Property of...the One Behind the Writing
Arguably the most challenging duty of a university’s administration is directly related to the group of students they serve. This task, neither mundane nor inconsequential, is to arouse and then foster a true sense of unity within all the student community. This duty is essential in nature yet befuddling when it comes to practical execution attempts. As colleges search for effective solutions to this challenge, many have discovered that students who don “spirit wear” seem to feel “blended-in” among the rest of the students body. In response to this tendency, colleges and universities mass-produce their school’s name on the fronts, backs, hoods, and tops of hundreds of “spirit-wear” clothing items. By making these products readily available to their students, administrators accomplish their goal of fostering a sense of unity in the student body.
Though spirit tees and school apparel have proven effective in blending and unifying student bodies, I have discovered that individualism and personal identity are sacrificed in the long-run, by plastering redundant phrases and mass-produced words onto articles of clothing.
Recent events of my life prove this assertion to be true.
Of the various envelopes and random parcels that Case Western Reserve University sent to my home this past summer, one in particular ranks amongst the most memorable. This parcel contained a most generous gift from the University, a t-shirt which bore the Case logo and the proud words: Case Western Reserve University - Weatherhead School of Management. After reading and then rereading the eye-catching phrase, I instinctively exclaimed, “Now I can blend right in at Case.” No sooner had those words tumbled forth then a mild suspicion seized control of my thoughts: and they sent me this because… my voice trailed off. Though unbeknownst to me at the time, that shirt marked the beginning of a proud line of complementary CASE t-shirts.
New additions to my collection of complementary “blend-right-in” CASE shirts were added about a month later, during the dazzling days of Welcome Week.
The chief goal of Welcome Week aligns with the aforementioned duty of college administrators: to build community and foster a sense of unity within the student body. In this case, the entering class were the ones who needed serious unifying. To serve this end, each member of the incoming class was given two shirts. On the first shirt was printed the theme of our Freshman Orientation session, “CASE MARKS THE SPOT.” The second, the “residential college” shirt, was styled to match the color and crest of CASE’s four residential colleges. Though the color and back panel varied slightly between the four styles, all bore the common, unifying phrase: “CWRU 2007-2008.” As Welcome Days progressed, it became apparent that our matching shirts, each echoing phrases of comforting sameness, made it possible to really grasp our visible unity. At a time when everyone around you was a total stranger, it gave some comfort to find one element of familiarity in a crowd of diverse personalities, even if that element happened to be a mass-produced passage plastered on a shirt.
We carried those feelings of familiarity and unity beyond Welcome Days and into the new year.
During the first week of classes, a surprising number of freshman elected to wear our complementary “class t-shirts” around campus. As I trekked from class to class the familiar words, “CWRU 2007-2008” or “CASE MARKS THE SPOT,” passed me time and time again, and each time my eyes were immediately drawn to the words that had brought our class into such indefatigable unanimity and sameness. However, after several days’ time I realized that during all those fleeting moments in passing, I had been ignoring the people on whose bodies those words were displayed. I had allowed people to pass without acknowledgement, for all I saw were the printed words.
I had lumped every single one of my classmates, my friends, into mass-produced phrases. Their personal identity was lost, overshadowed by the printed words on their shirts.
This pitiable state of affairs extends beyond the bounds of the freshman class.
Every nonchalant schlep through the Case quad opens my eyes to the growing numbers of students who sport Case apparel. Whether their motivation flows from group affiliation or from an abundant store of school spirit, it has become apparent that many Case students opt to sacrifice individualism and personal identity to display the “Fat Man” and the CWRU name. Just as my eyes were drawn to the phrase “CWRU 2007-2008” with no consideration for the person behind those words, so other eyes can easily be drawn to the Case name printed so cleanly on a students’ clothes. Will those eyes see the student for the uniqueness of his identity, or will they only see him as a vertical representation of a unified student body, the name of which being plastered across his body?
Must a sense of unity leave students without their own unique, personal identity?
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