Deconstructing Gender
Clothes are part of what society uses to enforce the idea that gender presents exclusively in two categories: male and female. We dress girls in pink and boys in blue. We think of dresses as something that only women wear. At HONK!, there was more freedom and fluidity when it came to how clothes were worn and what they signified. Attendees and performers broke from the gender binary to simply wear clothes as a form of expression separate from their gender markers.
However, certain forms of gender deconstruction resulted in enforcing gender norms. The Brass Balagans performed in Davis Square. All of the instrumentalists wore androgynous/male-reading red jumpsuits, while the flag twirlers wore more traditionally feminine, revealing outfits. The instrumentalists end up coded as male based on their clothing. Given that brass instruments also tend to be coded "male" (their history, after all, is military history), this enforces stereotypes about who can play what type of instrument.
The Clamor and Lace Noise Brigade, on the other hand, enforced a more traditionally feminine aesthetic of dress. They were one of three all-female bands to perform. They decorated their instruments and persons in lace (a traditionally feminine fabric). Here, you see them participating in a slight overperformance of femininity that is also outside the norm. By embracing the feminine, they reject society's standard devaluation of feminine clothing and associated femininity.
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