Great hair, great dresses, and great expectations. The prom has long functioned as a rite of
passage for American teenagers as they act out fantasies of a (generally unattainable)
adult ideal. But outside of being the center of a ton of teenage dreams, prom is also big
business. Money magazine cites a 2015 Visa survey as reporting that the American family
spends an average of $919 per student attending prom.
Why might American families fork over so much for just one night? Well, today, we’ll discuss
where we got this funny little word from, how a high school party evolved into a teenage
gateway to adult life, and why filmmakers love to make prom movies that critique American
culture.
So first a little background on the word. The word prom is short for promenade, a French
term used to describe a leisurely walk or the spaces in which this walk might take place.
The word “promenade” also describes various dance positions (for example, promenade your
partn’r is a staple of American square dancing). But by the late 19th century, prom started
to be used to describe a formal dance at a school.
A 2014 article in Slate charts the frequency of prom-related words in English texts. In
the first half of the 20th century, prom was most used to designate a cotillion-style ball.
During the 1960s and 1970s, prom-related terminology appeared less frequently, which the article
postulates was because more pressing issues, including the Vietnam War and the counterculture
movement, were on teenagers’ minds. In the 1980s, usage increased, but shifted from designating
a simple dance to describing a big school blow out. Blow outs: not just for hair. But
how did prom become such a critical “rite of passage” into American adulthood?
Let’s start by clarifying the phrase “rites of passage.” The ethnographer, Arnold van
Gennep, coined this in 1909 to describe a ceremony marking an individual’s transition
from one social (or religious) status to another. van Gennep maintained that a “rite of passage”
has three stages.
The first involves preliminal events--separation from family, breaking with routine, leaving
something behind. The second involves liminal activities--a choreographed transition, during
which an element of one’s identity is destroyed to make room for something new. The third
involves postliminal proceedings--the changed individual is reincorporated into society.
In pre-industrial societies, religious coming-of-age rites often coincided with the onset of puberty.
During the Jewish bar or bat mitzvah, a 12- to 13-year old transitions to adulthood. And
at around 14-years old, Roman Catholic children are considered old enough to understand the
challenges of living a Christian life and are “confirmed.”
Today these ceremonies (along with others from diverse religious and cultural traditions)
remain important to many Americans. However they occur long before a child obtains legal
adult status in America (being allowed to drive, marry, own property, buy alcohol and
tobacco, enter military service, and vote). And if you want more on 18-year old as adult
then check out our video. But, given that proms occur closer to this legal coming-of-age,
for some this party functions as a secular rite of passage.
A key element of the American prom fantasy is that the individual can transcend class
boundaries for one magical night. Sociologist Amy Best explains that the expansion of American
public schools during the late 19th- and early 20th- centuries gave more working-class children
access to formal education. They also had the chance to attend the kind of formal dances
that were once only the provenance of the wealthy. She writes that prom became a “‘popularized’
debutante ball” that allowed “anyone attending high school the opportunity to feel as though
they too were ‘coming out’” like Dianna Ross. American filmmakers have long been drawn
to this fantasy of social mobility.
Cinematic representations of prom can provide great insight into broader social attitudes
within a culture. And many filmmakers reproduce van Gennep’s three “rites of passage”
stages in a film formula that you’ll recognize.
Stage 1: A teenager enacts the “death” of their childhood self. They distance themselves
emotionally from their family. They engage in a performance of “adult” roles (make-up;
hair; prom king, queen, or tricked out outfits). They give and wear flowers. They leave their
childhood home in a fantasy vehicle which maybe has a hot tub on the back. Stage 2:
In the liminal space of prom, the teenager is tested. They may get involved in a fight
or (BETTER YET!) a dance-off. They navigate peer pressure. They decide whether to try
various mind- (or mood-) altering substances. They deflect or initiate sexual advances.
In short, they scrutinize adult culture and determine who they hope to be within it. Stage
3: The new adult is incorporated into society. If the prom takes place in the film’s penultimate
scene, this might involve busting out some “adult” dance moves or engaging in a very
“adult” kiss.
What makes these formulaic prom scenes interesting is the degree to which filmmakers use them
to foreground what is wrong with the adult society into which the teenager hopes to emerge.
Take one of the earliest prom scenes in American film: Frank Capra’s 1946 classic, It’s
a Wonderful Life. George Bailey has been working for his father for four years, saving money
for college. He reconnects with 18-year old Mary at the 1928 Bedford Falls high school
graduation dance (aka his younger brother’s prom). George and Mary expertly dance the
Charleston on a stage built above a pool, fall in the water, and continue dancing. George
(in oversized pants) walks home Mary (in a bathrobe). Later that night, George’s father
has a stroke. George will manage his father’s business through the Great Depression (and
his own), and give his tuition money to his brother, and marry Mary. The prom marks George’s
transition from youthful idealism into a nuanced and complex adulthood.
Another film that uses a scene about prom to comment on American society is Grease,
the 1978 film, based on the musical by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey. Grease portrays a
romanticized fantasy version of 1950s America in which class and gender roles seem clear.
But the film is shot through the lens of the more chaotic 1970s, when these class and gender
were as hectic as a hand jive. Film scholar Barbara Jane Brickman argues that the 1960s
and 1970s were marked by a series of, quote, “cultural earthquakes [….] The pill had
become widely available and contributed to a sexual revolution; the youth revolts, countercultural
movements, political upheaval, and Vietnam nightmare of the 1960s had changed the country
forever; the civil rights, women’s rights, and gay rights movements had worked to redefine
identity and equality under the law; and the political and economic crises of the early
1970s decimated trust in traditional authorities and national mythologies.”
For this reason, there was a surge in nostalgia for an imagined version of the 1950s. Grease
aestheticizes those standard prom clichés (the outfits, the rides, the decorated gym!).
But it also represents a buttoned up 1950s style prom on the brink of implosion. Our
secondary hero Kenickie is on the verge of fisticuffs with Craterface Balmudo over Rizzo.
Dance battles threaten to end in violence and teen promiscuity. So it’s less corsages
and punch, and more condoms and punches. But ultimately the masculine violence onscreen
is more about fixing the curl in the front of your pompadour, and dance offs, than it
is about any real physical threat.
Brickman explains that in her view, Grease portrays the male idol with so much irony
that it actually undermines its force. Grease presents the 1950s prom as a campy, nostalgic
performance. It openly mocks the idea that prom is a legitimate “rite of passage”
and it draws attention to the toxicity of the vision of masculinity that the rituals
associated with prom seem to promote.
Much as the term prom had a resurgence in texts during the 1980s, prom scenes appeared
quite frequently in major films during this decade. However, prom scenes in some of the
major films of this era did less to provide cultural criticism than to reinforce some
of the more material values of capitalist America.
Consider this 1980s prom epic by teen movie machine John Hughes: Pretty in Pink starring
80s idol Molly Ringwald. After Andie transitions to adulthood at her prom, the film closes
as Andie and her rich crush Blane make out in the parking lot to OMD’s “If You Leave.”
In this scene, Hughes suggests that Andie achieves adult status by retaining the option
to ride home in Blane’s BMW. Rather than critique a classist and materialist subset
of American culture, this film actually endorses its values. So if previous prom movies were
about growing up, finding love, and moving on, then the 1980s spin on these movies was
growing up, finding love, and moving on...in a better car than the one you showed up in.
Bye Bye Duckie, hello Blane. Get outta her dreams and into his car.
Of course, even these more precarious prom fantasies are not accessible to all American
teens. In Georgia, some towns still debate whether to desegregate graduation parties
and the town of Charleston, Mississippi waited until 2008 to accept the actor Morgan Freeman’s
1997 offer to finance an integrated prom. Proms also can alienate those who do not conform
to the heteronormative paradigm. Some schools still cite policies banning same-sex couples,
despite the 1980 ruling by the US District Court in Rhode Island (the case of Fricke
v. Lynch), which upheld a gay student’s right to have a same-sex date at a school
dance.
And media representations of prom are also evolving. Take for example a recent indie
film, Death to Prom, that reimagines some classic prom films with gay characters. So
the images and representations we see of proms in popular culture often reflect the social
upheavals present in teen culture in any given decade. And it’s all set to music.
Today, it's arguable about whether prom continues to play an active role in helping teenagers
explore what it means to be an “adult” in American society. And that’s mainly because
we’ve stopped looking at it exclusively as a rite of passage, and started talking
about it as a night of escapism from the pressures of the real adult world.
In a modern prom night movie you’re more likely to see your classmates dancing wildly
and taking selfies than challenging someone from the nearest school over who gets to date
the prettiest girl in town. But as we’ve shed some of the more outdated and antiquated
ideologies that have come along with prom, it still maintains its mythical allure as
a celebration of the end of high school and the first (timid) steps into the adult world
of being 18+.
So whether you’re dropping that estimated $919 on prom swag (over a ⅓ of which is
actually spent on “promposals” if you can believe it), or going a more frugal DIY
route by making a dress that goes viral, prom is still a huge part of the American high
school experience. And in some ways it gets to be the final bookend of your years of teen
angst and the beginning of the endless years of your adult angst that await you. Prom:
usually kinda disappointing but still better than aging without music.