I noticed that Prime Minister Modi of India wears a “power vest” and a dress shirt:
. . and Iran’s Ahmednijad always wore a sport coat or a suit, but never a tie.
I get African and Middle Eastern leaders such as the Saudis visiting America in full tribal or Royal garb, headdresses, robes etc etc . . . but I don’t understand these guys.
You are already dressed “Western” . . . why not just do that jacket and tie?
BTW, Im not looking for what doesn’t Obama wear a vest when he visits India-----Im just wondering what the cultural reasons are for this choice of “half-Western” formal wear from these countries.
It’s too damn hot in South Asia and the Middle East for all men to wear ties. It’s completely impractical. Even in a/c, you’ll have to step out sooner or later. Besides, what’s so great about the tie anyway? Just so they can follow a ‘western’ uniform for business? They are NOT the west, and good on them for recognizing the tie is not, for them, essential business attire.
And if those leaders lived in said mountain ranges, you’d have a point. As it is, that’s like saying the U.S. is a frigid land because Alaska is 20% of the land area.
Most of the population of S. Asia (esp. India and Pakistan) is, from a Western perspective, ridiculously hot most of the time.
I don’t agree with the OP’s premise. If not wearing Western dress, then South Asian leaders are likely to be wearing indigenous dress like Nehru suits or kurta-pajama/shalwar-kameez, the latter of which can superficially look like a Western shirt. Neither of these are designed to be used with Western-style ties.
Plus, there are plenty of occasions where Western leaders don’t wear ties to engagements. The photo used in the OP is from a Facebook Q&A with Mark Zuckerberg. I can easily imagine that if Obama was doing such an event he’d “dress down” to more informal tie-less attire.
As for Iran, Ahmadinejad styled himself as a “man of the people” and so wore the sort of everyday clothes that the ordinary Iranian people wear. He was also quite anti-Western and so would probably feel reluctant to wear a symbol of the West, like a tie (and I can’t find a single photo of him wearing one). His predecessor and successor as President of Iran wear indigenous attire.
As I understand it, ties are a relatively recently formalised relic of neckerchiefs/cravats that became fashionable in eighteenth century Europe.
Other cultures didn’t have an equivalent. So why would they adopt all aspects of western dress if they don’t have any use for them? Why do we go on expecting it as a sign of formal dress?
Something like a fifth to a quarter of Pakistans population lives in the Montains regions.
A significant portion of Indias population lives in tropical zones.
We really need less ignorance about these region, especially in this thread,
The answer to this is that ties suck and they are wise men. Like the fake buttons on a suit (Only there to prevent you from wiping your nose on your sleeve. True Story.) they are a vestige of a dress code that said “You shall be uncomfortable to appear successful”. The sooner they go away the better.
Not a true story. The reason they’re there is that buttons were very popular among the Victorians, who festooned fake ones everywhere (mens’ coats even had a row down the back). The ones at the cuffs just happened to stick.
There are other ways to avoid wearing a tie in formal situations, such as the Latin American guayabera shirt. PresidentEvo Morales of Bolivia likes to wear a kind of sweater thing. President Mujica of Uruguay would wear a three piece suit without a tie.
I don’t blame them. I avoid wearing ties whenever possible. If I could claim “native dress” to avoid wearing one, I do it in a second. But talk about Euro-centrism. Why the fuck should everyone in the world adopt European style clothing?
One also often sees Iranian politicians in a hybrid East-West suit, with a Western-style jacket and a Nehru collar-style shirt, like this, thus negating the need for a Western imperialist tie.
