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Clothing refers to any covering for the human body. The wearing of clothing is exclusively a human characteristic and is a feature of most human societies. The amount and type of clothing worn depends on functional considerations (such as a need for warmth or protection from the elements) and social considerations. In some situations the minimum amount of clothing (i.e. covering of a person’s genitals) may be socially acceptable, while in others much more clothing is expected. Functionality is the primary purpose of clothing. It can serve as protection from the elements. Clothes also enhance safety during hazardous activities such as hiking and cooking, by providing a barrier between the skin and the environment. Further, clothes provide a hygienic barrier, keeping toxins away from the body and limiting the transmission of germs. Clothing performs a range of social and cultural functions, such as individual, occupational and sexual differentiation, and social status. A uniform, for example, may identify civil authority figures, such as police and military personnel, or it may identify team, group or political affiliations. In many societies, norms about clothing reflect standards of modesty, religion, gender, and social status. Clothing may also function as a form of adornment and an expression of personal taste or style. Clothing can and has in history been made from a very wide variety of materials. Materials have ranged from leather and furs, to woven materials, to elaborate and exotic natural and synthetic fabrics. Not all body coverings are regarded as clothing. Articles carried rather than worn (such as purses), worn on a single part of the body and easily removed (scarves), worn purely for adornment (jewelry), or those that serve a function other than protection (eyeglasses), are normally considered accessories rather than clothing, as are footwear and hats 
Clothing in history Functions It can be said that there are four primary factors in clothing comfort, identifiable as the ’4 Fs of Comfort’ (1) fashion; (2) feel; (3) fit; and (4) function. One of the primary purposes of clothing is to keep the wearer comfortable. In hot climates, clothing provides protection from sunburn or wind damage, while in cold climates its thermal insulation properties are generally more important. Shelter usually reduces the functional need for clothing. For example, coats, hats, gloves, shoes, socks, and other superficial layers are normally removed when entering a warm home, particularly if one is residing or sleeping there. Similarly, clothing has seasonal and regional aspects, so that thinner materials and fewer layers of clothing are generally worn in warmer seasons and regions than in colder ones. Clothing protects people against many things that might injure the uncovered human body. Clothes act as protection from the elements, including rain, snow and wind and other weather conditions, as well as from the sun. However, if your clothes is too sheer, thin, small, tight, etc., the protection effect is minimized. Clothes also reduce the level of risk during activity, such as work or sport. Clothing at times is worn as protection from specific environmental hazards, such as insects, noxious chemicals, weapons, and contact with abrasive substances. Conversely, clothing may protect the environment from the clothing wearer, as with doctors wearing medical scrubs. Humans have shown extreme inventiveness in devising clothing solutions to environmental hazards. Some examples include: space suits, air conditioned clothing, armor, diving suits, swimsuits, bee-keeper gear, motorcycle leathers, high-visibility clothing, and other pieces of protective clothing. Meanwhile, the distinction between clothing and protective equipment is not always clear-cut, since clothes designed to be fashionable often have protective value and clothes designed for function often consider fashion in their design 
Former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Turkish President Abdullah Gül both wearing Western-style business suits. In most cultures, gender differentiation of clothing is considered appropriate for men and women. The differences are in styles, colors and fabrics. In Western societies, skirts, dresses and high-heeled shoes are usually seen as women’s clothing, while neckties are usually seen as men’s clothing. Trousers were once seen as exclusively male clothing, but are nowadays worn by both genders. Male clothes are often more practical (that is, they can function well under a wide variety of situations), but a wider range of clothing styles are available for females. Males are typically allowed to bare their chests in a greater variety of public places. It is generally acceptable for a woman to wear traditionally male clothing, while the converse is unusual. In some cultures, sumptuary laws regulate what men and women are required to wear. Islam requires women to wear more modest forms of attire, usually hijab. What qualifies as "modest" varies in different Muslim societies; however, women are usually required to cover more of their bodies than men are. Articles of clothing worn by Muslim women for purposes of modesty range from the headscarf to the burqa. Men may sometimes choose to wear men’s skirts such as togas or kilts, especially on ceremonial occasions. Such garments were (in previous times) often worn as normal daily clothing by men. Compared to men’s clothing, women’s clothing tends to be more attractive, often intended to be looked at by men. In modern industrialized nations, women are more likely to wear makeup, jewelry, and colorful clothing, while in very traditional cultures women are protected from men’s gazes by modest 
A traditional Khmer dancer wearing a sampot in Cambodia In some societies, clothing may be used to indicate rank or status. In ancient Rome, for example, only senators were permitted to wear garments dyed with Tyrian purple. In traditional Hawaiian society only high-ranking chiefs could wear feather cloaks and palaoa or carved whale teeth. Under the Travancore Kingdom of Kerala, (India), lower caste women had to pay a tax for the right to cover their upper body. In China, before the establishment of the republic, only the emperor could wear yellow. History provides many examples of elaborate sumptuary laws that regulated what people could wear. In societies without such laws, which includes most modern societies, social status is instead signaled by the purchase of rare or luxury items that are limited by cost to those with wealth or status. In addition, peer pressure influences clothing choice. 
Muslim men traditionally wear white robes and a cap during prayers Religious clothing might be considered a special case of occupational clothing. Sometimes it is worn only during the performance of religious ceremonies. However, it may also be worn everyday as a marker for special religious status. For example, Jains wear unstitched cloth pieces when performing religious ceremonies. The unstitched cloth signifies unified and complete devotion to the task at hand, with no digression. Sikhs wear a turban as it is a part of their religion. The cleanliness of religious dresses in Eastern Religions like Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism is of paramount importance, since it indicates purity. Clothing figures prominently in the Bible where it appears in numerous contexts, the more prominent ones being: the story of Adam and Eve, Joseph’s cloak, Judah and Tamar, Mordecai and Esther. Furthermore the priests officiating in the Temple had very specific garments, the lack of which made one liable to death. Jewish ritual also requires rending of one’s upper garment as a sign of mourning. This practice is found in the Bible when Jacob hears of the apparent death of his son Joseph. According to archaeologists and anthropologists, the earliest clothing likely consisted of fur, leather, leaves, or grass that were draped, wrapped, or tied around the body. Knowledge of such clothing remains inferential, since clothing materials deteriorate quickly compared to stone, bone, shell and metal artifacts. Archeologists have identified very early sewing needles of bone and ivory from about 30,000 BC, found near Kostenki, Russia in 1988. Dyed flax fibers that could have been used in clothing have been found in a prehistoric cave in the Republic of Georgia that date back to 36,000 BP. Scientists are still debating when people started wearing clothes. Ralf Kittler, Manfred Kayser and Mark Stoneking, anthropologists at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, have conducted a genetic analysis of human body lice that suggests clothing originated quite recently, around 107,000 years ago. Body lice is an indicator of clothes-wearing, since most humans have sparse body hair, and lice thus require human clothing to survive. Their research suggests the invention of clothing may have coincided with the northward migration of modern Homo sapiens away from the warm climate of Africa, thought to have begun between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago. However, a second group of researchers using similar genetic methods estimate that clothing originated around 540,000 years ago (Reed et al. 2004. PLoS Biology 2(11): e340). For now, the date of the origin of clothing remains unresolved. A sarong or sarung (pronounced in Malay; English: /səˈrɒŋ/) is a large tube or length of fabric, often wrapped around the waist and worn as a kilt by men and as a skirt by women throughout much of South Asia, Southeast Asia, the Arabian Peninsula, the Horn of Africa, and on many Pacific islands. The fabric most often has woven plaid or checkered patterns, or may be brightly colored by means of batik or ikat dyeing. Many modern sarongs also have printed designs, often depicting animals or plants 
Sarongs are widespread in the Northeast part of India - in the state of Manipur, where they are called phanek, in the South Indian states of Kerala, where they are called mundu, and Tamil Nadu, where they are called sarem or veshti or lungi (worn by Muslims) and are usually worn at home. A standard lungi measures 2.12 by 1.2 metres. Unlike the brightly coloured Southeast Asian sarongs, the Kerala variety (the mundu) is more often plain white and is worn for ceremonial or religious purposes. In Kerala, the brightly coloured sarongs are called kaily and the white ones are called mundu. The more formal, all-white Dhoti, is worn for formal and religious occasions. While there are also dresses based on the mundu which can be worn by women, they more commonly wear the 
Bangladeshi boy in a traditional lungi loincloth. 
See also: Weaving, Knitting, and Twining Some human cultures, such as the various people of the Arctic Circle, make their clothing entirely of prepared and decorated furs and skins. Other cultures have supplemented or replaced leather and skins with cloth: woven, knitted, or twined from various animal and vegetable fibers. Although modern consumers may take the production of clothing for granted, making fabric by hand is a tedious and labor intensive process. That the textile industry was the first to be mechanized  with the powered loom  during the Industrial Revolution attests to this fact. Different cultures have evolved various ways of creating clothes out of cloth. One approach simply involves draping the cloth. Many people wore, and still wear, garments consisting of rectangles of cloth wrapped to fit  for example, the dhoti for men and the sari for women in the Indian subcontinent, the Scottish kilt or the Javanese sarong. The clothes may simply be tied up, as is the case of the first two garments; or pins or belts hold the garments in place, as in the case of the latter two. The precious cloth remains uncut, and people of various sizes or the same person at different sizes can wear the garment. Another approach involves cutting and sewing the cloth, but using every bit of the cloth rectangle in constructing the clothing. The tailor may cut triangular pieces from one corner of the cloth, and then add them elsewhere as gussets. Traditional European patterns for men’s shirts and women’s chemises take this approach. Western World In North America and Europe, hip wraps are worn as beach wear, or as a cover-up over swimwear. The wrap is often made of a thin, light fabric, often times rayon, and may feature decorative fringing on both sides. They may also have ties, which are long thin straps of fabric which the wearer can tie together to prevent the wrap from falling down. These wraps are almost exclusively worn by women, and do not usually resemble a traditional African or Asian sarong. In the thousands of years that humans have spent constructing clothing, they have created an astonishing array of styles, many of which have been reconstructed from surviving garments, photos, paintings, mosaics, etc., as well as from written descriptions. Costume history serves as a source of inspiration to current fashion designers, as well as a topic of professional interest to costumers constructing for plays, films, television, and historical reenactment. Arabian Peninsula 
Yemeni men in traditional loincloth. 
Yemeni man tying his futah (sarong). Sometimes people keep money and other small utensils in the folds of the futah. Sarongs known under a variety of local names are traditionally worn by the people of Yemen and elsewhere on the Arabian Peninsula. Local names for the garment include futah, izaar, wazaar and ma’awiis. In Oman, sarongs are called wizaar and are often white in color, similar to the Keralan mundu of South Asia and it is usually worn under the Thawb. In Saudi Arabia, sarongs are known as izaar. Designs can be checkered or striped as well floral or arabesque, but double plaid (i.e. a vertical section of the izaar with a different plaid pattern) designs from Indonesia are also very popular. In southwestern Saudi Arabia, tribal groups have their own style of unstitched izaar, which is locally weaved. This are also worn in northern Yemen. However, the tribal groups in Yemen each have their own design for their futah, the latter of which may include tassels and fringes. It is thought that these tribal futah resemble the original izaar as worn on the Arabian Peninsula since pre-Islamic times. They are generally worn open and unstitched in such a way that the loin cloth does not reach over one’s ankles. Other izaars, often imported from Bangladesh, are also the traditional clothing of Arab fishermen of the Persian Gulf, the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea. It was the traditional garment for men prior to the introduction of pant-like pyjamas and kaftans during the Turkish and European colonial periods. Tube-stitched as well as open sarongs are both worn, even in formal dishdasha-wearing countries, as casual sleep wear and at home. 
Somali man wearing a macawiis sarong. 
A Sri Lankan man wearing a sarong.
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