‘Within the limits of decency and modesty’: the construction of cis-heteronormativity in New Brunswick school dress code policies

ABSTRACT

This study considers the ways school dress code policies in the Atlantic Canadian province of New Brunswick subtly perpetuate heteronormative and cisgendered assumptions regarding acceptable youth cultures. Although past media attention in the province has drawn attention to their indiscriminate enforcement, little is known on how these policies implicate queer and trans youth. Using critical discourse analysis, I collect and analyse data from 113 dress code policies across the region and examine how the language constructs norms about gender and sexuality. My findings reveal many policies using language which largely excludes the stylistic expression of queer and trans students: The texts nullify overall student sexuality and attempt to stabilise gender in ways that make sense to oppressive systems. I argue that my findings have broader appeal to other educational jurisdictions and can be applied to a wider set of discourses and practices around school dress code policies.

KEYWORDS:

• 2SLGBTQI+ youth
• critical queer theory
• critical discourse analysis
• school dress code policies

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. New Brunswick is a largely rural and conservative province, with 49% of its population residing in small towns (Statistics Canada, 2022). Fredericton, the province’s capital city, has a total population of 63,116 residents (Statistics Canada, 2021).

2. The acronym 2SLGBTQI+ comprises Two Spirit, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex. The + encompasses all other sexual and gender identities which exist outside of the acronym. I intentionally and respectfully place Two Spirit at the beginning to acknowledge the enduring violence established by settler colonialism towards Two Spirited peoples in this territory (Gibson Library Connections, Inc, Wesley-Esquimaux et al. 2009).

3. See the revised policy here: https://www2.gnb.ca/content/dam/gnb/Departments/ed/pdf/K12/policies-politiques/e/713-2023-07-01.pdf

4. Here, I think about stylistic expressions of queer and trans youth as a distinct kind of aesthetic that facilitates 2SLGBTQI+ visibility (Huxley et al., 2014). It resists, interrupts, and unfolds alongside cis-heteronormative systems. I also draw from Tulloch’s (2010) understanding of style as a ‘construction of self through the assemblage of garments, accessories, and beauty regimes that may, or may not, be “in fashion” at the time of use’ (p. 276). Queer youth stylistic expression shares space with this particular notion of style and becomes a site of (re)creation—imagined, cultivated, and altered through hairstyles, clothing, accessories, body modification, and makeup.