From sportswear to protest attire: the surprisingly political history of the hoodie

In the cold weather, few items of clothing beat a hoodie. They’re comfy, warm and they look cool. But where did hoodies come from and how did they come to be everywhere? From warmth and protection, to sportswear then streetwear, across decades hoodies have become entangled with groups and gangs, surveillance and control, fear and policing, race and power. Hoodies can divide, but they also bring people together. With this in mind, they might be “our last truly political item of clothing”. Hoods in history Hooded garments are nothing new. In fact, they’re very old. The Orkney Hood, discovered in a peat bog on Scotland’s Orkney Islands, covered the head and shoulders of a child in the late Iron Age (between the third and seventh centuries CE). In 1936, a Swedish bog revealed the “Bocksten Man”. He still wore the clothes he died in, sometime between 1350–70. His woollen hood added warmth to his outfit: a tunic and mantle (cloak), plus long socks, footwraps and leather shoes. It also gave researchers clues centuries later to his status and changing hood fashions, even then. Women’s gabled hoods, worn around 1500, were wired into a point at the top of the top of the head. powerofforever/Getty Images Medieval monks wore austere versions of hooded garments. These served to aid the inner contemplation demanded by monastic life. Medieval knights donned chain mail hoods as part of their protective armour. Women’s gabled hoods, worn around 1500, were wired into a point at the top of the head, with fabric draping over the shoulders. They were fashionable and modest, before the French hood (which was pushed back to reveal the hair) was popularised by Anne Boleyn. Other hoods appeared across centuries to follow, though it was only in the 20th century we saw the emergence of the hoodie as we now know it. The origins of the hoodie “Hoodie” was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2006 to mean “a hooded sweatshirt, fleece, or other garment”. The garment had its origins on the sports field and in hard work decades earlier. The company that later became Champion Athletic Apparel developed a hooded sweater in the 1930s. The functional garment was meant to keep athletes warm ahead of a game. The hooded garment also appealed to manual workers. In Australia, hooded jumpers worn for ice skating or other outdoor winter sports became stylish for women in the 1940s. “Here it is – the hooded jumper you’ve dreamed of for those bleak days of winter when the wind sends shivers down your spine,” a knitting pattern in one Melbourne newspaper described, encouraging women to make their own. Sylvester Stallone as boxer Rocky Balboa lifted hoodies from sportswear into the cultural zeitgeist. The iconic training scene from the first of the Rocky films, with Stallone running up the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, helped to elevate the garment as a symbol of grit and determination. When, nearly 40 years later Michael B. Jordan starred opposite Stallone in the film Creed, the grey hoodie appeared again. This time, however, it also reflected a deep racial divide. From sportswear to streetwear In the 1980s and ‘90s, youth culture transformed the garment from sportswear to streetwear. Break dancers and graffiti artists adopted them. So did skaters and snowboarders as hoodies became a symbol of a younger generation – and soon, of moral panic. Hip hop artists and rappers – Eminem, Ice-T, and plenty more – gave the garment an added edge. Oversized or baggy hoodies became linked to youth crime – vandalism, violence or shoplifting. With the hood pulled up, they were often framed as being symbols of rebellion and defiance, with their capacity to make wearers menacingly anonymous. Hoodies’ bad reputation sparked their banning in shopping centres in the United Kingdom, the United States and New Zealand in the 2000s. A ban was even trialled in Australia, though it was quickly scrapped following community outrage. The tragic killing of Trayvon Martin in Florida in 2012 sent shockwaves around the globe. Martin, an unarmed African American teenager, had been wearing a hoodie when he was fatally shot for looking “suspicious”. In the wake of Martin’s death, some queried the place of his hoodie in the shooting. It also sparked the Million Hoodie March in protest of racial profiling. This prompted a troubling question: who could wear the garment without fear of repercussion and how much of this was based on age or skin colour? Hoodies are a potential flashpoint for power and politics. King Nkosy/Pexels Power and politics When a young Mark Zuckerberg held meetings with investors just months after Trayvon Martin’s death, his hoodie raised eyebrows for different reasons. His sartorial rebellion flouted corporate dress trends. US politician John Fetterman now frequently wears his preferred outfit of a hoodie and shorts. He even donned a hoodie printed to suggest a tuxedo – a reference to the black tie dress code – for the 2024 White House Correspondents’ Dinner and another for Donald Trump’s second presidential inauguration. Hoodies are a potential flashpoint for power and politics. For this reason, an exhibition focused on the style staple at the Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam in 2019, then the Museum of Design Atlanta in 2026, provocatively invited visitors to consider: “What do you see when you look at this garment – and what might others see?”