From Royal tartan to slut walking: How the fashion police control what we wear

Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. And after millennia of dictating on anything from hair-coverings to the length of pointed shoes, in various guises the fashion police remain hard at work, according to Ruthann Robson, professor of law at City University in New York and author of Dressing Constitutionally, as they try to “control how race, class, gender and nationality are conveyed”. “Restricting or transforming native dress has long been a strategic part of military and colonial violence,” says Jane Tynan, a lecturer in design history at Central St Martin’s School of Art in London. open image in gallery Queen Elizabeth I introduced sumptuary laws which restricted clothing according to social class Whichever, according to Marianne Franklin, professor of global media and politics at Goldsmiths, such legal or social pressure is a heavy-handed attempt to promote integration. She equates the sensitivity about such clothing to the British ban on Scots wearing tartan in the 18th century: now we’re a happy democracy, the passion of the Crown against the kilt is spent; and, says Franklin, “Tartan has become acceptable because it’s not within the geopolitical polarisation of ‘Islam versus the West’, as people would like to put it”.