Jamie Janosz

  I come from a long line of school teachers. My grandmother, Elsie Benson Storms, taught in a one-room country schoolhouse in Iowa. She continued teaching well into her late 30s, which delayed her marriage to my grandfather. In the early part of the 1900s teachers signed contracts that required them to abide by the following set of strict rules: You will not marry during the term of your contract. You are not to keep company with men. You must be home between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. unless attending a school function. You may not loiter downtown in any ice cream stores. You may not travel beyond the city limits unless you have the permission of the chairman of the board. You may not smoke cigarettes. You may not under any circumstances dye your hair. You may not dress in bright colors. You may not ride in a carriage or automobile with any man unless he is your father or brother. You must wear at least two petticoats. Your dresses must not be any shorter...

I've been reading a great deal about women and clothing lately. First, I picked up the book Talking from 9 to 5: Women and Men at Work by Deborah Tannen. Years earlier, I had read Tannen's book You Just Don't Understand: Men, Women and Conversation and found the differences between the ways men and women communicate fascinating. In this later book, she shifts the discussion to gender differences in the workplace. She discusses the idea that women are always "marked" in the workplace by their clothing choices. In other words, there is no standard style to which women can conform - other than to adop the men's style. For some women, wearing a grey, navy, or black business suit allows them to fit in with the men at their office. They crop their hair or pull it back into a bun. They look: "professional." Other women wrestle each day with clothing choices. Is my skirt too short? Is my outfit too "sexy" or "dowdy" o...