Shalwar kameez—alternatively salwar kameez or shalwar qameez—is a traditional dress worn by both women and men in South Asia and Central Asia. Shalwar are loose pajama-like trousers. The legs are wide at the top and narrow at the ankle. The kameez is a long shirt or tunic. The side seams (known as the chaak), left open below the waist-line, give the wearer greater freedom of movement.
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Shalwar are gathered at the waist and held up by a drawstring or an elastic band. The pants can be wide and baggy or more narrow, and even made of fabric cut on the bias.
The kameez is usually cut straight and flat; older kameez use traditional cuts, as shown in the illustration above. Modern kameez are more likely to have European-inspired set-in sleeves. The tailor's taste and skill are usually displayed, not in the overall cut, but in the shape of the neckline and the decoration of the kameez. Modern versions of the feminine kameez can be much less modest than traditional versions. The kameez may be cut with a deep neckline, sewn in diaphanous fabrics, or styled in cap-sleeve or sleeveless designs. The kameez side seams may be split up to the thigh or even the waistline, and it may be worn with the salwar slung low on the hips. When a woman wears a semi-transparent kameez (mostly as a party dress), she wears a choli or a cropped camisole underneath it.
When women wear the shalwar kameez, they usually wear a long scarf or shawl called a dupatta around the head or neck. For Muslim women, the dupatta is a less stringent alternative to the chador or burqa (see also hijab and purdah). For Sikh and Hindu women, the dupatta is useful when the head must be covered, as in a Sikh Gurdwara or a Hindu Temple, or the presence of elders. For other women, the dupatta is simply a stylish accessory that can be worn over one shoulder or draped around the chest and over both shoulders.
The garment has seen a transformation in the past few decades, from that of an everyday garment worn by immigrant women from the region of South Asia—mostly from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka—to one with mainstream, and even high-fashion, appeal in Britain, Canada, and the U.S.
In India, the garment was a convenient and modest alternative to a sari—and is popular across the nation due to its ability to flatter practically any body type. By varying the fabric, color, and the level of embroidery and decoration, the shalwar kameez can be formal, casual, dressy, or plain; and it can also be made to suit practically any climate.
The pants, or salvar, are known as salvar, salvaar or shalvar शलवार क़मीज़ in Hindi, and shalvar in Urdu: شلوار قمیض. The word comes from the Persian: شلوار, meaning pants.
The shirt, kameez or qamiz, takes its name from the Arabic qamis. There are two main hypotheses regarding the origin of the Arabic word, namely:
Garments cut like the traditional kameez are known in many cultures; according to Dorothy Burnham, of the Royal Ontario Museum, the "seamless shirt," woven in one piece on warp-weighted looms, was superseded in early Roman times by cloth woven on vertical looms and carefully pieced so as not to waste any cloth. 10th century cotton shirts recovered from the Egyptian desert are cut much like the traditional kameez or the contemporary Egyptian jellabah or galabia.[3]
Transliterations starting from Urdu, Persian, Pashto, Turkish languages use "sh". Both spellings are found in common English usage. The shalwar spelling seems to be most common in Canada and the United Kingdom, and is the preferred spelling in the Oxford English Dictionary. Salwar seems to be more common in the US and is found at many online stores selling salwar kameez. The word kameez is often spelled with an H, as in khameez.