Dress for Success

13 February 2008 at 12:06 pm Peter G. Klein 7 comments

| Peter Klein |

The professorial dress code has long been an object of (gentle) ridicule. “This diagram explains why I’m an expert on money yet I dress like a flood victim,” says an economics professor in a recent Dilbert strip. I remember one from years back in which an older professor says to the younger, “Congratulations on making tenure! Here are your elbow patches.”

Erik Jensen argues that professors should, instead, conduct themselves in a professional manner, which includes professional dress. For men that means jackets and ties; for women, suits or modest, professional dresses. His proposed Uniform Uniform Code: “Faculty members shall, when on college grounds or on college business, dress in a way that would not embarrass their mothers, unless their mothers are under age 50 and are therefore likely to be immune to embarrassment from scruffy dressing, in which case faculty members shall dress in a way that would not embarrass my mother.”

When I started my career I wore a tie every day in class, but eventually quit. This semester I’m teaching a class at Olin, where ties are the norm (except among the economists, apparently), and am wearing one again. I’d really prefer a gown, however. And when did students quit bowing?

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7 Comments Add your own

1. Donald A. Coffin | 13 February 2008 at 12:47 pm

I found Brad DeLong’s comments on this both hilarious and pertinent:
http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2008/02/cosma-shalizi-c.html
2. Manuel Lora | 13 February 2008 at 12:53 pm

Do you think that Austrians tend to wear bow ties more often than non-Austrians?
3. Warren Miller | 13 February 2008 at 2:57 pm

I used to to handtie a bow-tie whenever I taught. For one thing, it took the edge off the passion in my teaching, which students, in their instructor evaluations, had said for years was intimidating.

For another, on the first day of class, as I explained the course and its objectives, I’d pull one of the trailing ends of the bowtie loose, completely untie it, and then retie it, all the while never missing a word. When I was done, they invariably applauded. . .and then I had to restart the lecture at the point where I had begun retying the bow-tie because, riveted as they were on my handiwork, they had missed everything I said after I began the retie!
4. REW | 13 February 2008 at 4:00 pm

The best moment of my study of organizations over the past 30 years occurred when the department head announced a dress code for faculty as the first agenda item of the monthly department meeting. During the ensuing brouhaha (all the worst of faculty comportment at full throat) he stripped three full professors of leadership roles and disbanded one research group and presented sad budget news. Before anyone knew it, the meeting was gaveled to a close. It took almost two months before anyone above the rank of assistant professor recognized what he had accomplished behind the smoke screen. Even now, there is a tear in my eye.
5. Bart | 14 February 2008 at 8:00 am

I think Austrians tend to wear lederhosen…
Boy am I lucky to be the first one to come up with that one!
6. Bob | 14 February 2008 at 9:30 am

I have only one rule for proper dress: Dress at or slightly better than your immediate supervisor. This has always worked well for me, except that my current department chair and dean are both women.

Man my hose itch and these pumps are killing me.
7. REW | 14 February 2008 at 10:56 am

Bob,

I recommend Yardley English Lavender Talc to ease the hose itch — it works for me. There are a couple of nice shops just off Union Square in SF that can do custom pumps for the masculine foot. You get a free coupon for a pedicure.

And the Hermes scarf might be just the thing to out-dress the dean…