DISCO TROUSERS

My paper on the disco spandex pant is up for publication this summer in a book entitled "Fashion Forward: Selected Papers from the First Global Conference on Fashion" published by Inter-Disciplinary Press in Oxford. Whoohoo! As I elaborate my discussion for the book, I am considering altering the title to describe spandex "trousers" rather than spandex "pants." The term pants is most often used in Canada, South America and the U.S. to describe those below the waist leg coverings, with the word trousers used primarily to describe a more formal, tailored garment with a waistband, belt loops and fly front. In Australia the words pants and trousers are synonymous. However, in most parts of the United Kingdom and Ireland, trouser is the general category term and pants refer to underwear. As this is to be published and distributed in England with additional worldwide distribution, perhaps it would be wise to accommodate the British use of the term and not confuse readers that may think I conducted research on disco spandex underwear. Just sayin'.

The use of the word trousers in this case is also of note because it has associations with the emergence of designer jeans in the late 1970s, which were so desirable and exclusive they could fit in nicely with that American definition of the trouser. In these television commercials from the period, form fitting designer jeans are associated with action and adventure (as in the Bonjour Jeans ad) and aim to fit you "like you had em painted on" inspiring the illicit touch of a handsome lover (Jou Jou jeans). Top image: Lauren Hutton shot by Richard Avedon for Vogue, 1978, wearing a version of the disco trouser in black leather.