Discussion Jumpstarter
Study leader reference - not a definitive answer
Question 4
Laura said clothing history is a “downward path,” pointing to the mid-14th century as a major shift: the “abandonment of the long flowing costume,” the rise of the “fashion designer,” the male codpiece, and lower female necklines—how does her use of secular fashion history challenge the common assumption that modesty standards are mostly arbitrary or purely cultural?
Another way to ask: How does Laura’s use of fashion history challenge the idea that modesty rules are just random or only based on culture?
Discussion Jumpstarter
Direct Answer
Based on her teaching, secular fashion history challenges the idea that modesty is arbitrary by showing broad, cross-cultural agreement for long periods, followed by identifiable historical “innovations” that moved toward accentuating sexuality—suggesting modern norms aren’t neutral but part of a moral “downward path.”
- She says she studied “illustrated histories of clothing” and found it “fascinating” how much “general consensus” existed in older civilizations.
- In those pictures, women commonly wore “skirts or dresses,” chests and legs were covered, shapes “not accented,” and “often… the woman’s head is covered.”
- She cites a secular source (Boucher, *20,000 Years of Fashion*) describing the “great innovation… after the mid-14th century”: “abandonment of the long flowing costume common to both sexes.”
- The same source notes “the fashion designer made his appearance,” and that innovations “met scandalized opposition.”
- She highlights the male “short coat… hose and a codpiece” which “serve[s] to accentuate, not to hide,” and women’s “lower necklines” exposing cleavage.
- She concludes “the history of clothing is a downward path,” and that earlier societies “dress far more modestly than the world today.”