Uniforms: Why We Are What We Wear. By Paul Fussell. Houghton Mifflin. 224 pages. $22.

I have been a fan of Paul Fussell for years -- not just of his rich, beautifully written World War I history, The Great War and Modern Memory, but also of his 1983 effort, Class: A Guide Through the American Status System, whose winsome, cranky voice was eclipsed only by its stunning accuracy. Thus I eagerly looked forward to Uniforms: Why We Are What We Wear. This book is not, however, all that I had hoped it would be.

The first disappointment was that it focused on uniforms in a literal way -- not, say, the gray flannel suit of mid-20th-century businessmen or the baggy trousers of contemporary hip-hop types, but clothing actually issued by institutions like the military and the post office. Fussell has a good reason for this; he served in World War II and wore a uniform, hence he has first-hand experience. But the 50-year-old data seemed irrelevant. I wish he'd rooted the book less in his personal past and more in fresh observation.

Still, the book has many insightful passages. You don't need to remember the costumes that President Richard Nixon issued for the White House police -- double-breasted tunics and black plastic hats, the likes of which hadn't been seen "since the British and Germans fought us in the 1770s" -- to enjoy Fussell's account of them. He characterizes Nixon as an "awkward and angry sad sack" and speculates that the clownish outfits ended up with "a high school band in Iowa."

He is also perceptive about the sartorial coding of package deliverers. While U.S. mail carriers lined up in their blue paramilitary attire look like "the troops of a well-disciplined army," Fed Ex personnel in their purple and green shirts bring to mind "a chorus line in a Broadway musical." He doesn't, however, explain why the "well-disciplined troops" are so notoriously inefficient.

Women's clothes receive short shrift from Fussell, but his reasoning smacks less of misogyny than cluelessness. "I have worn many a trousered uniform and buckled many a cartridge belt," he explains, "but I have never worn a dress or fastened a garter belt." An observant male, however, might have noticed that with the advent of pantyhose in the 1970s -- to say nothing of the acceptability of pants in the business world -- many if not most women have never fastened a garter belt, either.

What is more, the glib class condescension that was palatable in the 1980s when Class appeared seems out-of-touch in 2002. For example, Fussell tells us that some nuns perform charitable work in clothes other than their habits because the habits prompt rude remarks. Then he concludes that "the poor" are "growing snottier or more articulate" -- a remark that made me cringe. Likewise, his report on a woman in Goshen, Ind., who sews bedsheets for the KKK also seemed more creepy than funny.

Although brief, "Civilian Uniformities," a section on office attire, is among his best. He shows how the coding for "business casual" Fridays is as stiffly regulated as for everyday business wear. This regulation, along with the ubiquity of literal uniforms, leads to a conclusion that I could not shrug off: Individuality is dead, and "The Group Man has undeniably won."

M.G. Lord is the author of Forever Barbie: The Unauthorized Biography of a Real Doll. She is finishing a memoir of mid-20th century aerospace culture.