A Quote by Shirley Geok-lin Lim

For a while they wore suits or pants suits, and pants suits are kind of a women's appropriation of male costume, work costume. For me, it wasn't Western feminism or the Western workspace. It was my growing up in a house with a bunch of boys, so that male costuming just became my mode of appropriation way before, you know, Betty Friedan came along.

Shirley Geok-lin Lim

Quote Topics

Along Appropriation Became Before Betty Boys Bunch Came Costume Feminism Growing Growing Up House Just Just Be Kind Know Male Me Mode Pants Suits Up Way Western While Women Wore Work Workspace

Quote Author

Shirley Geok-lin Lim
Writer
Born: 1944

The Asian male has an interesting history as far as Western appropriation. At one point, we were completely sexless Chinamen building the railroads. Then, World War II came around, and it was like, Asian guys are coming after the white women. We became a menace for a second.

Freddie Wong

Costume is always an asset. Normal costume you have a lot to say about - if you're wearing suits or ties, and what color you want, and how it's going to be cut, and stuff like that, and whether or not you're going to wear a hat, and blah, blah, blah. But, when you're wearing a special costume, and of course, costume is probably the second ingredient in character, script being first, I always find that the costume does a lot to cement your character, to put it firmly in mind.

Morgan Freeman

I remember, growing up, my mother had a work wardrobe. It was this very compartmentalized area of her closet. It was suits, but she would never wear those suits out on a date with my father!

Ivanka Trump

Once upon a time, growing up male gave little boys a sense of certainty about the natural order of things. We had short hair, wore pants, and played baseball. Girls had long hair, wore skirts, and, no matter how hard they tried, always threw a baseball just like a girl.

Kenneth R. Miller

Bespoke tailoring: yes! I found this one pair of pants - they're Canali - and brought them into a tailor and said, 'Clone these, dammit.' They just do all the right things. I've got eight pairs in different colors and I never have to think about pants again. The only look otherwise that suits me is, like, the Professor from 'Gilligan's Island.'

Douglas Coupland

Nan Kempner wore one of the first Saint Laurent trouser suits to one of those fancy Madison Avenue restaurants and was denied access. She famously took off her pants and walked in wearing only the jacket. And it was that kind of revolution that was echoed in fashion and in life.

Suzy Menkes

When you see all the suits in the room, everybody in the room has on suits, you know, the women, too. We're not wearing dresses and chiffon and we're not as fun as we used to be.

Regina King

I feel like dress socks differentiate you in a different way - especially men in suits who just have the traditional business suit. The dress sock is the way to change it up in your mind and I like wearing my pants up higher so you see them.

Rob Kardashian

I have a lot of suits, but I'm not the kind of person who looks good in a suit. Suits are too serious for me. They are better if you can break the rules, so that's why I always try to add something crazy to them.

Alessandro Michele

I get to actually experience what it would be like to be a psycho, which is not a fun one, or to be a cowboy, or to be a weird character of some sort. For me, it suits me. It suits my personality. I'm an emotional kind of person anyway.

Josh Holloway

It is obvious that many women have appropriated feminism to serve their own ends, especially those white women who have been at the forefront of the movement; but rather than resigning myself to this appropriation I choose to re-appropriate the term “feminism,” to focus on the fact that to be “feminist” in any authentic sense of the term is to want for all people, female and male, liberation from sexist role patterns, domination, and oppression.

bell hooks

Seeing European guys wear suits was incredible. And it wasn't all like the big fashion house expensive suits, it was like simple stuff but the way the older men dressed in Europe just absolutely amazed me. In Italy, in France the way the older men dressed was incredible.

P. J. Tucker

I think feminism has always been global. I think there's feminism everywhere throughout the world. I think, though, for Western feminism and for American feminism, it not so surprisingly continues to center Western feminism and American feminism. And I think the biggest hurdle American feminists have in terms of taking a more global approach is that too often when you hear American feminists talk about international feminism or women in other countries, it kind of goes along with this condescending point of view like we have to save the women of such-and-such country; we have to help them.

Jessica Valenti

Now I'm way into suits that I can put on whether I took a shower or not, and wear barefoot and paint my toes black or whatever color the suit is. It's very cool to wear suits like that. Roll up the sleeves and just say yee-haw.

Steven Tyler

The affinity towards suits was a functional thing for me early on because I was thrifting at secondhand shops, and it was also initially a way of grieving - my father had passed, and he used to wear suits all the time.