Sex and Unisex by Paoletti Jo B

Author:Paoletti, Jo B.
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 2015-04-09T04:00:00+00:00

Styles for schoolgirls, Montgomery Ward catalog, Fall/Winter 1961.

Children’s jeans, Montgomery Ward catalog, Spring/Summer 1960.

Gender patterns in children’s clothing shifted between 1962 and 1979 in ways that parallel the changes in adult clothing. For most of the 1960s the postwar rules prevailed: younger children had more neutral options than school-age boys and girls. The dressier the occasion, the more gendered the clothing. The clothing for active play was decidedly “masculine” and located in the boys’ section of the catalog. A page from the fall-winter 1964 Sears catalog is typical. A boy and a girl are shown in jeans and striped T-shirts; no “boy” or “girl” versions are offered either in sizing or in style.

Like Victorian fashions, mid-century styles continued to mark age distinctions from infancy to adulthood, though with fewer rigid rules. No longer restricted to short trousers, toddler boys now enjoyed a greater range of colors and patterns than older boys and men. Younger girls’ fashions were shorter and more whimsically decorated than those for older girls and women. Party and holiday fashions for little girls featured frilly dresses worn over poufy underskirts, not child versions of women’s trends. Misses styles could be more revealing and more sophisticated than the Junior fashions designed for high school and college-age consumers. Different flavors of femininity were available depending on age and dating or marital status. Little girl femininity was dainty, pastel, and whimsical. Bigger girl femininity was ladylike and paid attention to current trends and to becomingness (colors that flattered the girl’s complexion, for example). Teenage clothing was trendier and figure-flattering, but not revealing. “Sexy” was for adult women.

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