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I think I can solve this puzzle for y'all. I study ritual behavior for a living, and I'm a native southerner.
Humans have marked the changing of the seasons with ritual behavior for millennia. Often the practices are arbitrary in nature, sometimes functional. In the southern US as well as many of the former British colonies, light colors are associated with warm weather because there is a general presumption that white reflects light rather than absorbing it, same with heat (this is scientifically debatable, but it's the functional belief behind the custom). Although I doubt there ever seemed to be widespread concern about one's feet overheating in dark shoes in the summer, the whole "light colors in the summer" was adopted in part because of semi-correct, semi-erroneous belief - and shoes just fell into that package. Now in these days of air conditioning, people still wear lightweight fabrics (and cover themselves up with sweaters b/c of the artificially-created chill indoors!) and light shoes as a way of marking late spring, summer, and early fall. The "rule" about the shoes is just a marker of identity - the way some people separate themselves out from others by noting a lack of observance in what has become a largely aesthetic tradition. So part of the "she wore white!" chatter is because of a desire to create a pleasing summer aesthetic, and part to create a social divide between "us" (i.e., "nice" people in the know) and "them" (tacky people not in the know).
Now this applies to shoes, seersucker, and linen. With clothes, its the fabric that is more important than the color - a winter white wool suit is perfectly "acceptable" for a woman. Generally it "should" be worn with non-summery shoes.
I've even heard that women are "allowed" to go without hose in the summer, although just to show you how deep the "us" vs. "them" thing goes, my mama would have replied "LADIES always wear hose, no matter the season."
Anyway, that's what is going on from a sociological perspective.
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