Are five hours of queue needed for a graduation dress?

It might seem that as societies modernize they tend to gradually shed inherited rituals laden with formality. Current times, increasingly oriented towards practicality and immediacy, have refined many social ceremonies that today seem excessively solemn: from the rigor of wearing mourning clothes to the protocols associated with baptisms or communions. However, from time to time, rituals emerge that, like stubborn salmon swimming against the current, not only survive but reappear hypertrophied, clad in a ceremonial that they did not even have in the past. This is the case with graduations. The turn is so unexpected that there are already specialized brands in this festive-academic niche and teenagers capable of patiently waiting five hours in line to get the outfit with which to publicly stage that they have finished the fourth year of ESO.

The origin of graduation ceremonies is medieval. Linked to institutions like the University of Bologna or Paris, they served to certify knowledge that allowed entry into a community of learning. An origin that might make us think that it is the value of education that motivates these girls today. But “Ay miserable of me, and ay, unhappy!”, lamented poor Segismundo when he confused reality with mirage. These ceremonies, rather than celebrating acquired competencies, have taken root strongly in the so lucrative and commercially exploitable field of social signification.

These parties, with obvious references to American high school movie graduations, have been fully absorbed by visual and consumer culture. Turned into highly mediatized events, image –photographs, videos, social networks– is central and fuels an entire industry around them. And clothing plays a leading role. While boys tend towards the tailored suit, similar to the wedding cake topper, girls, subjected to much more pronounced aesthetic pressure, opt for an image that in no case responds to current trends. Long, satin, monochrome dresses, elaborate makeup, and high heels seek to combine two apparently opposite poles: conservatism and sexualization. And to the indisputable long dress are added pronounced necklines and side slits from which the leg emerges and the now classic Angelina Jolie pose.

Dresses that clearly impose premature adultification and function as a kind of social debut, almost evoking ancient rituals of presentation to society. Celebrations that have become rites of passage into maturity, which would not present a major problem if they were confined to the end of compulsory secondary education, but which are already extending to other school moments, such as the end of primary school. In increasingly individualized societies, these rituals act as collective reference points. The problem arises when rites of passage are imposed where there is no real passage yet, instead of respecting each person's natural maturation rhythms.

Beyond the logic of celebrity culture, which turns these parties into small red carpets, class dynamics dominate a large part of these “celebrations of education”. In a context where not everyone can afford the same level of spending, what should be a shared ritual can end up becoming, clearly, a space for class differentiation. In the case of young people, this differentiation often comes through the desire to dress projecting the image that neoliberal thought has drawn as a successful adult: formal, elegant, and sophisticated. And in the case of children, too often they end up becoming the vehicle for a parental need to project, onto sons and daughters dressed as mini wedding guests, frustrated longings for social advancement.