The Song of the Dong

The Dong people number about 2.9 million and make up one of China’s 56 minority groups.

Some trace the appearance of the Dong to the Song Dynasty (960-1279) when they migrated southward due to the advancing Mongols; but other references place them as far back as the Qin Dynasty (221-206 BC).

Referring to themselves as Gaeml or Kam, the Dong have become renowned for their skillful carpentry and architectural creativity as with their preponderant towers and the covered bridge.

The Dong live mostly in Hunan, Guangxi, and Guizhou, where I lived for 4 years, and speak a language that belongs to the Kradai family, which has some commonality with Sino-Tibetian languages. The Dong language has 9 tones.

Dong dress is traditionally rich in silver jewelry, dyed woven fabrics, and embroideries of plants, animals, and legends with a color palette of blue, black, white, and purple.

Music and song plays a major role in the village life of the Dong people.


Photo by Jialiang Gao GNU Free Documentation License at Wikipedia.

Guizhou Minorities in the 80's

Ninety percent of the population in the region where I resided could be classified under one heading: down-and-out poor. In other words, there were plenty of paupers, especially among the minority groups, who lived entirely distinct from the mainstream of Chinese “Hans.”

The minorities in our province were cut off from the outside world and subsisted on the petty provisions of third-world conditions and tribal superstitions. In their eyes, I was an alien from another galaxy; but just the same, I tried to reach out to them by providing medicine, clothing, and other basic commodities.

One cold day, I stopped by a cinder block hut of stone masons, who existed on cabbage and hot peppers. I proposed that we have dinner together. A progressive adolescent in the bunch cackled his excitement with “Oh, boy, coffee!” At sundown, I lugged three pounds of pork over to their hut. We gathered the wood, lit a bonfire, roasted the hot peppers, and had a decent meal and conversed about our different cultures.

Although in the next articles we will see the beautiful traditional dress of China’s minorities, in the 1980’s most men could not afford to wear anything other than the military blue or green version of the Mao suit.

Photos & slideshow Copyright Men's Fashion by Francesco.

Menswear—Not Just Fashion: Focus on China

Menswear does not just stand for fashion but rather embraces so much more, such as the history, culture, psychology, sociology, economics, dance, and music of any given group of men.

Menswear does not merely entail a man’s clothing or garments but also entails how and why they wear what they choose.

As we approach the holiday season and a brand-new year, I would like to introduce a whole new series of articles that arise from my travels throughout several countries in the Far East, beginning with a focus on China, where I lived for 4 years.

We hear so much about China as a new world economic power that boasts one of the world’s oldest civilizations and a population of 1.35 billion people! But what do we know about China’s men: how do they think and what do they wear?

Like many countries, China is not homogeneous but rather home to 56 ethnic groups, the largest of which is the Han.

Besides the Han majority, there exist fascinating peoples like the Zhuang (16 million), Manchu (10 million), Hui (9 million), Miao (8 million), Uighur (7 million), Yi (7 million), Tujia (5.75 million), Mongols (5 million), Tibetans (5 million), Buyi (3 million), Dong (2.9 million), Yao (2.5 million), Bai (1.8 million), Gelao, (0.5 million), Shui (0.5 million), and Qiang (0.2 million).

I must say that I have been extremely fortunate—and privileged—to have lived 4 years in a region of southwest China where 11 of these minorities constitute 37% of the local population.

During my sojourn, I became acquainted with the men and their languages, cultures, music and dance, cuisine, and—of course—their traditional dress.

Since I lived in this minority region in the 1980’s, much of the minority life that I experienced has slowly disappeared.

So, I have done my best to reproduce it for you with the photos that I took and the memoirs that I wrote!

Photos Copyright Men's Fashion by Francesco.