A feature of all modern human societies is the wearing of clothing or clothes , a category encompassing a wide variety of materials that cover the body.
The primary purpose of clothing is functional, as a protection from the elements. Clothes also enhance safety during hazardous activities such as hunting and cooking by providing a barrier between the skin and the environment. Clothes incidentally also provide a hygienic barrier, keeping toxins away from the body and limiting the transmission of bacteria and viruses.
Clothes also have important social and cultural functions. A uniform, for example, may identify civil authority figures, such as police and army personnel, or it may identify team or group or even political affiliations. In most societies, clothing is an aspect of norms of the society, in relation to standards of modesty, religious practices and social status. Clothing may also function as a form of adornment and an expression of personal taste or style.
Throughout history, many materials have been used for clothes. Materials have ranged from leather and furs to weaved and woven materials, to elaborate and exotic natural and synthetic fabrics.
Articles carried rather than worn (such as purses, canes, and umbrellas) are normally considered fashion accessories rather than clothing, but hats and small dress sweaters can be called either clothing or accessories. Jewelry and eyeglasses are usually considered as accessories , even though in common speech these particular items are described as being worn rather than carried.
Clothing probably originated in the neolithic age. Some recent scientific research estimates that humans have been wearing clothing for as long as 650,000 years.
Functions of clothing
One of the primary purposes of clothing is to keep the wearer warm or in some cases cool. In hot climates clothing provides protection from sunburn or wind damage, while in cold climates its thermal insulation properties are generally more important. Shelter usually reduces the functional need for clothing. For example, coats, hats, gloves, shoes, socks, and other superficial layers would normally be removed when entering or once inside a warm home, particularly if one is residing or sleeping there. Similarly, clothing have seasonal and regional aspects, so that thinner materials and fewer layers of clothing are generally worn in warmer seasons and regions than in colder ones.
Clothing at times is worn as protection from specific environmental hazards, such as insects, noxious chemicals, weapons, and contact with abrasive substances. Clothing can protect against many things that might injure the uncovered human body. Clothes act as protection from the elements, including rain, snow and wind and other weather conditions, even from the sun. Clothes also reduce the level of risk during an activity, such as work or sport. Conversely, clothing may protect the environment from the clothing wearer, as for example wearing of medical scrubs.
Humans have shown extreme inventiveness in devising clothing solutions to environmental hazards. Some examples include: space suits, air conditioned clothing, armor, diving suits, swimsuits, bee-keeper gear, motorcycle leathers, high-visibility clothing, and other pieces of protective clothing. Meanwhile, the distinction between clothing and protective equipment is not always clear-cut, since clothes designed to be fashionable will often have some protective value and clothes which are designed to be functional will often consider fashion in their design.
Cultural aspects
Gender differentiation
In most cultures, gender differentiation of clothing is considered appropriate for men and women. The differences are in styles, colors and fabrics.
- In Western societies, skirts, dresses and high-heeled shoes are usually seen as women's clothing, while neckties are usually seen as men's clothing. Trousers were once seen as exclusively male clothing, but are nowadays worn by both sexes. Male clothes are often more practical (that is, they can function well under a wide variety of situations), but a wider range of clothing styles is available for females. Males are typically allowed to bare their chests in a greater variety of public places. It is generally acceptable for a woman to wear traditionally male clothing, while the converse is unusual.
- In some cultures, sumptuary laws regulate what men and women are required to wear.
- Islam requires women to wear hijab, or modest clothing. What qualifies as "modest" varies in different Muslim societies; however, women are usually required to cover more of their bodies than men are. Articles of clothing worn by Muslim women for purposes of modesty range from the headscarf to the burqa.
- Men may sometimes choose to wear men's skirts such as togas or kilts, especially on ceremonial occasions. Such garments were (in previous times) often worn as normal daily clothing by men.
- Compared to men's clothing, women's clothing tends to be attractive, often intended to be looked at by men. In the modern West, women are more likely to wear makeup, jewellery, and colorful clothing, while in very traditional cultures women are protected from men's gazes by modest dress.
Social status
In some societies, clothing may be used to indicate rank or status. In ancient Rome, for example, only senators were permitted to wear garments dyed with Tyrian purple. In traditional Hawaiian society only high-ranking chiefs could wear feather cloaks and palaoa or carved whale teeth. Under the Travancore Kingdom of Kerala, (India), lower caste women had to pay a tax for the right to cover their upper body. In China, before the establishment of the republic, only the emperor could wear yellow. There are numerous examples throughout history of elaborate systems of sumptuary laws regulating what people could wear. In societies without such laws, which includes most modern societies, social status is instead signaled by the purchase of high cost, rare, or luxury items, the purchase of which are effectively limited to those with the wealth or status to acquire them. In addition, peer pressure may influence clothing choice.
Religious aspects
See also: Category:Religious vestureReligious clothing might be considered a special case of occupational clothing. Sometimes it is worn only during the performance of religious ceremonies. However, it may also be worn everyday as a marker for special religious status.
For example, Jains wear unstitched cloth pieces when performing religious ceremonies. The unstitched cloth signifies unified and complete devotion to the task at hand, with no digression. Sikhs wear a turban as it is a part of their religion.
The cleanliness of religious dresses in Eastern Religions like Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism is of paramount importance, which indicates purity.
Clothing figures prominently in the Bible where it appears in numerous contexts, the more prominent ones being: the story of Adam and Eve, Joseph's cloak, Judah and Tamar, Mordechai and Esther. Furthermore the priests officiating in the Temple had very specific garments, the lack of which would make one liable to death.
Jewish ritual also requires rending of one's upper garment as a sign of mourning. This practice is found in the Bible when Jacob hears of the apparent death of his son Joseph.
Origin and history of clothing
Main article: History of clothingSee also: History of Western fashion and Category:History of clothingAccording to archaeologists and anthropologists, the earliest clothing likely consisted of fur, leather, leaves or grass which were draped, wrapped or tied around the body. Knowledge of such clothing remains inferential, since clothing materials deteriorate quickly compared to stone, bone, shell and metal artifacts. Archeologists have identified very early sewing needles of bone and ivory from about 30,000 BC, found near Kostenki, Russia in 1988. Dyed flax fibers that could have been used in clothing have been found in a prehistoric cave in the Republic of Georgia that date back to 36,000 BP.
Scientists are still debating when people started wearing clothes. Ralf Kittler, Manfred Kayser and Mark Stoneking, anthropologists at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, have conducted a genetic analysis of human body lice that suggests clothing originated quite recently, around 107,000 years ago. Body lice is an indicator of clothes-wearing, since most humans have sparse body hair, and lice thus require human clothing to survive. Their research suggests the invention of clothing may have coincided with the northward migration of modern Homo sapiens away from the warm climate of Africa, thought to have begun between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago. However, a second group of researchers using similar genetic methods estimate that clothing originated around 540,000 years ago (Reed et al. 2004. PLoS Biol
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