Eicher, J. & Sumberg, B. (1999) World Fashion and Ethnic and National Dress. In: Eicher, J. (eds) Dress and Ethnicity: Change across space and time. Oxford: Berg

Factors encouraging rapid change in the dress of many people, including the adoption of non-indigenous items, occur along with factors encouraging continued adherence to indigenous forms and styles of dress. Awareness of group affiliation and the power of identification with a group can mobilize actions and emotions of group members in order to identify with a group through dress. 

The complexities of ethnic identity are acknowledged by De Vos and Romanucci (1982: xi). They define ethnicity on four levels of analysis: “first, in respect to a social structural level; second, as a pattern of social interaction; third, as a subjective experience of identity; and fourth, as expressed in relatively fixed patterns of behavior and expressive emotional style.” These patterns of behavior and expressive emotional style include styles of dress and the meanings associated with them.

Ethnic dress visually separates one group from another, and can also involve other sensory aspects of dress. Often known as traditional,^[8] ethnic dress brings to mind images of coiffure, garments and jewelry that stereotypically never change. In Roach-Higgins’ definition of fashion, the implication is that awareness of change within one’s lifetime does not occur in ethnic dress.^[9] In other words, when used in such a way, the terms “traditional” and “ethnic” imply non-fashionable dress, dress that reflects the past, with slow change and few modernizing influences.^[10]

An orientation to the past is also included in defining ethnicity and ethnic identity. De Vos and Romanucci-Ross (1982) provide a useful definition of ethnic identity as “a past-oriented form of identity, embedded in the cultural heritage of the individual or group . . . [that] contrasts with a sense of belonging linked with citizenship within a political state, or present-oriented affiliations to specific groups demanding professional, occupational or class loyalties’.

Ethnic dress often differs from the national dress associated with citizens of a country when several or many ethnic groups exist within the country’s boundaries. In Nigeria, what has often become identified as national dress is a composite of the garb of the two largest ethnic groups, the Yoruba and Hausa, giving groups like the Kalabari a reason to wear and flaunt their Kalabari dress as highly distinct. The Kalabari example also illustrates additional points. First, ethnic dress may include borrowed items from other cultures that result in a distinctly identifiable ethnic ensemble because the new outfit is culturally authenticated. Second, ethnic dress is not usually static over time.^[13] Although change may not be obvious unless carefully researched, it does occur and needs investigating through oral history, photographs,^[14] sketches or drawings as well as documents. Third, variety in dress can also be found within a group at one point in time as creativity and individuality are common human expressions. Some individuals enjoy and practice the art of dress more than others, with the result that not all ethnic dress examples are duplicates of one another. Finally, ethnic dress may not always be worn daily but may constitute dress for a special occasion or for a special location. Thus an individual’s wardrobe may contain both ethnic dress and world fashion, to be worn as appropriate to time and place.