PODCAST EPISODES

After spending over a year working from home, returning to the office and readjusting to your company dress code can be challenging.  Today, Doreen Pierre, a Brooklyn based fashion writer, visual content creator, and events producer chats about how restrictive dress codes inhibit us from bringing our true Selves to work. Doreen’s work centers people of color and queer communities and has been featured in The Huffington Post, Buzzfeed, Virgin Media, DapperQ and more. 

Topics Covered: 

• Exploring the connection between fashion and identity
• How Doreen embraces the many aspects of her identity through fashion
• Fashion as protection
• The importance of authenticity in the workplace
• How dress codes reinforce problematic standards of professionalism 
• How company dress codes may exclude workers
• How organizations can support employee authenticity

Highlights:

• “Fashion is one mode of expressing who you are without having to use the words to do it. And it also can be a marker for the message you want to put out into the world.”
• “We cannot look at fashion without looking at it through the lens of white supremacy, which has become the standard globally.”
• “How I dress can elicit violence in my direction based on my identity.”
• “Dress codes are not made to police men, but to police women.”

Connect with Doreen: 

On her website: https://www.doreenpierre.com/

On Twitter: @itsdoreenpierre

On Instagram: @itsdoreenpierre

Other References: 

• Doreen Pierre,  The Problematic Politics of Style and Gender Identity in The Workplace, The Huffington Post, Sept. 12, 2019.
• Susan B. Kaiser,  Fashion and Identity, Beauty & Style

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