There is a crisp breeze in the air and college ruled notebook ads on my TV which can only mean one thing, it’s back to school season. From malls to online carts across America, students are shopping for changing weather, changing bodies, and new school self-reinventions. To celebrate this annual school shopping frenzy, Rayne Fisher-Quann and I and perused the Abercrombie & Fitch’s 2003 “Back to School” catalog, infamously copy written by Slovenian critical theorist Slavoj Žižek, one of the more absurd publications on her coffee table:

Rayne: This brand direction is so interesting. I’m a little too young to have engaged with the mythology of Abercrombie and Fitch while it was huge.

Ella: Same, I remember it being this really daunting thing at the mall that I was terrified of but also so interested in.

R: I got A&F clothes as hand-me-downs from my mom’s friends' kids. I never went to the store, I was only aware of people talking about what it meant. So it is really interesting to see how these clothes are styled and how aggressive and unflinching this propaganda is. Like, what mall brand was doing anything like this, having Žižek write copy over softcore porn? Who is even doing anything like this today? The only thing I can compare it to right now is like… Roxane Gay writing an essay for Hinge.

E: Did that happen?

R: It is happening right now.

R: Okay so first off, a lot of this is really just Žižek ripping off Lacan. In many ways. But there’s a lot of stuff in this book where you’re even like, “Is that true?” This one makes me LOL. It’s giving LindyMan. Cause it's like, what are you even talking about? I think it would still be transgressive if a music teacher seduced the daughter of the family today.

E: Like was there age gap discourse in the Victorian Era?

R: I feel like maybe it was more normal if the music teacher seduced the daughter in the Victorian Era.

E: I think that was maybe a major plot point in Little Women?

R: A wider theme of what Žižek is writing about here is mimetic desire and how sex is learned. All the visual juxtaposition of these scholarly themes and instructional images against extreme eroticism totally relates to that. Like this catalog is a vehicle by which I’m sure young people learned sex, and I wonder if that is what it set out to do. Like provide a model for the erotic.

E: It almost relates back to like stolen J. C. Penny lingerie catalogs stuffed under beds.

E: Crazy hat!

R: Crazy hat.

E: No one has an undershirt on ever.

R: I’m genuinely asking this, did the A&F consumer ever dress like this?

E: From my perspective, A&F was more or less a t shirt company and you see almost none of that in these images.

R: It is really interesting to take what I assume was a very middle-American jocks and cheerleaders audience in 2003 which I assume was, if not a homophobic audience, then at least was an audience who were deeply invested in repressing the homoeroticism of their own relationships, and then marketing these explicitly gay images to them. I just think that's really interesting. 

E: Do you think weird high school girls were fujoing out to this?

R: Who was the audience for this book? It was available to purchase in A&F stores but was the average high school or college student shopper actually buying this book? Was this intended as like a novelty esoteric art object at the time? Or was this really a move to appeal to their core demographic? I mean, obviously, there are a lot of naked women in this but there are also so many photos of naked men together with heavy overtones.

R: All the direction in this is so intelligent and all the artists involved in this were so intelligent and in many ways it feels like such an intentional pastiche, obviously, like with all the references to Greek and Roman imagery. It feels almost like an imitation of eroticism, in a really interesting and smart way. Which relates directly to Žižek’s text. It’s all about simulations of sexuality. There is a wider arc to this across the catalog that is about a performance of eroticism, I mean it feels like it is almost pushing on you how constructed these images are.

R: So Challengers. I love this spread.

E: I like how they look slightly more real, it makes it so much more compelling and erotic than the more absurd naked-on-a-horse images.

R: Totally. I love her outfit. The styling is less baroque, but even the more relatable teenage erotic images in this refuse to be totally sexually safe. Like it is two guys and a girl getting naked in a car together.

I’m not lib-ing out like, “This is such incredible representation!” because obviously their homoerotic desire is being mediated through a beautiful woman. But it is super interesting to see this kind of thing be presented as mass-market commercially viable in, again, what I assume was an environment of such intense heteronormativity. 

E: I feel like transgression is exactly and especially what appeals to teenagers who are going to the mall alone and for the first time. Like for the first time ever you have a job and some money and are able to buy something outside of your parents’ gaze. I mean, that is the whole business model of Spencer’s gifts. The inoffensive A&F tee shirt almost acts as like this encoded symbol of eroticism that you can’t get dress coded for.

R: This one is so true to the A&F consumer. It is like a meta-commentary on the actual A&F consumer base and their motives for participating A&F.

E: I anticipated more tension between the images and text, like a snarky take down. But this feels like much more of a shared vision between the photography and writing. These masks feel like a really intentional nod to sex as a performance. It seems like everyone involved in creating this is on the same page in a lot of ways.

R: And then it is so interesting in the back of the catalog you have this stark difference with no models, just product styled so simply. And also, a lot of these eat. The trend cycle is so crazy, I would buy any of these camisoles. The sheerness is so Nicole Kidman in Eyes Wide Shut.

E: You wore something exactly like that sweater when you came over last week.

R: Don’t publish this until I can search for these on Depop. 

E: The women’s wear is super similar to what the brand still sells, but the menswear is very much not. Which is maybe because A&F’s demographic now is a little older, but women today are maybe dressing a little younger? Like young professional post-grad girls.

R: Yeah, it's the whole girlhood thing. The vibe from the website now is so sorority girl in the office. Like she’s out of school but isn’t ready to dress like her mom, but even so the whole brand feels much more reserved. 

To learn more about back to school shopping from an educator’s perspective, I spoke to a current and former teacher about how they dress for school:

Chris Bartee

Middle School Teacher in New York

Ella: How does the way you dress for school differ from the way you dress outside of work?

Chris: My job has a pretty strict dress code for men. I’m forced to wear a button down shirt and tie with slacks every day, and it couldn’t be farther than my closet which is 90% denim and Tees.

E: What limitations are placed on you by your school's dress code? How do you adapt your wardrobe to this?

C: Because of these restrictions I had to really get out of my comfort zone, but out of spite I challenged myself to Dress as sustainably as possible for work, and I gave myself a uniform that was two Walmart button downs and a pair of Yohji Yamamoto pants, That I wore every day to work for the school year. ( I have an in unit washer and dryer)

E: What age and subject do you teach? In what ways do these factors affect how you dress for work?

C: I teach middle school 5th-8th. I don’t adjust my personal style at all and they comment on it all the time.

E: As a relatively young person, do you feel the need to age yourself up or accentuate the difference between you and your students with clothing? If so, how do you do this?

C: I’d given up on respecting the opinions of the kids I teach before I started working. I have a sister who’s entering high school this year and for years she’s ignored my fashion advice. I will say the kids have an unspoken respect for my look even if they say its “weird” I get a ton of questions about random designers and I’ve helped on a couple portfolio submissions to Specialized fashion school programs

E: Do you feel fully comfortable expressing yourself at school? In what ways are you able to incorporate your personal tastes or personality in your self presentation?

C: Yes actually! Back in February I had my hair bleached and dyed professionally, I was a little worried how the change would go over, but all my coworkers reassured me and encouraged me to do it. My last two jobs I did a similar thing and the backlash was pretty extreme to the point my boss literally payed for me to have my hair a more natural color. The kids don’t let up especially since the color is faded now, but everyone raves whenever I style it in braids or something, it’s very sweet.

E: Where do you shop for school clothes?

C: Im a little neurotic with consumption and I can’t allow myself to buy something I don’t see myself wearing long term, so Uniqlo has been a functional compromise. Ideally all of my outfits would be tailored Comme des Garçon Homme and I’m seriously on the fence about full sending a permanent high fashion look for work, but I’m moving more in the direction of a traditional ivy style with Brooks Brothers having some great semi affordable options.

E: What are kids wearing today that differs from how you dressed as a student? Are there any clothing trends among your students that you enjoy or dislike? 

C: Kids more or less dress the same whenever we have days where kids are out of uniform their looks are either modern equivalents for accessible fast fashion or uber trendy brands with name recognition like Bape or Sp5der. In between American Eagle, Hollister, and other Gap related brands fill in the space for an evergreen wash between prep and trendy.

E: What is an example of an outfit you'd wear to work? Could you explain why  elements of this outfit work well for teaching?

C: I gave my work Uniform that I used for the last year but the main element of my work look besides my hair are my accessories and shoe choice.

I have a pair of all black Bape shoes I wear every day, and an ensemble of rings that I’ve slowly added to over time. The juxtaposition of a fairly flat “uniform” with fashion pieces that fit well within the rules for work, make an inside joke that everyone is in on, and the kids respond well to an adult figure that has clear and defined interests with the ability to express them.    

Sarah Hermes Griesbach

Former Elementary and High School Teacher in St. Louis

When I began teaching, I worked in the St. Louis Public schools with little elementary age kids. I was simultaneously working on my teacher certification to teach high school social studies, but my first job was as a substitute for the little kids. At the same time, I worked with a special program in St. Louis called Springboard to Learning that brought creative fun projects of all sorts into the elementary and middle schools. During those years, when I was 24 through 27, I often wore long skirts with scarves and flouncy blouses or vintage dresses. I was absolutely going for a Mary Poppins look. One class actually told me I reminded them of her and I was then (and am still) on Cloud 9 from the complement. 

Then, I got my first high school teaching job and I began to dress to appear older. It wasn’t my natural style and I started to imagine myself getting up in the am and putting on my teacher drag, meaning it was a look I felt I could use for effect. My teacher clothing during those years felt just a bit transformative. I wore pants that were like “slacks” I guess, sometimes with pleats or visible seams that made them look professional somehow and shirt blouses with jackets. Often the ensembles were all grey, white, and black. And I wore red lipstick, because my wonderful mentor told me to.

Dressing to appear older became less of a thing as I actually aged. Giving a specific impression through garments continued, but I shifted from needing to convince myself I was an authoritative presence to trying to look fresh and interesting for myself as much as for my students. I’ve always been a second-hand shopper so nothing I wore was ever too fancy, but a couple girls I taught Psychology to once told me they knew where I shopped — Anthropologie. I had never heard of the shop. It was like 2010. I went into one of their shops when I saw one and my jaw dropped at the prices. But I appreciated the thought that my mismatched thrifted workwear looked like something people would pay silly money for. 

The exception to my enjoying clothes was extreme during all three of my pregnancies. When I was pregnant, I just looked a mess because I refused to buy maternity clothes which are insanely expensive. I did not have a cute baby bump. My entire body blew up into a swollen balloon of discomfort. So, I wore my husband’s drawstring medical scrubs and huge tent shirts. During my last pregnancy, I heard two girls discussing their hope that when pregnant themselves, they would look like the darling little English teacher Sharon down the hall “not Sarah” (the students called us by our first names at that school). I whispered a “me too, sister, I want that for me too!” to myself and cursed the gods of motherhood for all of the many injustices begot to so many of us, swollen ankles the least of them. 

I never taught in a school with a dress code but I know that my exposure to teens wearing their era’s looks shaped my own choices. Sometimes, my students taught me something about the rigid unhealthy beauty standards of my youth. I observed adolescents wearing cropped shirts and low cut pants without being stick thin and I reveled in their ability to be in their bodies without the kind of self-censorship that fully governed my generation. Much of what was attractive to the students I taught throughout the first decade of the 21st century would have looked fine in the 1980s too. Though when we held eras dress days during the school’s spirit week I was often confused at the archetypal clothing styles associated with each decade. I was still too close to the 90s to imagine that there could have been a significant look of the period. Picking out plaid as a projection of grunge kinda shocked me because to my mind that had been a norm so so recently. I couldn’t imagine my college years as the past yet. 

Thinking back to what my own teachers wore— I don’t think I cared too much. The woman who mentored me when I was beginning my own teaching career was my African American Studies and Latin American History teacher in high school. I adored her then as I do now. I remember nothing about her appearance back then, but I do remember that she was always drinking weight watchers shakes. To me that recollection adds to my memory of the 1980s as an era when all that mattered was that we were skinny. All of us dressed to emphasize thinness and we talked about that topic regularly. The high school where I went to school had a majority black student body and there were some racial cultural differences in perceptions around weight. Sometimes black boys would call girls “healthy” and that meant not too skinny, in a good way. But really, as far as I was aware, every girl wanted to be unhealthily thin. 

For years, my children were performers in local and even international circuses. That was when I was in my 40s. I suspect that the circus world probably injected some fun into my wardrobe. During those years, I took adult aerial arts classes and built costumes for very (amateur) performances of my own. I was still teaching high school but didn’t have any insecurity around how I presented myself anymore. I suppose I dressed kinda silly. I think I still do. But there was a period when I kept sewing capes onto shirts. Not sure why. Just seemed like a fun accoutrement for what can be a kinda dull or frustrating daily existence. Anyway, I stopped sewing capes onto things and stopped wearing the caped shirts without really being conscious of the shift. Until my youngest kid was like 15 and he handed me a massive duffel bag on my birthday saying, “I just want to say, I’m not proud that I did this. It wasn’t ok and I wouldn’t do it again. I was much younger and I’m sorry.” I opened the bag and it was full of goofy things I’d worn when he was 12/13 and had scavenged my closet and then hid the clothing that mortified him. I’d never missed any of it. I always have too much clothes.

I’m now in my 50s and definitely making efforts to make my quickly changing face look a bit more lively. I want to deemphasize the effects of gravity but I don’t really have any makeup ability, so I rely on accessories older women often employ. I have a large selection of big, ridiculous glasses. I need them to see anything at all so I have to put on something. I’ve decided that, unlike in my youth when I could only afford a single pair at a time, variety is a key to my happiness. Maybe happiness is too strong a word, but there is joy in feeling fresh and fun. 

Sometimes, I see a photographed image of myself and it reveals a far less endearing sight than the picture I’m carrying of myself that day — but I’m dressing for that inner vision anyway. Just as I did in my 20s, trying to look like Mary Poppins while teaching second graders or like a Ted Talk presenter when teaching AP World History, I’m now organizing climate writing workshops while wearing outfits that add to costume to my performance of life. This iteration tends to include big hexagonal glasses and old tops that I’ve bedazzled with embroidered felt patches. Since the act of dressing each and every day requires effort, it might as well also carry the benefit of some good feeling too!

Always wise to revisit Sylvia Plath's back to school commandments:

Casey Lewis deserves a Pulitzer for her combat-reporter-style dispatches from adolescent back to school shopping:

A cute look at first day of school outfits from high schoolers in LA:

And, lastly, a Nancy comic By Ernie Bushmiller from September 7, 1965