Chinese Traditional Costume Culture
中国传统服饰文化
Course Syllabus 课程章节
1Costume is the unique achievement of human labor, and is a crystal of both material civilization and spiritual civilization. For hundred thousand years, human society has slowly progressed through the ages of ignorance, barbarism and civilization. After bidding farewell to the apes and monkeys, our ancestors, clad in animal skins and leaves, wandered in the wind and rain for uncountable years before finally crossing the threshold of civilization with difficulty, knowing how to cover their bodies and create a material civilization. However, it is human nature to pursue beauty, and clothing is as useful to people as gold clothing is to the Buddha, not only in covering the body and warming it, but also in beautifying it. Almost from the day dress was first introduced, people have been putting their living customs, aesthetic interests, color preferences, as well as various cultural attitudes and religious concepts into costumes, building up a spiritual civilization connotation of costume culture.
服饰是人类特有的劳动成果,它既是物质文明的结晶,又具精神文明的含义。人类社会经过蒙昧、野蛮到文明时代,缓缓地行进了几十万年。我们的祖先在与猿猴相揖别以后,披着兽皮与树叶,在风雨中徘徊了难以计数的岁月,终于艰难地跨进了文明时代的门槛,懂得了遮身暖体,创造出一个物质文明。然而,追求美是人的天性,衣冠于人,如金装在佛,其作用不仅在遮身暖体,更具有美化的功能。几乎是从服饰起源的那天起,人们就已将其生活习俗、审美情趣、色彩爱好,以及种种文化心态、宗教观念,都沉淀于服饰之中,构筑成了服饰文化精神文明内涵。