Geek chic
It has struck me that there are three films that go a long way in explaining the peculiar phenomenon that is the Oxford dress sense (or, dare I say it, occasional lack thereof). The first of these is Legally Blonde, a saccharine chick flick in which Reese Witherspoon joins law school to win a young man’s affections and realises that despite being as deep as a puddle and concerned with little outside of her wardrobe, she is rather intelligent.
The moral of the story is, pretty girls can be clever too and can bring an interesting new perspective to some law cases. Now I do not disagree with this moral as such, I just wonder why poor Reese had to be dressed up in such ridiculous candy floss coloured, Hello Kitty-esque outfits. It seemed as though if we are to have an academically achieving female heroine, she needs to be attired in head-to-toe in girl-pink outfits that would even make Paris Hilton cringe.
Secretary with Maggie Gyllenhaal provides a better style model for the female academic, her prim white shirts, tight pencil skirts, endless legs wrapped in seamed tights and sky high heels, were tantalisingly demure and screamed sex appeal. It is not all fun and games for the feminist movement though. Maggie is a masochist, showing that men always come up tops somehow in the exciting play that is power relations.
Whether it is in the workplace, or cowering and hungover in a tutorial, knowing how to dress to be taken seriously without looking like a square (a very unflattering body shape indeed), can be rather problematic. Female academics have a reputation for being frumpy and matronly and it can be tempting to feel that the ‘I don’t have to brush my hair, I’m an academic’ approach to dressing is the best way to make yourself heard.
This is all made more complicated by the constant accusations of people such as Sir Alan Sugar, aimed at women who try to get ahead in the workplace by using their womanly wiles. You may be wondering what has happened to the third film on my list: this happens to be Napoleon Dynamite. Has anyone else noticed that there are a remarkable number of Napoleon Dynamite lookalikes populating the winding streets of Oxford? Sadly, I have no idea why this could be.
11th May 2006