A simple pair of denim shorts have caused a major controversy on an American college campus this week. 

Letitia Chai, a final year student at Cornell University in New York, has gone viral after stripping down to her underwear in a disagreement with her professor. 

According to campus sources, in practising her final presentation, her professor said that her shorts were "too short" and advised Chai that she was making a "statement" with her clothes. 

“The first thing that the professor said to me was ‘is that really what you would wear?’,” Chai explained. 

Wearing a pair of shorts and a buttoned shirt, Chia was taken aback by the remark. 

The professor then proceeded to tell her that she was drawing the "male gaze" away from the content of her presentation with her dress. 

Chai then grew more upset as a male classmate agreed with the professor, telling her that she had a "moral obligation" to dress more appropriately. 

Deciding to take a stand Chai returned to the classroom stripping to her underwear to give her presentation. She did the same thing again at her final presentation, which was live streamed on Facebook. 

She also called on her classmates to strip on support- and more than two dozen did. 

"I am more than Asian. I am more than a woman. I am more than Letitia Chai. I am a human being," she implored her classmates, while stripping. "And I ask you to take this leap of faith, to take this next step, or rather this next strip, in our movement and to join me in revealing to each other and to seeing each other for who we truly are — members of the human race." 

Comments on Chai's bold move were divided, with some standing by her demonstration and others questioning if the behaviour was mature. 

Professor Maggor herself replied to the controversy stating that it was never her intention to tell her students how to dress. 

“I do not tell my students what to wear, nor do I define for them what constitutes appropriate dress. I ask them to reflect for themselves and make their own decisions," she said.