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Target Lesson: Analyzing the Author’s Point of View with “Serena Williams’
catsuit controversy evokes the battle over women wearing shorts”
PART 1: Gallery Walk
Directions: Look at the images and answer the writing warm-up questions.

Over the past 120 years, women’s athletic fashion has changed Female tennis players from 2017.
quite a bit. Today, you’ll learn about the changing attitudes toward
women’s fashion in tennis in particular.

Female tennis players from 1907.

"2017 Sierra College Women's Tennis" by Matthew Folsom is licensed

under the CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 license.

What do you notice about how female

“Italian Tenniswomen in 1907” by Unknown author is part of the Public Domain.
athletic clothing has changed?

Female tennis players from 1926. Why do you think female athletic fashion has
changed so much?

Take three minutes to jot down your ideas.

“Group of four female players at the nets, ca. 1926, by Sam Hood” from the collection of the
State Library of New South Wales has no known copyright restrictions.

Female tennis players from 1944.

“Waiting to go on to the tennis court under summer skies” by Robert Bruce from the Australian
War Memorial collection has no known copyright restrictions.

Analyzing the Author’s Point of View: Serena Williams’ catsuit controversy evokes the battle over women wearing shorts 1
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PART 2: Today’s Target - Analyzing the Author’s Point of View

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PART 3: Reading and Questions
Directions: Read the text and answer the questions.

Serena Williams’ catsuit controversy evokes the battle over

women wearing shorts
by Deirdre Clemente

[1] At the French Open, Serena Williams wore a custom-made black catsuit. On Aug. Paragraphs 1 - 2
24, the president of the French Tennis Federation said the outfit “wouldn’t be back.” 1. In paragraph 2, the author writes
It “went too far,” he continued. It didn’t “respect the game and the place.” “female athletes face more scrutiny
and are held to outdated dress
[2] Among Williams’ defenders, the pushback was swift — the decision indicative of
standards.”
how female athletes face more scrutiny1 and are held to outdated dress standards.
What do the bolded words suggest
[3] As a historian of the American fashion industry, I’m not surprised when an outfit
about the author’s point of view
worn by a female athlete generates outrage. I thought of Suzanne Lenglen, the
toward Serena Williams’ treatment?
French tennis star of the late 1910s who shocked onlookers with her knee-length
tennis dress. Coincidentally, Stade Roland Garros, the stadium where Serena wore A. It was expected, but also unfair.
her suit during the French Open, has a court named after Lenglen.
B. It was deserved, but too
[4] This is simply the most recent chapter of a century long debate over the place of forgiving.
informality and immodesty in our dress: how short can that skirt be? Should the first
C. It was insignificant, but also
lady be able to don a tank top? What about wearing sneakers to prom?
popular.
[5] Sportswear, which can be both informal and immodest, has served as a
D. It was confusing, but too
flashpoint2 in these debates — particularly for women.
sympathetic.
[6] In 1936, a sportswriter named Paul Gallico argued that female athletes and their
clothing were offensive.
Paragraphs 3 - 4
[7] Women who play sports, he wrote, “stick out places when they play, wear funny
2. How does the author use the
clothes, get out of breath or perspire.” He didn’t like that because “it’s a lady’s
example of Suzanne Lenglen to reveal
business to look beautiful, and there are hardly any sports in which she seems able
her point of view?
to do it.”
[8] Nothing, it seemed, upset people more than women in shorts. Starting in the late
Complete the sentence starter in the
1920s, shorts became the much-contested replacement for bloomers, the
space below: The example of Suzanne
puffy-legged, bifurcated3 garment worn under long skirts. Women who did wear
Lenglen reveals the author’s point of
athletic garb were supposed to keep out of the public eye because it was deemed
view that women athletes…
unfeminine and, yes, immodest.
[9] Female tennis players were on the frontlines of the battle for public acceptance
________________________________
of shorts. Even though tennis industry officials and country club muckety mucks
wrote dress codes that outlawed shorts, many women refused to adhere to the rules ________________________________
and continued showing up to play wearing them.
________________________________
[10] Some were thrown off the courts. But it’s hard to enforce dress codes when
________________________________
everybody’s doing it.
________________________________
[11] Not surprisingly, this really rankled4 the old guard.5

1
Scrutiny (noun): critical observation or examination
2
a place, event, or time at which trouble starts
3
divided in two parts
4
Rankle (verb): to cause persistent annoyance or resentment
5
the original or long-standing members of a group who are reluctant to accept change

Analyzing the Author’s Point of View: Serena Williams’ catsuit controversy evokes the battle over women wearing shorts 3
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[12] “If you gals really knew how cute you look in a well-cut dress, you wouldn’t Paragraphs 5 - 13
hanker to wear shorts,” one etiquette writer grumbled in the 1936 book,
3. A "muckety muck" is someone who is
“Co-Ediquette: Poise and Popularity for Every Girl.” “Of course, you’ve got to be
arrogant, or thinks they are very
comfortable, ah, me! Even if you have to insult the aesthetic sense of men to do it?”
important.
[13] Most women shrugged — and kept on wearing shorts, on and off the court.
What does this word choice in
[14] In time, shorts as hiking wear, shorts as gardening garb and shorts as paragraph 9 reveal about the author’s
loungewear became increasingly common. It seems the old guard had been worn point of view?
down — or simply died off.
[15] By the end of the 1930s, younger women were acknowledging a shift in
________________________________
attitudes. “American women live 24 hours a day in sports clothes,” one college
student told the Boston Post. “Husbands no longer come home and deliver stern ________________________________
lectures upon finding their wives cooking supper in shorts. It’s just taken for
________________________________
granted.”
________________________________
[16] While some husbands may have skipped the stern lectures, it took three more
decades for shorts to fully reach widespread acceptance. ________________________________
[17] But in tennis, notions of immodesty and informality die hard. When female ________________________________
tennis players such as Billie Jean King wore very short, gored skirts6 and sleeveless
________________________________
polo shirts in the 1970s, they were criticized for their “radical” outfits. Time and
again, the powers-that-be in tennis push back on immodesty, and the players push ________________________________
forward towards personal choice and — dare we say — personal style.
________________________________
[18] So, we’ve seen this all before. New stuff — never-seen-before stuff — has long
spelled trouble for female athletes and sparked public outcry.
[19] Today, the sartorial7 standards of what you can and can’t wear in certain settings Paragraphs 17 - 19
have changed so radically that institutions can’t keep up. You almost feel sorry for
4. How do paragraphs 17-19 develop
the French official who announced the ban on the catsuit. In the big picture, he
the author’s point of view
won’t do anything to stop the crawl of social change.
[20] And how did Serena Williams respond to being chastised for wearing her black
catsuit? ________________________________
[21] She simply showed up a few days later to win U.S. Open matches wearing a tulle ________________________________
tutu.
________________________________
________________________________
Serena Williams' catsuit controversy evokes the battle over women wearing shorts by Deirdre
Clemente, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, September 5, 2018. Copyright (c) The Conversation ________________________________
2018, CC-BY-ND. ________________________________
________________________________
________________________________
________________________________

6
a style of folded skirt
7
related to clothing or style of dress

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PART 4: Assessment
Directions: Answer the questions.

1. Which sentence best describes the author’s point of view about women’s athletic dress codes?

A. Women athletes should conform to society’s fashion expectations.

B. Criticism of women’s athletic fashion does not stop eventual change.
C. Men use harsh dress codes to ensure they don’t have to compete against women.
D. Women who participate in athletics should be judged differently than women who don’t.

2. What message do you think it sends to athletes when more attention is paid to what they're wearing than to
how they're playing? Use text evidence and your own experience to support your response.

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