為什么維多利亞時代的小男孩都穿裙子？

It has been said that clothes make the man. Whether this is true or not is irrelevant, but the fact remains that we, as a society, are all aware that appearance is everything; it’s the first thing most people notice when looking at someone. Unknowingly, more often than we care to admit, we judge people by what they wear or how they look. It’s in our nature and there’s nothing we can do about it. In a way, it’s a sort of an unwritten rule: if you want to make a killer first impression, you’ve got to look good.

俗話說，人靠衣裝。無論這話正確與否，我們都知道，這是個樣貌決定一切的社會。不知不覺間，我們會通過衣著或樣貌來判斷一個人——雖然很多時候，人們不愿意承認這點。這是人類的天性，我們對此無能為力。在某種程度上，這是條不成文的法則：如果你希望給人留下良好的第一印象，就必須擁有好看的外表。

When it comes to clothing in general, most of us remain confined by the norms and principles that define our gender. It’s a distinction made in the broadest spectrum possible. For instance, we often make those stereotypical color associations that relate to gender (blue for boys, pink for girls), or we identify certain kind of clothing as suitable for men or women.

在衣著方面，大多數人都受限于性別規(guī)范。舉例而言：男性穿藍色、女性穿粉色;只有女性才能穿裙子……

In order to maintain these strict social rules, many would sacrifice their comfort to appease their sex. Just think about it, wearing a dress is absolutely more comfortable than wearing, let’s say, jeans. But, for all of us “true” men, that would be quite shocking because we are not prepared to lose our “macho” image over a dress. However, if you were a baby boy in the 19th century you could have easily ended up wearing a dress and that wouldn’t be weird in any way. On the contrary, that was a common practice.

為了遵守嚴格的社會規(guī)則，人們會犧牲舒適度，以符合性別角色。想想看，穿裙子顯然比穿牛仔褲舒服。然而，“男子漢”們可不愿意因為穿裙子而失掉“男子氣概”。不過，如果你生活在十九世紀的維多利亞時代，那么小男孩穿裙子是再平常不過的事情了。

Not to get confused, the patriarch system was the norm in the Victorian era and gender roles were extremely polarized. However, young children were left out of the equation. According to most accounts, pictures, and photos, up until the age of seven, gender was apparently not something that parents paid much attention to. The clothes worn by boys and girls were nearly identical, indistinguishable from one another.

別誤會。在維多利亞時代，父權體系才是社會規(guī)范，性別角色兩極分化嚴重，但小孩子除外。根據大部分記載、繪畫、照片：在7歲以前，父母不會注意孩子的性別。小男孩和小女孩穿的衣服幾乎一模一樣，兩者不存在明顯差異。

Chances are great that you’ve accidentally stumbled upon an image of a Victorian-era toddler boy wearing a dress, you’ve probably mistaken it for a girl. Even some of the most famous individuals of the 20th century, including Ernest Hemingway and Franklin D. Roosevelt, had their picture taken wearing white skirts that were considered gender-neutral for the time period.

偶然看到一幅維多利亞時代的繪畫時，你很可能會把圖中穿裙子的小男孩誤認成小女孩。即便是在二十世紀，一些著名人物(包括歐內斯特·海明威、富蘭克林·羅斯福)也曾拍過身穿白色裙子的照片——當時，那類裙子被視為中性著裝。

Many people would find this practice peculiar today and perceive it as feminine, but the explanation behind why this was done the way it was is very simple and it is due to pragmatic reasons.

如今，很多人會覺得男孩穿裙子很奇怪，認為這種行為太過女性化。但其實，小男孩穿裙子的原因很簡單——為了實用。

Imagine being a parent in an era when zippers and snaps were yet to be invented and the pants that were available were too complicated and had too many accessories, which made it almost impossible for a small boy to put them on all by himself. What would you do? One alternative would be to dress your toddler boy by yourself, spending quite some time doing it. But Victorian-era parents had another method and frankly, it was much more effective.

那時候，拉鏈和紐扣尚未發(fā)明，褲子樣式復雜、配飾太多，小孩子幾乎不可能自己穿褲子。如果身為父母，你會怎么做?你可以選擇花時間手把手替孩子穿褲子。但在維多利亞時代，父母有更高效的解決辦法——給孩子穿裙子。

Dressing boy toddlers in dresses made the process of potty training significantly easier and much more flexible. Parents were able to change the toddler’s diapers without the need of undressing them. Just lifting their skirts up would suffice. Additionally, the flexibility of the dresses allowed them to be worn from infancy to about age six or seven.

這樣一來，事情輕松多了——孩子不用脫褲子，就可以上廁所;家長不用替孩子脫褲子，就可以換尿布。裙子非常方便，孩子可以從嬰兒期一直穿到六七歲。