Paper short abstract:

In my paper, I will take a look at how the categories of public/men’s spaces and private/women’s spaces are produced, maintained, and contested by conforming or transgressing the gender-specific dress codes. As an example, I discuss the effects of the introduction of trousers into women’s dress.

Paper long abstract:

Feminist scholars have argued that the categories of public versus private places are matter of men's/masculine spaces versus women's/feminine spaces. In my proposed paper, I take a look at how the categories of public/men's spaces and private/women's spaces are produced, maintained, and contested by conforming or transgressing the gender-specific dress codes. As an example, I discuss the effects of the introduction of trousers into women's dress.

When we think of space as corporeally practiced, one thing should not be omitted: the fact that human bodies by whose actions and practices the place is turned into space are dressed bodies. By drawing on the theoretical thinking of sociologists Joanne Entwistle (2000) who has defined dress as situated bodily practice, I argue that the dress codes, discourses of dress, and the material qualities of dress play an important role in the social production of space. For example, the wearing a narrow skirt encumbers woman's ability to climb the stairs and to move in different places.

The adoption of trousers eliminated the physical constraints of women's movement. In my paper that is based on my PhD thesis I demonstrate how women's attempts to enter masculine areas of sports and work were interpreted and how it was possible to attach feminine meanings to masculine spaces and, on the other hand, masculine meanings to feminine spaces.