Fashion Speaks

Have you ever worn a uniform? A T-shirt that made a statement? How do you express yourself through dress? Fashion has always been at the cutting edge of freedom of expression–at Cornell, and beyond. Multiple Supreme Court decisions have upheld fashion as a form of “symbolic speech” and “expressive conduct” that warrants protection under the First Amendment. But this freedom is only guaranteed in public spaces and government institutions; at a private institution, like Cornell, speech and dress can legally be constrained. 

From its early years, Cornell has upheld freedom of expression as a core value. It is inherent in Ezra Cornell’s mission of founding a university “where any person can find instruction in any study” and upheld by the tenet of “freedom with responsibility.” This addition of “with responsibility” is meant to consider collective interests. According to Cornell’s 1960 Student Code, this allows “each student the greatest possible freedom of action consistent with the welfare of the community.” These principles resonate with the ways that dress has been a right of expression as well as regulation on the Cornell campus since its founding. Freedom of expression through fashion has been constrained in the interest of the collective at varying scales, whether by peer pressure and group dynamic, or through institutional expectations, rules, and social conduct codes. At the same time, Cornell community members have mobilized fashion to fight for even greater freedoms for students and citizens alike.

Throughout the exhibition, garments are set against backdrops with photos by Margaret Bourke White ‘27, a groundbreaking documentarian who used her camera to speak. Her photographs are expressive and tell stories of people and places, beginning here with her documentation of Cornell’s campus in 1926-7. Immediately to the left of this poster and continuing to the left are: Goldwin Smith Sundial, Prudence Risley Hall, Willard Straight Hall, McGraw Tower, and Andrew Dixon White in front of Goldwin Smith Hall. We end with the statues of A. D. White opposite Ezra Cornell on the Arts Quad to bring attention to another opposition between the two: dress. Ezra Cornell stands in a working man’s frock while White sits in academic robes; the former representing the “any person, any study” mission of the university, and the latter personifying a “man of letters.” The tension between the two has, in fact, made  purposeful discovery possible at Cornell by bringing humanities and technical studies together through scientific inquiry. Likewise, fashion on campus has found itself at the center of many historical tensions: freedom vs. responsibility, independence vs. restraint, repression vs. expression, visibility vs. invisibility, anarchy vs. compliance.

Consider your own dress as you walk through these campus halls today: what are you able to express, and what are you not? What restrictions regulate your appearance today, and what restrictions might you be challenging?

— Denise Nicole Green & Alison Rittershaus, September 2023

Prior to the creation of this digital exhibit, Fashioning the Bounds of Free Speech was mounted as a physical exhibition at Cornell University. The show was open to the public in the College of Human Ecology building, as well as the Johnson Museum of Art, from October 5, 2023 through January 15, 2024.

The original exhibit can be explored in the pictures below or you may take a virtual tour.

Photography by Simon Wheeler for Cornell University, 2023.