Subversive School Girl Chic Can Be Magical and Masterful - Not Meeksource: http://th01.deviantart.com/
Happy 2010! I'm sure that your life (and Facebook page), like mine, is being inundated with "Top," "Countdown," and "Best" Lists - not only of the year, but this time of the entire bloody DECADE. That seems unfair somehow -- as though both academia and popular culture get to come together like party guests who usually detest one another, gloating drunkenly, intertwining their fingers and breakin' it down to hook up for an epic dance-off that includes absolutely everything you could think of. A glorious amalgamation. Another decade has passed.
As for yours truly - well, I've made some strong personal resolutions. Things like, stop making bodily function jokes all the time, at the most inopportune moments ... just do the dishes without politicking along the way ... find more reasons to laugh and fewer reasons to stress ... watch more movies and read more books ....
I am a strong believer in devoting a substantial amount of the winter-time to aggressive, fervent relaxation / New England hibernation involving blankets, steaming beverages, and pajamas. In that spirit, I recently watched both Reservation Road (Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Ruffalo - made me decide to never text while driving or take my loved ones for granted ever again) and Revolutionary Road (reunited Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio - made me decide to never go back in time to the 1950s, should I encounter the DeLorean, or fight with my loved ones ever again). Both were crushingly dark, painfully real, thought-provoking, and beautifully tragic. I loved Frank McCourt's Teacher Man, so I also finally got around to reading Angela's Ashes, which was, while certainly another stunning affirmation of life and of the human spirit, terribly depressing. In summation: three works; an alliterative rush of devastation.
The reason I have all this time to catch up on my leisure activities lies in two gorgeous words: Winter Break. As a teacher, I get to luxuriate from Christmas Eve until Monday, January 4th, in not working and still getting paid. Is it a wildly productive time? Ha. (I'm writing this blog entry while warily eyeing a massive pile of grading that I get to simply refuse, like it's the smarmy, wasted guy at the bar who asks every girl about her ethnic background while breathing his SoCo garlic breath all over the place.) But it's a time where there is some time. As a result, I've finally had the spare moments to start reading Junot Diaz's Pulitzer-winning novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.
It's beyond fantastic.
Consider the blurb: "Oscar is a sweet but disastrously overweight ghetto nerd, a New Jersey romantic who dreams of becoming the Dominican J.R.R. Tolkien and, most of all, finding love. But Oscar may never get what he wants. Blame the fuku - a curse that has haunted Oscar's family for generations, following them on their epic journey from the Dominican Republic to the United States and back again." It doesn't at all begin to do justice to this sprawling, manic, sensitive, heartbreaking book.
It occurred to me that I encountered Diaz's work (short story collection called Drown) when I was that most guileless, ingenuous and suggestible of creatures: a school-girl. Granted, you couldn't find me clad in one of Gossip Girl's meticulous, immaculate and tricked-out private school uniforms or anything close. I was in college, and you would more likely find me with long, dirtyish hair and some ill-fitting wanna-be vintage "frock." Mea culpa - I was a self-styled bohemian (read: pothead).School Days, School Days! The Original Days of Judgement! Dear old Golden Rule Days!
But seriously, there is a kind of magical je ne sais quois that surrounds schoolgirls and their untold possibility. Without wandering into the trite and inevitable porno context (I won't! I really won't!...), it's clear that this class of human (at least in the sartorial world) possesses a certain allure. They are innocent yet can be crazy-wild; naughty (girls just want to have fun) yet pristine. What I find most intriguing is the fact that school girls, and students at large, have something truly special: the vast expanse of information that lies at the mercy of their learning. Learning and intellect are a business. As Frank McCourt's old schoolmaster used to chant, "Stock your minds! They are your own. Stock your minds!" And it doesn't hurt to look rather natty and dapper while you're at it.
But seriously, there is a kind of magical je ne sais quois that surrounds schoolgirls and their untold possibility. Without wandering into the trite and inevitable porno context (I won't! I really won't!...), it's clear that this class of human (at least in the sartorial world) possesses a certain allure. They are innocent yet can be crazy-wild; naughty (girls just want to have fun) yet pristine. What I find most intriguing is the fact that school girls, and students at large, have something truly special: the vast expanse of information that lies at the mercy of their learning. Learning and intellect are a business. As Frank McCourt's old schoolmaster used to chant, "Stock your minds! They are your own. Stock your minds!" And it doesn't hurt to look rather natty and dapper while you're at it.
You know by now that I, like many Gen-Xers and Gen-XYers (and plenty of our moms), love me some GG, but this phenomenon is older than Serena Van der Woodsen, Anne of Green Gables, or Becky Thatcher. What is it about a young lady going about her learning with lioness-like ferocity (and often a good dose of sensuality) that inspires such yearning in others? How appealing is a fresh, white-collared shirt, wool skirt, and a menswear tie when you feel like the world has had its way with you, and you're ready to fight back? Right now women are CEOs, astronauts, professors, entrepeneurs - but before we broke through the glass ceiling, school was at the very least one of the only venues of fair game, where a girl could gird her intellectual loins and sally forth with all the swagger and determination of any boy. School is business time. Don't hate just because nowadays, the blouse is more flattering, the boots more fierce, and the blazer cut at a razor-sharp angle. (There's a fine line, of course, between overt sexual brazenness and cool, studied "can't touch this" impenetrability - literally. School-girl dressing past the age of eighteen is, on a style level, I believe, an exercise in proportion, intention, and restraint.)
But there are some levels of sheer cuteness that even the most hard-core Feminist Theorist could be pressed to appreciate. Anime fans will 
remember the mini-skirted, conflict-ridden posse from Sailor Moon. These girls were mere demerit-earners by day, but terrific crime-fighters by night. Their femininity, as you can see in the photo, belies their ferociousness.
remember the mini-skirted, conflict-ridden posse from Sailor Moon. These girls were mere demerit-earners by day, but terrific crime-fighters by night. Their femininity, as you can see in the photo, belies their ferociousness.
Let's say you hate all this cutesy Hello-Kitty fluffy crap, and you want something more gangster. (Studies show that "gangster shit" is one of the highest-ranked search
topics amongst the demograpic of median-range earners ages 17-25.) Well, look no further than GoGo. Yes, film buffs - from director Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill is the merciless 17-year-old body guard/assassin for O Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu), leader of the Yakuza clan in Tokyo, Japan. Chiaki Kuriyama played this delightfully diabolical character, clad in the classic white knee-socks, pristine gym shoes, tartan skirt, and insignia-emblazoned jacket of the School Girl.
She swings a giant, lethal mace, giggles innocuously before she splices your skull open, and lets out a barbaric war cry. She seduces sloppy older men only to leave them dismembered and blood-soaked in a hotel room, then skips off to algebra class, where she also presumably kicks ass. ....... Sweet.
Gangster enough?
High fashion clearly reverberates with echoes of the past at all times, and here are some of its academic-inspired offerings in the school-girl style:
These Hermione-like, whimsical creations are from Charles Anastase, a young designer who studied Political Science at the Lycee Charlemagne in Paris. He was an illustrator before launching a fashion design career. CHARLES ANASTASE, SPRING 2009-12-18
At the end of the day, whether it's knee socks, bright headbands, crisp blazers, snow-white button-downs or cheeky little ties, it's really the surge of nostalgia this look brings upon me. I know how hard a serious school-girl works because I've been there. As a teacher, I also know how much work I pile on my students, and I see the strong among them rise to the challenge and keep on rising. The cerebral world is a jungle like any other, and only the fittest survive. I respect the hustle of a serious school-girl. She's there to learn, pick up some business skills, apply her hard-won savvy, and pursue her most treasured creative and mental endeavors. And what is true learning without kicking some serious ass?
Here's to all of your goals, both style-wise and wise, with style, in 2010.
xo MSW
