Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Irish step dancers learn to navigate a wide variety of social codes and expectations
through their interactions with costuming. Not all of these meanings are based in
economics. For example, Irish step dancing dresses can be viewed as expressing a variety
of notions concerning gender. Some observers might characterize Irish step dancing
empowering. Other viewers, however might note the ways in which Irish costume
suggest, offer portrayals of a girl-child ideal, which is solidified both through rules and
My scrutiny of this girl-child ideal draws from recent considerations of the nature
of gender. In her 1996 book, Gender: The Pain and Pleasure of Difference, Betsy Waring
Lacan were concerned with the existence of fundamental systems of knowledge such as a
socialist, anarchist, radical, and liberal feminists—who may also incorporate post-
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control in which women and feminine gender expressions are subjugated to men and
masculinity.
However, Waring also details ways in which many feminist scholars have
a malleable and socially constructed system, as opposed to a fixed biological one, or one
gender philosophies are influenced by the work of postmodern philosophers such as Jean-
François Lyotard, Jacques Derrida, and Julia Kristeva, who criticize ideas of overarching
narratives, binary oppositions, essential human nature, and universals in general. Post-
structuralists are often concerned with meaning as something that is relative to the
observer, unstable and transitory, and thus malleable. In these philosophies, women and
others can engage in resistance through the remaking of meaning relating to their
In The Gender and Consumer Culture Reader (2000), Jennifer Scanlon applies an
approach to the ways in which scholarship relating to products and marketing campaigns,
way it relates to gendered norms and practices. Scanlon notes that early scholarly
dictating the choices of actors in society. She argues that analysis of products and
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consumption practices has (and should) become more multifaceted, moving beyond
In addition, Scanlon notes that feminist scholars, some of whom had previously
condemned commodity cultures for reinforcing stereotypical roles for women, have
expanded their viewpoints and critiques of consumer culture to acknowledge the agency
of women and others who participate in building identity through consumption. These
scholars explore the ways that women may even be using consumption to contest
patriarchal norms of gender and to assert power in the home, among other spaces.
Scanlon writes:
Feminists have been among those who have objected most strongly to
women’s participation in the culture of consumption, viewing women as
victims of male capitalism and male family members. Yet recent feminist
scholarship, particularly that of historians and cultural theorists, has
looked at the ways in which women play with the images thrust at them
and, by so doing, disrupt dominant notions of femininity” (7).
According to Scanlon, consumers are agents who may choose to utilize their purchasing
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Scanlon’s book, takes an often-sarcastic look at the contradictions many women feel
between urges to follow feminist ideals and desires to improve their body according to
industry standards. Douglas addresses the ways in which marketers made attempts,
specifically in the 1980s, to merge these drives in the minds of American women. She
critiques the manner in which marketers attempted to connect the promotion of women’s
wishes for beauty with those for “liberation and equality” and “collapse” these broader
goals into “distinctly personal, private desires.” Douglas states that marketers, who
wished to shill luxury products, suggested that “the ability to spend more time and money
on one’s appearance was a sign of personal success and of breaking away from the old
roles and rules that had held women down in the past” and liberate themselves (p. 268).
Douglas does not entirely discount the ability of women to actively make these
choices and lean towards acceptance of “narcissism” on their own. However, she argues
that the idea of “narcissism as liberation gutted many of the underlying principles of the
deployment of perfect faces and bodies” may ultimately be based in response to fear of
exclusion and “economic pun[ishment]” (281). While women may be responding to these
messages by making active choices with regards to their content, they may also be
reacting to the coerciveness of their intent: to enable companies to sell products that
of the pleasures of agency and the constraints of structure or coercion. The following two
sections pose interpretations of Irish step dancing costumes that diverge along these lines.
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Irish Step Dancing Dresses as an Expression of Dancers’ Agency and Positive Self-
Perceptions
Commodities such as Irish step dancing dresses are distinct from mass-marketed
goods such as Lucky Charms cereal or Irish Spring soap, or even Riverdance, because
they are not offered to the general public. In addition, Irish step dancing dresses can be
distinguished from many other commodities because although they are made to fit certain
market expectations, such as expectations relating to style, they are usually manufactured
one by one, and not en masse. Consumers of products sold in Wal-Mart or Target, to list
only two examples, cannot generally interact with the owners of the stores, the
contractors, or the workers who produce the goods they buy. Usually, consumers do not
contrast, some Irish step dancers have the opportunity to interact with the people who
make their dresses, either online, through the phone, in person, or through paper ordering
forms, wherein they may discuss not only their measurements but other details about
their preferences in terms of design, color, fabrics and other features. Dancers agentively
express creative aspects of their personalities when they help to design Irish step dancing
dancing magazines, suggest that aspects of the design of their dresses represent aspects of
their personalities. The meanings suggested by Irish step dancing costumes may be very
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specific to their owners’ conceptions of self, or to their perceptions of Irish step dancing
as a whole.
Furthermore, Irish step dancing dresses are almost unquestionably “girly.” Indeed,
the expanses of pink, ruffles, and sequins seen on Irish step dancing dresses practically
scream “femininity”—a normative middle class white femininity that I unpack in the next
section. The silhouettes, colors, and designs of Irish step dancing costumes work together
cheerful, bouncy energy. Irish step dancing costumes feature a cylindrical body clad with
curvy ruffles and curls, as well as sparkling sequins and fantasy tiaras. In fact, if the
unconventional patterns and fabrics, wigs, and loud makeup are taken into account, these
garbings are not far from drag queen territory. However, unlike the joys that the
femaleness proposed by Irish step dancing dresses lack any sense of irony. Irish step
dancing dresses are like pure squeals of deadpan little-girl joy—or in any case, the joy
that little girls are encouraged by many marketers to enjoy. All humor aside, many girls
in Irish step dancing genuinely seem to enjoy the ability to perform a normative
femininity so unabashedly.
As discussed in the previous chapter, Irish step dancing dresses have become
increasingly colorful, shiny, and bright in the late 1990s and the 2000s. Some dancers
suggest that these changes have been made in an attempt to catch the attention of
adjudicators. While dancers who comment on dresses generally assert the argument that
dancing technique, and not just the dress, should be the basis of adjudicators’ judgments,
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they often view dresses as enhancing both their performances and viewers’ perceptions of
those performances. These dancers, and their dresses alike, seem to respond
enthusiastically to the pressures of competition, willing to shine their best to beat the rest.
Dancers glisten with the glitter of their effort, and project their performance, with the
help of their garb, directly to the dancing judge’s eye and throughout the hall. Irish step
dancing dresses may be an expression of qualities of self that dancers imagine for
themselves—those qualities that dancers wish the judges to perceive. Perhaps, even in
dancing dresses as providing a forum for girls to empower themselves, to play with
femininity, as well as opportunities for girls’ agency in their article, “Commanding the
Room in Short Skirts: Cheering as the Embodiment of Ideal Girlhood” (2003). These to
me help situate what seems to be afoot in Irish step dancing. Adams and Bettis “discuss
cheerleading as [a] discursive practice that operates as a socially sanctioned space for a
few girls to create multiple gendered subject positions that accommodate the shifting and
argue that “there is no fixed meaning of the ideal girl; rather, the meaning of ideal
girlhood is always in flux and constantly subject to dispersal” (75). One way in which
“normative” United States femininities for girls have changed is that they have
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more prominent signifying “markers” such as “passivity, quietness, and acquiescence”
(74). Adams and Bettis also cite the rising prominence of concepts like “determination,
ideal girl” (74). However, the authors argue that although some markers of femininity
have shifted and changed, some elements of this construction remain “nonnegotiable”—
attractive, work to constrain their behavior. Alternately, however, the authors argue that
as participants of cheerleading, some teenage girls are able to “take risks, to try on
different personas, to delight in the physicality of their bodies, and to control and revel in
their own power and desire” (87). Some of these same contradictions in the ways that
cheerleaders explore gender in the authors’ study may also be present in the ways that
Costume precedents in Irish step dancing divide dancers into two basic and
relatively immutable genders. In almost all cases, Irish step dancing costumes reinforce a
strict dichotomy between “male” and “female” costumes. Men and boys wear a shirt and
pants, and perhaps an accessory, with a total cost of perhaps $150, and almost no style
expiration date. Women and girls, in contrast, wear elaborate dresses costing between
$1000 and $3000, wigs costing up to $150, and numerous extra accessories such as tiaras
and specialized socks. The number of years after a female costume is made in which it
will still be considered “new” is perhaps limited to two. Boys in Irish step dancing
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absolutely do not wear solo dresses in regular competition, and girls do not have the
especially demonstrated by the case of brightly colored fabrics for shirts, cummerbunds
and ties, and even the use of colors such as pink for these garments. Although most boys
in Irish step dancing competition adopt a relatively unified style of black, these deviations
from the norm suggest other gendered or sexualized possibilities for male dancers.
either used on female dancers as a result of a lack of male dancers in the school, or to
humorous effect in the case of male dancers (the feminization of male dancers perhaps
being a sorer or less acceptable point—and thus more amusing—than the masculinization
these special cases, such variation is not accepted in general competition or performance.
Dresses conceal elements of the female body that are perceived as sexual. There
is little emphasis on bust line or other sexualized body parts. Indeed, these parts are
prohibited from being revealed, either by cutting down necklines or by using fabrics that
are not of sufficient weight to conceal them. Dancers are not allowed to show more than
four inches of thigh. These expectations are specifically stated in the rules governing
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Irish step dancing dresses. Irish step dancers are not encouraged to question or defy
these very strict norms, which set definite parameters for appropriate femaleness and
maleness.
However, the embodied practice of Irish step dancing does, in a sense, allow
girls to defy some gendered expectations. For example, dancers are encouraged to be
loud and aggressive in hard shoe dancing, when they beat out precise rhythms on the
floor. They are encouraged to compete as individuals, and find satisfaction in their
performances. In this light, Irish step dancing practice is portrayed as an activity that can
teach girls confidence and enable them to express themselves. In terms of dancing skill,
girls are valued equally to boys. There are thus elements of Irish step dancing practices
that allow girls to transform normative expressions of femininity. These elements may
or may not be in contradiction with the gendered meanings promoted by Irish step
dancing dresses, a complexity that should not surprise given the intersectionality of
Dancers interacting with Irish step dancing dresses construct and interact with not
only images of femininity, but with certain kinds of femininities that are strictly bounded
by a dual construction of age, and a division between adult female and girl child. Some
scholars studying constructions of age and childhood provide useful theorization for this
idea.
Allison James and Adrian L. James examine childhood as a “structural space” that is
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shaped by the influence of law and social policy (25). The authors argue that the
medieval period to the present. While children were “not granted a special or distinctive
social status,” from the fifteenth century onward, an awareness of childhood as a separate
category of the human life span began to develop (26). According to the authors,
“seventeenth-century Puritanical regimes that controlled and ordered the evil child were
gradually replaced by less strict regimes designed to foster the child's natural innocence”
in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (33). These ideals about childhood, the authors
suggest, “that become concretized and made ‘fact’ through the different ways in which
children's lives are ordered and controlled” through laws, but also through social
Mary Shine Thompson analyzes ways in which childhood has been constructed
legally and socially throughout the modern history of the Republic of Ireland in her 2003
ways in which childhood was deployed as a metaphor for an “embryonic Irish republic”
and for “incipient citizenship” in the 1916 Proclamation of the Provisional Government
(94). However, she details ways in which children’s rights are neglected or limited in the
children are portrayed as being “conduits for the rights of parents rather than as a well-
defined group of citizens” (96). Furthermore, the constitution explicitly limited the types
of parent status and families that were supported by the state, and implicitly marginalized
those families, parents and children that did not conform to a “bourgeois,” nuclear,
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heterosexual model, which “revealed an intolerance of difference” (97). Children thus
have served a variety of conceptual roles in the construction of family that has been
children. Certain Irish families historically expected children to perform tasks such as
“arduous chores on small farms and childminding in a society of large families” (93).
Children were also addressed by Irish Catholic intellectual figure Timothy Corcoran SJ
(Society of Jesus), “whose philosophies dominated Irish education for the first two
being naturally “corrupt” and as requiring “strict authoritarian teaching” (93). The
Catholic perception of children as being sinful and in need of restriction and guidance
by British tendencies to idolize or “sacralize” childhood “during the years between 1870
and 1930” (93). One British Victorian model of childhood that inflected Irish
constructions was the “cult of the child beautiful,” in which “children were recast as
emotional and affective assets and confined to the domestic arena" (93). This model also
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prejudice,” Thompson argues, were defining elements of early twentieth century Irish
Thomson argues that some elements of this spectrum have changed over time.
(107). Questions might be raised as to whether Irish step dancing costumes are more
representative of earlier or later modes of Irish childhood. Perhaps they are a combination
centeredness.
to create profit and drive spending. Some authors argue that childrens’ understanding of
the identities and realities they navigate through consuming may be limited by their
(lower) analytic and critical thinking abilities. Some of these authors also question
whether interaction with commodities has negative effects on childres. Juliet B. Schor, an
economist and author of Born to Buy (2004), and Susan Linn, a psychologist and author
of Consuming Kids (2004), both describe ways in which children interact with the
market, but more often, are responsive to market imperatives. The world they describe is
not one in which children demonstrate active control over the commercial environment,
although the children in their studies may perceive themselves as active agents. Rather,
children, according to Schor and Linn, are the subjects of extensive, pervasive, and
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pernicious marketing strategies that are offered through media and through advertizing in
coerce parents to spend in ways they might otherwise loathe. Marketers, according to
both Schor and Linn, cultivate the “nag factor,” in which children repeatedly request
products they have been exposed to advertisements for repeatedly. In addition, both
authors depict the rationale of marketing and industry executives, who are “the
architects” of the new consumer culture (according to Schor, 9), as being driven by the
psychology to penetrate the minds of children (Schor, 43-44, Linn, 23-26). Interestingly
as active agents, as oppositional and as being more aware than their adult counterparts.
Schor does not discount the desirability to children of these images, and children’s desire
for control over their lives, but rather questions the effects of the promotion of children
Each of the authors is uncomfortable with the messages that reach children,
specifically because of childrens’ lack of ability to comprehend and critique the images
and meanings at hand. Both authors condemn the depictions of sexuality and violence, as
well as material culture, which are offered through media such as television. In many
ways, the authors depict a battlefield of values, some of which are offered through the
home, and are theoretically appropriate, and some of which are marketed to children, and
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are percieved by the authors to be less appropriate and often detrimental. According to
Schor, “cool,” as currently marketed, is “social exclusive, that is, expensive,” as “older
Some authors offer information that counters the portrayal offered by Linn and
consumption. Both Mary Shine Thompson and Alison and Adrian James assert that prior
research into the cognitive and perceptual skills of children may have underestimated
Jean Piaget as emphasizing a “gap between children’s and adults’ capacities for formal
operations and abstract reasoning” that is “now considered not to be as wide as his
research suggested” (108). Allison James and Adrian James also assert that “children are
competent social actors who may have a particular perspective on the social world that
we, as adults, might find worth listening to” (26). They further state, “children
themselves, in and through their own social relationships, actively construct a child's
world, distinctive and unique in its form and content” (29). These findings offer a greater
Lydia Martens, Dale Southerton and Sue Scott apply these types of ideas to
linkages between childhood and consumption practices. They note the sometimes
“patronizing” nature of texts relating to the “child consumer,” which, they argue, suggest
the child is “easily manipulated and in need of guidance” (159). This sort of guidance is
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on the consumers of those products (i.e. children)” (160). However, they argue that these
While it is not within the scope of this thesis to make a final decision on the
amount of agency with which child dancers engage dresses and other commodities, there
is a debate within Irish step dancing culture as to whether the costumes that are worn
have negative or positive effects on dancing children. A feis musician, Ryan Duns, from
New York, raises some concerns about the presumed effects of Irish step dancing
Is it that in order to win, to be sucessful [sic], they must have "the look"?
Are small fortunes are spent on the latest costumes, garrish [sic] make-up,
wigs, fake tans, in order to achieve this purpose? I fully understand the
desire of people to look beautiful, but I do not see anything beautiful or
comely in all of this. What I see is a message that says, "If you want to be
a success, you must conform to an established norm. You will win only if
you cease being you as an individual and step into the figure of a
champion." In an era of image-consciousness when anorexia and bulemia
[sic] are plaguing teens, I just have to pause to wonder whether this is a
healthy message to send to children.
(http://ryandunssj.blogspot.com/2007/06/letter-to-irish-dancing-
community.html).
There is not enough evidence available to necessarily refute or justify this sentiment.
However, it seems remiss to discuss Irish step dancing costumes and children without
making reference to the debate of what “effects” dancing dress cultures might have on
dancers.
Competitive Irish dancers operate within an age framework that clearly separates
and differentiates adults from children. Adults and children are accorded specific social
positions within the structure of the practice. The majority of Irish dancers who compete
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do so in “child” competitions. These competitions reinforce specific constructs and
conceptions of childhood.
It is important to note that the term “adult dancer” has a very specialized
meaning in Irish step dancing. Only dancers who never competed as children, or who
have not competed for at least five years, can be considered “adult” dancers. Acceptable
positions for (chronological or legal) adults in competitive Irish step dancing are as
authority figures, such as teachers, and as parents. It is generally not considered realistic
for dancers who begin their training late in life to compete alongside children, youth, or
teens, and thus they are entered into entirely separate categories. It is technically
possible for “older” dancers who begin their careers as teenagers or even later to be
entered into competitions intended for youth. However, teachers do not always present
these opportunities to older dancers, and older dancers often must assert their interest in
competing in such a category. This is something the significance of which is difficult for
dancers with a limited knowledge of the competition structure to grasp. The line which
maintains the division between child and “adult” is manifest in the segregation of adult
dancers from younger dances, and in rules which constrain adults’ ability to compete
“Adult” Irish dancers are allowed in small numbers in adult ceílí competitions in
some regional Oireachtaisí (generally in ceílí dances only), and are allowed to compete
in special solo and ceílí competitions in local feiseanna—but only where competitions
are designated for “adults.” However, “adults” are barred from competition (because of
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addition, according to North American Feis Commission rules, adult dancers are banned
from competing with more difficult, “slow,” hardshoe dances, and must compete at
the only other groups that are required to dance at “traditional” speeds are beginners,
Some dancers who are over the age of 21—the United States standard for legal
age category available is 21 and over, and so all dancers older than this, no matter what
competition, must compete with dancers who are often several yeas younger than
themselves. This is especially the case in local competitions, where dancers over the age
to dancing, and dancers who competed as children but did not continuously practice the
art form. These dancers are generally not accorded a high degree of respect and are also
usually afforded little time or attention from a teacher, especially as many teachers do
not offer more than one “adult” class per week. In addition, some adult classes are
taught by assistant teachers who may or may not be registered with An Coimisiún.
Although the practice of having uncertified teacher run classes is technically banned, it
is nevertheless widespread, especially where classes for beginners and adults are
concerned.
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In some cases, new, well meaning, and enthusiastic adult dancers are
discouraged by teachers from believing they can reach a high standard of dancing. In
addition, some teachers do not even offer classes for adults. There is a definite social
Many dancers end their careers either at the completion of high school or at the
end of their college careers. Dancers who have reached the highest levels of competition
as children are more often encouraged to become teachers, and, for some dancers, the
a transition out of competition and into adulthood. Teachers themselves are barred from
authority figure and dancer. Although some dancing teachers maintain their physical
skills, many do not perform and some have discontinued much of their own dancing.
Another option for older dancers who have had successful competition careers is
to audition for a touring show such as Riverdance, Lord of the Dance, or Celtic Tiger.
Some dancers in these shows are active competitors, but others may view entrance into a
competitive Irish step dancing technique. Competitive Irish step dancing standards do
not accommodate deviations from the overall standard according to age. Thus,
expectations for performance are largely the same for older dancers as they are for
students. The youthful standard of Irish step dancing is quite aerobic; Irish step dancing
contains high and powerful leaps and other difficult maneuvers that are set to a quick
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pace. Indeed, Irish step dancing can be hazardous in some cases; knee, ankle and leg
Dancers who are at the highest levels of competition routinely take class multiple
times a week, and practice on their own. Such a schedule may be difficult to maintain in
tandem with other “adult” obligations, such as work, college, or parenting. Until the
twenty-first century, it has not been possible to obtain a university degree in Irish
dancing. This has recently been changed by the introduction of Bachelors and Masters
degree programs at the University of Limerick’s Irish World Academy of Music and
Dance. Until the late 1990s, well-paying performing positions were not prevalent, and
only a small number of dancers pursued them. Until recent years, therefore, there have
been few paying adult occupations in Irish dancing aside from teaching—and even that
very profession has only become lucrative for some in light of increases in numbers of
pupils.
class costumes worn by their younger “schoolmates,” often in the colors of the school
they represent. Adult female dancers generally eschew the highly ornamented costumes
show, often in black or navy loosely flowing stretch velvet) or more “traditional” dresses
(e.g. less stiffened, less decorated outfits that resemble competition dresses from the
1970s and 1980s). These dresses allow for interpretations of womanhood aside from
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are sometimes worn by dancers of all ages in public (non-competition) performances and
competition, they do so with a far lower frequency. The same applies to metal tiaras, leg
tanning, and bright makeup: while adult dancers can and do wear and do such things,
they do so far less frequently. Adult dancers (and older “child” dancers such as dancers in
the Senior Ladies 21 and Over competitions) are currently still allowed to wear “poodle”
younger counterparts’ costumes, that is, pants and a button front shirt, often with a tie.
The shirts in question are more likely to be plain white (-collar) work shirts. Although
adult male dancers did wear kilts during the heyday of that garment, it has been far more
historically acceptable for adult men to simply compete in pants, and this has been even
Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, An Coimisiún slowly issued new rules
constraining the ways in which Irish step dancing dresses have been made. In 2008,
information has been informally released by teachers that a new rule will be instituted to
prohibit dancers who are eighteen and older from wearing socks and bare legs during
competition. Instead, “older” dancers will be required to wear black tights. Theoretically,
the ruling is supposed to combat short hemlines—thus limiting the amount of suggestive
adult thigh on display. It might be the case that the coming ruling on black tights works
also simply to marginalize senior or adult dancers (by creating a more hostile
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environment of specific rules for those dancers alone), as well as to make sure that adult
sexuality is fully constrained in Irish step dancing. Adult dancers are subject to specific
rules that limit them from performing “slow” (more difficult) hardshoe dances—the
rationale being that they simply cannot perform them well enough. The new tights rule
may follow these same lines of thought. One commentator on Dance.net in January of
2008 noted:
It's just crossed my mind that there might be another reason for the
adjudicators wanting to impose tights on senior age groups - I was at the
feis where in the older age groups there were numerous ladies wearing
socks (they must have been over 35, up to 50 I'd say). The three adjs [sic]
present at the feis were all very displeased with this fact and addressed the
teachers present to make sure that their senior dancers wear "proper
attire", in the future. They commented that adults should not wear
"chldren's [sic] socks" and that the skirts seem shorter with socks. Now
while I'm not a teen myself anymore I must say that the visual result was
not the best - not everybody has the firmness to pull off bare legs, also the
contrast between maturity and socks was quite striking
(http://www.dance.net/topic/6800144/5/Irish/black-tights-for-
18.html&replies=110).
Regardless of the rationale, these kinds of rulings send a message that is unfriendly to
senior and adult Irish dancers—by singling out aspects of their bodies as particularly
offensive and as needing to be restrained. This rule illustrates the idea that adults are not
Children are designated as the target market for Irish step dancing, and are
encouraged to be pupils. Children may begin as young as four years of age (or possibly
younger, although some teachers prefer not to teach toddlers). Local feiseanna offer
competitions for a wide variety of age ranges, even accommodating the very young. The
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lowest age category at the local Oireachtas level, and the North American Nationals
level, is under eight years of age. However, pupils are not able to qualify for the World
Costumes for Irish competitive Irish step dancing, at least in the case of the
specific image of childhood. Often, solo costumes are designed to take into account the
will of the child and the expectations of the child, and the child may be involved in the
design and selection process. The wide assortment of bright colors, cartoon-like prints
such as fish on underskirts, ruffles, sequins, and tiaras all seem coded to appeal to a girl-
child market. Children in some cases may be more aware of current trends than are their
parents, and may be very influential in terms of purchase, although parents (and, more
Dancing dresses shaped for the pre-pubescent bodies of children are also worn
by older dancers, even in the 21 and over age categories. These dresses often seem ill-
suited to the reinforcement of a strong role for older dancers—they seem rather to push
the bodies of older dancers into the same little-girl-model dresses, wigs and tiaras. Older
dancers often appear to be caught trying to emulate their younger peers. The bright
colors and stiffened silhouette of solo dresses, when worn by older dancers, often seem
to exaggerate the plumpness sometimes acquired with age, making older dancers look
hefty. However, tiaras, wigs, the color pink, and sequins are worn by all dancers in an
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The ideal of childhood offered by Irish step dancing costumes and Irish step
dancing competition is one that emphasizes the construction of skilled and appropriately
teens in Irish step dancing mediate their advanced skills by emphasizing infantile
qualities in their dress. Irish step dancing dresses signal that for all their technical
virtuosity, it is their gendered age status that defines their eligibility to occupy center
stage and claim attention, evaluation and worth. Costume rules and practices contain
Arrayed in their bright and shiny dresses, set with wigs and tiaras, female Irish dancers
often look like they are performing child dress-up play. It is my contention that both the
overwhelmingly girlish and childish images promoted by these dresses serve in some
ways to create a space of idyllic childhood, but also to counteract the performance of
Although dancers do have agency in the ways they represent themselves, they are
the imperative for An Coimisiún to maintain its authority that makes the system
encourage dancers to dress as children, and which marginalizes adult dancers, who may
be better able to question their instructors. Regardless of the final conclusion, however, it
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seems clear that Irish step dancing costumes work to delineate male and female binaries,
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ENDNOTES
1 Kimberlé Crenshaw analyses the complexity of black women’s experiences, using the
term intersectionality. In her 1989 paper, “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and
Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory, and
Antiracist Politics,” she details the ways in which law, feminist theory, and anti-racist
political theories tend to treat race and gender as mutually exclusive categories, when, in
a more satisfactory model, black women’s experiences would be viewed as
“multidimensional” (140). She also suggests that the tendency to treat black women as
falling into one or the other of these dynamics indeed marginalizes their struggles and
experiences. Extrapolating from this analysis, I might say that no person’s relation to the
world is fixed by any one dynamic of race, class, gender, or sexuality, but, rather, these
dynamics are mutually implicated. Kimberlé Crenshaw, “Demarginalizing the
Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine,
Feminist Theory, and Antiracist Politics,” Chicago Legal Forum, 139 (1989): 140.
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