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National costume, also known as national dress, is the clothing that represents a nation or region and expresses its identity. Such dress is usually reserved for festivals, celebrations, folk performance and national occasions rather than everyday wear, and it often preserves cuts, textiles and embroidery that daily fashion has left behind. This page explains what counts as national dress, gives examples from several countries, and distinguishes historic working dress from the standardized ceremonial versions of it.
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National costume (also known
as national dress) or regional costume
expresses an identity through
costume
which usually relates to a geographic area, but can also indicate social,
marital and/or religious status. Such costumes often come in two forms:
one for everyday occasions, the other for festivals and formal wear
Origin theory
Following the outbreak of Romantic nationalism, the peasantry of Europe came to serve as models for all that appeared genuine and desirable. Their dress crystallised into so-called "typical" forms, and enthusiasts adopted it as part of their symbolism.
Thus one might now expect a patriotic Scot to wear a Highland kilt and a Lowland Tam o'shanter, an Irish Nationalist to sport green knee-breeches, etc. All true Frenchmen should wear a beret. German-speaking lands, long disunited politically, feature many regional variations of traditional dress. In this nostalgically idealised world, all South Sea islanders wear grass skirts, and all Africans appear topless or naked.
United States residents have choices. They can look back to European traditions, donning (for example) Puritan garb, slip into pioneer fringed leather with coonskin, cowboy or "Western" clothing, or even adopt Amerindian gear (as at the Boston Tea Party).
In England, on the other hand, early industrialisation preceded the full flowering of nationalism. There the middle-class uniiform of the suit predominated over the peasant's embroidered smock, and that suit spread throughout the world as a fashionable and prestige mode of dress -- only to become re-nationalized in forms like the Nehru jacket and the Mao suit.
Examples
Ceinture flche - Quebec
Dirndl - Bavaria, Austria
Kilt - Scotland
Kimono - Japan
Kroje - Bohemia, Moravia
Lederhosen - Bavaria
Qipao - China
Sari - India
Tracht - Germany, Austria
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The above article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/national_costume). 10/20/04
National costume or national dress is the set of clothing distinctive of a country or region and recognized as expressing its identity. It is worn mainly for festivals, folk performance, ceremonies and national celebrations.
Examples include the Scottish kilt and Highland dress, the Japanese kimono, the Indian sari and kurta, the Korean hanbok, the Norwegian bunad, German and Austrian dirndl and lederhosen, and the Mexican charro suit.
Not exactly. National costume usually descends from historic regional dress, but the versions preserved are often standardized and more decorated than the everyday clothing people once worked in.