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A shirt is a cloth garment for the upper body. Originally an undergarment worn exclusively by men, it has become, in American English, a catch-all term for almost any upper-body garment other than outerwear such as sweaters, coats, jackets, or undergarments such as bras, vests or base layers. In British English, a shirt is more specifically a garment with a collar, sleeves with cuffs and a full vertical opening with buttons. (North Americans would call that a "dress shirt", a specific type of "collared shirt".)
History
The world's oldest preserved garment, discovered by Flinders Petrie, is a "highly sophisticated" linen shirt from a First Dynasty Egyptian tomb at Tarkan, ca. 3000B.C. : "the shoulders and sleeves have been finely pleated to give form-fitting trimness while allowing the wearer room to move. The small fringe formed during weaving along one edge of the cloth has been placed by the designer to decorate the neck opening and side seam."
The shirt was an item of men's underwear until the twentieth century. Although the woman's chemise was a closely related garment to the man's, it is the man's garment that became the modern shirt. In the Middle Ages it was a plain, undyed garment worn next to the skin and under regular garments. In medieval artworks, the shirt is only visible (uncovered) on humble characters, such as shepherds, prisoners, and penitents. In the seventeenth century men's shirts were allowed to show, with much the same erotic import as visible underwear today. In the eighteenth century, instead of underpants, men "relied on the long tails of shirts ... to serve the function of drawers. Eighteenth century costume historian Joseph Strutt believed that men who did not wear shirts to bed were indecent. Even as late as 1879, a visible shirt with nothing over it was considered improper.
The shirt sometimes had frills at the neck or cuffs. In the sixteenth century, men's shirts often had embroidery, and sometimes frills or lace at the neck and cuffs, and through the eighteenth century long neck frills, or jabots, were fashionable. Colored shirts began to appear in the early nineteenth century, as can be seen in the paintings of George Caleb Bingham. They were considered casual wear, for lower class workers only, until the twentieth century. For a gentleman, "to wear a sky-blue shirt was unthinkable in 1860 but had become standard by 1920 and, in 1980, constituted the most commonplace event."
European and American women began wearing shirts in 1860, when the Garibaldi shirt, a red shirt as worn by the freedom fighters under Giuseppe Garibaldi, was popularized by Empress Eugénie of France. At the end of the 19th century, the Century Dictionary described an ordinary shirt as "of cotton, with linen bosom, wristbands and cuffs prepared for stiffening with starch, the collar and wristbands being usually separate and adjustable".
Types of shirt
- Camp shirt — a loose, straight-cut, short sleeved shirt or blouse with a simple placket front-opening and a "camp collar."
- Dress shirt - shirt with a formal (somewhat stiff) collar, a full-length opening at the front from the collar to the hem (usually buttoned), and sleeves with cuffs
- Dinner shirt - a shirt specifically made to be worn with male evening wear, e.g. a black tie or white tie.
- Winchester Shirt - a coloured or striped dress shirt nevertheless with white collar and cuffs.
- guayabera — an embroidered dress shirt with four pockets.
- Poet shirt — a loose-fitting shirt or blouse with full bishop sleeves, usually with large frills on the front and on the cuffs.
- T-shirt — also "tee shirt", a casual shirt without a collar or buttons, made of a stretchy, finely knit fabric, usually cotton, and usually short-sleeved. Originally worn under other shirts, it is now a common shirt for everyday wear in some countries.
- Ringer T-shirt — tee with a separate piece of fabric sewn on as the collar and sleeve hems
- Halfshirt — a high-hemmed t-shirt
- A-shirt or construction shirt or singlet (in British English) — essentially a sleeveless t-shirt with large armholes and a large neck hole, often worn by labourers or athletes for increased movability. Sometimes called a "wife beater" when worn without a covering layer.
- camisole — woman's undershirt with narrow straps, or a similar garment worn alone (often with bra). Also referred to as a cami, shelf top, spaghetti straps or strappy top
- tennis shirt, golf shirt, or polo shirt — a pullover soft collar short-sleeved shirt with an abbreviated button placket at the neck and a longer back than front (the "tennis tail").
- rugby shirt — a long-sleeved polo shirt, traditionally of rugged construction in thick cotton or wool, but often softer today
- henley shirt — a collarless polo shirt
- baseball shirt (jersey) — usually distinguished by a three quarters sleeve, team insignia, and flat waistseam
- sweatshirt — long-sleeved athletic shirt of heavier material, with or without hood
- tunic — primitive shirt, distinguished by two-piece construction. Initially a men's garment, is normally seen in modern times being worn by women
- shirtwaist — historically (circa. 1890-1920) a woman's tailored shirt (also called a "tailored waist") cut like a man's dress shirt; in contemporary usage, a woman's dress cut like a men's dress shirt to the waist, then extended into dress length at the bottom
- nightshirt — often oversized, ruined or inexpensive light cloth undergarment shirt for sleeping.
- sleeveless shirt — A shirt with no sleeves. Contains only neck, bottom hem, body, and sometimes shoulders depending on type. Also referred to as a tank top.
- halter top — a shoulderless, sleeveless garment for women. It is mechanically analogous to an apron with a string around the back of the neck and across the lower back holding it in place.
Tops that would generally not be considered shirts:
- onesie or diaper shirt — a shirt for infants which includes a long back that is wrapped between the legs and buttoned to the front of the shirt
- sweaters — heavy knitted upper garments
- jackets, coats and similar outerwear
- tube top (in American English) or boob tube (in British English) — a shoulderless, sleeveless "tube" that wraps the torso not reaching higher than the armpit, staying in place by elasticity or by a single strap that is attached to the front of the tube
hi :D
Types of shirting fabric
There are two main categories of fibres used: natural fibre and man-made fibre (synthetics or petroleum based). Some natural fibres are linen, the first used historically, cotton, the most used, ramie, wool, silk and more recently bamboo or soya. Some synthetic fibres are polyester, tencel, viscose, etc. Polyester mixed with cotton (poly-cotton) is often used. Fabrics for shirts are called shirtings. The four main weaves for shirtings are plain weave, oxford, twill and satin. Broadcloth, poplin and end-on-end are variations of the plain weave. After weaving, finishing can be applied to the fabric.
Shirts and politics
See also: Political colourIn the 1920s and 1930s, fascists wore different coloured shirts:
- Black shirts were used by the Italian fascio, and in Britain, Finland and Germany.
- Brownshirts were worn by German nazis of the SA.
- The Blueshirts was a fascist movement in Ireland and Canada, and the colour of the Spanish Falange Española, the French Solidarité Française, and the Chinese Blue Shirts Society.
- Green shirts were used in Hungary, Ireland, Romania, and Brazil.
- Camisas Doradas (golden shirts) were used in Mexico.
- Silver Shirts were worn in the United States of America.
In addition, redshirts have been used to symbolize a variety of different political groups.
See also
- Bare chested
- Blouse
- Cardigan
- Descamisado
- Dress shirt
- Jermyn Street, home of the oldest English shirtmakers
- Jersey
- Shirtdress
- Sleeveless shirt
References
- Barber, Elizabeth Wayland (1994). Women's Work. The first 20,000 Years, p.135.Norton & Company, New York. ISBN 0393313484
- ^ William L. Brown III, "Some Thoughts on Men's Shirts in America, 1750-1900", Thomas Publications, Gettysburg, PA 1999. ISBN 1-57747-048-6, p. 7
- Dorothy K. Burnham, "Cut My Cote", Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Ontario 1973. ISBN 0-88854-046-9, p. 14
- C. Willett and Phillis Cunnington, "The History of Underclothes", Dover Publications Inc., New York 1992. ISBN 0-486-27124-2 pp. 23-25
- C. Willett and Phillis Cunnington, "The History of Underclothes", Dover Publications Inc., New York 1992. ISBN 0-486-27124-2 pp. 54
- Linda Baumgarten, "What Clothes Reveal: The Language of Clothing in Colonial and Federal America", The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Williamsburg, Virginia, in association with the Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut 2002, ISBN 0-300-09580-5, p. 27
- Linda Baumgarten, "What Clothes Reveal: The Language of Clothing in Colonial and Federal America", The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Williamsburg, Virginia, in association with the Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut 2002, ISBN 0-300-09580-5, pp. 20-22
- C. Willet and Phillis Cunnington, "The History of Underclothes", Dover Publications Inc., New York 1992. ISBN 0-486-27124-2 pp. 36-39
- C. Willet and Phillis Cunnington, "The History of Underclothes", Dover Publications Inc., New York 1992. ISBN 0-486-27124-2 pp. 73
- Michel Pastoureau and Jody Gladding (translator), "The Devil's Cloth: A History of Stripes", Columbia University Press, New York 2001 ISBN 0-7434-5326-3, p. 65
- Anne Buck, "Victorian Costume", Ruth Bean Publishers, Carlton, Bedford, England 1984. ISBN 0-903585-17-0
- Young, Julia Ditto, "The Rise of the Shirt Waist", Good Housekeeping, May 1902, pp. 354-357
- For example, see Laura I. Baldt, A.M., "Clothing for Women: Selection, Design and Construction", J.B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, PA 1924 (second edition), p. 312
External links
- "18th Century Men's Costume". Fashion, Jewellery & Accessories. Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 2008-08-06.
- "19th Century Men's Fashion". Fashion, Jewellery & Accessories. Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 2008-08-06.
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