Disrobed In the Public Square – Urbanscapes 2008
Denison University First Year Program
Jeff Gill

Oxford is home to the original “Town and Gown” controversy.

From the 11th century roots of English college life, students were semi-monastic participants in religious life, so like monks and brothers in most monasteries, they wore robes that marked them as part of an intentional community.

Even as academic colleges grew more and more distinct from their monastic and seminary origins, the robes and hoods remained both useful and decorative in the vast drafty cathedral-like buildings, their uniformity across the quadrangles and cloisters mixing with the subtle flash of brightly colored linings, marking which school or institution was their scholastic home.

The rights and privileges carried by monastic establishments in the medieval period continued under royal charters that usually gave them exemptions from local authority. Local court jurisdiction and the ability to penalize students and faculty were limited, leading to growing resentments of people “who aren’t from here” by the folks who grew up and worked around the college precincts.

“Town and Gown” may rhyme, but they once were put together mainly to describe the two sides in street riots, conflicts that included death and dismemberment in medieval Oxford. The gowns slowly eroded into the 20th century as the style became more of a symbol, until the 1960s when the obligatory wearing of the short remnant robe was ended.

Today’s students at a Denison don’t wear any kind of academic robe other than at graduation, with faculty (some) wearing regalia (partially) at certain campus events through the year (occasionally). In the village, students once may have been quickly and readily recognizable by their style of dress, even if not a uniform garb, but no longer.

Clothing that a college student would wear is just as likely to be seen on a Granville grandmother or traveling tourist at a sidewalk café; the uniform of non-conformity is widely adopted, so the ability of any one person to spot another person from a distance and think “college student” is non-existent. A local high school kid, a young adult from a neighboring town on an errand, or an entrepreneur between conference calls can all be in similar clothing.

If everyone is dressed the same in the public square, then we have equality and collegiality, right? Recent concerns and questions lead us to shake our heads “no.” The distinctions between classes and cohorts may have visually narrowed, but the knowledge that inequalities and injustices still exist in economic opportunity and social mobility leads to an ever more careful parsing of glances and intonations. How much weight can “a look” carry? When other means of non-verbal communications are limited, quite a bit.

How we look at how people look at us is also framed in our assumptions about what they are likely to think about us. Sensitivities about what we wear are no longer rooted in whether we have a tie or a dress on, or if we are in our “dress clothes” or “work clothes.” There is less today for others to be “looking at,” focusing now on our faces, our skin, our own gaze back at them. This can be a vulnerable way to feel looked at, more personal than assumptions about “you’re a worker,” “you are wealthy,” “you are out of place.”

Granville has long wanted to be seen as a place where “all are welcome.” In such a location, no one would be “out of place.” With rapid population growth in the surrounding area along with increased tourism bringing many new faces to the streetscape and public square, there is going to be a certain amount of “visual sorting” going on no matter how welcoming the village may be.

“Do I know you? Are you someone I’ve met? Do I need to greet you, or can I keep moving?” These are questions that come to mind in a public social activity, propped up by social conventions like the Midwestern “hello” to strangers or the Northeastern “never make eye contact with strangers” assumption. Clothing and accessories used to be social lubricants, allowing the Town and Gown to slide easily past each other without a glance, friendly or not.

Those markers and signals are gone, and a certain uneasiness is all that remains in their place. Direct communication, personal relationship – those would be the gold standard, the ideal for building community and weaving together the streetscape at the foot of College Hill. TV time and commuting and technology have so far only worked against adding more interaction between students and staff and faculty and the residents of Granville.

Town and Gown may have more need of community with less obvious distinction separating them, since they do have different schedules and timetables and priorities in many ways. Understanding what has changed, even just about how those two aspects of our village see each other, may help us envision what we need to do to see each other afresh – then we might be better able to make the intentional effort to relate.