class assumptions about the purpose and style of uniforms and hair. Language about clothing or appearance being ‘scruffy’, ‘messy’, ‘professional’, ‘smart’ or ‘respectable’ is loaded in class terms. Uniforms are often promoted as preparing students for the world of work (even as enhancing students’ life chances), but that work is imagined to be white-collar office work (albeit of a specific and regimented kind). Thus, schools may perpetuate some young people’s sense of alienation from education if they imagine their futures in trades or other domains without such dress codes. Here we see that school uniform policies intra-act with an imagined ideal in the labour force around expected protocols and dress codes in many retail and business environments. The Government Equalities Office issued guidance about dress codes in the workplace (GEO, 2018), suggesting that gendered and overly prescriptive codes are likely to be illegal and infringe on human rights. No such recourse seems available to children. There was also evidence that what is deemed unacceptable relies on classed aesthetics and notions of ‘respectability’: for instance, when false nails and eyelashes are sanctioned but varnished nails and mascara are overlooked; or when shaved heads or ‘buzz cuts’ are banned. These accounts meant we had to continue to foreground how different bodies intra-act with the uniforms in a range of highly complex ways that create disadvantage to those who are not the normative ideal of a slim-­ bodied, white, cisgendered, heterosexual boy or girl. A 2022 case of a headteacher imposing strict rules and quoted as declaring that slips in discipline ‘lead to carnage’2 conveys how uniform acts as a container and the fear of losing control when bodies do not fit, when they spill out or leak from those confines, and how this can create a tricky terrain of subjective discipline in school environments.

From Discipline to Wellbeing and Educating We reviewed school uniform policies in our second workshop session, sourced from institutions participants had attended, taught at, worked in and so on. In most cases, these documents placed uniform as part of behaviour and discipline policy. Some sanctioned uniform issues as seriously as others such as misbehaviour or punctuality/attendance, allowing for students to be excluded from learning (sent home or into isolation) for infractions that could include wearing make-up, nails or particular

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hairstyles. Our participants tended to feel that time spent on uniform was unproductive and even damaging to teacher-student relationships: On my placement, I watched a teacher spend 15 minutes making his whole class line up, so he could inspect their uniform. All that time could have been given to teaching, learning and building positive relationships instead. (W1)

A central plank of our argument therefore became to move uniform towards schools’ wellbeing agenda instead of punitive behavioural policies. That is, the starting point in considering uniform policy should be whether rules and their enactment meaningfully enhance students’ sense of comfort and belonging to their school community. Additionally, we argued that since schools are educational institutions, uniforms could and should be a focus for learning. Some schools specify leather shoes, which are problematic both in terms of cost and in terms of vegetarian/vegan ethical principles. Participants noted the problem of artificial fabrics that shed ecologically damaging micro-fibres, while acknowledging that dilemmas of cheapness versus sustainability were not easy to resolve. At the very least, educational processes could engage relational and ethical questions about the planetary and social impacts of clothing and shoes, in terms of the materials they are made from, those who make them and under what conditions, who profits from school uniform, whether we enable young people to make the environmentally conscious choices they often want to do, as well as tackling bullying and harassment based on uniform.

The Guidance: Substance and Reception Collective feedback on our initial draft highlighted the need to produce brief soundbites as a focus for debate and training. For instance, the distinction between ‘policing uniforms’ and ‘policing bodies’ was seen as the kind of punchy statement that might make a difference. We were directive about prohibiting the kind of language that is problematic when used by teachers (such as, ‘slutty’). We included a section debunking the idea that uniform is in any straightforward sense an ‘equaliser’ as this was such a common response. Our guidance documents are now used on the UCL PGCE teaching programmes and recommended to student teachers to apply their learning in their professional lives, thus drawing more connections between theory and practice. Students have taken them into schools to rationalise critical

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engagement with school uniform policies and ultimately partially to address issues of sexual harassment in schools. Feedback received suggests that our guidance has particular traction and resonance among parents and students: SSE has received many appreciative emails from parents who recount that their children—especially daughters—have read it avidly. We are aware of several schools that have adopted the guidance and used it to change policy. We included a recommendation that schools consult with their communities in reviewing uniform policy, and indeed it appears that the impetus for change often comes from parents and governors as much as or more than teachers. Arguments for identity-oriented inclusiveness seem to be areas where schools feel able to take action, facilitating moves to less binary uniform options that accommodate non-binary and trans students, and away from policies that demand students not ‘flaunt’ non-normative sexuality or ethnicity or any other minoritized identity through, for example, hairstyles. This also supports recognising as valid young people’s desire to express individuality and uniqueness, legitimated by reference to the Equality Act. It can be used to resist senior management pressure to police uniforms— particularly for school staff to comment on girls’ uniforms. We recommended schools adopt the HALO collective’s code against hair discrimination,3 which seems to have been a popular ‘quick win’ move. Popular concern about growing economic inequalities means that cost is also an area where positive shifts seem possible. The UK Competition and Marketing Authority has acted on parental complaints about the cost of branded uniform items, particularly from sole providers, for some years now. Some Academy chains have been accused of deliberately making uniforms more expensive to deter poorer families from applying (and thereby increase the likelihood of improving results), while regular rebranding of uniforms for schools that are taken over by other schools means repeat purchases by parents. The Department for Education has recently issued guidance around the cost of school uniforms that could be used to support a more relaxed approach.4 We recommended offering a thorough justification for the use of branded items from monopolistic outlets and removing the requirement if no justification could be found. We also flagged issues of neurodiversity in relation to fabric, and uniforms that do not accommodate different body shapes. However, some feedback suggests that elite schools for whom uniforms are designed precisely as a marker of distinction (rather than for equity reasons which we noted were more compelling for our participants) are proving particularly hard to shift.

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Crucially, as we have noted, the guidance recommends a shift away from uniforms as a matter of discipline and positioning them more as one of wellbeing—building on public discourses about the ‘epidemic’ of poor mental health among young people. In this way the questions about uniforms become less those of correct rule-following, but more related to the reasons behind ‘incorrect’ uniforms and engaging with students about this in ways that are conducive to their feelings of wellbeing and belonging. The guidance takes a view that cultural norms and power relations are always at play in how dress enfolds onto bodies. It therefore cautions against sexist assumptions, particularly that skirt-rolling relates in simplistic ways to self-sexualisation. It proposes attending to the meanings that things might have for students themselves, such as altering skirts to feel better about their body image, using makeup to cover skin conditions or simply wearing natural hair as part of the right to be. We also produced a version of the guidance for students. We offered ‘scripts’ that students could use to express their discomfort to each other and to teachers, along the lines of ‘when I hear that … I feel this … Could you try this instead?’ Simply repeating what a student or a teacher has said might help that person hear themselves in a different way, for example, ‘you have said that I am indecent because I have a hole in my tights’. Drawing on our experience of schools-based research, we also proposed the idea of a diary that students might make to document their experiences of uniform in a single day. For instance, how long it takes them to prepare in the mornings, the number of times they get pulled up for uniform in the day, how the uniforms make them feel at different points in the day, the responses they get in different places—at school but also on the bus or in the street. Schools and classroom teachers can be unaware of the cumulative impact of what they say.

Policy into Practice, the Final Frontier? Our guidance is designed to focus not only on the rules about what should be worn but also and perhaps even more importantly on enactment of the policy, the intra-actions and multiple practices that make up the school day in the school space. However, some feedback suggests that this is a big step for schools. We heard of one school saying that implementation was not part of ‘policy’ so could not be addressed. Teacher participants argued that there was a lack of training for school staff in how to understand, let alone address, rape culture, harassment, patriarchal attitudes, gender diversity and a host of further equity issues.

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Furthermore, as trainees were interpellated into their teacherly role in school sites, they found themselves under increasing pressure to police uniforms, especially given their more junior role. This pressure was sometimes overt, in the form of comments or notes from senior leaders—and we came across an example of a senior staff member whose job description included ‘uniform inspector’, suggesting that this role is endorsed as a requirement of leadership. We also heard about vagaries of implementation—that is, that some individual staff members took up the issue of uniforms while others did not. But pressure could also be anticipatory: that is, a concern that failing to issue uniform sanctions would be interpreted as laxness on their part, meaning student teachers did so despite their own reluctance. They expressed the feeling they should ‘tow the line’ as one put it (W1), despite discomfort and/or that it was against their personal views. The broader stresses on teachers, in England, related to high-stakes testing, inspection regimes, accountability and performativity measures, are well documented in research literature (Kulz et  al., 2022; Maguire et  al., 2020). There is some evidence that teachers are also increasingly incited or expected to adopt particular business-oriented dress codes, such as suits for men, with women having to regulate any ‘sexualised’ element of feminine dress. ‘What you wear is policed as female teachers, I am hyper-­ aware of my outfit”’(W1). At times we wondered whether monitoring uniforms was a way for teachers to exert the conventional hierarchical authority and relationships expected of them in contemporary schooling as well as a response to the policing to which they too are subject.

Towards Conversations The contradiction between the constraints around clothing for both feminine-­presenting (or even not-masculine-enough) staff and students, and the relative lack of regulation around men’s and boys’ bodies came into sharp relief at the launch of the report. A teacher in the audience noted that he felt uncomfortable measuring girls’ skirts but that he was charged with doing so and felt he had no options. In response Jessica pointed out how male sports teachers often roam around school in shorts, exposing a significant amount of leg, without sanction—recounting a research experience where a sports teacher the research team dubbed ‘sexy legs’ showed up to a formal interview in his gym shorts. Turning the gaze back onto the privileged site of masculinity and male bodies in this instance

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had a pedagogical effect/affect: the teacher noted he had ‘never thought of this’ double standard and would reconsider his practice with it in mind. In exactly this way, our guidance aims to flip the script and turn the lens of power onto the materiality of privilege, that is, to create the space for questioning the restraints around one’s own body and others, to think through the meanings and matterings of school uniforms and rules that may seem universal but are actually deeply contextual, situational and applied in ways that create inequity. If it can be inserted into school environments and staff-student dialogues, the guidance may be able to create an attunement to uniform that could incite transformative change. Indeed, it would seem that enactment is the relational, intra-active element of uniform policies that proves most impervious to change and most vulnerable to inconsistencies because it relies most on individual teacher judgement and decision-making. This is why policies must shift to encompass diversity, equity and inclusion from the outset. However, more so than just more rules in a different direction, a constant dialogue and disruption of uniform is needed to champion the rights and wellbeing of young people and create conditions of equity for all. Acknowledgements  This chapter reports on a  Community-Engaged Learning Project funded by University College London.

Notes 1. Students’ statement is available here: https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmQtstSXu815 MdeDB4p3eKQKMy6BaXgz8pUPo64KrmrUQK. 2. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-­11262007/Head-­kicks-­50-­ pupils-­one-­day-­breaking-­uniform-­rules-­including-­wore-­wrong-­socks.html. 3. https://halocollective.co.uk. 4. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cost-­of-­school-­uniforms/ cost-­of-­school-­uniforms.

References Barad, K. (2007). Meeting the Universe halfway: Quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Duke University Press Books. Berger-Correa, B., & Ringrose, J. (2023). Sonic disruptions to sexual violence lessons in the science lab: A postfoundational discursive-material-affective-­ sensorial approach. In A. Y. Jackson & L. A. Mazzei (Eds.), Postfoundational inquiry. Routledge.

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Bodine, A. (2003). School uniforms and discourses on childhood. Childhood, 10(1), 43–63. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568203010001003 Bragg, S., Renold, E., Ringrose, J., & Jackson, C. (2018). ‘More than boy, girl, male, female’: Exploring young people’s views on gender diversity within and beyond school contexts. Sex Education, 18(4), 420–434. https://doi.org/1 0.1080/14681811.2018.1439373 Bragg, S., Jenkinson, A., Wiggins, A.  Boldry, K., & Ringrose, J. (2021). UCL Community Engaged Learning Project: School Uniform Guidance London: UCL / School of Sexuality Education. https://static1.squarespace.com/ static/57dbe276f7e0abec416bc9bb/t/6162b2874b848a5ebf5 2a2c1/1633858184636/School+Uniform+guidance+for+schools.pdf. Edwards, T. K., & Marshall, C. (2020). Undressing policy: A critical analysis of North Carolina (USA) public school dress codes [Article]. Gender & Education, 32(6), 732–750. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2018.1503234 Estyn. (2021). “We don’t tell our teachers”: Experiences of peer-on-peer sexual harassment among secondary school pupils in Wales Estyn (estyn.gov.wales). https://www.estyn.gov.wales/thematic-report/we-dont-tell-our-teachers-experiencespeer-peer-sexual-harassment-among-­secondary GEO (Government Equalities Office). (2018). Dress codes and sex discrimination – What you need to know. UK Government. https://www.gov.uk/government/ publications/dress-­codes-­and-­sex-­discrimination-­what-­you-­need-­to-­know Happel, A. (2013). Ritualized girling: School uniforms and the compulsory performance of gender. Journal of Gender Studies, 22(1), 92–96. https://doi. org/10.1080/09589236.2012.745680 Jenkinson, A., Whitehead, S., Emmerson, L., Wiggins, A., Worton, S., Ringrose, J., & Bragg, S. (2020). Good practice guide for teaching relationships and sex(uality) Education. IOE UCL ­ https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/ 10125267/ Kulz, C., Morrin, K., & McGinity, R. (2022). Inside the English education lab: Critical qualitative and ethnographic perspectives on the academies experiment. Manchester University Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv2s5b4tj Let Clothes Be Clothes. (2021). School uniform: Dressing girls to fail. https:// www.letclothesbeclothes.co.uk/girls-school-uniform-report-2021 Maguire, M., Gewirtz, S., Towers, E., & Neumann, E. (2020). Contextualising policy work: Policy enactment and the specificities of English secondary schools. Research Papers in Education, 35(4), 488–509. https://doi.org/10.108 0/02671522.2019.1601758 Mendes, K., Ringrose, J., & Keller, J. (2019). Digital feminist activism: Girls and women fight back against rape culture. Oxford University Press. Ofsted. (2021). Review of sexual abuse in schools and colleges. Ofsted. https:// www.gov.uk/government/publications/review-of-sexual-abuse-in-schoolsand-colleges

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CHAPTER 5

Pupil Participation in Secondary School Uniform Policies in Scotland Rachel Shanks

Introduction There are several reasons for encouraging the participation of pupils in decisions about school uniform. First, there are possibilities that deciding on school uniform together can help young people understand pluralist societies and decision-making processes, as Dewey suggested (1916). Second, school uniform and how it is worn are part of a young person’s identity development and their self-expression, which can impact their wellbeing. A third reason is that children and young people have a right to involvement in decisions that affect them under Article 12 of the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child (1989). As children develop and grow older, they are meant to have more of a say over their lives. The level of pupils’ participation in school uniform policy is an indicator of the extent to which they are involved in decisions that affect them. In terms of the participation of pupils in decision-making about school uniform in

R. Shanks (*) School of Education, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_5

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Scotland, we can consider what power they and other stakeholders have in relation to school uniform. These stakeholders include local authorities, headteachers, teachers, parents and pupils. A further reason for involving young people in these decisions could be to avoid confrontation and publicity when schools impose policies that are directly at odds with the rights or wishes of young people. Two recent examples of this occurred at an academy in London (Kulz et al., 2022) and a secondary school in Scotland (Campbell, 2021). Until recently, participation by children and young people in school affairs in Scotland has largely focused on mimicking external political processes with pupil councils and class representatives (Cross et  al., 2014). Unlike in the rest of the United Kingdom (England, Northern Ireland and Wales), there is currently no national policy or guidance on school uniform in Scotland; however, this may change following a national consultation in 2022 (Scottish Government, 2022). The guidance could include steps for schools to ensure that full consultation and involvement around reviewing school uniform policy is put in place. In New South Wales there is a School Uniform Policy Guidelines Checklist which includes four groups who must be formally consulted on the policy: students, teachers and other staff, parents/carers (including the parents’ association), and suppliers and retailers (NSW Government, 2022). In the Scottish Government consultation on national policy, it is stated that special arrangements have been made to seek the views of children and young people. Their views will be considered alongside the consultation findings (Scottish Government, 2022). In a survey of adults across England, Scotland and Wales in 2022 support for compulsory school uniforms in secondary schools was lower in Scotland than elsewhere (61%), but support for compulsory school uniforms in primary schools was higher (55%) (Morris, 2022). No children or young people were surveyed. The focus of this chapter is an analysis of the school uniform policies, handbooks and websites of all 357 publicly funded secondary schools in Scotland. While there is a language of involvement and consultation with pupils, there is little evidence of embedded participation in decision-­ making around uniform and appearance policies. What children and young people wear at school is a matter that affects them, and thus, according to Article 12 on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, they should be able to express their views on this, and their views should be considered. In this chapter, it is considered to what extent this right is complied with and whether the policies allow pupils to not only have a voice but also

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influence policy (Lundy, 2007). I am accepting Alldred and Fox’s (2019) invitation to explore another area of social life and social interaction, namely, school uniform, using a combination of materialist and micropolitical analysis to inform other possibilities of becoming-citizen. In the assemblage related to school uniform, how do children and young people influence school policies? While individual instances of influence can be found (e.g., Riddell, 2020), the emphasis in this chapter is on how pupils are involved (or not) in the making of policies that seek to regulate what they wear within a school uniform assemblage that includes school, teacher, parents, pupils, school uniform items, clothing and shoes not allowed, community, school wear manufacturers, retailers, and ethos. The concluding part of the chapter considers how involving young people in school uniform decision-making could help foster democratic participation to continue outside and after school (Andersson, 2019). However, it is necessary to be aware of the possibility that the incorporation of pupil participation may lead to it becoming a technology of governance (Mayes, 2020) rather than a mechanism to practise democratic citizenship. Using a new materialist approach, school uniform policies are treated as artefacts that make things happen (Fox & Alldred, 2022). The policies are artefacts that govern the objects of clothing that pupils can or cannot wear at school and in school. In addition to understanding what is happening in the policies and the consequent affects on school pupils’ bodies, this analysis also provides an opportunity to highlight ways that we can change and improve pupils’ experiences at school. This new materialist approach allows us to ‘ask new questions about the social world, inequalities, social justice and human futures’ (Fox & Alldred, 2022, p. 635). In school uniform policies, we can look for traces of how pupils are regarded by schools. Are they active agents involved in decision-making who are becoming-citizens? In Scotland, 16- and 17-year-olds have the right to vote in local municipal elections and in Scottish Parliament elections, and 18-year-olds at school have full citizenship rights. There are debates about whether children are beings or becomings, but it could also be argued that we are all becomings, never staying the same but always changing and being affected by the physical and social world (see Davies, 2016). In Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence, four capacities are meant to be developed within pupils, namely, they should become successful learners, confident individuals, responsible citizens and effective contributors (Scottish Executive, 2004). An analysis of school uniform policies shows how school authorities regard pupils, their bodies, clothing and

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shoes. Alldred and Fox (2019) looked at how teachers, school nurses and youth workers contributed to young people ‘becoming-citizen’ (p. 690). By involving pupils in deciding these policies, the schools could help pupils in the process of becoming-citizens. As Alldred and Fox (2019) note, citizenship can be understood as ‘an emergent capacity of material social interactions: part of a ceaseless ‘becoming’ of the social world’ (emphasis in original) (p. 692). Citizenship can be seen as ‘the material flux of affects between humans, things, social collectivities and ideas’ (Alldred & Fox, 2019, p. 699). Here, I am interested in uncovering the micropolitics of school uniform assemblages in school policies to understand how young people and their clothes and shoes are assembled. To understand the assemblage at play here, it is important to note that there is currently no national guidance on school uniform in Scotland. Some local authorities provide general guidance to schools, and school handbooks generally include information on school uniform although there is no legal requirement to do so (Scott, 2016). At the school level, there can be several iterations of the same policy in different places, such as the school handbook, communications to parents and standalone school uniform policies. In the policies, there is a specification of what pupils can wear and what they cannot wear and an aggregation that lays down strict requirements for them to follow to become ‘good citizens’ (Alldred & Fox, 2019).

Pupil Participation in the Assemblage of School Uniform Policy In an earlier research study on political community in schools, the issue of school uniform arose at multiple sites (Kiwan et al., 2022), and a lack of real involvement by pupils in decision-making was found (Shanks & Molloy, 2017). That study piqued a latent interest in school uniforms, which indirectly led to the study being reported in this chapter. The focus here is on a study that comprised an analysis of the school uniform policies, handbooks, and websites of all 357 publicly funded secondary schools in Scotland. It is possible to conduct new materialist data analysis in documentary analysis by looking for data on affects, capacities and relations (Fox & Alldred, 2022). In this chapter, the analysis is conducted to look for the micropolitical consequences for bodies and nonhuman elements in the school uniform assemblage. While there is a language of involvement

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and consultation with pupils, there is little evidence of embedded participation in decision-making around uniform and appearance policies. Of note is the repeated reference to the involvement of not only parents but also teachers in the decisions around uniform. When pupils are potentially involved in determining school policy, they are one part of a human troika consisting of parents, pupils and staff. Information from a small number of schools on surveys and other methods of consultation provides a snapshot of how schools consult with these stakeholders on uniform policies. The concept of materiality is returned to in this chapter, as this is central to understanding how school uniform is experienced. On the one hand, there are policies and rules, and on the other hand, there are decisions made by pupils before and during school every day about what and how to wear their uniforms. A previous Foucauldian analysis of 357 schools’ policies on school uniform and dress code presented a move away from regarding uniform policy as a direct method of surveillance and control to Foucault’s idea of governmentality through which pupils police themselves (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). This is not to say that uniform is not also used as a method of discipline and control in schools; for example, one of the school policies states, ‘The office staff will identify who has received two or more uniform demerits at the end of each week and a letter of concern will be sent home by the headteacher.’ Here, the concept of governmentality is brought together with materiality to understand how the micro decision-making of school pupils in relation to school uniform is dealt with by schools. Examples of differing emphases in the statements from schools are provided to highlight the tensions in this field. While one school might refer to widespread consultation with parents and pupils on uniform policy and that the local authority will not insist on uniform being worn, another school refers to ‘substantial parental and public approval of uniform’ and that the schools in that local authority are ‘free to encourage the wearing of school uniform’. School documents and websites refer to ‘extensive consultations’ (8 schools), ‘widespread consultation’ (23 schools) or pupils, parents and staff being ‘fully consulted’ (25 schools). One school policy states that ‘The uniform is actively supported by our pupils, parents and the Parent Council and is of great benefit to our young people’. There are a small number of schools that note more than consultation in terms of the involvement of young people in the school uniform. In one case, a working group of pupils produced a guide; in another, a working group of

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pupils, parents, teachers and community members agreed on a school dress code. There is also a narrative in the policies that schools are merely giving pupils what they want. Through the involvement of pupils in their own school’s uniform policy, it is possible that a polyvocal approach could lead to change. It is perhaps surprising that in the 2020s, school uniform is still so similar to those worn in the 1950s. If pupils were regularly involved in reviewing their own school’s uniform requirements, would they wish to update them or keep them the same? In one instance, it was stated that ‘Following extensive consultation, the wearing of school uniform has now been firmly re-established.’

What Influence Do Pupils Have on School Uniform Policies? New materialism makes it possible to explore the physical world and social constructs, such as the need for school uniform, together and to consider how they affect each other (Fox & Alldred, 2022). Nonhuman things, such as school uniform policies, can be social actors or agents, creating affects and making things happen. In England, with the growth of academisation (moving from democratic education authority control to private control) of schools, there has been a rise in ever stricter school uniform requirements (Kulz et al., 2022). Like the performance of being a ‘good teacher’ (Smith & Lander, 2012), there is the enforcement of rules on children and young people about how to be a ‘good pupil’ wearing the correct uniform in the correct way. As Clarke (2018) writes, one way to ‘make education less oppressive and authoritarian … is to recognise and seek to undo the power of the fantasies that we use to frame education’ (p. 119), and it could be argued that one of these fantasies is that school uniform improves learning and behaviour in school. If the role of school is to instil the ability to play an active role in democratic society, then it is worrisome that critical literacy is given less status than knowledge acquisition (Ashbridge et al., 2022). Local authorities have overall responsibility for all but one of the 357 publicly funded secondary schools in Scotland. In some local authority areas, secondary schools have similar policies with very similar wording: the school uniform is not compulsory, and it is not policy to force pupils to wear a uniform or to wear ‘specialist items of clothing in order to

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engage in all of the activities of the curriculum’. Identical phrasing is also used by two local authorities, which state: Given that there is a substantial parental and public approval of uniform, schools in [name of local authority] are free to encourage the wearing of school uniform.

This exact phrasing was then found in the policies of two schools in one of the local authorities and three schools in another. However, the text before and after this sentence showed different emphases by the schools. In one school, it was noted that uniform was not compulsory and that ‘pupils will not be deprived of any educational benefit as a result of not wearing uniform’, while in another school in the same local authority, this was not included; instead, the reason for having a uniform to enhance the ethos of the school was emphasised. Directions such as those above may act as a limit on the discretion that school leaders feel they have to freely determine their uniform policies. What is really meant by the phrase ‘are free to encourage’ in the quotation above? In some schools’ documents, there are references to consultations on school uniform. There are three schools that reference consultations with pupils, parents and staff about a new uniform. It is interesting that there is a presumption of having a uniform. On another school’s website, it referred to revising its dress code and stated that it had been revised ‘through a pupil survey and consultation with Pupil Councils, parents and staff’. Another mentioned an online survey. One school mentioned that its two ties, one for S1 to S3 and Broad General Education and another for S4 to S6 and Senior Phase, ‘were voted for by students, staff, parents and the wider community’. Another school mentioned in its handbook that it had; ‘carried out wide consultation on uniform in 2015 and the agreed school policy can be found on the ‘Parent Zone’’. In the coding analysis of school handbooks and school uniform policies, involvement for ‘parents’, ‘pupils’ and ‘teachers’ was looked for and found in 177, 161 and 103 documents, respectively. The description of the code for pupil participation was ‘when the students are stated to have/ have had a degree of influence on the uniform policy’. The robustness of the coding was checked by performing a coding comparison query in NVivo, and there was over 90% similarity for coding between members of the research team, which consisted of the author and 13 university students.

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The eight schools that state there have been ‘extensive consultations’ are situated in seven different local authorities, so this is not simply a set phrase suggested by the local authority to use in school documentation. In relation to the 23 schools that refer to ‘widespread consultation’, 8 schools are situated in one local authority, 7 schools in a second local authority, 3 each in two other authorities and a single school in two other authorities. These six local authorities are all in close geographical proximity to one another, so there may be some policy text borrowing going on. In 25 schools, it is stated that parents, pupils and staff should be or were ‘fully consulted’ (emphasis added), with 14 of these 25 schools situated in one local authority, 9 in another authority and 2 in another. For example, in three school handbooks, it is stated that ‘Prior to drawing up the dress code, parents, pupils and staff should be fully consulted.’ Although some schools in the same local authority say simply that they had ‘a consultation process’ rather than an extensive or widespread one, a school handbook states that: Following a consultation process with pupils, staff, parents and all other interested agencies, school uniform was changed in line with the results of that survey.

In some cases, it could be seen as rather overstating things: Our school uniform promotes a real sense of school identity, shared values, self-confidence and a shared sense of community. The uniform is actively supported by our pupils, parents and the Parent Council and is of great benefit to our young people. (School Handbook)

The above text exists with slightly different wording in different schools, suggesting that it is a master text and has a strategic purpose that belies any actual consultation within each school. In only one school policy it was mentioned that manufacturers were also consulted. From policy documents, the narrative is ‘we are giving pupils what they want’, but there is limited evidence in the documents to back up this statement. When we consulted with the Parent Council, pupils and staff a substantial number of responses, particularly from pupils, indicated the preference for

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all pupils to wear blazers, rather than it being the privilege of the senior school. (School Handbook)

However, in the School Uniform document rather than the School Handbook for this school, it is stated that the current uniform was ‘endorsed by both the Pupil and Parent Councils’, which shows less involvement. Another school highlights the difficulty if people are presented with the status quo of a practice that is so taken for granted that it is unseen. A large majority of pupils, staff and parents all agreed that uniform greatly enhances school ethos and makes a significant contribution to the purposeful, hard-working mindset we are trying to encourage in the school (school uniform policy).

Being ‘actively involved’ is a phrase used by several schools (emphasis added in the extracts below), for example: Our school uniform promotes a real sense of school identity, shared values, self-confidence and a shared sense of community. The uniform is actively supported by our pupils, parents and the Parent Council and is of great benefit to our young people. (School Handbook) At [school name], our dress code promotes a real sense of school identity, shared values, self-confidence and a shared sense of community. The dress code is actively supported by our young people, parents/carers and the Parent Council and is of great benefit to our young people. (School Handbook) Our school uniform promotes a real sense of school identity, shared values, self-confidence and a shared sense of community. The uniform is actively supported by our pupils and parents and is of great benefit to our young people. (School Handbook)

A rather weaker tone comes from ‘Pupils, parents and staff were involved in choosing the current dress code.’

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Involvement of Pupils in Deciding the School Uniform Only a small number of schools note the involvement of pupils in the writing of the school uniform; for example, one school issued a uniform letter in 2017: The pupils, who have been supported by school staff, have worked very hard during summer term to produce a guide that details the expectations of what is included in the … School Uniform and also the standards of how it should be worn.

Another school dress code stated: Our school dress code was developed by a working group of pupils, parents, teachers and others from our community and was agreed by all. It therefore has the support of pupils, parents and members of the community who feel that it improves the image of the school.

Another said, ‘Uniform was designed a number of years ago by pupils— largely to remove any financial and competitive pressure from families and pupils. In addition, with your support we would like to keep it that way.’ While policies may appear to pay some attention to the involvement of pupils and parents about being consulted in the process of reviewing or creating school uniform, there is very little information provided on what parents or pupils should do if there is an issue with the school uniform.

Dialogue Between Parents and Schools About Uniform Very few school handbooks or uniform policies state that parents should contact the school about any changes required to school dress code; one exception is the following: If, for specific reasons, you think a slight modification to the above dress code is required to meet the needs of your child, please don’t hesitate to contact us. (Handbook)

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However, it would be more useful if examples of ‘specific reasons’ were given. In other policies the parents are mentioned in relation to a suggested blazer recycling scheme and to do with noncompliance with school uniform requirements: ‘As a school community we have listened to parents’ concern about the tensions which can arise when young people show disregard for their school’s uniform/dress code.’ In another school it is the Parent Council which is involved rather than the student body. In the last few years, School … parents, pupils and staff have been working together to ensure the highest standards of school dress, which is after all, an important indicator of the best and most high achieving schools in Scotland. We have received very strong support from our parents and young people for this work to raise standards, with the Parent Council being very actively involved. (School Handbook)

Conclusion Participation by pupils in school decision-making, such as uniform policies, is important for several reasons. First, it provides an opportunity for them to develop skills in critical literacy, political literacy and empathy. Schools can thus provide the opportunity to practise democratic citizenship, listening to others’ points of view and understanding how to get on with others who have opposing views (Dewey, 1916). This can be regarded as a chance for ‘a generational transmission of democracy’ (Stone, 2016, p.  92) and an opportunity to challenge ‘the structures governing their everyday lives’ (Ashbridge et al., 2022, p. 302). Second, it directly affects their identity development, self-expression and hence wellbeing. Another reason is that children and young people have a right to be involved in decisions that affect them according to their maturity and ability to take part from the UNCRC article 12 (Lundy, 2007). Therefore, if not persuaded that as becoming-citizens or actual citizens for older pupils, or for reasons of democratic education or identity development, then there is the argument that children and young people have a legal right to involvement, particularly when the UNCRC is due to be incorporated into Scots law. Regular reviews of policies by staff, children and young people, and parents make sense because no school body stays the same; children and young people progress through the school and leave after seven years of primary school and four, five or six years of secondary school in Scotland.

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If reviews of school uniform had occurred every 3 years, for example, after the UK ratified the UNCRC in 1991, it is highly unlikely that in 10 such reviews over 31 years, school uniforms would have changed so little. At a recent roundtable event at the Scottish Parliament, a member of the Scottish Youth Parliament said that pupils he consulted wanted to wear jogging trousers, t-shirts and hoodies. Comfort was a key consideration, as young people want to feel comfortable at school. It is time to ask children and young people what they want to wear to school and to embrace their participation in decision-making rather than offering tokenistic opportunities to a select few who sit on the Pupil Council. In this call, I echo Alldred and Fox’s assertion that we should do more than report what we find but also attempt to make a difference with our social science research. However, we must be aware that young people may not be able to see beyond the taken-for-granted elements of school clothing that are ever present in media representations of being at school, whether that is St. Trinian’s, Grange Hill or Hogwarts. The emphasis on the individual, particularly the wearing of the school uniform on the school pupil’s body, highlights the individualistic, neoliberal turn in education. Rather than focusing on the collective good that education brings, there is an emphasis on what the individual must achieve for themselves done at school, whether that is good grades, human capital or ‘employability’ (Olsson & Shanks, 2022). By engaging pupils in decision-­making and debating different and competing views of what uniform is for and what it can and cannot achieve, it shows pupils that there is not one right view and that it is okay to disagree. We do not have to wear the same uniform in the same way and be the same. In fact, we cannot do that as all our bodies are different and uniform will create different affects for us all. Acknowledgements  I wish to thank the students who were involved in the original sourcing and coding of the school uniform policies, namely Lucas Adrian Brauns, Jasper Friedrich, Agata Kostrzewa, Marton Kottmayer, Annabelle Eveline Olsson, Kirsten Phelps, Daniel Phillips, Vilma Pullinen, Atyrah Hanim Razali, Cameron Roy and Maria Steiner Simonsen.

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References Alldred, P., & Fox, N.  J. (2019). Assembling citizenship: Sexualities education, micropolitics and the becoming-citizen. Sociology, 53(4), 689–706. https:// doi.org/10.1177/0038038518822889 Andersson, E. (2019). The school as a public space for democratic experiences: Formal student participation and its political characteristics. Education, Citizenship and Social Justice, 14(2), 149–164. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 1746197918776657 Ashbridge, C., Clarke, M., Bell, B.  T., Sauntson, H., & Walker, E. (2022). Democratic citizenship, critical literacy and educational policy in England: A conceptual paradox? Cambridge Journal of Education, 52(3), 291–307. https://doi.org/10.1080/0305764X.2021.1977781 Campbell, R. (2021, June 3). Should schoolgirls be forced to wear tights on hot days? Oban High School seems to think so. The Press and Journal. https:// www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/highlands-­i slands/3198637/ should-­schoolgirls-­be-­forced-­to-­wear-­tights-­on-­hot-­days-­oban-­high-­school-­ seems-­to-­think-­so/ Clarke, M. (2018). Democracy and education: ‘In spite of it all’. Power and Education, 10(2), 112–124. Cross, B., Hulme, M., & McKinney, S. (2014). The last place to look: The place of pupil councils within citizen participation in Scottish schools. Oxford Review of Education, 40(5), 628–648. https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985. 2014.963039 Davies, B. (2016). Listening to children: Being and becoming. Taylor & Francis. Dewey, J. (1966: first published 1916). Democracy and education. Free Paper Press. Fox, N. J., & Alldred, P. (2022). Doing new materialist data analysis: A Spinozo-­ Deleuzian ethological toolkit. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 25(5), 625–638. https://doi.org/10.1080/1364557 9.2021.1933070 Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630 6.2021.1931813 Kiwan, N., Shanks, R., & Stack, T. (2022). Schools and political community amidst a referendum on independence. In T.  Stack & R.  Luminiello (Eds.), Engaging authority. Citizenship and political community. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Kulz, C., Morrin, K., & McGinity, R. (2022). Conclusion—Embedding an educational settlement: Coercion, contestation and localised struggles. In Inside the English education lab (pp. 200–223). Manchester University Press.

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Lundy, L. (2007). ‘Voice’ is not enough: Conceptualising Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. British Educational Research Journal, 33(6), 927–942. https://doi.org/10.1080/01411920701657033 Mayes, E. (2020). Student voice in school reform? Desiring simultaneous critique and affirmation. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 41(3), 454–470. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2018.1492517 Morris, E. W. (2005). ‘Tuck in that shirt!’: Race, class, gender and discipline in an urban school. Sociological Perspectives, 48(1), 25–48. Morris, D. (2022). Most Britons say schools should provide school uniforms to families, YouGov. https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-­ reports/2022/11/14/most-­britons-­say-­schools-­should-­provideschool-­uni NSW Government. (2022). School uniform policy guidelines checklist. https://education.nsw.gov.au/policy-­library/policies/pd-­2004-­0025/pd-­2004-­0025-­01 Olsson, A., & Shanks, R. (2022). Employability and school uniform policies: Projecting the employer’s gaze. Childhood, 29(4), 628–645. Riddell, S. (2020). Participation by children and young people in representative bodies. In Autonomy, rights and children with special educational needs. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-­3-­030-­55825-­3_7 Scott, J. (2016). Education law in Scotland (2nd ed.). W. Green. Scottish Executive. (2004). A curriculum for excellence: The Curriculum Review Group. Edinburgh: Scottish Executive. Scottish Government. (2022). School uniforms in Scotland. https://consult.gov. scot/learning-­directorate/school-­uniforms-­statutory-­guidance-­scotland/ Shanks, R., & Molloy, C. (2017). Democracy in schools, Dewey and the referendum on Scottish independence. Education in the North, 24(1), 53–71. https:// doi.org/10.26203/WJSA-­5H14 Smith, H. J., & Lander, V. (2012). Collusion or collision: Effects of teacher ethnicity in the teaching of critical whiteness. Race Ethnicity and Education, 15(3), 331–351. Stone, L. (2016). Re-thinking Dewey’s democracy: Shifting from a process of participation to an institution of association. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 48(1), 77–93. United Nations. (1989). Convention on the Rights of the Child. Geneva: Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). https://www.ohchr.org/ EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/CRC.aspx

CHAPTER 6

School Uniforms in Ireland: The Intersection of Religion, Class and Gender Majella McSharry

Ireland increasingly positions itself as a liberal, agentic and entrepreneurial nation, motivated to move between and beyond binaries of Church/State, man/woman, advantaged/disadvantaged. Despite this, the uniformed body can be seen as a material assemblage that is intimately tied to a distinct national and cultural past and that continues to intersect religion, class and gender in complex ways. This chapter engages with recent public conversations around school uniforms in the Irish context. For example, in September 2020 children returned to school after months of homeschooling and public health restrictions. Some schools issued directives on the daily washing of uniforms, with parents taking to social media to voice their concerns about the financial implications of this. This was not the first time school uniforms hit the headlines, with debates often focused on affordability, but more recently on issues of sexism and gender autonomy and diversity. However, the public conversation around uniforms is typically momentary

M. McSharry (*) Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_6

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and fleeting, and schools continue to enforce uniform policies and police student bodies in largely uncontested ways. This chapter identifies school uniforms as a material reality that cross-cuts historical dualisms and contemporary freedoms, presenting students with a multifaceted identity quandary.

The Irish School Uniform The School Attendance Act came into being in 1926, four years after Ireland achieved independence from Britain. The Act made attendance at school compulsory for all children between the ages of six and fourteen, and in doing so, it visibilised the Irish school-going child in a way that often alluded to national imagery previously. This was not surprising, given that during the eighteenth century and indeed much of the nineteenth century many Irish children attended secret and illegal ‘Hedge Schools’. Even after the repeal of Penal Laws, the government’s policy on education remained unchanged, providing state-aided instruction to children who were native English speakers and of accepted Protestant affiliation (Lyons, 2016). Outlawing Catholicism, Presbyterianism and the Irish language was a deafening threat to national identity. Children whose families could afford Hedge Schools received instruction near hedges or rivers, ‘under overhanging rocks, in mud huts, in barns, in chapels, in the homes of people or, in rare instances, in the teacher’s own house’ (Lyons, 2016, p. 28). These secret schooling arrangements grew in popularity, and by the mid-1820s, approximately 9000 Hedge Schools were attended by 400,000 pupils (McManus, 2002). Therefore, by the time the 1926 School Attendance Act came into effect, Irish children had a chequered history of nonattendance and invisible attendance at school, and it is arguable that this was not convincingly addressed until the introduction of free post-primary education in 1966. Although Ireland achieved independence before uniforms became commonplace in schools, the style of uniforms typically introduced largely resembled those of private schools in England. Ireland remained relatively impoverished until the 1980s, and Church-funded schools provided the State with significant financial respite. Those Church-run schools—predominantly Catholic—were also in direct competition with private schools in England prior to the introduction of free post-primary education in Ireland, which is another likely reason for uniform similarities. Starched collars, stiff ties, long pleated skirts, rigid trousers and woollen jumpers are

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often thought to be the products of Catholic influence and control, stifling bodies into conservative conformity. In reality, there is nothing specifically Catholic about these uniforms, and while their conservative style might have served the purist pursuit of the Catholic Church well, in essence Irish uniforms have always borne an undeniable resemblance to school uniforms in the United Kingdom. Even today, the only notable difference is the absence of a blazer in the majority of schools in the Republic of Ireland. Where blazers do feature, they are most likely to be in private post-primary schools and often reserved for special school ceremonies and celebrations. It is likely that this has always been the case, as historic imagery from the 1950s onwards firmly locates the blazer within male, aristocratic school settings. Today, school-specific jackets can be observed in many post-primary schools, but these are more akin to an anorak than a formal blazer. The absence of the school blazer is as emblematic of its classed, gendered and national significance, as is its presence. Initially the preserve of post-primary schools, by the turn of the twenty-­ first century, school uniform policies had largely been adopted by primary schools in Ireland also. Along with the United Kingdom, Cyprus and Malta, Ireland is unique in Europe, for its normalisation of school uniforms (Shanks & McKinney, 2022). Affluence and location have been identified as factors in schools choosing to have a uniform in contexts such as the United States (Brunsma, 2006), but in Ireland uniforms are a prominent feature across almost the entire primary and post-primary terrain. Ireland’s embracing of school uniforms is likely due to the perception of uniforms as an equalising social apparatus. The role of uniforms in ‘leveling the playing field for children’ and ensuring that ‘all children look alike whether they are from rich and poor families’ is the principal motivation in the discourse on school uniforms (Bodine, 2003, p. 52). The function of school uniforms in the pursuit of ‘egalitarianism’ (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023, p. 3), parity and equality of opportunity is undeniable, and these are particularly pertinent in a state with a history of educational turbulence and injustice. However, the ‘fairness function’ of uniforms has come under scrutiny in recent times with increasing debate about whether the cost of uniforms itself is prohibitive to accessing education. For example, in September 2020 children returned to school after months of homeschooling and public health restrictions owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some schools issued directives on the daily washing of uniforms, with parents taking to social media to voice their concerns about the financial implications of this. Public health restrictions disrupted the

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enforcement of uniform policies and gave rise to new lines of debate, but at their core was a conversation about the relationship between school uniforms, affordability, identity and materiality which had been gaining momentum for many years.

National Government and School Governance School governance, including the adoption of uniform policies, generally falls within the remit of individual Boards of Management in Irish schools. The Irish government has no say on the specific items that should form a uniform or on whether schools should adopt uniform policies in the first instance. That said, political representatives are not without views on school uniforms, and those views are most audible for fleeting periods each summer as constituents struggle with return to school costs. The Irish government provides a Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance (BTSCFA) for families that meet specific income criteria. In July 2022, Departments of Education and Social Protection announced that the BTSCFA would increase by €100 from €160 to €260 for children aged 4–11 and from €285 to €385 for children aged 12–22. They estimated that approximately 151,000 families would benefit from the measure with respect to over 262,000 children (Department of Education/ Department of Social Protection, 2022). However, a 2022 survey conducted by children’s charity Barnardos estimated that the cost of sending a child back to primary school could be as high as €424 and €811 for a child in post-primary school (Barnardos, 2022). School uniforms form a significant part of back-to-school costs, particularly when schools insist on pre-crested or clothing with logos that is only available from specific suppliers. In 2017, the Department of Education issued circular 0032/2017, which set out cost-effective practices to be adopted by schools to reduce, among others, uniform costs. The circular was unequivocal in its directive, that: (a) All elements of a school uniform should be purchasable from various stores; (b) Only “iron on” or “sew on” crests should be used; (c) Wherever possible, generic rather than branded items should be specified (e.g. uniform, clothing, IT tablets, sports equipment etc.) (d) Provide parents with a list of all required items and indicate the likely costs of these required items at best value stores. (Department of Education, 2017)

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In spite of the clarity provided in the circular, its implementation has been ad hoc with many schools remaining autonomous in their identification of suppliers and seemingly unchallenged in their continued insistence on expensive pre-crested uniforms. The Irish government assumes a relatively neutral stance on school uniforms, with limited contribution to the uniform narrative beyond the affordability discourse. This is interesting given the material significance of the uniformed body as an illustration of the properly educated, professionally agile and personally responsible young Irish citizen. In 2015, Ireland became the first country in Europe to develop a National Strategy on Children and Young People’s Participation in Decision-making. The strategy was part of successive governments’ cross-departmental commitment to Ireland’s ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. The strategy centred on the everyday lives of children and young people and on the places and spaces where they are entitled to have a voice in decisions that affect their lives such as community, education, health and well-being, and legal settings (Department of Children and Youth Affairs, 2015). In terms of education, the strategy facilitated and formalised young people’s voice in key areas such as curriculum development and school evaluation. However, there has been no similar formalisation of their right to voice on school uniforms, at the level of either policy or practice. In post-primary schools young people engage with curriculum learning outcomes in subjects such as Civic, Social and Political Education and Politics and Society that encourage them to critically interrogate the operationalisation of power and decision making in schools. The implementation of uniform policies is a common focus of debate in these classrooms, as it is in Student Council forums, yet in reality, little change has occurred. Irish schools historically tend to reflect the wider changes in society regarding curriculum but have remained highly conservative in terms of how students should present themselves physically (McSharry & Walsh, 2014). Ireland unreservedly positions young people as rights holders and freethinkers, yet as one newspaper suggested, we continue to ‘kit out our children like miniature adults from the 1950s’ (Feely, 2014). The article claimed that uniforms vary only in their silliness, typically including shirts and ties, pullovers or cardigans, and trousers or skirts—items with ‘lots of tiny, fiddly buttons to defeat little fingers; a tight, stiff collar to chafe against the tender skin of the neck; and tights that can’t be put on by a small girl’ (ibid). The description elicits the relatable, palpable and unfathomable corporeal experience that

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emerges when soft physical contours meet tricky, tailored structures. Yet, school uniforms have remained largely uncontested and undisputed, and there are a number of possible reasons for this. It is arguable that just as rigid, conservative school uniforms served the purist pursuits of the Catholic Church, they have also served the professional pursuits of the State. Ireland has strived to establish itself as an epicentre of educational and economic ascendancy. In 2021, 63% of 25- to 34-year-olds were tertiary educated, increasing from 30% in 2000 and at a faster pace than most other countries in the OECD (2021). And even though Ireland is not as rich as it is sometimes portrayed, the Irish economy remains among the world’s richest (Ó Gráda & O’Rourke, 2022). For a modestly sized country with a long history of peasantry and unconvincing economic progress for the first 60 years of independence, Ireland’s current position of relative prosperity has required careful self-styling around the ideologies of professionalism and capability. The correctly worn school uniform, with its official appearance, epitomises the ‘public body … dressed for the formal conditions of the professional workplace’ (Entwistle, 2003, p. 141). The uniform symbolises compliance and cooperation, community and ceremony. It is often aligned with notions of ‘proper schooling’ (Sabic-El-Rayess et al., 2020, p.  3). The meticulous surveillance of uniforms in schools is frequently justified as a tool for shaping confident and responsible citizens who are more likely to succeed in a competitive labour market (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023; Olsson & Shanks, 2022). Strict implementation of uniform policies and policing of student bodies are excused as necessary aspects of successful school governance (ibid). The well-worn uniform signifies the quality of school leadership and acts as a recognisable cue to wider society about professionalism, power and pride (Baumann & Krskova, 2016). However, some might argue the traditional uniform is at odds with Ireland’s positioning of itself and its citizens as liberal, agentic and free thinking. This relational unease has come into particularly sharp focus since the COVID-19 pandemic and the disruption to uniform policies caused by public health restrictions, which was illustrated by one particularly high-profile case.

The Case of the Carlow Assemblies In November 2020 a story about the implementation of uniform policy in a mixed post-primary school in County Carlow made national news. The story claimed that ‘Deans of Discipline’ called female students to

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assemblies where they were instructed not to wear tight-fitting leggings for PE.  They were allegedly told that such clothing was distracting for male teachers. The story was reported in a local newspaper, but soon attracted much national attention. On Twitter, news of the story resulted in thousands of tweets, retweets and comments. In the main, the reaction was one of disbelief and condemnation. Parents, politicians and the general public converged on the story, criticising the school for its seeming archaic attitude towards girls and a public shaming of their bodies. One city mayor tweeted that the girls should wear whatever they wanted and called on teachers to ‘do better’—to stop blaming and shaming the wrong party. One Teachta Dála (member of the Irish Parliament) tweeted that such an objectification of girls and identification of their bodies or clothes as problematic for men was a cause of gender-based violence and victim blaming, while another called for an immediate apology from the school. Some comments suggested the need for police involvement if male teachers found their students’ bodies or clothing ‘distracting’. One national newspaper reported that an anti-sexism petition entitled ‘sexism against female students in school’, which was circulated on social media in response to the incident attracted almost 4000 signatures in two days (Phelan & MacNamee, 2020). A national radio station reported that students hung up posters in the school the week after the incident, demanding that the focus be on teaching men how to respect women rather than on teaching women how to dress (O’Riordan, 2020). It was claimed that a survey had been distributed by students amongst the wider student population to gauge attitudes towards the message conveyed at the assemblies. Notices subsequently hung in the school claiming that, based on the survey responses, the incident made students feel ‘uncomfortable, degraded, paranoid, violated, disgusted, unsafe’ (ibid). By the time the Carlow school story was put to the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) for comment, the school Principal had undertaken an interview on national radio where he insisted that nothing ‘inappropriate, wrong or uncomfortable’ (RT​​É Radio Archive, 2020) was said to the girls. He acknowledged that the assemblies had taken place but described them as normal gatherings to remind students of existing uniform policy, rather than a ‘body-shaming’ exercise (ibid). He explained that prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, students had changed into school-specific tracksuits on days when PE was timetabled. However, those changing facilities were not in use in November 2020 because of public health restrictions. Instead, students were permitted to wear PE clothing to school on the

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days PE was scheduled. However, what started out as a response to public health guidelines resulted in PE uniform regulations not being followed. Girls were choosing alternative clothing, particularly leggings, and this had become increasingly more akin to a ‘fashion show’, according to the Principal (RT​​É Radio Archive, 2020). He described this as a cause of concern for himself personally and for other members of staff. He said boys were not called to the assemblies because the issue ‘primarily was with the girls’ (ibid). He insisted that the assemblies were nothing more than a normal reminder of uniform policy by the school’s Deans of Discipline and that no reference had been made to the reaction of staff to tight clothing. He criticised the publication of ‘unsubstantiated facts’ in a local newspaper that had left staff ‘bemused’ and ‘annoyed’ and described the subsequent reaction on social media as ‘scandalous’ and ‘damaging to staff’ (ibid). Following the Principal’s radio interview, there was some backlash on social media against irresponsible and unethical journalism. However, this generated significantly less interest than the original story. The ruling by the Press Ombudsman in June 2021 confirming that the newspaper that originally reported the alleged incident had breached a number of accuracy principles was also less reported. The judgement by the Press Ombudsman was that the newspaper’s front page story was not supported by adequate and verifiable sources, both of which were necessary to confirm the story’s accuracy (Daly, 2021). The judgement provided some vindication for the school, but in many respects the reputational damage had already been done and relationships of trust had already been severed. Only those present at the assemblies in November 2020 know for certain what was said, conveyed or implied. However, we do know for certain that school uniform policies were disrupted by COVID-19 and that this challenged schools in a number of ways. It has caused some schools to gravitate completely towards school tracksuits and others to adopt a more relaxed approach, allowing students to choose between school tracksuits and formal school uniforms and others to grapple with reclaiming strict pre-pandemic uniform practices. Whatever the truth of the assemblies in Carlow, the incident symbolises a relational unease between the implementation of uniform policy and the realisation of young people as rights holders, particularly in relation to gender.

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Skirts and Trousers Outside of Malta, Ireland has the highest percentage of sex-segregated schools in Europe, standing at 17% for primary schools and 33% for post-­ primary schools (Department of Education, 2022). Sex segregation does not occur in pre-school settings, in further and higher education settings or in the workplace. The Department of Education’s plans for the future of sex-segregated schools are clear in that it has not sanctioned the creation of a new single-sex school since 1998. Nonetheless, single-sex schools, most of which are denominational, remain a popular choice for parents, arguably informed by the rhetoric of legacy and civility. In Ireland, school selection is not based on centralised systems or academic scores. Previous research indicated almost half of post-primary students, particularly those living in urban areas, did not attend their nearest or most accessible school (Smyth et  al., 2004). While newcomer students and those from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds are more likely to attend their local schools (Smyth et al., 2009), middle-class, highly educated parents are ‘likely to seek out schools that ensure academic success and status perpetuation for their children’ (Darmody et al., 2012, p. 20). The Schools Admissions Act 2018 was established to ensure greater fairness and transparency with regard to school enrolment, but parents have maintained considerable autonomy in school selection and are entitled to send their child to any school of their choosing provided a place is available. Studies continue to dispel any academic advantage to single-sex schooling (Clavel & Flannery, 2022). Irish schools provide little quantitative information on academic signifiers to parents (Doris et  al., 2022). However, The Sunday Times publication of Ireland’s top ranking schools acts as a convenient annual reference point, and this paints an interesting picture of segregated and mixed schools. Based on the average proportion of students gaining places in Irish universities and a number of prestigious colleges in 2017, 2018 and 2019, eight of the ten top ranking schools were all-girls schools, one was an all-boys school, and one was mixed (Burton et al., 2019). Such statistics act as convincing fodder for parents who previously attended a single-sex school or have personal, professional or ideological connections with such schools and wish for their children, particularly ‘their girls’, to inherit the same educational legacy. Notions of shared sisterhood, sorority and success continue to protect the traditional and territorial aspects of girls’ schools, and preservation of the school uniform is often central to this. Therefore, entrenched in paradigms of

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custom and convention, middle-class all-girls schools have been slowest to embrace trouser options for girls and to move away from the uniform skirt. In 2016, the Gay and Lesbian Equality Network, supported by the Department of Education, issued guidelines for schools with regard to uniform policy and gender diversity. It was advised that transgender or intersex students should be permitted to wear a uniform consistent with their gender identity (GLEN, 2016). The report stated that: At a minimum a gender neutral option should be offered. For example, single-sex girls’ schools may need to consider allowing trousers to be worn. Single-sex boys schools may need to consider a variation in uniform options. (ibid, p. 21)

It is notable that trousers are explicitly suggested as an option for all-­ girls schools, but skirts are not mentioned as an option for all-boys schools. This is particularly interesting when set against the backdrop of images of ‘skirted’ school-going boys in nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Ireland. Young boys, particularly those based in rural areas, can be seen in distinctive flannel dresses with bare legs and feet. However, many Irish schools prohibit those who identify as male, and those who have transitioned from male to female, from wearing skirts (TENI, 2015). This practice is likely to face significant challenges going forward, but until recently, it has been girls, understood through a binary lens, who have been central to the school skirt debate. Irish schools have embraced feminist ideals of equality and success for girls in terms of academic achievement, but many schools have retained quite a conservative outlook on the sexualisation of young ‘ladies’, an outlook that is at odds with wider culture (McSharry & Walsh, 2014). The socio-historical meaning of the uniform skirt has undoubtedly evolved over time. Once a sign of an independent Ireland with girls visibly accessing education, the school skirt is viewed by some as clinging to outdated versions of gender. However, accordian pleats and tartan patterns maintain a prevalent position in single-sex and mixed Irish schools, even though some context-specific differences in style are notable. For example, in many schools in County Limerick ankle-length skirts are worn, while in the adjoining County Cork, skirts are typically worn above the knee. In an exploration of the Korean context, Park (2013) also noted slight differences in uniform style depending on location, with some areas seeing uniforms worn both shorter and tighter than others. Variations in skirts act as

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a clear reminder that uniform style is as much about culture and tradition as it is about functionality. For school staff, each length and width brings with it a set of policing requirements and associated rewards and punishments. It enables school administration to patrol gendered borders, particularly in the enforcement and (re)production of acceptable forms of girlhood (Pomerantz, 2007), and facilitates a type of patrolling that, in the main, applies to only girls’ attire (Aghasaleh, 2018). For students, the length and width of skirts, as well as accompanying accoutrements such as tights and socks and associated activities such as tanning and hair removal, require a specific type of socialisation. The school skirt demands exposure of the body, but in meticulously monitored and predetermined ways (McSharry & Walsh, 2014). It ‘demands a particular type of gender performance’ (Happel, 2013, p. 93) and a discernibly refined ‘middle classiness’ (McSharry & Walsh, 2014). In schools, where there is a choice of skirt or trousers, many students continue to select the school skirt, embracing the gender performance it necessitates and mediates. In schools, where skirts remain compulsory, however, the skirt is often equated with a lack of choice and an infringement of personal freedom. In Spring 2022, a group of post-primary students from an all-girls school in Dublin made national news for their campaign to end skirt-only uniform policies. Their social media campaign #whowearsthetrousers encouraged other schools to join the movement to end mandatory skirts. They described ‘ladylike’ skirt rules as outdated and a hindrance to free movement, particularly cycling (O’Brien, 2022). Their theory is backed up by research, which found that a uniform skirt inhibits cycling (Norrish et al., 2012). Again, the style of uniform skirt is of importance as a recent research in Limerick city found that boys are approximately 18 times more likely to cycle to school than girls (7.1% vs 0.4%) and that this is significantly impacted by long skirts, which were mandatory for all of the girls involved in the study (Higgins & Ahern, 2021). For the #whowearsthetrousers campaign, COVID-19 was once again cited as intensifying an already unacceptable situation, where girls’ bare legs bore the brunt of open windows and winter temperatures. Some social media comments in response to the campaign indicated ongoing nostalgia towards the idea of ‘good girls in smart skirts’, but most contributors were aghast that such a campaign was still necessary in contemporary Ireland. The inability to wear trousers seemed irreconcilable with gender equality and gender diversity.

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Women’s rights, particularly in relation to bodily freedom and autonomy, have gained considerable recognition in Ireland in recent years. There is a palpable sense of victory and accomplishment in the air, and school trousers seem like one more battle that needs to be won. Trousers appear, perhaps, like an obvious way of unshackling girls from endless school surveillance and self-checking. Happel (2013) suggests that either consciously or unconsciously, skirt wearing imposes considerations of (im) modesty, in ways that trousers do not. However, if the case of the Carlow school assemblies has exemplified anything, it is that the regimen of surveillance and expectations of decency are not solely about skirts. In Carlow, it was girls’ leggings that were problematised and allegedly posed a threat to moral order. Pomerantz (2007) maintains that rather than responsibility for the school’s moral climate falling on the shoulders of school management and staff, it is frequently a burden placed on girls more than any other group. Pomerantz continues, that non-compliance carries accusations of deviance, indecency and dishonour. Seemingly naive girls are positioned as ‘at risk’ and in need of help and guidance (ibid). However, whatever the reality of the school assemblies, it was these very positionings of girls that caused public outrage.

To Finish… And time for some personal insights! My work has taken me to hundreds of schools throughout the Republic of Ireland over the years. The schools I visit are similar in that they are all post-primary schools, but they are diverse in terms of geography, denomination, social class and gender. My visits have overwhelmingly confirmed the popularity of school uniforms in Ireland. I have also been left in no doubt that school uniforms and individual uniform items inscribe class, gender and national identity on to bodies in distinct ways. At a mere glance, I can differentiate between junior and senior students based on the colour of their jumpers. In one all-girls school, I was able to identify individual year groups based on the coloured tag on their (otherwise identical) black shoes. I can distinguish student council members and prefects from head girls and head boys based on their badges. I can tell which boys have made it onto prestigious school rugby teams based on their exclusive ties. In each case, the school uniform is coded with recognisable markers of hierarchy and success. These material differences confer those who have reached a distinctive level or goal with discernible embodied gravitas. Uniforms divide, hierarchise and

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homogenise (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023), yet in doing so, ironically, they also create community and membership. The hierarchising features of uniforms are, on the one hand, exclusionary and discriminatory; on the other hand, they are the ‘non-human matter’ (Fox & Alldred, 2022) that are the hallmarks of insider ritual and understanding and of institutional appreciation of ambition and accomplishment. There is an ongoing narrative in Ireland that aligns divestment of the Catholic Church from schools with liberation from conservatism and control. This narrative leans towards new non-denominational schools as the way forward in facilitating and nurturing individual freedom, creativity and autonomy. In such schools, the constraints of uniforms are removed and the potential for self-expression is perceived to be limitless. However, this isn’t necessarily the case. Dress codes in these schools can be more granular, detailed and prescriptive than any uniform policy. They often include statements similar to the following: skirts and shorts must be on or below the knee; leggings must be in no way transparent; if leggings or tight jeans are worn, they must be accompanied by a top long enough to satisfy the fingertip rule; backs, bottoms, chests, stomachs and all underwear must be covered. Perhaps informed by Church morality, or maybe colonial oppression or modern discourses of professionalism, or a combination of all of these, what these statements tell us is that decisions about respectability and decency are much more far reaching than Catholic schools. So, it could be suggested that uniforms are restrictive and debilitating, preventing young people from dressing in ways that are personally authentic and self-expressive. It could also be argued that it is actually the uniform that facilitates authenticity of self and liberates young people from constraining social forces. Through uniforms, children are somewhat protected from the pressures of competitive dressing and the demands of the latest fashions (Bodine, 2003; Shanks & McKinney, 2022, p.  29). The school uniform provides the child, and the planet, with much-needed respite from commercial manipulation and fast fashion. Through uniforms, schools have been ‘doing sustainability’ long before its social and scientific significance took centre stage. By levelling the playing field, uniforms allow children to be ‘free to just be themselves’ (Bodine, 2003, p. 60), to focus on learning, making connections and fulfilling their aspirations. Therefore, rather than being viewed as a violation of individual rights, the young person’s educational rights might just be realised through the uniform. This is why parents around the world, including

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Ireland, seek support in acquiring uniforms each year. The right to have a uniform is as convincing as the right to not have a uniform. If uniforms have such equalising and enabling potential, why are they questioned? It is likely that this comes back to the very real experiences of thinking, feeling bodies. To illustrate this, I will draw on one personal observation. On a visit to a school a number of years ago, I witnessed a heated, rather one-sided conversation, between a teacher and a student. As I waited outside the staffroom for the teacher I was visiting to meet me, a senior student who was walking past with a group of friends was singled out by a teacher. He was asked why he was wearing white runners and not black shoes. Without sufficient time to reply the question was put to him again. He tried to articulate an explanation, but at every syllable he was shut down and the only resounding sound that could be heard was the word ‘detention’. Even a stranger could feel the ‘realness’ of this experience; singled out from friends, scrutinised by onlookers, chastised in public, refused the right to reply, punished with detention, all because of the ‘wrong’ shoes. If it was material circumstances that led to the ‘wrong’ shoes being worn to school, then the altercation was a clear reproduction of dis/advantage in salient and symbolic ways. Rather than levelling the playing field and drifting into the background so the focus can be on meaningful learning, in these instances the uniform (or lack thereof) is foregrounded. We are reminded of the Carlow assemblies, where calling students out of class for ‘Deans of Discipline’ to remind them of uniform policy was not disputed, explained or excused. Policing bodies for the good of the institution ‘produces the accounts of bodies as if they were texts, acted upon by social forces, rather than the flesh and blood material of … embodied existence’ (Entwistle, 2003, p.  148). The uniform no longer offers equality or protection but comes to be yet another social force attempting to inscribe power on the body, a cultural reality prioritised over corporeality. Against the backdrop of wider socio-cultural proclamations of bodily autonomy and sensibility, ‘unreasonable’ uniform policies (and dress codes) seem unsustainable. They come to represent material reality where historical dualisms collide with contemporary freedoms, and this presents students in Ireland with a multifaceted identity quandary.

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References Aghasaleh, R. (2018). Oppressive curriculum: Sexist, racist, classist, and homophobic practice of dress codes in schooling. Journal of African American Studies, 22(1), 94–108. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12111-­018-­9397-­5 Barnardos. (2022). Back to School Survey 2022 Summary. https://www.barnardos. ie/media/15933/barnardos-­back-­to-­school-­survey-­2022-­summary.pdf Baumann, C., & Krskova, H. (2016). School discipline, school uniforms and academic performance. International Journal of Educational Management, 30(6), 1003–1029. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEM-­09-­2015-­0118 Bodine, A. (2003). School uniforms and discourses on childhood. Childhood, 10(1), 43–63. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568203010001003 Brunsma, D.  L. (2006). School uniform policies in public schools. Principal, 85(3), 50–53. Burton, W., Murphy, C., & Coxon, I. (2019). The Sunday Times 2019 Top 500 schools in Ireland list. https://extras.thetimes.co.uk/web/public/pdfs/ af77b0e5b0aa716178ab331a61c57064.pdf Clavel, J. G., & Flannery, D. (2022). Single-sex schooling, compulsory performance of gender. Journal of Gender Studies, 22(1), 92–96. https://doi. org/10.1080/09589236.2012.745680 Daly, A. (2021, June 20). Press Ombudsman finds that story about schoolgirls’ ‘distracting’ clothing breached accuracy principle. The Journal. https://www. thejournal.ie/carlow-­school-­the-­nationalist-­tight-­clothing-­complaint-­5472273-­ Jun2021/ Darmody, M., Smyth, E., & McCoy, S. (2012). School sector variation among primary schools in Ireland, [Research Series]. Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI). https://www.esri.ie/system/files/publications/ BKMNEXT221.pdf Department of Children and Youth Affairs. (2015). National strategy on children and young people’s participation in decision-making, 2015–2020. Dublin: Government Publications. https://assets.gov.ie/24462/48a6f98a921446 ad85829585389e57de.pdf Department of Education. (2017). Circular 0032:2017. Dublin: Department of Education. https://circulars.gov.ie/pdf/circular/education/2017/32.pdf Department of Education. (2022). Data on individual schools: Post-primary schools list. https://www.education.ie/en/publications/statistics/data-­on­individual-­schools/ Department of Education & Department of Social Protection. (2022). Press Release. https://www.gov.ie/en/press-­release/bf84e-­ministers-­foley-­ humphreys-­and-­mcgrath-­announce-­initiatives-­to-­assist-­families-­with-­back-­to-­ school-­costs/

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Doris, A., O’Neill, D., & Sweetman, O. (2022). Good schools or good students? The importance of selectivity for school rankings. Oxford Review of Education, 48(6), 804–826. https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2022.2034611 Entwistle, J. (2003). The dressed body. In M. Evans & E. Lee (Eds.), Real bodies: A sociological introduction (pp. 133–150). Palgrave Macmillan. Feely, M. (2014, September 3). Why do schools insist we kit out our children like miniature adults from the 1950s? The Irish Times. https://www.irishtimes. com/news/education/why-­do-­schools-­insist-­we-­kit-­out-­our-­children-­like-­ miniature-­adults-­from-­the-­1950s-­1.1915587 Fox, N. J., & Alldred, P. (2022). Bodies, non-human matter and the micropolitical production of sociomaterial disadvantage. Journal of Sociology, 58(2), 499–516. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-­9566.13265 Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630 6.2021.1931813 GLEN (Gay and Lesbian Equality Network). (2016). ‘Being LGBT in School’, a resource for post-primary schools to prevent homophobic and transphobic bullying and support LGBT students. Dublin: Gay and Lesbian Equality Network and The Department of Education. https://assets.gov.ie/24762/729f5d890618 4a6a8c4be0c5e2a349dd.pdf Happel, A. (2013). Ritualized girling: School uniforms and the compulsory performance of gender. Journal of Gender Studies, 22(1), 92–96. Higgins, R., & Ahern, A. (2021). Students’ and parents’ perceptions of barriers to cycling to school—An analysis by gender. Sustainability, 13(23), 1–16. https:// doi.org/10.3390/su132313213 Lyons, T. (2016). ‘Inciting the lawless and profligate adventure’—The hedge schools of Ireland. 18th–19th Century Social Perspectives, Features, 24(6). https://www.historyireland.com/inciting-­lawless-­profligate-­adventure-­hedge-­schools-­ireland/ McManus, A. (2002). The Irish hedge school and its books, 1695–1831. Four Courts Press. McSharry, M., & Walsh, B. (2014). Fostering complicit femininity: Epoch, education and the young female body. In P. Kelly & A. Kamp (Eds.), A critical youth studies for the 21st century (pp. 317–332). Brill. Norrish, H., Farringdon, F., Bulsara, M., & Hands, B. (2012). The effect of school uniform on incidental physical activity among 10-year-old children. Asia-Pacific Journal of Health, Sport and Physical Education, 3(1), 51–63. https://doi.org/10.1080/18377122.2012.666198

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Ó Gráda, C., & O’Rourke, K. J. (2022). The Irish economy during the century after partition. The Economic History Review, 75(2), 336–370. https://doi. org/10.1111/ehr.13106 O’Brien, C. (2022, March 7). ‘Cold…discriminatory’: Students campaign to end skirt-only uniform policies. The Irish Times. https://www.irishtimes.com/ news/education/cold-­discriminatory-­students-­campaign-­to-­end-­skirt-­only-­ uniform-­policies-­1.4819839 O’Riordan, C. (2020, November 24). Students at a Carlow secondary school have been told by the school not to wear tight-fitting clothing to PE. NewsTalk. https://www.newstalk.com/news/ students-­at-­carlow-­school-­told-­wearing-­tight-­clothing-­during-­pe-­1111111 OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development). (2021). Education at a Glance. https://www.oecd-­ilibrary.org/docserver/fa8dfbd4­en.pdf?expires=1672671433&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=62B0FA7 EE8610253DC1C011E9F559BDF Olsson, A., & Shanks, R. (2022). Employability and school uniform policies: Projecting the employer’s gaze. Childhood, 0(0), 1–18. https://doi. org/10.1177/09075682221108838 Park, J. (2013). Do school uniforms lead to uniform minds?: School uniforms and appearance restrictions in Korean middle schools and high schools. Fashion Theory, 17(2), 159–177. https://doi.org/10.275 2/175174113X13541091797607 Phelan, C., & MacNamee, D. (2020, November 24). Parents and students slam Carlow school after female pupils told not to wear ‘distracting’ clothing. Irish Mirror. https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-­news/ parents-­students-­slam-­carlow-­school-­23061347 Pomerantz, S. (2007). Cleavage in a tank top: Bodily prohibition and the discourses of school dress codes. Alberta Journal of Educational Research, 53(4), 373–386. https://doi.org/10.11575/ajer.v53i4.55303 RT​​É Radio Archive. (2020, November 25). Carlow school principal rejects claims over PE gear. Morning Ireland. https://www.rte.ie/ news/2020/1125/1180329-­carlow-­school/ Sabic-El-Rayess, A., Mansur, N. N., Batkhuyag, B., & Otgonlkhagva, S. (2020). School uniform policy’s adverse impact on equity and access to schooling. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 50(8), 1122–1139. https://doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2019.1579637 Shanks, R., & McKinney, S. J. (2022). Cost and affordability of school uniform and child poverty. Scottish Educational Review, 54(1), 26–48. https://doi. org/10.1163/27730840-­54010003

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Smyth, E., Darmody, M., McGinnity, F., & Byrne, D. (2009). Adapting to diversity: Irish schools and newcomer students, [Report]. ESRI Research Series, 8. https://www.esri.ie/publications/adapting-­to-­diversity-­irish­schools-­and-­newcomer-­students Smyth, E., McCoy, S., & Darmody, M. (2004). Moving up: The experiences of first-­ year students in post-primary education. Liffey Press. TENI (Transgender Equality Network Ireland). (2015). Transforming the classroom supporting trans young people in schools. Dublin: Transgender Equality Network Ireland. https://teni.ie/wp-­content/uploads/2019/07/ Transforming-­the-­Classroom.pdf

CHAPTER 7

Students’ Appearance According to School Regulations: A Polish Case Study Anna Babicka-Wirkus

Introduction The school is a place where students spend a significant part of their lives. Thus, the regulations that are in place in schools have an impact on shaping their identity. As institutions responsible for inculcating the norms and values dominant in a given culture, schools rely on a variety of formal and informal regulations to shape students into members of a given community. One of the areas of particular interest for schools is students’ bodies and appearance, which are subject to various disciplinary practices. These practices become imprinted on the student bodies, marking them permanently (Bourdieu, 2000; Foucault, 1995; McLaren, 1988). Thus, it is important to study and analyse the practices of disciplining student bodies and appearance. In the current study, I analysed the formal regulations concerning student appearance in Polish schools. I analysed documents

A. Babicka-Wirkus (*) Pomeranian University in Słupsk, Słupsk, Poland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_7

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published on the websites of 21 Polish schools (11 state and 10 nonstate). Critical pedagogy served as the theoretical background for the analysis. The body and appearance are significant areas of self-expression for students (Bobel & Kwan, 2011; Raby, 2005a, 2010). They also play key roles as tools of resistance (McLaren, 1988; McLaren, 2002). They are thus a space of oppression on the one hand and resistance on the other. McLaren (2022, p. 45) points out that “The body served both as a mirror of state oppression and an instrument of resisting domination.” As a consequence, the school, as a dominant institution, determines the restrictions regarding student bodies and appearance, seeking to control them and fit them into arbitrarily imposed frames. However, these practices violate children’s right to freedom of expression as set out in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (United Nations, 1989). Using a range of neutralizing techniques, restrictions in the form of mandatory school uniforms or requirements that clothes have muted colours or certain lengths are experienced as a natural necessity that does not warrant critical reflection. There are numerous justifications for introducing specific regulations of student bodies and appearance in schools, including safety, prestige, a sense of community, reducing the differences in social status between the students, protection against sexual harassment, uniformity, and preventing school absences. However, in many cases, these justifications are based on individual opinions of decision-makers within the education system, not on objective facts (Brunsma, 2006; Brunsma & Rockquemore, 1998; Cornell, 2013). Both proponents and opponents of uniform dress in schools clash in academic and public discussions on this topic. The former underscore the positive aspects of controlling student bodies and appearance. They chiefly focus on the significance of appropriate dress for students’ educational achievements and, thus, their better fit for professional work in the future (Bauman & Krskova, 2016; Bodine, 2003; Firmin et al., 2006). The latter point to the lack of a clear relationship between appearance restrictions and educational achievements, behaviour, or negating of differences in social-economic status between students (Ansari et  al., 2022; Brunsma, 2004; Brunsma, 2006; Sabic-El-Rayess et al., 2020; Yeung, 2009). In Poland, the topic of uniform student dress has become a topic of discussion in the context of education law reform. The last debate on this topic took place in 2007, when new regulations reinstituted mandatory unforms in primary and secondary schools (subsequently repealed in 2019). In middle schools, principals had the option to mandate school

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uniforms after consultations with parents (Act of 11 April 2007). The law allowing mandatory school uniforms caused such intense public opposition that it was changed in 2008. Currently, school uniforms are not mandatory in Poland, and most state schools do not require them. However, this does not mean that Polish schools do not regulate student dress and appearance. In some schools, especially private, community, Catholic, or Montessori schools, uniform dress is mandatory and very precisely defined.

A Short History of Polish School Uniforms School uniforms have quite a long tradition in Poland, especially when compared to, for example, the United States (Ansari et  al., 2022). The sources that I have been able to access show that school uniforms were mandatory in Ursuline schools, founded over 160  years ago in Poznań (Igielska, 2005). School uniforms became a constant element of school life at the beginning of the twentieth century. Girls’ school uniforms comprised a dark blue shirt with a white collar and a pleated skirt reaching halfway to the calf. Hats were also mandatory. Boys’ school uniforms were similar to military uniforms. They were adorned with a stiff, starched collar. In the interwar period, the specific elements of school uniforms were defined individually by the schools. It is worth noting that uniforms were typical for elite middle schools and, later, also high schools. A typical girls’ school unform was composed of a dress and a cuffed blouse with a white collar. Dark blue berets or side caps were the headwear. The uniform was also paired with dark-coloured stockings. On holidays or days of celebration, the uniform comprised a white shirt and a dark blue skirt (dark trousers for boys), which has largely survived into the modern day as the so-called formal dress (strój galowy). Boys’ uniforms included a white shirt with a starched collar, often paired with a tie. In some schools, aprons were also worn. It is worth noting that in the interwar period, students were also required to wear uniforms outside of school. Additionally, the education reform carried out by Janusz Jędrzejewski in 1932–1933 instituted the requirement to wear school badges, which remained for over half a century. The regulations on student appearance were somewhat different in rural schools. Due to a high level of poverty, it was not possible to make school uniforms mandatory for rural children. Belonging to a given school was marked with school badges sewn onto schoolcaps. The badges showed

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the school number and colours, often also the school’s patron. In spite of their poverty, rural children took care to maintain their school uniforms. After the Second World War, mandatory school uniforms for boys took the form of a dark blue suit. On the other hand, girls wore dark blue aprons adorned with white collars. The uniforms were paired with dark blue berets and coats. School uniforms were mandatory for the duration of the entire year, regardless of whether the student was currently at school or not. During the period of the Polish People’s Republic (Polska Republika Ludowa, PRL, 1947–1989), stylon (nylon 6) or nylon school aprons became mandatory. Boys’ aprons had two breast pockets and resembled bomber jackets. Girls’ aprons were longer and were tied with a string on the waist. Both uniforms, usually dark blue, were paired with white collars. At the beginning of the 1980s, uniform school dress stopped being mandatory. This was related to an economic crisis and the resulting difficulties in purchasing uniforms. School uniforms in Poland ultimately ceased to be mandatory in the 1990s. Later, a 2007 reform attempted to reinstate them permanently. However, as a result of intense discussions and protests, the Minister of Education withdrew from this idea. These protests were largely due to an unwillingness to return to a school system reminiscent of the Polish People’s Republic, in which civil liberties were restricted. In turn, school uniforms were associated with limits to freedom of expression. Students themselves were also against school uniforms. This situation was caused chiefly by the lack of governmental interest in the students’ opinions on this subject. As Rokowska’s (2008) study shows, negative attitudes towards mandatory school uniforms among students stem from their lack of consent to their introduction in everyday school life. Rather, they are treated as coercive and limiting individual freedom (Igielska, 2005; Meadmore & Symes, 1997). Currently, the topic of student appearance and dress is regulated on an individual basis by school statutes. Article 100 of the Act of 14 December 2016 on Educational Law allows principals to mandate school uniforms (by personal decision or by requests from parents, teachers, or the student council) with the consent of parents, teachers, or the student council (if the request did not come from the student council). This law allows parents and student representatives to voice their own opinions on school unforms, which negates bias in decision-making about student appearance and dress. However, in terms of the less restrictive regulations concerning appearance, students must follow them unconditionally.

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Methodological Background The topic of the study presented in this chapter was the formal regulations concerning the dress and appearance of students in Polish schools. The research question was as follows: which aspects of student appearance are regulated in school documents of Polish primary schools? Consequently, the aim of the study was to determine the aspects of student appearance and dress regulated in these school documents. To answer the research question, a qualitative analysis of documents hosted on school websites was carried out in September 2022. I analysed documents from 21 schools, including 11 state and 10 nonstate schools. School uniforms were mandatory in nine of the nonstate schools. Only one nonstate (community) school did not mandate uniform dress. None of the state schools had mandatory school uniforms. The sample of analysed schools included four Catholic schools in which precise regulations concerning mandatory uniform dress were in place. One of the schools that mandated uniform dress was a Montessori school. It is worth noting that 7 of the analysed schools were rural schools, while 14 were urban schools (12 were in large cities and 2 in medium-sized cities). Moreover, the schools were located in various parts of Poland. Regulations concerning student appearance and dress were mostly located in school statutes or rules. Some schools devoted separate website sections to describing the dress requirements.

Results Practices of disciplining student bodies and appearance are part of school culture (Babicka-Wirkus, 2019) and are rooted in the history of this institution. “Every culture deals with the human body in a certain way (such as hygiene habits, ways of walking, etc.); each cultures treat body in a particular way, adapts it, disciplines it, gives it a particular role, etc.” (Bánovčanová & Masaryková, 2014, pp. 253–254). All of the school documents analysed in the current study contain regulations concerning student appearance and dress. Their main aim is to discipline student bodies and self-expression (Foucault, 1995, 2007; Friedrich & Shanks, 2023; McLaren, 1988). This aim is realized through both the so-called hard and soft dress codes. The former involves precise specifications of individual parts of student dress that the school mandates. The language describing this policy is very precise. The specific requirements regarding student

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appearance are frequently illustrated with photographs or pictures. On the other hand, soft dress code is a set of general instructions on dress and appearance (Edwards & Marshall, 2020). The soft dress code policy is more discursive, and in that way, it could be interpreted in very different ways because its language is inaccurate. Based on the qualitative analysis of the gathered empirical data, the following aspects related to student dress and appearance were distinguished: justification for the regulations, reason for the regulations, controlled areas, procedure of inspection, and consequences. It is interesting that the analysed school documents lacked almost any justifications for the dress regulations, which are usually present in the case of British schools, where uniforms are mandatory (Babicka-Wirkus, 2023). Only one Polish school that mandated uniform dress provided a short justification for it: Student uniforms distinguish our school from other educational facilities. It helps students identify with the school, where they spend most of their day. Moreover, a uniform dress makes the members of the school community feel closer to their peers. They belong to the community, and they shape the school’s tradition together. The educational value of the school uniform should also be mentioned. Uniform dress negates economic divisions, teaches students to not judge others superficially, and prepares them for adult life, in which dress code is one of the basic elements of savoir-vivre. (NS9)

The introduction of a unified school dress was related to the desire to distinguish themselves from other schools on the one hand and to attempt to build stronger ties between the students and the school on the other hand. A study of Scottish schools by Friedrich and Shanks (2023) shows that they also justify mandatory school uniforms in this manner. As mentioned above, the majority of schools in Poland do not mandate school uniforms. Therefore, their presence distinguishes a given school from the others. Another category distinguished in the analysis was the reasons for mandating uniform dress. It is worth noting that these reasons were given only by those schools that did mandate school uniforms. These reasons are listed below in order of their frequency of appearance in school regulations. The following reasons were given by schools that instituted hard dress codes: • identification with the school ethos • a sense of belonging and loyalty

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• preparing for future adult and professional life • students’ recognizability—safety • preparing for following the rules (etiquette) of social life • protection from social pressure of dressing in a specific way • parents’ convenience The reasons listed above may be combined into broader content categories such as identification with the school, socialization into adult life, safety, or convenience. Identifying with the school’s mission or values was the most frequently given reason for introducing uniform school dress. This was often related to a sense of belongingness and fostering ties between the participants in school life. Such reasons are often given in justifications for school uniforms (Babicka-Wirkus, 2023; Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). School uniform practices are intended to build a community around given values and aims, which are particularly clearly specified in nonstate schools in Poland. Wearing a school uniform is intended to remind students of an intrinsic goal-­ oriented attitude towards their work at school. It is also intended to help them focus on important rather than superficial matters, namely, personal relationships. (NS3)

Another important reason behind mandating uniform dress in schools was to prepare students for future professional work in the neoliberal market (Bowe et al., 1994). Professional dress is associated with dress codes typical for corporations, in which muted colours dominate. They are intended to make the individual not stand out from their group. The goal of mandating uniform dress is the implementation of middle-class standards, in which dress should be modest, comfortable, and neat (Edwards & Marshall, 2020). Uniform dress also points to the necessity of adaptation and prohibits students from expressing their individuality, which is especially important in the period of adolescence (Erikson, 1994). Uniform dress hampers the search for one’s own style, but as the documents of one school indicate, this also has protective purposes. A uniform dress is mandatory at the school. This has both aesthetic and educational significance. In this way, we make children familiar with everyday elegance but also protect them from excessive experiments

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with their appearance and from competing with one another over the most fashionable outfit [bolded in original]. (NP10)

Additionally, according to Raby (2005b), mandating uniform dress prepares students for traditional, routine professions rather than liberal professions in which dress is an important element of creating one’s professional status. Introducing routine dress into everyday school and professional reality may point to the fact that work is an unpleasant obligation rather than the fulfilment of one’s own interests and passions. Mandatory school uniforms may cause resistance by students. They may attempt to give the uniforms a different character, for example, by attaching ornaments, adding optional elements, or wearing certain parts of the uniform in an inappropriate manner. Disciplining students through the mandatory school uniform may cause resistance (Giroux, 2001). In this case, a conscious form of resistance will be typical because students, who add something to their mandatory uniforms, do so on purpose. They are aware that they break the school regulations related to dress requirements, and in this aspect, their resistance may have emancipatory potential. By changing their mandatory uniforms, students usually want to express their disagreement with school regulations or other aspects of school, social, or political reality and challenge norms and typical ways of acting. In this way, they express themselves. Therefore, school practices, also in the sphere of student clothing and appearance, are a tool of oppression, homogenization, and marketisation on the one hand and a key tool of liberation on the other (Giroux, 2022). Oppression is a key aspect of resistance. Without the first, the second cannot exist. Therefore, paradoxically, mandatory school uniforms may be crucial for developing students’ resistance approaches. Another important reason for mandating uniform dress was student safety. School uniforms allow for quickly identifying strangers on school grounds. They also provide safety in the form of a lack of discrimination of less wealthy students. Such reasons are frequently cited in the literature as justifications for mandating uniform dress in schools (Edwards & Marshall, 2020; Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). Equal treatment of all students plays a key role in introducing or maintaining uniform dress. Our community is created by students who are equal, although not identical. Their dress is an element of the school’s identity and represents our right to self-­ expression within the local community. (NP3)

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The above quote from a school document included in the current analysis points to the right of the school community to self-expression within the local community. It is interesting that, on the one hand, the school underscores the importance of creating a distinct, unique identity. On the other hand, it mandates that students keep a homogeneous appearance, which limits their uniqueness and individuality. Consequently, the children’s right to self-expression is violated. The above quote points to the contradictions and arbitrariness in the school administration’s decision. Following the logic of student equality, which guides the creation of regulatory practices concerning their appearance, schools as communities should not simultaneously seek to distinguish themselves from other schools and risk becoming prideful or superficial. It is also worth mentioning that in Poland, nonstate schools are chiefly intended for children of wealthier families, as they require tuition fees. In many cases, these are elite schools that, as Gromkowska-Melosik (2019) notes, have the greatest potential for social stratification. Thus, under the guise of equality, such schools implement practices that separate the privileged from the nonprivileged, wealthier from the poorer, stronger from the weaker, and so forth. Parents’ convenience is an interesting reason for mandating school uniforms. In my earlier studies on this topic, I did not identify this reason (Babicka-Wirkus, 2023). However, school principals do not specify how this convenience may be achieved. Perhaps it is related to a relatively easy way of purchasing the specified uniform, as the schools indicate where it is being sold. However, as Crockett and Wallendorf’s (1998) study shows, purchasing school uniforms does not limit clothing expenses. Young people want to wear fashionable clothes outside of school. Consequently, the expenses on children’s clothes are higher than if they could attend school in any chosen outfit. It is interesting that those schools that give precise requirements concerning student appearance despite not mandating school uniforms also do not give reasons for these requirements in the formal documents. This may stem from a belief that the school has a “natural” right, based in its history, to regulate its students’ appearance. Another category distinguished on the basis of an analysis of the school documents was the student body areas subject to control. The regulations concerned the following body areas in particular: • outfit • hairstyle

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• jewellery and accessories • makeup • nails • PE outfit In Polish schools, student clothing is divided into three categories: everyday, formal, and PE outfits. Clothing is one of the most precisely defined categories concerning student appearance. Schools that mandate uniforms usually also provide specific descriptions of the uniforms together with information on where to purchase them. In one school, the description was paired with photographs of an everyday and formal outfit, separately for boys and girls. This practice is a very clear example of hard/mandated school policies regarding student appearance. Notably, in the analysed documents, the specified colour of the school uniforms was usually a shade of blue. Dark blue was the most frequent. The school uniforms frequently involved a white shirt. Descriptions of the school uniforms also often contained information on the allowed stocking or sock colours. Student clothing is also regulated in schools where uniforms are not mandated. These schools require students to wear clothes in muted colours, and bright or reflective-coloured clothing is not allowed. The outfits have a formal character—classical or sportswear. They do not draw attention with bright colors or designs. (NS1)

The outfits should also be neat and clean. Many schools use the label “aesthetic” (estetyczny) to define outfit requirements. Aesthetic outfits are neat, modest, and appropriate. They do not reveal specific body parts and do not have flashing elements, for example, sequins. The following rules concerning school outfits and student appearance are instituted: 1) the everyday outfit should a) be clean, neat, and appropriate for the school circumstances, b) cover the hips, stomach, and neckline, and c) not have dangerous decorations. (PS2) Everyday student outfits should be modest, neat, and clean. Students may dress according to their preferences but without violating the commonly accepted rules of good taste. The clothes should cover the back, shoulders, and stomach and should not have inappropriate slogans or emblems. (PS1) The everyday school outfit should be: clean, modest, neat, complete, appropriate for the weather, in any colour except bright and reflective colours, appropriate—should not reveal the shoulders, neckline, back, stomach, upper

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thighs, or underwear—should not be transparent (…) dresses without flashing decorations, e.g., sequins (…) the clothes should not be torn, frayed, with “fashionable” holes or marks [bolding in original]. (PS9)

An important requirement concerning dress is a lack of slogans or pictures of a vulgar or discriminatory character. It is also a very strict rule in many schools, and thus, it serves as an example of a hard dress code policy. The clothes should not have designs that are provocative, insulting, aggression-­ inducing, fascist, totalitarian, or alluding to such. (NS1) Wearing clothes with offensive or insulting slogans or pictures is not allowed. (PS7) Clothes cannot have designs that are insulting to the school, vulgar, provocative, expressing support for drugs, fascist, racist, or that show death, skeletons, skulls, deformed bodies, or that harm religious feelings. (PS9)

Clothes associated with youth subcultures or that propagate various ideologies are also not allowed. Expressing belongingness to subcultures and promoting ideologies with one’s clothing or appearance is not allowed. (PS10)

Aside from colours and designs of student outfits, school regulations often also specified the length of the individual articles of clothing. Particular attention is given to female students’ dress length, which should usually reach the knee. Those schools that allow wearing shorts in spring and summer also specify their length. Girls can wear shorts that reach at least halfway down the hip, while boys can wear ones that reach down to the knee. Appropriate clothing length constitutes an important part of the outfit’s aesthetic. Shirts, especially those worn by female students, should also reach down to the hips. All of the analysed school documents contained regulations against headwear in school. These mainly concerned hoods and caps. However, these rules may violate students’ rights to religious practice, which are sometimes related to wearing specific headwear, for example, the hijab. It is worth noting that Polish schools are mostly homogeneous in terms of religion. The decisive majority of the students are Catholic, which may explain the lack of precision regarding headwear in school regulations.

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In schools that do not mandate school uniforms, formal dress is also precisely defined. It usually comprises a dark blue or black skirt and a white shirt for girls and dark blue or black trousers and a white shirt for boys. The outfit is matched with appropriate, full-size, elegant footwear. It is worth noting here that dark blue remains a dominant colour in Polish schools, which was also the case for school uniforms and aprons in the twentieth century. The third type of school outfit is the PE outfit. Most schools also clearly define its appearance. It usually comprises a white t-shirt and dark shorts or leggings (for girls). Sport shoes with a bright sole that do not damage floors are mandatory. Another important area of student bodies subject to school regulations is the hairstyle. Students should not dye their hair, although if the school allows it, they should choose colours that closely resemble natural ones. Students’ hair should also be clean. Artificial hair extensions or patterns and signs shaved into the hair are not allowed. One school document specified that student hairstyles should be adequate for their age and gender. Students’ hairstyles should follow the rules of hygiene (be clean, not dyed, without visible shaved parts, without artificial extensions or braids, cannot be an inconvenience while writing, reading, or during P.E.—they should be appropriately tied). (PS11) Dying hair in natural colours is allowed (neon, artificially bright colours are excluded). (PS5) Hair should be neat and aesthetic (long hair should be braided or tied) and appropriate with respect to age and gender. (PS1)

Jewellery worn by students is also subject to school regulations. Schools usually allow for wearing pendants or light necklaces. Girls can also wear light earrings, one per ear. It is worth noting that only modest jewellery is allowed. Such restrictions are usually motivated by safety concerns. Piercings and other forms of body marking, such as tattoos, are not allowed. Such prohibitions are clearly formulated in many of the analysed documents. Jewellery should be modest and safe. Small earrings that do not protrude from the ear, rings that do not protrude and do not have sharp elements, and necklaces that do not present a choking hazard are allowed. (PS5)

Students cannot have tattoos, plugs, or other dangerous jewellery. (PS4)

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Most of the analysed documents contained prohibitions against makeup. These regulations correspond with the requirements of neat and modest appearance. Students should focus on developing relationships with others rather than on maintaining one’s own appearance or judging others on the basis of their external traits. Thus, makeup as a way to highlight specific aspects of one’s appearance is, according to numerous school regulations, an unnecessary and time-consuming practice. However, some of the analysed schools allowed for subtle makeup, precisely defining acceptable elements. This was also the case for painting nails. Coming to school wearing makeup is not allowed. Applying makeup while in school is also not allowed. Girls are allowed to wear light mascara in natural colours. (PS7) Painting nails with a colourless, transparent, vanilla, cream, or beige lacquer and light makeup (foundation, mascara, neutral lip gloss) are allowed. (PS5)

Students’ visible body parts are subjected to greater or lesser restrictions. Both schools that use hard/mandated as well as soft/discursive policies in this matter can be identified. Most of the analysed documents evidenced a soft policy regarding makeup, hairstyles, or piercings. Some of the analysed schools also presented the procedures of inspecting students’ appearance in their documents. This is usually the teachers’ responsibility, although all school employees are involved in some instances. Teachers who notice a student’s inappropriate appearance are required to document it in the digital class register and/or notify the parents (usually in reoccurring cases). All teachers and employees of the school are responsible for controlling the students’ adherence to the regulations concerning dress and appearance. In cases of student appearance that is inappropriate or in violation of the regulations, all teachers are required to document it accordingly in the e-register (notes on the student’s violation of regulations should only be made once for the given day). In cases of regular violations of regulations by the student, the class tutor is responsible for notifying the student’s parents. (PS5)

The consequences faced by students who do not adhere to the regulations concerning appearance usually involve written notes or notifying the parents. In some schools, students who regularly violate appearance

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regulations are given a date by the tutor by which they have to adjust their appearance in line with the regulations. The most severe consequence indicated in the analysed documents was lowering the conduct grade (ocena z zachowania) for repeated violations of the regulations concerning appearance. It is worth noting that consequences for inappropriate appearance are less severe in Polish schools than in, for example, British (Babicka-­ Wirkus, 2023) or Kenyan (Sabic-El-Rayess et al., 2020) schools. When analysing the school regulations concerning student appearance, it is worth noting their language. It is usually very imprecise and allows for a broad range of interpretations, which is also highlighted by other authors (Edwards & Marshall, 2020). Polish school documents use the following words to describe student appearance: clean (czysty), neat (schludny), modest (skromny), aesthetic (estetyczny), not flashy (niekrzykliwy), and muted (stonowany). Such adjectives allow for significant discrepancies in interpretation and selective enforcement of formal regulations by teachers (Babicka-Wirkus, 2018). The lack of precision, especially in schools that do not mandate a uniform dress and instead use the so-called soft dress code, is an element of control and discipline, as discussed by Foucault (1995, 2007). Edwards and Marshall (2020) highlight the fact that norms of student appearance are based on standards defined by the dominant, white, heterosexual, male group, which shapes educational policy through the prism of their expectations and concerns, also concerning appearance. These norms are considered natural and thus not subject to reflection and criticism. It is worth noting here that the majority of school regulations concerning appearance pertain to girls, even though this may not always be stated directly.

Conclusion The requirement of a uniform school dress is not a frequent practice in Poland. The majority of schools in Poland are state schools, where school uniforms are not mandated. School uniforms are usually mandated in nonstate schools that seek to underscore their distinctiveness and prestige through homogeneous outfits. The analysis of state and nonstate school documents with regard to regulations of student appearance and dress showed that they contain numerous directions and prohibitions that discipline students’ bodies. Schools where unform dress is mandated define the appearance of specific articles of clothing very precisely, sometimes also including underwear.

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They mandate a hard dress code that does not leave much room for individual interpretations. On the other hand, schools that do not mandate a uniform dress implement a soft dress code, which also regulates student appearance but allows for broad interpretations, as it is written using imprecise language. In this case, students have more opportunities for self-­ expression. On the other hand, there is also a greater likelihood of abuse and overinterpretation on the part of teachers and school administrators. Polish schools adopt the position that students’ external appearance is not important. However, they simultaneously list numerous regulations concerning student appearance in their documents. This creates a pretence through which the belief in the nonimportance of external appearance in everyday life is inculcated in the students. At the same time, it is highlighted that a neat, modest, and muted dress is a condition of entry into professional and adult life. The discrepancy between declarations and practice in this aspect is a mechanism of control over the students’ bodies. It creates passive, obedient bodies (Foucault, 1995, 2007). It is a form of disciplining the body through which the students’ individuality and freedom of expression are hampered. Regulations and prohibitions concerning appearance are imprinted into the students’ bodies and thus internalized (McLaren, 1988; Fay, 1987), which inhibits experimenting, adopting various social roles, and creating one’s own identity.

References Act of 11 April 2007 on amending the act on the education system and amending other select acts (Journal of Laws 2007, Volume 80, Item 542). https:// archiwum-­b ip.men.gov.pl/akty-­p rawne-­o bowizujce/ustawa-­z -­d nia-­1 1-­ kwietnia-­2 007-­r-­o -­z mianie-­u stawy-­o -­s ystemie-­o wiaty-­o raz-­o -­z mianie-­ niektorych-­innych-­ustaw.html Act of 14 December 2016 on educational law (Journal of Laws 2017, Item 59). https://isap.sejm.gov.pl/isap.nsf/download.xsp/WDU20170000059/U/ D20170059Lj.pdf Ansari, A., Shepard, M., & Gottfried, M. A. (2022). School uniforms and student behavior: Is there a link? Early childhood research quarterly, 58, 278–286. Babicka-Wirkus, A. (2018). Respektowanie prawa do autoekspresji a rytuały oporu gimnazjalistów [Respecting the right to self-expression and middle school students’ rituals of resistance]. Biuro Rzecznika Praw Dziecka. Babicka-Wirkus, A. (2019). Kultury oporu w szkole. Działania  – motywacje  – przestrzeń [Cultures of resistance in school. Actions  – motivations  – spaces]. Wolters Kluwer.

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Babicka-Wirkus, A. (2023). Children’s Rights to Freedom of Expression in the Context of Students’ Appearance. A Comparative Study of Poland and the United Kingdom – in process of reviewing. Bánovčanová, Z., & Masaryková, D. (2014). The docile body  – Reflecting the school. Journal of Pedagogy, 2, 251–264. https://doi.org/10.2478/ jped-­2014-­0012 Bauman, C., & Krskova, H. (2016). School discipline, School uniforms and academic performance. International Journal of Educational Management, 30(6), 1003–1029. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEM-­09-­2015-­0118 Bobel, C., & Kwan, S. (2011). Introduction. In C.  Bobel & S.  Kwon (Eds.), Embodied resistance: Breaking the rules, challenging the norms (pp.  1–10). Vanderbilt University Press. Bodine, A. (2003). School uniforms, academic achievement, and uses of research. The Journal of educational Research, 97(2), 67–71. https://doi. org/10.1080/00220670309597509 Bourdieu, P. (2000). Pascalian meditations. Stanford University Press. Bowe, R., Ball, S., & Gewirtz, S. (1994). ‘Parental choice’, consumption and social theory: The operation of micromarkets in education. British Journal of Educational Studies, 42(1), 38–52. Brunsma, D.  L. (2004). The school uniform movement and what it tells us about American education. Scarecrow Education. Brunsma, D.  L. (2006). School uniform policies in public schools. Principal, 85, 50–53. Brunsma, D. L., & Rockquemore, K. A. (1998). Effects of students uniforms on attendance, behavior problems, substance use, and academic achievement. The Journal of Educational Research, 92(1), 53–62. https://doi. org/10.1080/00220679809597575 Cornell, D. G. (2013). School violence: Fears versus facts. Routledge. Crockett, D., & Wallendorf, M. (1998). Sociological perspectives on imposed School dress codes: Consumption as attempted suppression of class and group symbolism. Journal of Macromarketing, 18(2), 115–131. https://doi. org/10.1177/027614679801800204 Edwards, T. K., & Marshall, C. (2020). Undressing policy: A critical analysis of North Carolina (USA) public school dress codes. Gender and Education, 32(6), 732–750. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2018.1503234 Erikson, E. H. (1994). Identity and the life cycle. Norton & Company. Fay, B. (1987). Critical social science. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Firmin, M., Smith, S., & Perry, L. (2006). School uniforms: A qualitative analysis of aims and accomplishments at two Christian Schools. Journal of Research on Christian Education, 15(2), 143–168. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 10656210609485000

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Foucault, M. (1995). Discipline and punish: The birth of a prison (2nd ed.). Vintage Books House. Foucault, M. (2007). Security, territory, population. Lectures at the Collège de France (G. Burchell, Trans.). Palgrave Macmillan. Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630 6.2021.1931813 Giroux, H. A. (2001). Theory and resistance in education: Towards a pedagogy for the opposition (Revised and Expanded Edition). Bergin & Garvey. Giroux, H.  A. (2022). Pedagogy of resistance. Against manufactured ignorance. Bloomsbury Academic. Gromkowska-Melosik, A. (2019). Społeczne funkcje elitarnego szkolnictwa średniego [The social functions of elite middle schools]. In M.  Szymański (Ed.), Krótkie wykłady z socjologii edukacji [Short lectures in the sociology of education] (pp. 128–154). Wolters Kluwer. Igielska, B. (2005). Powrót mundurka [The return of the school uniform]. Głos Nauczycielski, 35, 6. McLaren, M.  A. (2002). Feminism, Foucault, and embodied subjectivity. SUNY Press. McLaren, P. (1988). Schooling the postmodern body: Critical pedagogy and the politics of enfleshment. Journal of Education, 170(3), 53–83. McLaren, P. (2022). Critical theory: Rituals, pedagogies and resistance. Brill. Meadmore, D., & Symes, C. (1997). Keeping up appearances: Uniform policy for school diversity? British Journal of Educational Studies, 45(2), 174–186. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-­8527.00044 Raby, R. (2005a). What is resistance? Journal of Youth Studies, 8(2), 151–171. https://doi.org/10.1080/13676260500149246 Raby, R. (2005b). Polite, well-dressed and on time: Secondary school conduct codes and the production if docile citizens. Canadian Review of Sociology, 42(1), 71–91. Raby, R. (2010). ‘Tank Tops Are Ok but I Don’t Want to See Her Thong’: Girls’ engagements with Secondary School dress codes. Youth & Society, 41(93), 333–356. https://doi.org/10.1177/0044118X09333663 Rokowska, A. (2008). Opór psychologiczny młodzieży: rola źródła i kierunek presji społecznej w kwestii ujednolicenia ubioru w szkole [Psychological resistance in adolescents: The role of the source and the direction of social pressure concerning uniform dress in schools]. Psychologia Rozwojowa, 13(2), 47–56. Sabic-El-Rayess, A., Mansur, N. N., Batkhuyag, B., & Otgonlkhagva, S. (2020). School uniform policy’s adverse impact on equality and access to schooling. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 50(8), 1122–1139. https://doi.org/10.1080/03057925.2019.1579637

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Strój szkolny, czyli o mundurkach [School dress, or school uniforms]. Retrieved September 18, 2022, from https://www.ngs24.pl/stroj-­szkolny-­czyli­o-­mundurkach United Nations. (1989). Convention on the rights of the child. Retrieved June 21, 2018, from https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx Yeung, R. (2009). Are School uniforms a good fit? Results from the ECLS-K and the NELS. Educational Policy, 23(6), 847–874. https://doi. org/10.1177/0895904808330170

CHAPTER 8

Why Do Girls Have to Wear Ties at School in the UK? Rachel Shanks

Introduction Skirts, school dresses and the female body have been widely researched and reported (e.g. Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020; Happel, 2013; Raby, 2010; Pomerantz, 2007). Much of the academic literature and popular debate has focused on school skirts, whether girls should have to wear them, whether schools should require skirts to be of a certain length and so on. One item of school uniform that has been overlooked in relation to gender and how it may impact girls in school is the school tie. Just as pink used to be for boys and blue was for girls in British society, originally it was women and children who wore neck ties rather than men (see Hart, 1998, for a full history). Slowly men’s neck ties developed into the necktie or tie that we know today. While women may choose to wear a tie or a silk scarf, they are not regarded as obligatory in any setting. This contrasts with the wearing of a tie, which for much of the twentieth century was seen as an

R. Shanks (*) School of Education, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_8

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essential item of dress for men in workplaces such as the civil service, commerce, schools and universities. The tie’s origins go further back to at least the 1640s to neckwear described as a band. These were also called cravats, and the eighteenth-century versions are still worn by ministers and lawyers in formal dress today. The term ‘necktie’ started to be used in the midnineteenth century (Hart, 1998). Rugby was the first school to have its badge on a jersey, and Eton was the first to put its colours on scarves, socks, caps and ties (ibid). Thus, the necktie, along with the collar, became a label around someone’s neck identifying their class and which school they went to. Ties, skirts and blouses can be understood as some of the ‘mundane materialities’ of school that are often not noticed but are significant in the way that they enact gendered power (Taylor, 2013, p. 688). We need to ‘undress’ dress codes and policies with ties as part of ‘hard dress codes’ or compulsory school uniform policies (Edwards & Marshall, 2020). Gender in schools with a uniform is materialised in skirts and trousers, shirts and blouses, blazers and especially ties. This chapter investigates how gender is accepted, ignored, and understood in school uniform policies. In other words, how gender is ‘done’ (Gill et al., 2016, p. 97). Some schools (see Dobson, 2018) have attempted to address gender in relation to school uniform by banning skirts, but this appears to blame girls for their own bodies and how others see and feel about them (see Allan, 2009; Ringrose & Renold, 2014). Not allowing girls to wear skirts at school when they will wear them outside schooltime and possibly for the rest of their lives while at the same time requiring them to wear ties that are almost never worn by women shows how muddled the issue of gender and school uniform has become. Other schools have gender-neutral school uniform policies, so girls can wear trousers and boys can wear skirts (Ramaswamy, 2016). The imposition of the necktie in girls’ uniforms is in stark contrast to the banning of Muslim girls’ veils in France and elsewhere.

What Clothes Do Clothing as material culture helps us to understand a society’s values (Moorosi, 2012). The dressed bodies of school children and, in particular, the dressed bodies of schoolgirls form part of their identities. Clothing articulates a person’s cultural identity (Barnes & Eicher, cited in Moorosi, 2012, p.  184). The choice of style, colour and pattern of tie can be regarded as a window into the male wearer’s identity (Hart, 1998).

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Western societies classified trousers as something men wore and s­kirts/ dresses as something that women wore (Moorosi, 2012). However, in societies such as China, it was acceptable for women to wear trousers and for men to wear gowns. Dress codes are not related to differences between the anatomies of women and men (Moorosi, 2012 citing Hayworth, 1994). There is nothing inherently masculine or feminine about particular items of clothing; instead, how garments are viewed reflects a society’s cultural norms (Moorosi, 2012, p.  185 citing Weber & Mitchell, 1995 and Steele, 1989). Whether men, women or both wear trousers or gowns, shirts or blouses, scarves or ties. Clothes can be understood as communicating class, status and identity (Taylor, 2013). One reason given for hard dress codes/strict uniform policies is that they reduce these differences and create a level playing field. However, adding the cost of a school tie seems an odd way to do this (see Shanks & McKinney, 2022 on cost of school uniforms), particularly as it is associated with male office wear in mainly middle-class jobs. Schools should prepare pupils to dress themselves in the way expected of young people in their own community and in their own time. McSharry and Walsh (2015) noted that schools seem determined to insist on conforming to an appearance that is hardly in evidence elsewhere. This serves to ‘maintain the stereotypical fixed identify of the schoolgirl and boy’ (Spencer, 2007, p.  246) with a mixture of nineteenth- and twentieth-century fashions. Uniform clothing can be regarded as a type of unisex clothing that is not made to fit girls’ or young women’s bodies. This intentionally de-­ emphasises and masculinises girls’ bodies (Crockett & Wallendorf, 1998). Ties are not sex-neutral or unisex; instead, they enforce male ways of dressing onto girls’ bodies. Taylor (2013, p.  695 citing Miller, 2010) states that ‘things make people’ and ‘people make things’. However, ‘nothing is more material, physical, corporal than the exercise of power’ (Foucault, 1980, p. 57). Compulsory school uniform policies are a concrete exercise of power over children and young people’s docile bodies (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). Let us stop and consider why it is required for girls in schools in the twenty-first century. Here, we consider the ‘thing-power’ (Bennett, 2010, p.  2) of ties, meaning how ties as matter impact other matter, including people and institutions. Here, the term ‘affect’ is used to cover the impact of both animate and inanimate matter rather than saying that things have agency. Affect is how things and bodies in social space affect one another. Ringrose

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and Rawlings (2015) suggest that ‘skirts exist as the ultimate material objects that can be stylised, read and embedded with meanings for girls in schools’ (p. 14). In the UK and Ireland, the skirt has been the most contested item of clothing, while in Australia, school dress has been at the centre of a power struggle (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020). In this chapter, the analysis of uniform shifts through considerations of the material-­ discursive intra-actions and apparatuses of ties. Here, we want to ask what is a tie supposed to do, and what does a tie do to girls, in particular? As Taylor (2013) put it, we ‘seek not just to fight the familiar but to change it through feminist praxis’ (p. 701). Researchers and educators have been invited to focus on ‘some of the more invisible practices of the school’ (Pomerantz, 2007, p. 383), and within the school uniform, the tie, and its affects, has become so taken-for-granted that it has become invisible.

History of Girls’ Uniform and School Ties Girls’ uniforms in the UK began with distinctly feminine attire, such as gymslips, but from the late nineteenth century into the twentieth century, this changed from overtly feminine to explicitly male shirts and ties (Stephenson, 2021). Girls’ schools in nineteenth-century Britain faced a problem of ‘double conformity’ in that they wanted to show that girls could be equal to boys in terms of educational ability and potential but that they could also become wives and mothers. Thus, the feminine could not be removed; it had to be modified, and women’s clothes reinforced the ideal of the passive, feminine girl and woman. In fighting for girls’ and women’s education in nineteenth-century Britain, it was not possible to extinguish the feminine ideal; instead, it had to be modified. Over time, girls’ uniforms changed to more masculine-type shirts and ties (ibid). While girls’ schools incorporated ties into their uniforms, they did not allow trousers (ibid). Stephenson notes that house ties were often one of the first items that were made compulsory and fully regulated. Later, in the 1920s to late 1930s, girls’ uniforms had become more incongruous with normal clothing. The mix of masculine and feminine items at school was at odds with the gender roles that women were expected to play. Uniforms went out of fashion in the 1960s, but as they gradually returned or became stricter in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, the school tie remained a key part of what was expected. In the 1970s, young people in the UK could use school ties to show if they were mods (small knots) or more into

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glam rock (wide knots), but there are currently no similar tie-related fashions. In the twentieth century, millions of ties were being produced in the UK, and millions more were imported; for example, in 1988, there were 30 million new ties produced for the UK marketplace (Hart, 1998). In 1989, the shop Tie Rack’s ‘Tie Report’ stated that on average, an American man had 22 ties and a British man had 17 ties in their wardrobes (Hart, 1998). It was not reported, but it can be assumed that the average for an American woman and a British woman was zero. However, the tie as an item of clothing for men in the traditional office is fast disappearing with even male world leaders discarding it as a compulsory item at international summits (Baio, 2022). Six reasons have been given for the decline in men wearing ties by Preston Schlueter of the Gentleman’s Gazette (2022): restrictive dress codes, the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, the rise of Business Casual, an increasingly casual world, tie fashion trends, and popular and media perception of the tie today.

Study of Secondary School Uniform Policies in Scotland Feminist critical policy analysis is being used as school uniform policies need to be deconstructed to analyse the different effects they have by gender (Allan, 2009). Gender is a ‘fundamental category’ that creates different experiences, understanding and social realities (Bensimon & Marshall, 2003). For a boy at school wearing a tie is different to a girl wearing one. There is a disparity between what policymakers might regard as gender-­ neutral policy and what effect these policies actually have on girls. Using feminist critical policy analysis to investigate and understand school uniform policies is an important step by which we can see how gender norms are created, reinforced and made systematic. An intersectional lens is also required to understand the further effects of white heterosexual masculinity on black girls’ lives and on gay, lesbian, trans and nonbinary people. Hegemonic norms can be seen with the white middle-class male heterosexual at the centre with he/him assumed as the starting point in school uniform policies. Those most at the margins for whom an egalitarian school uniform is meant to help are further marginalised by wearing middle-­class clothes such as ties and blazers. The status quo is considered neutral and unisex and goes unquestioned year after year.

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In a research study conducted with 13 university students, the uniform and/or dress code policies of all 357 publicly funded secondary schools in Scotland were analysed. This is a unique national data set that captured every aspect of uniform policy. The students spent a week learning how to use the qualitative data analysis software NVivo while collecting, uploading and analysing the data. Coding in relation to ties was performed in two ways: content analysis of the short policy texts in relation to whether the schools required a tie to be worn by girls or not and, at the same time, thematic coding for gender difference within the policies. As soon as a school decides (see Chap. 5 on participation in decision-­ making on school uniform) on a compulsory uniform or continues its tradition of having a school uniform, then decisions must be made about what that uniform includes and what will not be allowed. In Scotland’s publicly funded secondary schools, 96% have a compulsory school uniform (n=343). Out of all 357 secondary schools, 90% (n=320) require a school tie to be worn by girls as well as boys (see Fig. 8.1). Within the 343 schools that had a compulsory school uniform (a hard dress code), there were 10 schools that did not require a school tie as part of the uniform. A further 13 schools out of the 343 with a uniform had optional ties or ties only had to be worn by pupils in senior years. Thus, 320 schools or 90% of all publicly funded secondary schools in Scotland

Fig. 8.1  Secondary school uniform in Scotland

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required a school tie to be worn by girls as well as boys. As seen above in Fig. 8.1, a far higher number of schools require a tie than a blazer (66%, n=235) as part of the school uniform. Figure 8.1 shows the percentages for mandated items alongside those for some of the banned items of clothing and footwear for secondary school pupils. There are very few schools without school ties, and there did not appear to be any common characteristic that explained why they had a school uniform but no tie. Schools without a compulsory uniform were generally located in remote rural locations, often on islands with no nearby schools. Analysis of the schools that required ties as part of their uniform did not show a difference in terms of the level of deprivation in socioeconomic terms. It was also found that in most school uniform policies, there was little or no acknowledgement of the potential for discrimination in school uniform practices or information on what recourses were at pupils’ disposal if they felt they had been discriminated against. At the same time, the policies made no mention of fluid gender identities or transgender pupils. What was found was that in a small number of schools, there was a hierarchy of school ties. In 12 schools, there were different ties: in 8 schools, there were different ties for those in year S4 (equivalent to 9th grade) onwards or for those in years S5 and S6. In one school, there were different ties for prefects. Two schools even had three different school ties: one tie for pupils in years S1 to S3 or S4; a tie for year S4 and S5 or S5 pupils; and a third tie for year S6. In five schools, only pupils in senior years (S4 to S6, S5 to S6, or S6) had to wear ties. Nowhere in the school uniform policies that require ties to be worn are girls given a choice of whether to wear them or not. All pupils are treated the same, but pupils are not all the same. They have different bodies, and they come from different social classes and backgrounds.

The Taken-for-Grantedness of the School Tie In the UK, school uniforms, of which the tie is an integral part, have become ‘a taken-for-granted part of the training in masculinity’ (Craik, 2005, p. 62). The requirement for girls to wear a school tie is not questioned. The point here is that boys have not fought for the right to wear skirts, why would they? However, girls MUST wear ties, an item of clothing that is associated with men. The dress sticks to its wearer and proclaims this is not a boy inside (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020), while the tie says we’re all the same, we’re all to be as like boys as we possibly can. To

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wear a tie is to be at school, it is to be obedient, well-behaved, middle class, white and as like a boy as it is possible to be even when you are a girl. When wearing a tie at school, girls are deemed amorphous, unisex, ungendered, degendered and in lesser bodies who matter less. Due to the school tie originating in fee-paying schools the school tie is often worn by their alumni long after they have left school (Craik, 2005). The tie from certain schools can still be used as a powerful social lubricant and lever. The ‘old school tie’ is both a metaphor and a physical artefact (Spencer, 2007). The tie equates to school just as the particular school is marked on the tie. While dress=girl (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020), tie=school. Ties are imbued with implicit power, while we cannot know everything about the tie, as it will produce differing affects in diverse social world assemblages. Here, some of the potential affects of ties are presented. It should be explained that ties themselves are not a problem, it is because ties, as an item of dress over the last 300 years in Britain, have developed as an item of male attire, as an item that distinguishes class and other social strata. The school tie can still make a difference when the tie of an expensive private school is spotted in a professional or social encounter.

School Ties and Gender I wish to interrogate practice and assumptions with the taken-for-granted and therefore hidden anomaly of girls wearing ties for school. Children’s bodies and their sexualities are unavoidable but somehow ignored (Foucault, 1980). While girls are navigating their gender and gender identity, their sexuality, their changing bodies and society’s ever-increasing and often contradictory expectations of what it means to be a girl or woman, they have to decide how ‘to do’ gender which often means how ‘to do heterosexuality’ (Allan, 2009). The requirement to wear a tie is at odds with ‘“post-feminist” demands of heterosexualised hyper-femininity (the need for girls to be sassy, sexy and successful) (Allan, 2009, p. 147). Girls’ bodies are clad in clothes that deny their ‘embryonic sexuality’ (Spencer, 2007, p. 242). Ties are a part of the heterosexual world with men wearing them, but something that appears to have been overlooked is that for lesbians, the wearing of a tie is a way to signify a butch or masc lesbian. Thus, the hetero tie is part of an assemblage to create girls in the image of men but ignores girls’ gender, bodies and sexualities.

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Here, I explore material-discursive boundary-making practices (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020) in this case tie-wearing, which produces the object of the tie and the subject of the girl wearing an item of male clothing. What does the tie equate to when both boys and girls have to wear this classist piece of material associated with male office wear, private schools and military uniforms? In addition to signifying school, it surely tells girls that they are second to boys, that their bodies are not considered and that primacy is always given to boys and men. Just as the school dress is a ‘direct gendering practice of Australian schools that materializes some bodies at the expense of othered bodies’ (Wolfe & Rasmussen, 2020), the school tie ignores girls’ bodies; it is as if only boys’ bodies and items of male clothing matter. Wolfe and Rasmussen (2020) were able to present the school dress in new ways; here, the school tie is viewed anew as something not to take for granted but to question and dispute. We need to step back and see that the school tie is a thing that has consequences and produces affect in and on its wearers and those around them. The school tie for girls can be seen as an attempt to degender them and render them sexless to pretend they are sexually neutral and sexually unawakened; thus, schools can claim that they do not treat the sexes differently when schools are ‘constantly constructing gender differences’ (Paechter, 2006, p.  129). Femininity has become reworked through neoliberalism with tropes such as ‘girl power’ (Allan, 2009), but they are still expected to dress like prototype men while at school. Girls are being asked to ignore their bodies and wear a ‘unisex’ male-­ focused costume that only emphasises their body more. While Paechter noted in 2006 that the ‘corporeal turn’ had not impacted educational theory or practice, since then, there has been more of a focus on the material, both in terms of inanimate matter and on the bodies of pupils and teachers (see, e.g. Page & Sidebottom, 2022). The denial of children’s bodies can be understood as a consequence of the Cartesian distinction of mind and body, which leads to people treating children’s bodies as ‘a blank sheet upon which masculinities and femininities’ can be written upon (Paechter, 2006, p.  131). If we can bring children’s bodies into focus, then we can start to look at what happens in schools in new ways and question why certain policies and practices continue.

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What Do School Ties Do to Girls? The mandating of school ties needs to be reconsidered, and what does it achieve? What are school ties for? What do they do to girls? We could also ask what ties do to working-class boys? And to all pupils from nonmajority cultural backgrounds whose fathers have never worn a tie and whose parents didn’t wear ties to school. In at least one publicly funded secondary school in Scotland in 2023, the compulsory school tie is set to be replaced with lanyards. This may be regarded as a welcome step forwards in terms of gender, but it highlights the issue of school pupils being dressed as future employees (see Olsson & Shanks, 2022). Using a lens of feminist critical analysis and material feminism, we see that something as mundane and ubiquitous as a school tie has presence, affect and force over girls and their bodies. We need to forge a new way of thinking through the issue of why girls are made to wear ties to school to understand why practices do not change. Building on a feminist foundation but also paying attention to class and dominant culture, we can see that schools are deciding and selecting what pupils wear even when they do not change policies year after year. In practice, this perpetuates a nostalgic backwards-looking proclivity at the expense of engaging with emerging futures that may look far different. These uniform policies and practices produce emotional, cultural and economic affects. We need to understand at more than an individual and person-centred level, but look at relations between schools, pupils, pupils’ bodies and clothing. School uniform policies and practices include privileges and disciplinary sanctions in their enforcement. Policies show what is expected and what is justified, and provide a view of how tradition enfolds into and differentiates schooling from the rest of the social world. The purpose of education is tied up with the reasons for school uniform, both explicit and implicit. The unstated reasons for school uniform can be understood as the means to enforce authority and conformity. While teachers in the British tradition are referred to by their title of Sir, Miss, Mr or Mrs, thus making them less an individual and providing them more authority, school uniforms reduce the individuality of the pupils and make them more controllable. Clothing can be recognised as an actor within these school/pupil/pupil body relations. What is being proposed here is that the school tie does something to girls—it shows them that they must conform to a male world with male clothes and understand that a lack of diversity and intersectional

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considerations is the ‘natural order’ of things. Life is being shown as a ‘one size fits all’ and that the male body is the one to aspire to being. The school uniform makes gendered subjects that are normatively male and transgressively female. The repetitive nature of acts such as tie-wearing contributes to the normative force of the male body. The neutral or universal body is always the male body, whether that is testing the performance of airbags in car crashes (Wood, 2022) or deciding what it is acceptable to wear at school.

Conclusion As Moorosi (2012) states, to achieve change, we need to investigate power relations and question the taken-for-granted but stifling gender order. Secondary schools in Scotland and beyond could consider changing the genderedness of compulsory school uniforms and how gender is ‘done’ in dress codes and uniform policies. In a recent report from the Children’s Parliament in Scotland, ‘Gender Equality in Education and Learning’ (Scottish Government, 2022a), one recommendation was to ‘remove gendered uniforms and sports kits’ (p.  27); however, the ubiquity and invisibility of school ties means that it is unlikely it was being referred to here. In other documentation for schools from Education Scotland, Skills Development Scotland and the Institute of Physics (2017) on improving gender balance, there is no mention of school uniform. However, for the first time, there is to be a national policy in Scotland on school uniform following a consultation (Scottish Government, 2022b). Currently, the school pupil norm is a boy wearing a shirt and tie, jumper, blazer and trousers with girls perhaps given the option of a cardigan, a blouse rather than a shirt and the choice of skirt or trousers. Spencer (2007) noted that there are mixed messages at work in dress codes that require a ‘compulsory tie (marker of masculinity)’ and skirts that are of a decent or respectable length ‘marker of femininity’ in school uniform policies (p.  235). New national guidance on school uniform policy in Scotland could provide an opportunity to consider the place of the tie in school uniforms today. Here, I have tried to make the tie visible to critically assess its relevance for girls (and boys) at school today. While it is possible for young people to resist regulations and assert some individuality within the constraints of a hard dress code/compulsory school uniform, for example, with the length of a skirt or the bagginess of trousers, there is little scope

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with a regulation school tie available in one style from a limited number of suppliers. This chapter has highlighted issues of norms and differences in school uniform and, in particular, raised questions about an aspect of clothing, girls wearing ties, as an attempt to contribute to discussions on dress, gender and education. The main assertion in this chapter is that girls’ school uniform is still dictated by what boys wore to school over 100 years ago. This needs to change, and as researchers and educators, we should do more ‘to disrupt heteronormativity and oppressive patriarchal values and practices that prevent social transformation’ (Moorosi, 2012, p. 193). For young people today, there continues to be a ‘difficult individual negotiation between academic aspiration and overarching models of classed, gendered and teenage identity’ (Spencer, 2007, p. 246). As there does not appear to be an answer to the question ‘why must girls wear ties at school?’ so we must keep asking it. Acknowledgements  I wish to thank the students who were involved in the original sourcing and coding of the school uniform policies, namely Lucas Adrian Brauns, Jasper Friedrich, Agata Kostrzewa, Marton Kottmayer, Annabelle Eveline Olsson, Kirsten Phelps, Daniel Phillips, Vilma Pullinen, Atyrah Hanim Razali, Cameron Roy and Maria Steiner Simonsen.

References Allan, A. (2009). The importance of being a ‘lady’: Hyperfemininity and heterosexuality in the private, single-sex primary school. Gender and Education, 21(2), 145–158. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540250802213172 Baio, A. (2022). Why the absence of ties isn’t the biggest problem at the G7 Summit. indy100. https://www.indy100.com/politics/g7-­leaders-summitties-­women Bennett, J. (2010). Vibrant matter: A political ecology of things. Duke University Press. Bensimon, E. M., & Marshall, C. (2003). Like it or not. Feminist critical policy analysis matters. The Journal of Higher Education, 74(3), 337–349. Craik, J. (2005). Uniforms exposed. From conformity to transgression. Berg. Crockett, D., & Wallendorf, M. (1998). Sociological perspectives on imposed school dress codes: Consumption as attempted suppression of class and group symbolism. Journal of Macromarketing, 18(2), 115–131. https://doi. org/10.1177/027614679801800204

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Dobson, C. (2018, July 1). Dozens of schools ban girls from wearing skirts in move towards gender neutral uniform policy. The Mirror. https://www.mirror. co.uk/news/uk-­news/dozens-­schools-­ban-­girls-­wearing-­12829898 Edwards, T. K., & Marshall, C. (2020). Undressing policy: A critical analysis of North Carolina (USA) public school dress codes. Gender and Education, 32(6), 732–750. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2018.1503234 Foucault, M. (1980). Power/knowledge (C. Gordon, Ed.). Harvester Press. Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630 6.2021.1931813 Gill, J., Esson, K., & Yuen, R. (2016). A girl’s education: Schooling and the formation of gender, identities and future visions. Springer. Happel, A. (2013). Ritualized girling: School uniforms and the compulsory performance of gender. Journal of Gender Studies, 22(1), 92–96. https://doi. org/10.1080/09589236.2012.745680 Hart, A. (1998). Ties. V & A Publications. Institute of Physics. (2017). Improving gender balance Scotland. An action guide for secondary schools. Institute of Physics. McSharry, M., & Walsh, B. (2015). Fostering complicit femininity: Epoch, education and the young female body. In A critical youth studies for the 21st century (pp.  317–332). Brill. https://doi.org/10.3384/ confero.2001-4562.150626 Moorosi, P. (2012). Who wears the trousers here? Women teachers and the politics of gender and the dress code in South African schools. In R.  Moletsane, C.  Mitchell, & A.  Smith (Eds.), Was it something I wore? Dress, materiality, identity. HSRC Press. Olsson, A., & Shanks, R. (2022). Employability and school uniform policies: Projecting the employer’s gaze. Childhood, 29(4), 628–645. Paechter, C. (2006). Reconceptualizing the gendered body: Learning and constructing masculinities and femininities in school. Gender and Education, 18(2), 121–135. Page, D., & Sidebottom, K. (2022). The sensorium and fleshy schools. British Educational Research Journal, 48, 771–784. https://doi.org/10.1002/ berj.3793 Pomerantz, S. (2007). Cleavage in a tank top: Bodily prohibition and the discourses of school dress codes. The Alberta Journal of Educational Research, 53(4), 371–386. https://doi.org/10.11575/ajer.v53i4.55303 Raby, R. (2010). “Tank tops are ok but I don’t want to see her thong”: Girls’ engagements with secondary school dress codes. Youth & Society, 41(3), 333–356. https://doi.org/10.1177/0044118X09333663

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Ramaswamy, C. (2016, June 13). UK state schools get gender-neutral uniforms. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/shortcuts/2016/ jun/13/uk-­state-­schools-­get-­gender-­neutral-­uniforms Ringrose, J., & Rawlings, V. (2015). Posthuman performativity, gender and ‘school bullying’: Exploring the material-discursive intra-actions of skirts, hair, sluts, and poofs. Confero: Essays on Education, Philosophy and Politics, 3(2), 1–37. Ringrose, J., & Renold, E. (2014). “F**k rape!”: Mapping affective intensities in a feminist research assemblage. Qualitative Inquiry, 20(6), 772–780. https:// doi.org/10.1177/1077800414530261 Schlueter, P. (2022, June 16). Why did men stop wearing ties (long neckties)? https://www.gentlemansgazette.com/men-­stop-­wearing-­long-­ties/ Scottish Government. (2022a). Children’s Parliament gender equality in education and learning. A Theory of Change model. Scottish Government. (2022b). School uniforms in Scotland. https://consult.gov. scot/learning-­directorate/school-­uniforms-­statutory-­guidance-­scotland/ Shanks, R., & McKinney, S. J. (2022). Cost and affordability of school uniform and child poverty. Scottish Educational Review, 54(1), 26–48. https://doi. org/10.1163/27730840-­54010003 Spencer, S. (2007). A uniform identity: Schoolgirl snapshots and the spoken visual. History of Education, 36(2), 227–246. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 00467600601171468 Stephenson, K. (2021). A cultural history of school uniform. University of Exeter Press. Taylor, C. A. (2013). Objects, bodies and space: Gender and embodied practices of mattering in the classroom. Gender and Education, 25(6), 688–703. https:// doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2013.834864 Wolfe, M.  J., & Rasmussen, M.  L. (2020). The affective matter of (Australian) school uniforms: The school-dress that is and does. In Mapping the affective turn in education (pp. 179–193). Routledge. Wood, J. (2022). Can the world’s first female crash test dummy make driving safer for women? https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/12/female-­crashtest-­dummies-­road-­safety-­gender-­equality/

CHAPTER 9

Social Class and School Uniforms: A Zimbabwean Case Aaron T. Sigauke

Introduction Classical and modern sociological theorists on social class, such as Karl Marx, Max Weber and Pierre Bourdieu, have identified and highlighted a number of concepts related to social class relevant to the discussion of the sometimes-hidden role of uniforms in schools and society at large. These concepts are useful in explaining and understanding the nature of social relationships within and between social class groups. This chapter, with a particular focus on Zimbabwe, raises and tries to respond to questions concerning the role of uniforms in schools, that is, the extent to which the insistence on the need for school uniforms for school children is meant to benefit the capitalist agendas of some elite groups in that society. It also examines the role of uniforms as attempts by school authorities to create a given uniform identity (in contrast to diverse identities) and thus

A. T. Sigauke (*) Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences (HASS), School of Education, University of New England, Armidale, NSW, Australia e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_9

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discipline, control and regulate. The author, who comes from a postcolonial background, writes from his schooling and professional experiences in pre-independent (colonial Rhodesia) and postcolonial (independent) Zimbabwe. He raises questions about the role of social class in both preand post-independent Zimbabwe with regard to how school uniform policies have helped in enforcing and perpetuating class structures in that society. For example, while in a pre-independent society, largely made up of two racial groups (blacks and whites), the insistence on the wearing of hats as part of school uniform was largely meant to protect the sensitive white skin from the heat of the tropical sun, it is not clear why this is still the case in schools that are largely populated by black students. This is only one such example; there are many others that can be regarded as irrelevant to the current socio-political situation. These remnants of the pre-independence era raise questions and possible links to the current class structure of that society.

Theoretical Framework Social class can be regarded as referring to divisions in society that are based on economic and social status. People in the same social division (class) typically share a similar level of wealth, educational achievement, type of job and income. However, social class is open to change. Class, race and ethnicity can impact a person’s or community’s socio-economic standing, which, in turn, can influence circumstances such as job availability, quality of available health and education. As a result of historical conquest or internal ethnic or racial differentiation, a ruling class is often racially or ethnically homogeneous, and particular races or ethnic groups in some societies are legally or customarily restricted to occupying particular class positions (think of the caste system in India or colonial apartheid South Africa). The question as to which ethnicities or races are considered as belonging to high or low classes varies from society to society. How do these ideas help in our understanding of the role of school uniforms used in different countries?

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Linking Social Class and School Uniforms Regarding uniforms in school, it is important to take note of the following questions: why are uniforms needed, who benefits from uniforms as capitalist products, and are school uniforms a means of compliance enforcement? School uniforms are sometimes viewed as a way to minimise the image or appearance of pupils who come from very poor families. This means that pupils from poorer backgrounds would not feel ashamed of what they are wearing as they are clothed like anyone else in the school. Thus, uniforms function to ‘level the playing field between the haves and have-nots’ (Caruso, 1996, p. 83), so it is assumed. Friedrich and Shanks (2023) note that uniform practices in schools can tell a great deal about how power functions. Uniform policies in schools have also been regarded as being framed not just as tools to enforce discipline but rather as techniques for pupils to fashion themselves into respectable and employable future adults. Uniforms have functional values such as protection and comfort; symbolic values such as self-esteem, decoration and group membership; and socio-­ cultural symbolic values (Wallin & Karrholm, 1987). This partly signifies the ideology and culture of the society to which the wearer belongs or the school to which they belong. There is also public debate and controversy concerning school uniforms in terms of social justice issues such as the affordability of uniforms for families living in poverty, children’s right to choose what they want to wear, gender normativity, religious freedom, disability and other issues (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). Dussel (2004, p.  105) raises the question about what school uniform practices mean in terms of power functions in today’s schools. Broadly defined, power can be viewed as any action by some group that restricts and reshapes the free actions of others. Dress codes in schools are part of the techniques of disciplinary power: a form of power concerned with imposing strict rules of behaviour and classifying, hierarchising and surveilling people (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). Among other often cited reasons for the need for the school uniform are student safety and security, strengthening of discipline and moral values—all of which are hoped to improve educational attainment by the student. Still on the issue of power, a number of scholars, for example, Dussel (2004) and Symes and Meadmore (1996), describe how school uniforms relate to issues of gender, race, and social class and the extent to which these issues are reproduced (through uniforms) at the school level. In terms of gender,

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dress codes tend to reproduce binary, heteronormative gender roles with different rules for girls and boys and no consideration of nonbinary identities (Edwards & Marshall, 2020; Happel, 2013), and dress codes tend to place special emphasis on regulating girls and their bodies (Pomerantz, 2007). On issues of race and ethnicity, white gender norms are usually taken for granted. Morris (2005), for example, describes how African American girls are constantly accused of not dressing ‘lady-like’ (p. 34). Ethnic minority males, on the other hand, are also often targeted through discourses that see their style of dress as threatening and potentially part of dangerous ‘gang’ culture (Bodine, 2003, p. 50; Morris, 2005). In relation to social class, the mere sameness of dress is far from implying a level playing field. Apart from the fact that uniforms may be prohibitively expensive for some families (Ridge, 2006) and that visible differences persist among those wearing new and expensive or cheap versions of the school dress, Raby (2005) argues that dress codes are not class-neutral but embody ‘middle-class morality’ in their visual resemblance to white-collar office wear and in their vague references to ‘good taste’ and ‘socially acceptable’ dress (pp. 79–80). Dress codes such as uniforms can be interpreted in terms of how they shape pupils’ perceptions of themselves as members of the different social classes of the school community, society in general and as future employees. A question that can also be raised concerns the extent to which these enforced dress codes are resisted or negotiated in practice. Are policies on school uniforms always translated into practice without friction? Are there any indications or signs of ‘resistance, subversion, failures and conflicts regarding school uniforms policy’? (Doherty, 2007, p. 201) The discussion on the Zimbabwean case that follows answers some of these questions.

The Zimbabwean Case: Pre-independence and Postcolonial Education Policies Colonial Education Policies in Rhodesia (Now Zimbabwe): Race, Ethnicity and Social Class as Determinants of Political Power Race and other large-scale ethnic groupings can influence one’s social class standing and can also impact a person’s or communities’ socio-economic standing (social class), which in turn influences everything, including job availability and the quality of available health and education (see Najwan

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Saadi, 2014 on postcolonial theory and the introductory chapter to this book). As a result of these differences, some particular racial and ethnic groups in some societies become customarily legalised to become the ruling class, and others are restricted from occupying particular social class positions in their societies. Which ethnicities are considered to belong to high/ruling or low/subject classes varies from society to society. In modern societies, examples of such strict legal links between race, social class and political power have been practised in countries such as apartheid South Africa, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and others around the world. In colonial Rhodesia, in spite of their very low numbers, the ‘white race’ had most of the advantages politically, economically, socially and other considerations (Sigauke, 2013). It was during this colonial era in Zimbabwe that the education system was divided into two categories: the European Department of Education, which catered to white, Asian and mixed-race (‘coloured’) children; and the Division of African Education for Blacks. This separatist system of education was also reflected in the budget and other resources allocated to schools and within the ownership, administration of schools, student uniforms and completion rates at all levels of the system (Sigauke, 2013). European education was compulsory up to the age of 15, and funding for the white child was 20 times more than that allocated to the black child, who could just drop out at the primary education level because of financial constraints and other factors. A number of government instruments were put in place to legalise and justify the system, for example, the Education policy of 1966 and Education Act 1979 (Dorsey, 1989). As a result, there was very little social contact or interaction between students from the different races. Further to the racial nature of the system, in 1966, the government introduced junior secondary (F2) schools in the African Division of Education with a strong vocational bias alongside the F1 system with an academically focused curriculum. The F2 schools’ students and teachers were stigmatised as inferior by the public since they were associated with ‘less able’ students who could not be absorbed in the few academically oriented F1 schools available. F2 schools were seen as a further attempt by the racist colonial government to deny academic education to the black African child and to divide the black African population by academic capabilities. However, although the F2 system was discontinued after independence in 1980, the need to ensure that students acquired practical skills during their school career was kept alive, as witnessed by the introduction of practical subjects in the secondary school curriculum after

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independence. Every secondary school student after 1980 was expected to study one of these practical subjects. That policy, like school uniforms, still stands today (Sigauke, 2013). School uniforms policy previously made it easy to distinguish students as to whether or not they were from a white/black (European/African) background, elite/non-elite background, F1/F2 schools, ­government/ privately administered school, according to which school and, thus, their social class. While there have been some changes since independence to school uniforms, some issues still exist, as the following section will show. Postcolonial Education Policies in Zimbabwe: School Types, Curriculum Content and School Uniforms Writing on postcolonial education reforms in Zimbabwe, Zvobgo (1994, 1996, 1997) identifies some glaring contradictions between policy announcements and events on the ground. The democratisation of the education system in Zimbabwe in 1980 was meant to do away with the unequal access to education noted above, which was mainly due to the racial policies of the pre-independence era. Changes at independence involved the disbanding of the racially divided system that classified schools as A, B and C; expanding access to education for all children irrespective of race or social class through opening opportunities at all levels of education; the diversification of the curriculum; and positive discrimination in the allocation of government grants to schools. However, critics have pointed out that the decentralisation of responsibilities to local authorities has resulted in unequal distribution of resources because of differences in social class status between communities (Edwards & Tisdell, 1990). Furthermore, negative attitudes associated with social class differences still exist and are constraints to achieving equity in education. For example, it is observed that the former ‘whites only’ schools (Group A) are still better resourced compared to others. Access to such resources is now being determined by one’s class status rather than by race. The impact of social class is very evident in the discrepancies in educational opportunities and school quality between rural areas and urban centres. Opportunities and quality of schooling are still better in the latter than in rural areas (Edwards & Tisdell, 1990; Sigauke, 2013). There are also glaring differences between the types of school uniforms for students at these different schools in terms of the design and quality of school uniforms.

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The following extract from the biography of a former African student at a prestigious elite private school in Harare, Zimbabwe, covers school uniform. This former student attended the school in 1999, a long time after Zimbabwe’s 1980 independence: I was 12 years old when my parents first drove me from our home on the outskirts of city of Harare through the imposing black gates of St George’s College, Harare. Dressed in a red blazer, red-and-white striped tie, khaki shirt and shorts, grey knee-high socks and a cartoonishly floppy red hat, I looked like an English schoolboy on safari. As our car climbed towards the college, I peered up in awe at the granite castle tower, crowned with a full set of crenelations, that dominates the grounds. It was as if I had entered one of the last redoubts of Britain’s global imperium. After a 15-year liberation war that won Zimbabwe its independence in 1980, the school began admitting select sons of the country’s new Black middle classes, like me. (Chigudu, 2021)

In addition to the school uniform, typical of such elite schools, this former student went on to describe the college’s rituals of dominance and sadism, which taught the boys to accept the logic of colonialism, perpetuated almost two decades into the country’s independence. These practices reinscribe a version of the world in which one race, although it was in the minority, had previously thought of itself as being worthy of violently subjugating another, the African black race. After independence, this same college’s ways of doing things, including the expected school uniform, were embraced by a Black middle class that had imbibed colonial culture and internalised that culture’s sense of superiority. This culture in schools, including expectations of school uniform styles, is still present in Zimbabwean schools today. While formal racial segregation in Zimbabwe is assumed to have ended in 1980, even in 2022, school uniform expectations still reflect the colonial and racial culture of superiority but are now based on social class status. Current tensions between social classes are illustrated through the costs of school uniforms. Much of the debate about school uniforms in Zimbabwe, as the following discussion will show, has centred on the cost of purchasing the uniform, an issue that is determined by the family’s social class status. Little has been said publicly about how school uniform differences, for example, in terms of colour, design and quality, are indicators of the social class students come from.

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In her study on the design and function of the school uniform in Zimbabwe, Nkiwane (1992) sheds light on issues regarding school uniforms: • Generally, students were dissatisfied with the function of uniforms. • The majority of students (73%) expressed a willingness to be involved in the making of uniforms. They believed this helped reduce the cost of buying the uniforms and that they would produce uniform garments whose functional values would be close to their own (student) tastes. • Teachers expressed their willingness to help students with the making of some uniform garments as part of Education with Production (EWP), a programme meant to get schools to be productive and independent from reliance on government supplies. While it may be surprising to those in the Global North to read that school pupils manufactured their own uniforms while at school, involving students in making school uniforms at school locations can be a way of reducing school uniform costs. Furthermore, in rural areas, uniforms are not available because they cannot be purchased from rural shops. Parents or pupils themselves have to board buses to urban areas to buy uniforms and therefore also need transport money to travel to buy school uniforms (Nkiwane, 1992). Thus, this initiative could be argued to level class differences. However, schools’ involvement in the provision of school uniforms has also been used as an opportunity to exacerbate class differences and effectively exclude children from poorer social classes from gaining places in some schools. A bursar at one school in Harare admitted that while the idea of manufacturing and selling uniforms at school locations was good, this was being abused by authorities, adding that parents had a right to complain (Sunday Mail, 2021). Selling school uniforms has become big business for some elite schools. It was noted that the system was being abused for the benefit of a few individuals in schools who connived with school uniform suppliers to produce sub-standard uniforms at high prices. If schools reject uniforms bought outside their premises, this greatly disadvantages students from working-class backgrounds. In most shops outside school locations, a full set of uniform for a first-year secondary school student normally costs between $100 and $150, while uniforms manufactured in some school locations would be as high as $350. Parents were furious at school heads,

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who forced them to buy expensive and low-quality uniform from their schools once their children were offered places. In an interview, one parent said she was forced to pay $218 for school uniforms to secure a first-­ year place for her daughter at one government secondary school (ibid). Parents have called for government intervention, as they are being compelled to buy uniforms from schools where they would have enrolled their children. There is no policy that bars or allows the selling of uniforms in schools. This was confirmed by a deputy minister of primary and secondary education, who admitted that the matter merits an official investigation and subsequent regulation from the Ministry of Education to avoid abuse of either party (Sunday Mail, 2021). A senior government official suggested that schools and parents need to find common ground regarding disagreements pertaining to the sale of uniforms in and by schools. Since the government has not introduced price controls on school uniforms, this has led to the open exploitation of the working class by social elites who own and control activities in uniform manufacturing units. However, as noted above, the Government of Zimbabwe does not have a school uniform policy that requires parents and guardians to buy uniforms for their school-going children. In an address to parents, guardians and heads of schools, the Primary and Secondary Education minister directed that parents and guardians had the right to purchase school uniforms to their best advantage. While the minister insisted that all heads of schools were expected to ensure good governance and transparent, corruption-­ free processes in the management of schools and the procurement of school uniforms by parents and guardians, some school heads and their associates exploit the working class (New Zimbabwe, 2020). Regardless of government minister assurances, in the absence of clear, enforced policy, market forces will continue to drive class distinctions within educational settings. Schools that inherit better facilities and that can draw on better local tax revenues to continue to resource schools and attract better teachers with higher salaries can continue to dictate a uniform purchasing policy, even when this is exclusionary and prohibits able students from benefiting from the schools’ advantages. In microcosm, these dynamics, in which a practice that could have benefited students has been corrupted into a means to perpetuate disadvantage, reflect a number of development practices on a much wider scale that do not distribute resources to those most in need but, on the contrary, reinscribe their concentration within the elite (Musgrave & Wong, 2016).

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Conclusion Unlike pre-independent Zimbabwe, which was characterised by both racial and social class divisions, postcolonial Zimbabwe is characterised mostly by distinct social class divisions. While the government has no policy on the need for school uniforms in Zimbabwe, schools in the country have, of their own choice, put in place regulations demanding that students wear uniforms purchased by exclusive suppliers from which they benefit. This has further highlighted social class divisions in the country’s wider society, where some people struggle to purchase school uniforms for their school-going children, while others can easily afford to do so. It is still the case in Zimbabwe that, from the school uniform a student is wearing, one can tell the family social class background from which the student comes.

References Bodine, A. (2003). School uniforms and discourses on childhood. Childhood, 10(1), 43–63. Caruso, P. (1996). Individuality vs conformity: The issue behind school uniforms. NASSP Bulletin, 80(581), 83–88. Chigudu, S. (2021). “Colonialism had never really ended’: My life in the shadow of Cecil Rhodes”. Retrieved January 14, 2021, from https://www.theguardian. com/news/2021/ Doherty, R. (2007). Critically framing education policy: Foucault, discourse and governmentality. In M. A. Peters & T. Besley (Eds.), Why Foucault? New directions in educational research (pp. 193–204). Peter Lang. Dorsey, B.  J. (1989). Educational development and reform in Zimbabwe. Comparative Educational Review, 33(1, Special Issue on Africa), 40–58. Dussel, I. (2004). Fashioning the schooled self through uniforms: A Foucauldian approach to contemporary school policies. In B. M. Baker & K. E. Heyning (Eds.), Dangerous coagulations: The uses of Foucault in the study of education (pp. 85–116). Peter Lang. Edwards, G., & Tisdell, C. (1990). Post-independence trends in education in Zimbabwe. South African Journal of Economics., 58(4), 298–307. Edwards, T. K., & Marshall, C. (2020). Undressing policy: A critical analysis of North Carolina (USA) public school dress codes. Gender and Education, 32(6), 732–750. Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306. 2021.1931813

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Happel, A. (2013). Ritualized girling: School uniforms and the compulsory performance of gender. Journal of Gender Studies, 22(1), 92–96. Morris, E. W. (2005). ‘Tuck in that shirt!’: Race, class, gender and discipline in an urban school. Sociological Perspectives, 48(1), 25–48. Musgrave, M. K., & Wong, S. (2016). Towards a more nuanced theory of elite capture in development projects. The importance of context and theories of power, Journal of. Sustainable Development, 9(3) https://doi.org/10.5539/ jsd.v9n3p87 New Zimbabwe. (2020). No school should force parents to buy uniform from it  – Minister Mathema. Retrieved January 13, 2020, from https://www. newzimbabwe.com/no-­school-­should-­force-­parents-­to-­buy-­uniform-­from-­it-­ minister-­mathema/ Nkiwane, L. (1992). Design and function of the School uniform: Its production within the School curriculum. Zimbabwe Journal of Educational Research, 4(2), 184–200. Pomerantz, S. (2007). Cleavage in a tank top: Bodily prohibition and the discourses of school dress codes. Alberta Journal of Educational Research, 53(4), 373–386. Raby, R. (2005). Polite, well-dressed and on time: Secondary school conduct codes and the production of docile citizens. Canadian Review of Sociology, 42(1), 71–91. Ridge, T. (2006). Childhood poverty: A barrier to social participation and inclusion. In E. K. M. Tisdall, J. M. Davis, A. Prout, & M. Hill (Eds.), Children, young people and social inclusion: Participation for what? (pp.  23–38). Policy Press. Saadi, N. (2014). A review of pedagogy of the other: Edward Said: Post colonial theory and strategies for critique. Journal of American Educational Studies Association., 50(6), 605–611. Sigauke, A. (2013). Zimbabwe: From education reform to political instability. In C.  Harber (Ed.), Education in Southern Africa (pp.  229–249). Bloomsbury Academic. https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/14016 Sunday Mail. (2021). Should schools sell uniforms? Retrieved June 14, 2021, from https://www.sunday.co.zw/should-­schools-­sell-­uniforms Symes, C., & Meadmore, D. (1996). Force of habit: The school uniform as a body of knowledge. In E.  McWilliam & P.  G. Taylor (Eds.), Pedagogy, technology, and the body (pp. 171–191). Peter Lang. Wallin, E. R., & Karrholm, M. (1987). Environmental mapping as a basis for the formulation of clothing demands. Applied Ergonomics, 18(2), 103–110. Butterwork and Co. Zvobgo, R. J. (1994). Colonialism and education in Zimbabwe. SAPES. Zvobgo, R.  J. (1996). Transforming education: The Zimbabwean experience. College Press. Zvobgo, R. J. (1997). The state, ideology and education. Mambo Press.

CHAPTER 10

The Materiality and Materials of School Uniforms at a Local and Global Level Rachel Shanks

and Ainsley Carnarvon

Introduction In this chapter we take both a theoretical and practical turn to matter as in the actual materials of school uniforms. Items of school uniform are not simply inanimate objects or artefacts; they also participate in the production and reproduction of social relations. School uniform can be understood as materiality that both educates and communicates (Ribeiro & da Silva, 2012). Materials are explored in relation to comfort, affordability and sustainability. Comfort of the materials for pupils and the workers who produce the uniforms. Affordability is important because there are tensions between uniform playing a levelling function between pupils while putting the cost on families (Shanks & McKinney, 2022). Affordability is also linked to sustainability as the production of school uniforms has an environmental impact, and different fabrics are associated with different financial and environment costs. Sustainability relates to

R. Shanks (*) • A. Carnarvon School of Education, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_10

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issues such as micro-plastics, the non-recyclability or biodegrading of clothes with synthetic content, and the intensive manufacturing process of cotton. There has been some success in introducing Fairtrade items in primary schools, and there are some school uniform banks which encourage the re-use of items such as blazers, but neither of these developments necessarily lead to much reduction in the consumption of raw materials. These material concerns are not often considered in relation to school uniform policies, but attempts are being made to include the repairing of school uniform in early secondary education. The chapter concludes with some recommendations on how the importance of school uniform materials could be acted upon in light of the global climate crisis and the recent growing focus on sustainable clothing. This covers the re-use of school uniforms and the rise of school uniform clothing banks, the recycling of school uniforms, and their carbon footprint and the potential of the school uniform marketplace to bring about changes and moves towards more sustainable clothing. Uniform highlights the control over the body of the pupil that the school has; it can be seen as showing where school control begins, its contours or boundaries (Ribeiro & da Silva, 2012). This control can include where uniform is bought and how it is worn. Compared to the puff sleeves, uniforms appear as a standardized, flattening dress code. Yet this dull appearance should not cloud the fact that they too produce differences and distinctions. School uniforms are signs and signifying practices that carry along meanings about identity and difference, and that enact the disciplining of the body by a power that subjects and subjectifies. (Dussel, 2007, p. 98)

With a new materialist perspective, we are asking what uniform and particular items do to us, and we should also ask ‘what they might do that has nothing to do with us’ (Snaza et al., 2016 emphasis in original, p. xx1). A pilot study carried out by the chapter authors, Affordability and Sustainability of School Uniforms (ASSU), investigated school uniform banks in Scotland. Their number, geographical spread and method of operations looked into what type of information they gathered. This work led to further collaborations and a roundtable event at the Scottish Parliament involving members of the Scottish Youth Parliament.

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Comfort with the Artefacts and Materials in School Uniforms Here we consider comfort in relation not only to wearing the clothes but also to the comfort of knowing where and how the uniform is produced. The actual materials of school uniforms may be synthetic and/or natural fibres. The materials are important in relation to affordability, sourcing and sustainability. Each of these is inter-related as the affordability of the items of clothing is related to what they are made of and where they are sourced from, for example, an organic fairly traded cotton item will currently cost more than a garment manufactured out of nylon or cotton/ nylon mix without a Fairtrade premium. What is not considered in relation to school uniform policies is clothing comfort and whether this may influence pupils’ performance. In the run­up to a roundtable event at the Scottish Parliament in 2022 a member of the Scottish Youth Parliament conducted a small-scale survey among his constituents, and the primary concern of the young people who responded was comfort. Our skin is the largest organ of the body. In textile studies the terms tactile comfort and sensorial comfort are used (Singh et  al., 2022). Tactile comfort comes from a fabric’s surface and frictional properties. While people can ignore even significant levels of discomfort for up to two hours or so (Singh et al., 2022) and keep up performance, at school young people are wearing uniforms for much longer than two hours. Thus, it would appear that being uncomfortable in school uniform will impede performance rather than improve it (ibid). A recent study in Australia investigated school footwear, and it found that shoe comfort was the most important reason for secondary school students and their parents when selecting footwear (Mazzella et al., 2022). While there has been much written about whether there should be school uniforms, their bearing on pupils’ academic performance and the impact of particular items of clothing such as skirts and dresses, there is relatively little research on the development and performance of uniform items as clothing (Li, 2019). Factors that could be considered in relation to uniform as clothing rather than uniform as a tool by schools are aesthetic appearance, general health and the fit of the items (ibid). Due to the lack of research in this area Li (2019) undertook a study in China  to develop a functional uniform that took account of fit, comfort and safety as well as the overall aesthetic appearance of the uniform. There are

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national standards in China which cover school uniforms, but manufacturers may not comply with the standards (Li, 2019). Comfort includes issues such as fabrics not containing harmful or irritant chemicals, that heat can dissipate and moisture can be absorbed by the clothing, and that it fits well and does not restrict movement, chafe, or feel scratchy. Worse than not being comfortable, school uniforms might actually be releasing toxic chemicals onto young people’s bodies. In one study it was found that children wearing clothes containing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are exposed to dermal contact, air inhalation, dust ingestion and direct oral exposure because they frequently put their hands in their mouths (Xia et al., 2022). The exposure of children to PFAS is especially worrying because their bodies are small and also developing. This means that children’s exposure to PFAS may be a greater burden to their bodies and produce more health risks than those for adults (ibid). Cotton uniform items had higher levels of PFAS than cotton/polyester mixes, and this may be due to cotton requiring extra PFAS treatment to be as water-repellent or stain resistant as cotton blends or synthetic materials. There were also unknown and unquantifiable PFAS found in the school uniforms. The release of PFAS happens during fibre loss and/ or during the processing, wearing, washing and drying of the clothes. Washing school uniform items containing PFAS with other clothes could also contaminate the non-PFAS items (ibid). The use of PFAS in school uniforms increases children’s exposure because the uniform is coming into direct contact with their skin unlike outdoor clothing. In addition, children will be wearing school uniform for seven or more hours a day. There are millions of children worldwide wearing school uniforms for long periods every day. It should be considered whether stain-resistant clothing is worth the potential risks of PFAS exposure to children. If uniforms really need to be stain-resistant safer non-­ PFAS alternatives should be sought (ibid.). Comfort is not only in relation to the fabric of the clothing and how it feels, its tactile comfort, but can also relate to how functional the item is. For example, is it comfortable to sit, walk and run in the trousers, skirts or shorts? In terms of how the garment has been constructed, is it too tight anywhere? In relation to materials or fabrics and their properties, is the clothing uncomfortable? In China polyester is often used to manufacture uniforms, and as a fabric it is not breathable and has low moisture absorption (Li, 2019). This can cause discomfort when wearing it.

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Secondary schools in Scotland frequently give reasons of safety and security for having a compulsory school uniform (Friedrich & Shanks, 2023). There have been suggestions of using tracking technology in school uniforms which could monitor movements through school (Bryce et al., 2010). Safety concerns cover many issues, and in Japan in the 1990s, school students had to wear yellow hats so that they were easier to avoid on the roads (Li, 2019). In Scotland one of the safety and security justifications for having school uniform has been to identify intruders on school premises. School uniform is even being tested with Artificial Intelligence to see if school uniform can be identified and classified from photographs (Datta et al., 2023). The safety or comfort of those who produce uniforms are not often considered. People may think of the materials of school uniform in terms of the safety and comfort of the wearer, the chemicals and the touch of the fabric, but may not consider the effects of school uniform on those who manufacture it, namely workers in lower-income countries such as Bangladesh. An investigation by a UK newspaper found that supermarkets were selling school uniforms made by workers who were paid 25p an hour (Chamberlain, 2015). Unfair practices have been uncovered in relation to several retailers that sell school uniform items in the UK, such as Asda/ Walmart, Next, Primark and Tesco (Islam et al., 2023). Asda/Walmart, Next, Primark and other global brands had the highest proportion of unfair practices during the pandemic including cancellation of orders, price reductions, refusal to pay for goods and/or delaying payment. These practices had knock-on effects on the workers with one in five factories reporting that they were struggling with paying the Bangladeshi legal minimum wage since reopening after Covid-19 closures (ibid.). In the English and Welsh statutory guidance on school uniform there is nothing to ensure ethical sourcing of school uniforms. There is nothing on sustainable materials, Fairtrade sourcing or whether suppliers are ensuring anti-slavery monitoring and compliance. A search of the websites of dedicated school uniform suppliers in Scotland found that a minority had an anti-slavery statement. One exception in this area that we have found is the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney with its anti-slavery taskforce and guidelines as it wanted to ensure that uniforms were not made by children. The production of uniforms can reproduce inequality between the Global North and South, and then within schools, it can highlight unequal incomes too.

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Measuring the Affordability of School Uniforms The materials of uniform are on the skin of pupils, almost become part of them and are synonymous with school. They also show what the school is about and whether it concerns itself with the families’ financial circumstances. The cost of school uniform also highlights globalisation and a lack of thought in terms of sustainability and global citizenship (a stated aim in Scottish education). Should schools require a uniform that costs hundreds of pounds when the school clothing grant for those eligible is £150? (for more information on the school clothing grant in Scotland see Shanks, 2022). There is a tension between the cost of a school uniform and the role it can play as a levelling function between pupils (Ribeiro & da Silva, 2012). In their work with families, Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland has found that parents on low incomes see school uniform as the cheapest option, which also minimises difference between children (CPAG, 2022). The continuing popular support for compulsory school uniforms in the England, Scotland and Wales was shown in a survey conducted in October 2022 (Morris, 2022). While 49% of adults agreed that school uniforms should be compulsory for primary school children (aged 4–11 years), 65% agreed that school uniforms should be compulsory in secondary school. In the survey adults were also asked if they thought school uniforms should be provided by schools and 29% agreed, 37% said it should be provided to pupils from lower incomes only, 22% said it should not be provided by schools and 12% said they didn’t know. These statistics highlight the dilemma for schools: there is popular support for compulsory uniforms but not as much consensus about how to ensure those on lower incomes can afford them. Exploring the role of uniform banks in relation to affordability is important because of the potential for supporting families living in poverty. School uniform and clothing banks could become an even more important part of the circular economy in Scotland. A pilot project conducted by the chapter authors aimed to scope out what economic and social indicators can be used to assess the role of school uniform banks in supporting families living in poverty, for example, to find out the best way to calculate how much money is saved for people who use the uniform banks. It was found that formally constituted school uniform banks do collect information on the number of families and the cost of providing new uniforms showing the total amount of money they save families.

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With the current cost of living crisis in Scotland due to many global factors there are now more and more schools that have uniform swap shops, pre-loved clothes rails and discreet mechanisms to provide clothing to those who need it. In a survey of teachers in September 2022 by their union, over half said that more families were unable to afford uniform (NASUWT, 2022). In December 2022 many schools provided a space for pupils to donate and take away Christmas jumpers so that they could go ahead with ‘Christmas Jumper Day’. This and other non-uniform days can have the unintended consequence of putting pupils off attending school (Mazzoli Smith & Todd, 2019). Schools now regularly ask families to donate items for food banks, and at least one secondary school has set up ‘kindness lockers’ from which pupils can select items they need. These initiatives while well intentioned can never get to the root of the problem, which is structural poverty and inequality in society. Food bank research in the UK and elsewhere was studied to identify appropriate methods to research the sensitive topic of school uniform banks and how they are used. From the academic literature on food banks covering works on Scotland, the UK and Europe, there is a tension identified between food bank use becoming entrenched so that rather than the cause of use being addressed, that is, changes in welfare policy and rising levels of poverty, the symptoms are focused on, namely how they operate, who uses them and who volunteers with them. This highlights a decision to make for future research on school uniform banks in terms of focusing on why they are needed rather than how they operate. Clothing banks have been set up to alleviate poverty rather than to re-use and recycle uniforms. Just as food banks should be unnecessary so should school clothing banks. Families should have enough funds from work and social security to pay for school uniform, and schools should ensure that uniform requirements are affordable. Families on low incomes should not have to choose between heating, eating or a pair of black school shoes. An issue which will resonate with parents and carers of school-age children is the lack of uniform items that adjust with size. Occasionally trousers and skirts may be fitted with expandable waists and extra-long hems that can be let down, but this is not the norm as retailers want to sell a greater volume of stock rather than making garments that last longer. To make up for the fact that children have grown parents/carers frequently buy items in sizes which are too big but which children ‘will grow into’, and/or towards the end of the school year, children can be seen in clothes that are too tight or too short or that are very worn down. A comparison

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could be made with maternity wear which can be adjustable or has elasticated material within it. In Li’s (2019) study it was found that adjustable garments met the needs of students’ growing bodies and so was cost-­ effective as uniform lasted longer and so needed to be replaced less frequently. Often affordability and sustainability may be seen as competing rather than complementary, but Kate Raworth’s (2017) work on ‘doughnut economics’ shows how they are part of the same decision-making and living that we are all part of. Sustainability relates to the planetary boundaries we need to live within, and affordability is to do with the social foundation that everyone needs to live. Achieving balance between social and planetary boundaries needs to be humanity’s overriding goal.

Making School Uniform Sustainable The pilot study mentioned above looked at what indicators could be used to assist in the calculation of the environmental benefits from the re-use of school uniforms. We saw the benefit of using an existing mechanism such as a technique called Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) using commercial or open software. During the pilot study we found one school which sources a uniform made from recycled materials in order to be more sustainable (David Luke, 2023). While a growing number of schools operate ‘uniform exchange’ events, the schools do not appear to keep records on the number of items they receive or hand out, and so in the future, it could be worthwhile to create a tool for schools so that they could calculate how much they are re-circulating before it goes to be recycled or to landfill. We found that while schools tend to concentrate on the re-circulation or re-­ use of items, the school uniform banks set up for families living in poverty purchased new uniforms to reduce stigma and not make people’s individual circumstances as obvious to others. Bringing together the reduction of school uniform carbon footprint through the re-circulation/re-use of uniform items may not, therefore, tie into helping families living in poverty but instead focus more on those who can afford school uniform but wish to reduce their carbon footprint. Market research carried out on parents’ attitudes to school uniform found that more than 10% of UK parents throw school uniforms away once their children have outgrown them, even if the clothes are still wearable (My Nametags, 2022). In relation to items that were not immediately wearable in the same work it was found that over 50% of parents would

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throw something out rather than mend it. It was also found that 81% of parents said they always buy new uniforms with some saying because it is easier (31%). More of a problem for moving to the re-use of school uniform is that 41% said that in relation to previously owned/second-hand clothes, they did not like the thought of their children wearing them. New statutory guidance in England ‘Cost of school uniforms’ (2021) requires a mechanism for parents to have access to second-hand uniforms, for example, through second-hand uniform sales or swap shops. Each school can decide how to do this. In the 2022 consultation in Scotland on national uniform policy, one of the proposed principles was that national school uniform policy should reflect sustainable approaches to school uniform (Scottish Government, 2022). Uniform has effects on sustainability in the natural world too. Deforestation is also linked to rayon which is often used in school uniform garments. Sustainability is multifaceted as there is the non-recyclability and non-biodegrading of clothes with synthetic content; micro-plastics come off clothes while they are being washed and flow out into the seas and oceans. The intensive manufacturing process of cotton in particular is damaging to the environment and the workforce who produce the clothes. In Trinidad the carbon footprint of school uniform is not considered, and many items are imported from China. The material frequently used in uniforms is rayon due to its washing properties. If clothes are recycled then this may lead to PFAS release. The quantification of PFAS environmental release from school uniforms is not clear (Xia et al., 2022). A new area to explore is how to make uniforms more sustainable and affordable through more generic items that are made of more sustainable materials in a way that is less damaging to the environment. There are already innovators in this area, for example, David Luke provides school uniforms made from recycled plastic bottles (David Luke, 2023). In this way school uniform could become both more affordable and more sustainable. A first step will be to explore the differences between generic and exclusive supplier items. These material concerns are very rarely considered in relation to school uniform policies in Scotland. There has been some success in introducing Fairtrade items in primary schools, and there are some school uniform banks which encourage the re-use of items such as blazers, but neither of these developments necessarily leads to much reduction in the consumption of raw materials.

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Conclusion Items of school uniform are not simply inanimate objects or artefacts; they also participate in the production and reproduction of social relations. Objects are not neutral as they are incorporated into school norms and have meaning and convey values. We need to remember that humans are just one part of the natural environment, and material forces have capacities and effects which include unintended and unanticipated ones (Coole & Frost, 2010). The scale and urgency of the climate crisis leads us to: a new emphasis on the material dimensions of social existence. …. The enormous macroscopic impact of myriad mundane individual actions provokes critical, political, and legal reflection not only upon the nature of causation but also upon the nature of the responsibilities that individuals and governments have for the health of the planet. (Coole & Frost, 2010, p. 16)

For new materialists the importance of bodies cannot be ignored as we are all actors within the same material environment that includes nature, other bodies as well as socioeconomic structures that decide on the needs, resources and desires we seek in our lives (Coole & Frost, 2010). In a critical materialist analysis of school uniform, we can shine a light on the production and consumption of clothing and shoes in what has become like a sub-branch of fast fashion; we can see the uneven effects this industry has on people in different parts of the world, both those wearing the uniforms and those producing them. Through these practices we can see how power operates at a state level, at an institutional school level and in the everyday on individual bodies. Rather than focusing only on the human we can see all the affects of school uniform with a much wider assemblage covering the social worlds in the country where the raw materials are produced or grown, the country where the uniforms are manufactured and the country where the uniforms are sold and worn. This may all occur in one country but often covers several. This globalisation of the school uniform trade means that the natural world in various places has affects, and where the uniform goes, after it is no longer being worn, must be included too. The ‘thing power’ of school uniform is much wider than we might at first consider. There has been a call for uniform to be ‘affordable, flexible, equitable and

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inclusive’ (O’Neill, 2022). Here we have brought together the strands of flexibility, equity and inclusion under the banner of comfort. To deal with the global assemblage related to the school uniform trade we need to create school uniform that is comfortable, affordable and sustainable. The school uniform assemblage is both local and global, and the affects of its materials and threads connect the social and natural world in multifaceted ways. Acknowledgements  Funding for the pilot study, Affordability and Sustainability of School Uniforms (ASSU), was provided by the University of Aberdeen from its Interdisciplinary Research and Impact Scheme.

References Bryce, T., Nellis, M., Corrigan, A., Gallagher, H., Lee, P., & Sercombe, H. (2010). Biometric surveillance in Schools: Cause for concern or case for curriculum? Scottish Educational Review, 42(1), 3–22. https://doi.org/10.116 3/27730840-­04201002 Chamberlain, G. (2015). Tesco and Sainsbury school uniforms made by workers paid 25p an hour. The Sunday Mirror, September 12. https://www.mirror. co.uk/news/uk-­news/tesco-­sainsbury-­school-­uniforms-­made-­6432539 Coole, D., & Frost, S. (Eds.). (2010). New materialisms. Ontology, agency, and politics. Duke University Press. CPAG (Child Poverty Action Group) Scotland. (2022). Cost of the School day film uniform. Schools taking action on … Uniforms. https://cpag.org.uk/sites/ default/files/CPAG-­Cost-­of-­the-­School-­Day-­Film-­Uniform.pdf Datta, A., Giri, S. K., Sharma, V., Das, A., & Basak, J. (2023). School uniform identification using deep learning based approach. In Machine learning in information and communication technology (pp. 333–339). Springer. David Luke. (2023). Eco-uniform explained. https://www.davidluke.com/sustainability/eco-­uniform-­explained Dussel, I. (2007). The shaping of a citizenship with style: A history of uniforms and vestimentary codes in Argentinean public schools. In I. Grosvenor (Ed.), Lawn, M (pp. 97–123). Symposium Books. Friedrich, J., & Shanks, R. (2023). ‘The prison of the body’: School uniforms between discipline and governmentality. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 44(1), 16–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/0159630 6.2021.1931813

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Islam, M. A., Abbott, P., Haque, S., & Gooch, F. (2023). Impact of global clothing retailers’ unfair practices on Bangladeshi suppliers during Covid-19. University of Aberdeen. Li, P. (2019). Designing an Elementary School uniform with functions of fit, comfort, and road safety. Fashion Practice, 11(2), 222–243. Mazzella, N., Fox, A., Saunders, N., Trowell, D., Kremer, P., Vicenzino, B., & Bonacci, J. (2022). Australian secondary school principals’, parents’, and students’ attitudes to prescribed school footwear. Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport, 25, S20–S21. Mazzoli Smith, L., & Todd, L. (2019). Conceptualising poverty as a barrier to learning through ‘Poverty proofing the school day’: The genesis and impacts of stigmatisation. British Educational Research Journal, 45(2), 356–371. Morris, D. (2022). Most Britons say schools should provide school uniforms to families. YouGov. https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-­reports/2022/11/14/ most-­britons-­say-­schools-­should-­provide-­school-­uni My Nametags. (2022). My Nametags’ research finds Brits bin 1.4 million wearable school uniforms every year. https://www.mynametags.com/blog/2020/08/ my-­nametags-­research-­finds-­brits-­bin-­1-­4-­million-­wearable-­school-­uniforms-­ every-­year/ NASUWT. (2022). Scottish Government School uniform guidance: Consultation, NASUWT Scotland. https://www.nasuwt.org.uk/asset/BF031923-­BC9D-­4 0E4-­9CA6173C74EB4EF1/ O’Neill, L. (2022). A response from CELCIS to the Scottish Government’s Statutory School Uniform Guidance consultation. CELCIS (Centre for excellence for Children’s Care and Protection). http://www.celcis.org/application/ files/2716/6436/7937/CELCIS_response_to_Scottish_Governments_consultation_on_School_Uniform_School_uniform_002.pdf Raworth, K. (2017). Doughnut economics: Seven ways to think like a 21st-century economist. Chelsea Green Publishing. Ribeiro, I., & Silva, V. L. G. (2012). Of the materialities of school: The school uniform. Education and Research, 38(3), 575–588. https://doi.org/10.1590/ S1517-­97022012000300003 Scottish Government. (2022). School uniforms in Scotland. https://consult.gov. scot/learning-­directorate/school-­uniforms-­statutory-­guidance-­scotland/ Shanks, R. (2022). School clothing grant in Scotland policy briefing. University of Aberdeen. https://doi.org/10.57064/2164/19088 Shanks, R., & McKinney, S. J. (2022). Cost and affordability of School uniform and child poverty. Scottish Educational Review, 54(1), 26–48. https://doi. org/10.1163/27730840-­54010003

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Singh, P. A., Manshahia, M., & Das, A. (2022). Study on tactile comfort characteristics of School uniforms. Journal of the Textile Association, 83(1), 427–430. Snaza, N., Sonu, D., Truman, S., & Zaliwska, Z. (2016). Pedagogical matters: New materialisms and curriculum studies. Peter Lang. Xia, C., Diamond, M. L., Peaslee, G. F., Peng, H., Blum, A., Wang, Z., Shalin, A., Whitehead, H. D., Green, M., Schwartz-Narbonne, H., Yang, D., & Venier, M. (2022). Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances in North American School uniforms. Environmental Science & Technology, 56(19), 13845–13857. https:// doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.2c02111

CHAPTER 11

Conclusion: Looking back to look forward Rachel Shanks , Julie Ovington , and Beth Cross

With contrib. by Ainsley Carnarvon

As we draw this book to a close, we want to (re)turn to reiterate key factors enmeshed with the fabric of school uniforms—what they do and what they do not do. In our opening chapter we drew attention to how uniform(s) mark people out as belonging to an institution or being separated out from institutions. Uniforms create hierarchies and division R. Shanks (*) School of Education, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] J. Ovington School of Education and Social Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Ayr, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] B. Cross School of Education and Social Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Paisley, Scotland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5_11

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between the wearers and non-wearers. Creating expectations associated with those institutions and vice versa. School uniform has become a part of the British psyche and has been forced onto other places rather than simply influencing them. Wearing school uniform has become an unseen ritual in the UK, so much so it is hard for some within the education system to imagine school without uniform. In this book we have tried to point out what uniforms are, and how they interact and affect surroundings, in terms of both the social world and the natural world. We have seen the different threads that separate and draw together the clothes mandated in schools from Poland to Zimbabwe, Scotland to the Caribbean. School uniforms may seem mundane, but their everyday-ness, the degree to which they are sewn into our lived habits, makes them important sites through which to investigate the materiality of education. The threads of school uniforms are the capillaries through which institutional power flows. Each of the authors have generously shared photographs depicting a moment in time from their educational journey, some wearing a uniform and others not. Many parents, across the settings examined in this book, cherish photos of their children taken on their first day of school year on year. Often taken on doorsteps, in front of fireplaces, in the garden, often showing a child or young person seeming slightly discomfited in their brand-new uniforms. The one rare occurrence when parents might still be allowed to take, and even post or share, a photo of their teenage child is on the analogous first day of their child’s last year at school. Often parents post both photos side by side. These photos mark a rite of passage as much for the parent as for the child. They are important cultural rituals through which we know ourselves, our place in our communities and in our life course. Though the following years bring many changes for young people, one keepsake that is likely to remain in their possession is their last school uniform shirt, bearing scribbled best wishes, inside jokes and the names of classmates—all of these inscribed whilst the shirt is still being worn on the last day of school. Can we dare question what has come to be so emblematic of hope and pride, and the means by which we commemorate what we experience of maturation and transformation? Aristotle, for all his infelicities, rightly drew our attention to the argument that we project onto our construction of childhood those things we find necessary to believe about society as a whole. We do our world

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building through them. Thus, in a Victorian age, the conception of humanity as inherently sinful required that children be regimented with an education that drilled out of them the evils that would otherwise overcome them. That this regimentation also served the purpose of inuring large swathes of the population to mechanised labour is of no small consequence. A version of childhood enabled by the optimism of the development of the welfare state for a time supplanted this dystopian discourse. But just as the benefits of the welfare state have been eroded, so too has the capacity to imagine a more expansive exploratory educational experience, despite a number of valiant rear-guard voices (Apple, 2018; Greene, 2000; Filer & Pollard, 2000; Kincheloe & Steinberg, 2007). Uniforms and regimentation increasingly dominate a competitive educational space. Foucault’s lessons on the relation of power to knowledge are relevant here. For we see power remarkably impervious to knowledge that may run contrary to the continued regimes it inhabits. Particularly in the UK we see a doubling down on austerity policies, though research has proven their detriment. This austerity precipitates a scarcity model of employment that drives a regimentation function within education despite a century of psychological research from Vygotsky to Rogers, Bruner and Bateson, to name some of its key theorists, demonstrating cognitive development, higher thinking skills and human flourishing are blunted, not aided, by such regimentation. Habituation to uniformity rather than capacity to engage with diversity is most starkly at odds with what environmental science evidences—the sterility of uniform industrial practices imperils the very basis of subsistence. Economic, psychological, and environmental knowledge are sidelined through the continued adherence to a discourse of mechanistic modernity of which the school uniform is a key instantiation. While the reasons given for school uniform become an ever longer list it can seem that what is not said is that it gives the illusion of control to teachers, it homogenises and de-individualises the children and young people so that teachers and others in authority can feel more in charge as they are not in uniform. Rather than letting young people decide what to wear to school each day or even help decide what a school uniform should consist of, Chap. 5 shows us that school uniform policies may say that young people have been consulted and are fully in favour of uniform, but they are given limited options from which to choose and few opportunities to contribute to or influence decisions. Like adult workers, young people want to be comfortable in what they wear all day. Marx developed his theory of historical materialism to demonstrate that while some things seem natural and unchangeable, for example markets, the liberal state, in fact they are social and historical constructions or

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fabrications and can be changed (Coole & Frost, 2010). While it is possible to alter these taken-for-granted entities, their very acceptedness makes them difficult to see and therefore to change. School uniform can be understood as one of these shibboleths. It is so ubiquitous it is unseen. Uniform is so entrenched it isn’t questioned. It perpetuates empire today both in the UK and in former colonies such as Trinidad, Tobago and Zimbabwe. Marx questioned whether the master’s house can be torn down with the same tools that built it, and yet in former colonies we see attempts to construct emancipation by turning these tools to competitive vantage. The particular emphasis on how uniform is worn, providing a showcase for practices of self-care, attests to aesthetic values that exceed those dictated by colonisers. We can see empire haunting school uniform practices with throwbacks to private schools in the nineteenth century when the British empire had its largest influence. This haunting ripples through into everyday life in former colonies with blazers and ties still being worn. Gradually school uniforms have come to pervade British consciousness and encase ‘embodied subjectivities’ as understood by Foucault. In school uniform some cultural practices are enforced, such as gender binaries. The thread of gender is one we tease out in Chaps. 4, 6, 7 and 8 in relation to policies and practices in England, Ireland, Poland and Scotland. There are different starting points and concerns highlighted but through Bragg, Ringrose, Wiggins, Boldry and Jenkinson’s work we hear the opinions of girls and young women. McSharry provides an account of what was or wasn’t said to pupils in one school in terms of how skirts should be worn, and Babicka-Wirkus recounts the post-Soviet Polish experience. In Chap. 8 Shanks provides what we believe is the first published work to question the requirement for girls to wear ties to school. In her school photo, you see what she is writing about. Equally we have noted that other practices are excluded, for example headscarves in France. In Brazil hygiene was prioritised when determining what school uniforms should consist of when they were first adopted (Ribeiro & da Silva, 2012). Then for reasons related to the democratisation of education, uniform was promoted as a way to hide significant differences between pupils. However, in some areas pupils were punished and also excluded from school because of a lack of uniform. Materiality is not neutral but also educates, and so we have to consider what does school uniform educate pupils in? Conformity? Lack of power in school? Loss of individuality?

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Just as physics and biological science are constantly updating to take account of new discoveries and theories, we must update how we see the human and social world to account for new understandings rather than retain adherence to ideas and ways of thinking that are centuries old and do not take account of these new developments in physics, ecology and environmental science. New ways of thinking and of accountability are needed as humans interfere, ever more vigorously and severely, in the natural environment and natural processes (Coole & Frost, 2010). School uniforms are part of a larger extractive industry that exploits children within workforces, depletes watersheds and sterilises soils. The economic fallacies consumed with the purchase of uniforms perpetuate a landfill of intransigence as toxic as those on the outskirts of our cities, seamed with layers of polyester. These patterns of production and consumption mean that individuals, companies and governments are materially responsible for the outcomes of their actions even if they have not yet accepted ethical, moral or legal responsibility (Coole & Frost, 2010). We need to open eyes, make people look afresh at what we do in/with/through school uniforms through a series of policies and decisions made at various levels of the educational ‘establishment’ in its widest sense. We need to harness new biomaterialism to take account ‘of the role played by the body as a visceral protagonist within political encounters’ (Coole & Frost, 2010, p. 19). In this book we have emphasised corporeality, and as materialists we position ourselves as posthumanists so that the materialisation we are focused on is not thought of, or regarded as, anthropocentric. Throughout we are doing our best not to privilege human bodies over more-than-­human bodies. A core focus from the outset, beginning in Chap. 2 with the focus on tinythings and positioning all matter as a body that can affect and be affected. Whatever a sustainable future will require of children now at school, it grows increasingly unlikely that habituating them to regimented clothing and routines is going to be fit for purpose. Already automation is outstripping mechanisation with AI intensifying the rate at which mechanised work becomes obsolete. We will have to wait and see what balance develops between productivity and the earth’s capacity to bear extractive productivity, and this may lead to a change in the meaning of work. Our agency in negotiating that change in no small part requires us to question certainties and our allegiance to those things which we look to provide a sense of certainty. For us education is a site that should allow space for critical relationships to unfold as an ethico-political imperative inspired by the work of

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Friere (1976, 1985, 1988) and Giroux (2011, 2015, 2022) amongst others. A move towards what Bozalek and Zembylas (2017, p. 62) discuss as ‘response-able pedagogies’. Being response-able is a shift away from the dominant, western and neoliberal ways of ‘doing’ education; it involves a relational ontology that goes beyond simply acknowledging the entanglements of power and materiality. To be response-able is an attentiveness that renders capability in each other in order to enable us to respond to mundane politics with the intention of supporting social transformations. In practice this means ‘broadening the gaze from the human at the centre of the enquiry and instead attending to human, non-human and more-­ than-­human relational ontologies that challenge the separateness of knowing about the world and being in the world’ (Albin-Clark et  al., 2021, p. 21). This would mean inviting in other voices that speak about school uniforms so that we can consider ‘what matters and what is often excluded from mattering’ Bozalek and Zembylas (2017, p. 64) when making decisions in education that affect bodies. The material threads of school uniforms that are interwoven in/with/ through the countries detailed in this book highlight the relevance of this, and Taylor (2018) reminds us that there is moral force entangled with this. To give up, let go, move beyond ‘anthropocentric egocentricity’ (Taylor, 2018, p. 82) and disrupt entrenched normative behaviours that lead to particular truths, such as how uniforms result in better behaviour. As Haraway (2016) argues this means stirring the pot by asking the uncomfortable questions, particularly on matters such as colonialisation, gender, sexual violence and biodiversity amongst others, so that we can craft safer spaces as a matter of social justice. We need to put to work ‘hope’ in a way that it acts as: a warning and call to arms in order to understand and mobilize the resources of the imagination and the tools of critical analysis to address how the crises we faced then and today are the results of political, economic, and pedagogical forces that are tied to the mechanisms of predatory global capitalism. (Giroux, 2022, p. 170)

This is an enactment of care ‘with ethical, social, political, and cultural implications’ in matters of ongoing concern (Puig de la Bellacasa, 2017, p. 3.). This is not a new endeavour; it is a revitalised one that can transgress the status quo by destabilising the hegemonic infrastructures of education that are longstanding. Here the knowledge of school uniforms as

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do-ings, be-ings and matter-ings requires a shift in thinking to unlearn what we have been schooled on. We need an ‘open, nomadic, unfinished and perhaps unfinishable’ (Taylor, 2021, p. 30) commitment in education that listens to the multiple voices to enable situated knowledges to unfold and take flight (Haraway, 1988). We should not try to paper  over the cracks of large income differences and inequalities with strict school uniforms and discipline.

References Albin-Clark, J., Latto, L., Hawxwell, L., & Ovington, J. (2021). Becoming-with response-ability: How does diffracting posthuman ontologies with multi-modal sensory ethnography spark a multiplying femifesta/manifesta of noticing, attentiveness, and doings in relation to mundane politics and more-than-human pedagogies of response-ability? Entanglements, 4(2), 21–31. Apple, M. (2018). The struggle for democracy in education, lessons from social realities. Routledge. Bozalek, V., & Zembylas, M. (2017). Towards a response-able pedagogy across Higher Education institutions in post-apartheid South Africa: An ethico-­ political analysis. Education as change, 21(2), 62–85. https://doi. org/10.17159/1947-­9417/2017/2017 Coole, D., & Frost, S. (2010). New Materialisms: Ontology, agency and politics. Duke University Press. Filer, A., & Pollard, A. (2000). The social world of pupil assessment: Process and context of primary schooling. Continuum International Publishing Group. Freire, P. (1976). Education, the practice of freedom. Macmillan. Freire, P. (1985). The politics of education: Culture, power, and liberation. Bergin & Garvey. Freire, P. (1988). Pedagogy of the oppressed 20th-anniversary. Continuum. Giroux, H.  A. (2011). On critical pedagogy. Continuum International Publishing Group. Giroux, H. A. (2015). Dangerous thinking in the age of the new authoritarianism. Paradigm Publishers. Giroux, H.  A. (2022). Pedagogy of resistance: Against manufactured ignorance. Bloomsbury. Greene, M. (2000). Releasing the imagination: Essays on education, the arts, and social change. Jossey Bass Publishers. Haraway, D. (1988). Situated knowledges: The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies, 14(3), 575–599. https:// doi.org/10.2307/3178066

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Haraway, D. J. (2016). Staying with the trouble: Making kin in the Chthulucene. Duke University Press. Kincheloe, J. L., & Steinberg, S. R. (2007). Cutting class in a dangerous era: A critical pedagogy of class awareness. In J. L. Kincheloe & S. R. Steinberg (Eds.), Cutting class: Socioeconomic status and education (pp.  3–69). Rowman & Littlefield. Puig de la Bellacasa, M. (2017). Matters of care. Speculative ethics in more than human worlds. University of Minnesota Press. Ribeiro, I., & Silva, V. L. G. (2012). Of the materialities of school: The school uniform. Education and Research, 38(3), 575–588. https://doi.org/10.1590/ S1517-­97022012000300003 Taylor, C. A. (2018). A pedagogy of responseability. In V. Bozalek, R. Braidotti, T. Shefer, & M. Zembylas (Eds.), Socially just pedagogies: Posthumanist, feminist and materialist perspectives in higher education (pp. 81–97). Bloomsbury Publishing. Taylor, C. A. (2021). Knowledge matters: Five propositions concerning the reconceptualisation of knowledge in feminist new materialist, posthumanist and postqualitative approaches. In K. Murris (Ed.), Navigating the postqualitative, new materialist and critical posthumanist terrain across disciplines: An introductory guide (pp. 22–43). Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

Index

A Affordability, 81, 84, 85, 133, 143–145, 148–150 Affordable, 9, 54, 149, 151–153 African heritage, 38–42 Agency, 14, 18, 19, 21–23, 33, 56, 74, 119, 161 Assemblages, 7, 20, 22–24, 50, 56, 69–72, 81, 124, 152, 153 B Barad, Karen, 13, 18, 19, 50 Braids, 2, 37, 42, 44, 57, 110 Britain, 2, 6, 32, 44, 82, 120, 124, 137 C Carnival, 40 Children’s rights, 100, 107, 133

Class, 1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 21, 22, 36, 37, 41, 43–45, 50, 54, 56–59, 68, 81–94, 111, 118, 119, 124, 126, 132, 135–139 Colonial, 32, 33, 39, 42 Colonialism, 137 colonised, 36 coloniser, 39 colonising, 36 Comfort, 9, 55, 59, 78, 133, 143, 145–147, 153 Comfortable, 9, 57, 78, 105, 146, 153, 159 Community-engaged, 51 Consultation, 7, 43, 44, 68, 71–74, 101, 127, 151 Co-production, 50 Corporeal schema, 33 Cost, 6, 7, 15, 36, 50, 57, 59, 60, 83, 84, 119, 137, 138, 143, 145, 148, 149 Cuffs, 6, 32–46

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 R. Shanks et al. (eds.), School Uniforms, The Cultural and Social Foundations of Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32939-5

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D Dance, 24, 39–41 Decision-making, 17, 63, 67–71, 77, 78, 85, 102, 122, 150 Discipline, 5, 8, 15, 32, 36, 43, 55, 58–59, 61, 71, 103, 112, 132, 133, 163 Dreadlocks, 42, 44 Dress code hard, 103, 104, 109, 113, 118, 119, 122, 127 soft, 103, 104, 112, 113

H Hair, 37, 38, 40–45, 53, 57, 58, 60, 61, 91, 110 Hall, Stuart, 45 Human Capital Theory, 17, 25 Humiliation, 38

E Elite capture, 135, 139 Embodied, 44 Embodied practices, 34 England, 6, 7, 15, 16, 35, 49–63, 68, 72, 82, 148, 151, 160 Entanglements, 33, 162 Equity, 49–63, 136, 153 Ethnicity, 60, 132, 134–136

J Jewellery, 110 John Connu, 40

F Fanon, Frantz, 33, 46 Foucault, Michel, 5, 17, 32, 33, 35, 71, 99, 103, 112, 113, 119, 124, 159, 160 France, 118, 160 G Gender, 4–7, 14, 15, 17, 50–57, 60–62, 81–94, 106, 110, 112, 114, 117–128, 133, 134, 160, 162 Gender binaries, 4, 7, 51, 53, 160 Gender norms, 121, 134 Gramsi, 45 Grooming standards, 44

I Intersectionality, 56–58 Intra-active, 63 Ireland, 6–8, 81–94, 120, 160

K Kinkaid, Jamaica, 32, 34, 35, 39–41, 46 L Legal Precedent (UNCRC), 77, 78 M Makeup, 61, 108, 111 Material-discursive, 22, 23, 50, 120, 125 Materiality, 5, 8, 9, 63, 71, 84, 118, 143–153, 158, 160, 162 More-than-human, 5, 19, 20, 23–25, 162 N Neurodiversity, 56–58, 60 New materialism, 72

 INDEX 

P Participation, 7, 18, 67–78, 85, 122 Pastoral power, 32, 35, 46 PE kit, 57, 85, 127 Performative agents, 22, 23 Polish schools, 99–104, 108–110, 112, 113 Posthuman, 5 R Race, 5, 50, 56–58, 132–137 Recycling, 77, 144 Religion, 56, 81, 109 Resistance, 14, 18, 20–23, 33, 34, 40, 42, 100, 106, 134 Rights, 44 child, 44 S Safeguarding, 52 School guidance, 50, 52, 68, 70, 127, 147 School policy/policies, 3, 15, 44, 52, 69–71, 73, 74, 108 School readiness, 6, 14–17, 19, 20, 22–24 Scotland, 5–9, 14, 67–78, 121–123, 126, 127, 144, 147–149, 151, 158, 160 Scottish Government, 68, 127, 151 Sex education, 56 Sexuality, 52, 53, 56–58, 60, 124 Shirts, 14, 17, 37, 38, 53–55, 85, 101, 108–110, 118–120, 127, 137, 158 Shoes, 9, 38, 57, 59, 69, 70, 92, 94, 110, 149, 152 Skirts, 7, 50, 53–56, 61, 62, 82, 85, 89–93, 101, 110, 117–120, 123, 127, 145, 146, 149, 160 Slave revolt, 40 Social justice, 17, 23, 52, 69, 133, 162 Socio-economic inequalities, 57 Socks, 9, 38, 91, 108, 118, 137 Students’ appearance, 8, 99–113

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Supreme Court, Jamaica, 44 Sustainability, 59, 93, 143–145, 148, 150, 151 Sustainable, 9, 94, 144, 147, 150–151, 153, 161 T Taylor, Carol, 4, 32 Textile workers, 145 Thingly power, 22–24 Thinking differently, 24–25 Ties, 2, 8, 9, 14, 73, 82, 85, 92, 101, 117–128, 160 Tourism, 35 Tracksuit, 55, 57, 87, 88 Trinidad and Tobago, 43 Trousers, 7, 8, 53, 55, 56, 78, 82, 85, 89–92, 101, 110, 118–120, 127, 146, 149 Turning to notice, 22–24 U UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 18, 68, 85, 100 United Kingdom (UK), 3, 7, 8, 13, 14, 51, 55–57, 60, 68, 78, 83, 117–128, 147, 149, 150, 158–160 Upliftment, 33 V Voice, 14, 18–20, 24, 68, 81, 83, 85, 102, 159, 162, 163 W Whining, 40, 42 Z Zimbabwe, 6, 8, 9, 131, 132, 134–140, 158, 160