Carla J. Peterman used to work at the Aussie Outfitters T-shirt shop in Arlington, Virginia, not too far from the nation's capital and its attractions for sightseers. All types of customers would come into the store, she recalls. "There were tourist groups--Japanese tour groups would buy flower-power T-shirts because they were really pictorial or the 'Washington, D.C.' T-shirts. There were young black kids into basketball, old grandmothers buying T-shirts for their grandchildren, and people who were doing all their Christmas shopping."
Today you would be hard-pressed to find a more widely worn and versatile piece of clothing. In fact, we American consumers probably know of no other piece of merchandise that better expresses our style of democracy at work. T-shirts fit nearly every budget ($2 to $20-something) and every body shape (munchkin to nose tackle). They crop up in the wardrobes of celebrities and your great aunt's musty closet. They say everything, from the earnestness of the official "Gore/Lieberman 2000" T-shirts, to the cheekiness of the one that diminutive Fantasy Island star Herve Villechaize posed in--a shirt that read "Grow."
These days, the T-shirt is handy for a lot more than covering wanton chest hairs. For one thing, they are unrivaled as the catchall gift. T-shirts tattooed with the names of places sell particularly well, Peterman notes--after all, there is nothing easier to buy for the folks at home. They fill up every tourist shop from New York to the Great Mystery Spot, and they don't break, leak, or spoil in a suitcase. (Buying T-shirts as gifts or mementos is so much a part of American culture that scholar T. Bettina Cornwell has called them our equivalent to the tribal practice of taking scalps.) Plus, if Junior doesn't want to wear the T-shirt as a fashion statement, he can use it to wash the car.
Besides its usefulness as a gift, a T-shirt can also be a sexy piece
of clothing. Women's T-shirts are smaller and thinner than men's--the
better to enhance the curves. If the oversized T-shirts of the eighties
seemed to neuter most wearers, the advent of
lycra
has made T-shirts into showcases for society's buffer chests. Even when
the clothing itself doesn't have sex appeal, the slogan it flaunts can
help raise the wearer's profile. At Aussie Outfitters, one of the best
sellers was a T-shirt with a picture of a sperm wriggling on front and
the words "Natural Born Swimmer" on back. Another popular shirt said "Porn
Star" (presumably worn for ironic effect). Yes, having a witty T-shirt
can even improve your sex life:
Cornwell calls T-shirts "polycotton pheromones" because they act as portable conversation
pieces--healthier than asking for a light.
Wear your heart on your short-sleeve
Democracy with a T