What Not to Wear? Girls, Clothing and ‘Showing’ the Body

Abstract

Consumption practices of children in contemporary Western societies are implicated in the reconstruction of childhood, according to both popular debate and to those academic perspectives stressing the individualisation of identities within the life course of late modern consumer societies. Yet, little is known about the meanings children themselves give to their own consumption. Drawing from an ethnographic study of children aged 6–11 years and their families, the paper presents girls’ constructions of fashion in relation to their own bodies and to those of others. It is shown that although girls may both desire and actually ‘dress up’ in fashionable clothing, they present a range of contingent and contradictory meanings for doing so. For some girls, ‘dressing up’ in certain clothes may be a way of ‘ageing up’ toward feminine adulthood, albeit in restricted contexts and after negotiations between themselves and their parents as to what can be worn and where. Nonetheless, girls in the study also showed anxieties and disapproval of ‘showing the body’ through ‘revealing’ clothing. The article concludes by considering the implication of these findings for debates about gendered childhoods, and intergenerational relations in late modern consumer society.

Dress up and what else? Girls' online gaming, media cultures and consumer culture

“…Our findings are consistent with prior research on the doing of gender and age through fashion among pre-teens and their understanding of apparently sexualised clothing, which warn against interpretations of sexualisation as a linear cause-effect process (Pilcher, 2010;Rysst, 2010 Like Barbie before them, these games introduce tweens to a highly stereotypical model of adult femininity; in continuity with Barbie, moreover, dress up games "not only are gendered but are also a game about gender" and age (Driscoll, 2005: 226). From the one side, these games introduce young girls to an ageless girl culture where beauty practices, body makeovers and shopping play a fundamental role in building a post-feminist identity that fit from tweens to women in their 30s and 40s.…”

The silencing effects of the childhood innocence ideal: the perceptions and practices of fathers in educating their children about sexuality

“…Indeed, Buckingham and Bragg's () analysis of interview and diary data of 120 nine to 17 year olds demonstrated that children and young people assert agency in interpreting and assimilating sexual messages that they are exposed to through adult and youth media. Rysst () and Pilcher () have also demonstrated how adult interpretations of girls’ fashion are frequently at odds with adult interpretations in that adults assume that girls want to look ‘sexy’ and provocative whereas the girls talk about wishing to look ‘grown up’ and ‘cool’. Thus, children appear to assert agency and interpret ‘adult’ materials in more complex and nuanced ways than adults frequently assume (Renold ; Wyness ).…”

The Construction of the Female Identity in Pre-Adolescence; A Phenomenological Study of the Experience of Girls and their Mothers

“…Contemporary studies indicate that tweens are not passive receivers regarding the construction of their identities, but they themselves actively participate in this process [1][2][3][4]. More recent studies highlight the strong bond between mother and daughter in pre-adolescence [5][6][7][8].…”