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The U.S. Army Uniform as a Form of Interpretation in Material Culture

 

As a former track athlete and having seen my fair share of athletic award ceremonies, I have a general idea of where athletic medals are placed on the human body and its usual meaning in American society. In an average athletic competition, medals in the U.S. are usually placed around a competitor’s neck to signify that that competitor has earned/won recognition for a particular athletic event. In the case of commemorative U.S. military medals, I wanted to find a very specific example to draw parallels with this week’s course readings. After having read Sun-Young Park’s Ideals of the Body: Architecture, Urbanism, and Hygiene in Postrevolutionary Paris, I was very pleased with her inclusion of diagrams which laid out the social spaces of French boarding schools and the location of gymnasiums[1]. These diagrams are educational as they show the placement of architecture like schools, living spaces, and gardens in Postrevolutionary France which highly conveyed the social expectations in public and private spaces in certain areas of France at this time. As these diagrams illustrate certain social expectations for the people who inhabited the buildings within them, a U.S. Army diagram can tell its viewers of what is socially expected of members of the military when adorning medals and insignia.

The Department of the Army Pamphlet 670–1, a pamphlet released by the U.S. Army Headquarters in 2017, includes many diagrams which relay the proper etiquette that members of the U.S. military must adhere to while in uniform. My partner was very helpful in helping me locate this diagram as he is a member of the U.S. Army, and I was extremely thankful for his insight in the matter. The diagrams included in this pamphlet range from the proper wear of insignia on a uniform to how an actual U.S. military uniform should be worn. Because my item of interest this semester is a medal, I wanted to pay particular attention to the ways that insignia and badges are to be worn on a U.S. military uniform. Below are two of the many diagrams in which I found helpful in showing the proper etiquette of adorning military insignia. One shows the U.S. military standard for wearing the Army’s branch insignia on male officer uniforms, and the other is for the placement of the Army branch insignia on a female uniforms. 

Male Insignia Protocol:

[2]

 

Female Insignia Protocol:

[3]


To allow further study into the expectations of the Department of the Army regarding the proper wear of insignia on the uniform, I have provided below the two excerpts from the Department of the Army Pamphlet 670-1which further detail the Army Headquarters expectations for the branch’s insignia to be worn:

“19–12. Branch insignia-how worn a. As used in this paragraph, the word “collar” refers to that part of the coat or shirt (around the neck) that forms a neckband and turnover piece. Bold borders on figures 19–120 through 19–121 depict the collar area. The word “lapel” is used when referring to the fold of the front of the coat that is a continuation of the collar (usually separated by a notch in the collar). b. Nonsubdued branch insignia. (1) Male officers. On the Army service/dress uniform coat, male officers wear their branch insignia centered on both lapels, approximately 1 1/4 inches below the U.S. insignia. The branch insignia is positioned so that the centerline of the insignia bisects the centerline of the U.S. insignia and is parallel to the inside edge of the lapel (see fig 19–119). Except for chaplains and chaplain candidates, male officers will not wear their branch insignia on the service uniform shirt. Male chaplains and chaplain candidates wear their branch insignia centered immediately over the left breast pocket (see fig 19– 120). On the black pullover sweater, chaplains and chaplain candidates will wear their branch insignia centered above the nameplate, in lieu of the DUI”[4].

“(4) Female enlisted. On the old version of the Army service/dress uniform coat, enlisted females wear their branch insignia centered on the left collar, with the bottom of the disk approximately 1 inch above the notch , with the centerline of the branch insignia bisecting the notch, and parallel to the inside edge of the collar (see fig 19–124). On the new version of the Army service/dress uniform coat, enlisted females wear their branch insignia centered on the left collar, with the bottom of the disk approximately 5/8 inch up from center of the collar and lapel seam, with the centerline of the branch insignia bisecting the notch, and parallel to the inside edge of the lapel (see fig 19–125)”[5].

 

These examples also reminded me of how in Kenneth Ames’ Meaning in Artifacts: Hall Furnishings in Victorian America, he provides the examples of calling cards: cards which were used by people of the Victorian Era to practice social etiquette of visiting the homes of friends, family, and acquaintances and making one’s presence known in a certain fashion[6]. As there were expectations in the Victorian Era in which those who utilized calling cards adhered to, so too exists expectations for Army service members and the placement of insignia, badges, and other items on uniforms. The mandated placement of insignia on uniforms can allow insight into the social expectations of the U.S. Army. A uniform is not a hallway or building in which someone can stand within and examine their surroundings and social expectations, but a uniform showcased on the human body adorned with insignia can be deciphered as a diagram of sorts in which viewers can ascertain why insignias are positioned in a certain manner.


[1] Sun-Young Park, Ideals of the Body: Architecture, Urbanism, and Hygiene in Postrevolutionary Paris (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018).

[2] Headquarters Department of the Army, Department of the Army Pamphlet 670–1, (Washington, DC, 25 May 2017), 207-208.

[3] Ibid., Department of the Army Pamphlet 670-1, 210.

[4] Ibid., Department of the Army Pamphlet 670–1, 207-208.

[5] Ibid., Department of the Army Pamphlet 670-1, 210.

[6] Kenneth Ames, Meaning in Artifacts: Hall Furnishings in Victorian America, (Journal of Interdisciplinary History 9 1978), 19-46.

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