Design, Technology, and Identity: How a School Subject Reflects Our Times
Excerpt of an extended article ‘‘Unstitching the Seamstress Stereotype: Can boys Tailor a New Narrative?’’
What shapes a student’s subject preferences the most?
Is it their teachers or their friends? Their family or community? Or perhaps the culture they grow up in?
More importantly, who truly has the student’s best interests at heart — and what influences are steering their future?
As a Design and Technology teacher with a growing passion for Textiles, I became curious about how this subject’s popularity has shifted over time. My exploration led me through its history and the many forces that have shaped it — from changes in the National Curriculum and evolving societal needs to economic pressures, teacher advocacy, England’s industrial rise and fall, and the roles of femininity, feminism, and domestic education.
In 2017, textiles was the least popular mainstream GCSE option in England. According to a 2017 report published by Cambridge Assessment, Art, Design and Technology had 1.1% of students taking it, and Design and Technology (Textiles) had 3.2% of students taking it at GCSE (Carroll & Gill, 2018, as cited in Solomka, 2019).
Social popularity and hierarchy undoubtedly influence the positive and negative opinions surrounding textiles, much of which occurs within school environments, among male and female social groups, and within micro-environments such as friendship circles where opinions spread through word of mouth. On a larger scale, the wider societal and political view of the National Curriculum has also proven to be a significant factor.
Inevitably, the National Curriculum has changed and developed depending on the country’s needs and the government’s priorities. However, these changes have occurred disproportionately in relation to Design and Technology (D&T). As a result, a lack of consistency has created a blurred perception of the subject’s importance and place in education and professional practice.
History shows that Design and Technology emerged from a complex interplay of societal needs, economic pressures, and educational philosophies, tracing its roots through several related subjects including craft, design, technology, home economics, and technical drawing. Each of these areas had its own distinct content with some overlap, as demonstrated in the Curriculum Matters publications (Hardy, 2024).
Design and Technology has evolved alongside society. Emerging from five distinct subjects, each with unique content, it is one of the few subjects to have alternated between gendered and non-gendered curricula over time, incorporating practical, manual, and technical components.
The creation of Design and Technology as a new subject involved combining Craft, Design and Technology (CDT) with Home Economics (HE). The unification of CDT and HE into D&T took place during the late 1980s, following the introduction of the National Curriculum under the 1988 Education Reform Act. This reform formally established D&T as a compulsory subject in schools across England and Wales, integrating elements of CDT and HE into a single framework (Department of Education and Science, 1988).This process proved challenging as it required renaming and reorganizing existing material areas (Hardy, 2024). The merger was not straightforward, largely due to teachers’ strong loyalties to their original subject areas. CDT and HE teachers felt their professional identities were threatened by the change, which affected their commitment to the new D&T curriculum (Paechter, 1995a, 1995b).
A notable outcome was that some HE teachers retreated into their previous subject subcultures rather than fully adopting the new D&T identity. This subcultural retreat was largely attributed to the gendered nature of CDT and HE (Rutland, 2017; Paechter, 2003). Although combining these subjects was intended to create a more gender-neutral D&T curriculum (Paechter, 1993), neither the government nor subject associations adequately addressed the subcultures of HE and CDT. This oversight led to local conflicts and implementation challenges within the D&T curriculum (Paechter, 1995b).
Both the 1904 Regulations and the 1913 Acland Report endorsed a gendered curriculum. Historically, girls were taught skills for domestic service, while boys were trained for manual labour (Hardy, 2024). These distinctions were reflected in gendered subjects such as housewifery and manual work (Hardy, 2024). Heggie (2011, as cited in Hardy, 2024) argued that this form of domestic education sought to address the “servant problem” and to impose a socially engineered, idealised femininity in which girls were trained to manage households.
Meanwhile, since the mid-1800s, there had been increasing efforts to include practical, manual, and technical education in schools as a response to England’s perceived industrial decline (Penfold, 1988). The intention was to shape vocational education by training boys in craft skills and girls in domestic skills (Hardy, 2024).
Second-wave feminism (1960s–1980s) later challenged this gendered approach, criticising the focus on dressmaking and sewing as symbols of female oppression (Bain, 2016). Despite the decline in popularity during that period, dressmaking has seen a resurgence in recent years, with the rise of haberdasheries, sewing blogs, and craft websites (Burt, 2011; Dunk, 2009; Holson, 2012; Paul, 2013; Pithers, 2013). However, some women who enjoy fashion face pressure because it is not always considered a feminist pastime (Corner, 2015, p. 36; as cited in Solomka, 2019).
Bain’s (2016, as cited in Solomka, 2019) interviews with feminist sewers highlighted this tension. One participant, from Erin Seamstress Designs, stated:
“As if sewing is easy and designing patterns doesn’t take math, engineering, spatial abilities, and so many other ‘masculine’ skills” (p. 61).
Ultimately, Design and Technology evolved into a subject aiming to prepare all students for life in a technological society (Hardy, 2024). Between 1984 and 1989, a series of Curriculum Matters booklets were published, building on Callaghan’s speech, and notably did not separate aims by gender (Hardy, 2024). Home Economics outlined its role in education, emphasizing that its primary aim was to:
Help prepare boys and girls for important aspects of everyday living and the responsibilities of family life (Hardy, 2024).
HE was organised into three main areas: home and family, nutrition and food, and textiles. Gillard (2016) suggested that these publications laid the groundwork for the National Curriculum.
References
Bain, J. (2016). Feminist fabric: Fashion, craft and politics.
Burt, C. (2011). Sewing for pleasure: Contemporary crafting and creativity.
Carroll, M., & Gill, T. (2018). Gender differences in participation and attainment in GCSE.
Corner, F. (2015). Why fashion matters.
Department of Education and Science. (1988). National Curriculum: Design and Technology working group interim report.
Dunk, A. (2009). Stitch and resist: Feminism and contemporary craft.
Gillard, D. (2016). Education in England: A history.
Hardy, A. (2024). Design and technology: A contested history.
Heggie, V. (2011). Domesticity and education: Household skills and gender roles in 20th-century Britain.
Holson, L. (2012). The new domesticity: Why sewing is making a comeback.
Paechter, C. (1993). Learning processes in design and technology.
Paechter, C. (1995a). Subcultural retreat: Negotiating the design and technology curriculum.
Paechter, C. (1995b). The effect of subcultural retreat on subject implementation.
Paechter, C. (2003). Learning masculinities and femininities.
Paul, S. (2013). Crafting resistance: Sewing, feminism, and identity.
Penfold, P. (1988). Vocational education in Britain: Policy and practice since 1850.
Pithers, L. (2013). The stitch revolution: Sewing in the 21st century.
Rutland, M. (2017). Design and technology education: A gendered history.
Solomka, J. (2019). Gender, identity and subject choice in textiles education (PhD thesis).