page_title: Akha people
section_title: Dress
hierarchical_section_title: Akha people / Akha villages and culture / Dress
caption_attribution_description: English: That Xieng Tung Festival, Muang Sing, Luang Namtha Province, Laos. Akha young girls in the welcoming committee. On their arrival, visitors will have a colour ribbon pinned on their blouse in exchange for a donation. Français&#160;: Festival du That Xieng Tung, Muang Sing, Province de Luang Namtha, Laos. Jeunes filles akha faisant partie du comité d'accueil. À leur arrivée, les visiteurs se feront épingler un ruban de couleur sur leur blouse contre un don.
context_page_description: The Akha are an ethnic group who live in small villages at higher elevations in the mountains of Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Yunnan Province in China. They made their way from China into Southeast Asia during the early 20th century. Civil war in Burma and Laos resulted in an increased flow of Akha immigrants and there are now 80,000 people living in Thailand's northern provinces of Chiang Rai and Chiang Mai.
  The Akha speak Akha, a language in the Loloish branch of the Tibeto-Burman family. The Akha language is closely related to Lisu and it is thought that the Akha who once ruled the Baoshan and Tengchong plains in Yunnan before the invasion of the Ming Dynasty in 1644.
context_section_description: The Akha people are often noted for their very recognizable sartorial practices. Akha women spin cotton into thread with a hand spindle and weave it on a foot-treadle loom. The cloth is hand dyed with indigo. Women wear broad leggings, a short black skirt with a white beaded sporran, a loose fitting black jacket with heavily embroidered cuffs and lapels. Akha women are known for their embroidery skills. While traditional clothes are typically worn for special ceremonies, one is more likely to see Akha villagers in full traditional garb in areas that have heavy volumes of tourists, particularly in Thailand.
  The headdresses worn by the women are perhaps the most spectacular and elaborate items of Akha dress. Akha women define their age or marital status with the style of headdress worn. At roughly age 12, the Akha female exchanges her child's cap for that of a girl. A few years later she will begin to don the jejaw, the beaded sash that hangs down the front of her skirt and keeps it from flying up in the breeze. During mid-adolescence she will start wearing the adult woman's headdress. Headdresses are decorated by their owner and each is unique. Silver coins, monkey fur, and dyed chicken feathers are just a few of the things that might decorate the headdress. The headdresses differ by subgroup. According to an article about the variations in Akha headdress, "High Fashion, Hill Style", the
  "Ulo Akha headdress consists of a bamboo cone, covered in beads, silver studs and seeds, edged in coins (silver rupees for the rich, baht for the poor) topped by several dangling chicken feather tassels and maybe a woolen pom-pom. The Pamee Akha wear a trapezoidal colt cap covered in silver studs with coins on the beaded side flaps and long chains of linked silver rings hanging down each side. The Lomi Akha wear a round cap covered in silver studs and framed by silver balls, coins and pendants and the married women attach a trapezoidal inscribed plate at the back."
caption: That Xieng Tung Festival, Muang Sing, Laos. Akha young girls in the welcoming committee. On their arrival, visitors will have a color ribbon pinned to their blouse in exchange for a donation.
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