Minority Ethnic Clothing

Dai

Population: 1.15 million

Distribution: The Dai reside in the Yunnan Province, a mountainous lake district in southern China with warm weather and tropic forests. Concentrations of this group are located in the Dehong Dai and Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture as well as the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture.¹⁹

Economy: The Dehong Dai and Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture is a subtropical region with varying temperatures throughout the seasons that is home to many small plants and industries such as sugar refining and electricity.²⁰ The Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture has a vast amount of diversity in life forms of plants and animals. It is the most diverse region in China and is home to the last Asian elephants the country.²¹ In addition to being ideal farmland for exotic fruits like pineapple and staple foods like rice, this area is an up and coming tourist attraction in the Yunnan Province.

Language: The main languages spoken by the Dai are the Dai Lü and Dai Nüa.²² 

Traditions: The Dai have three distinguishing characteristics: a strong belief in Buddhism, the celebration of the Water-Splashing Festival, and the preservation of the famed Peacock Dance.²³ All Dai men are required to spend time as a monk in a Buddhist temple. At one time, the only place that a man could receive an education was in the temple. All men would study and earn the right to leave the temple to have a family or to remain in the temple as a monk.

The Water-Splashing Festival is the most important festival for the Dai.²³ Legend has it that seven girls who were terrorized by a heartless devil were set on fire after they destroyed him. Sympathetic villagers hurried to the girls, splashing water on them and saved their lives. In remembrance of the girls’ conquest over the merciless ruler, the Dai splash water on one another in the hope of chasing away bad fortune from the past year. This also symbolizes the wish for good fortune, weather, and harvests in the New Year. The splashing is playful at first but eventually erupts into water fights involving gentle looking young girls!

The Peacock Dance is the most famous dance of the Dai people.²⁴ Dai Legend tells how Zhaomali Jieshu, the head of the minority, invented the dance by imitating the movements of the peacock, a bird common in folk stories as a symbol of happiness. This dance requires fluid motions, quick leg movements, strength of the shoulders, and gentle yet striking eyes to mimic the “Holy Bird.” The costume worn during this dance has a slim fitting top and a flowing skirt to accentuate the grace of the movements and bring out the beautiful colors of the bird’s feathers.

The dress of the Dai man is simple and practical for farming and dancing.²⁵ They wear short shirts or vests paired with long and loose pants and no shoes. Clothing is light weight with a blanket placed over their shoulders in the instance of cold weather. Men adorn themselves with upper body tattoos in the shape of characters or animals such as tigers or dragons to draw attention to their muscles. Women generally wear light undershirts and pay special attention to the matching of complimenting colors and accents. A short, form fitting top is paired with a slim skirt with woven accents to show the slim figure of the Dai women. They wear their long hair wrapped in a bun and accented with a comb, hairpiece, or a flower.

This work by China Learning Library @ George Mason University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.