Talk:Cheongsam

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Qipao

I think Cheongsam is not equal to Qipao. Cheongsam is more general that the Chinese worn in the early 20th century. Qipao is specified the women clothing that was worn by women in Qing Dynasty and its mutation. There were some modifications in the 1930-40 and became not so conservative (e.g., shorter, higher slits, short sleeves or sleeveless and so forth). However, the Qipao is still exclusive used for the specified women dress and is NOT same as Cheongsam.

LHM Mar 21, 2007

Cheongsam is NOT THE SAME as QIPAO

In the movie "In the Mood For Love" the actress Maggie Cheung wore a different cheongsam for each scene. 46 in total. Not all 46 made it to the final version of the film.

I think the writer got confused. Cheongsam is NOT THE SAME as QIPAO. Cheongsam is made of thin silk. Qipao is thicker and less refined. They are definitely NOT kimonos. These are all propaganda from the North and from Beifangren. Please do not call what Maggie Cheung wore in In the Mood for Love a Qipao. That is incorrect. Qipao are thicker and less revealing, more conservative. And most Qipao are 2 piece suits popularized by the Communists, they are not Cheongsam. Cheongsams are 1 piece suits that are more sensual that were banned by the Communists. Please do not usurp Southern Chinese culture. Thanks.

Kimono

Why are qipaos confused with kimonos? I think the article should cover that. Cromulent Kwyjibo 22:31, 23 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Probably because they're both associated with Asia, and a lot of people don't bother distinguishing Japan and China.

Qipao v. Cheongsam

I'm confused by the frequent use of the word "cheongsam" in the article, despite the article being titled "qipao". The article should use whatever term is the most common, and then that should be the term used throughout the article, to avoid confusion. Then, in the part on Kill Bill, it says that the costume designer must have confused a qipao and a cheongsam? If the concepts of cheongsams and qipaos are different enough, they should be two separate articles. --DropDeadGorgias (talk) 18:20, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)

The recent addition was not very accurate to my knowledge. Qipao and Cheongsam are similar, but there are some differences and overlaps. The recent changes mixed them all up.

The original Qipao was a Manchu's traditional dress, so it probably dated back to even before the Qing dynasty. Qipao (modern) is also the Chinese words (Hong Kong Cantonese) for Cheongsam (the English loan word).

Cheongsam (the original Cantonese Chinese word, not the specific English word) means long dress (chang2shan1 in pinyin) which is the generic terms to cover both the mens and womens dress in that style.

Cheongsam (the English loan word) probably has the etymology from Hong Kong Cantonese which refers to the modern sexy cut Qipao made in the British colony that were originally from Shanghai. Modern Hong Kong people still call this Qipao formally, but Cheongsam informally.

The mens dress is always called Cheongsam, not Qipao.

The recent addition in the article also mixed in some mainland China information regarding the banning of the sexy cut Cheongsam after the conservative communist government took control. The confusion starts to build up when the English loan word Cheongsam (sexy kind) is explained as the Chinese word chang2shan1, and its relation to the original century old Qipao and the currently Hong Kong usage of the word Qipao, and the Mainland usage of word Qipao are all blended together. I think this article is a mess because each contributor was actually talking about a different item when they write about Qipao or Cheongsam.

To clean up the mess, whoever write this article should be aware of multiple dimensions of these terminologies as follows:

• the English word Cheongsam verses the Chinese word changshan. (the English word is specific, the Chinese word is generic)
• the Hong Kong usage verses the Mainland usage. (the HK usage is relevant because the English word Cheongsam came from Hong Kong Cantonese)
• the mens cheongsam verses womens qipao
• the different stages of the evolution of this dress over the years, namely:
  • the original traditional century-old Manchu style, (Qipao)
  • the conservative 1910s New China era style, (changshan)
  • the sexy western influenced pre-communist Shanghai style, (note many Qipao tailors fleed to Hong Kong during/after the civil war.)
  • the sexier Western influenced British colonial Hong Kong style, (Cheongsam in English, Qipao or Cheung Saam in Chinese)
  • the Maoist sexless everybody-is-your-comrade style. (need help from wikipedian in Mainland China to expand on this.)

This mess requires good English to fix. I don't think I qualify for the job. I just hope my explanation above clear things up a bit.

Kowloonese 01:25, Apr 28, 2005 (UTC)

But you got information required to rewrite it. Some English speaking native can then proofread it?

What I came to comment here about was the remark about Kill Bill. It's speculation without reference that they didn't do it on purpose and make a female character seem more masculine and strong, by dressing her in male costume. Is there a way to get a source for this? -- Suviko from fiWikipedia

As someone whose family still wears cheongsam for special occassions, cheongsam is used for both the mens and female versions with qipao being used only the female version. But saying that, we can look at Kimono as an example, kimono strictly applies to both men's and female versions, but is popularly seen as applying only to the female version in the West, by including both in the same article the reader can be informed of the reality. One has to ask what an average user expects to find when entering Cheonsam into the search box, and if this hypothetical user will know to search for qipao when looking for the female dress? KTo288 14:45, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Why not just put one of those lines up top saying "This article is about the men's version, if you're looking for women's version, go to qipao" or something like that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.107.58.131 (talk) 06:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Better Pictures

Qipao are very elegant. Someone should post more pictures of historical qipao and modern ones to compare and contrast. CanCanDuo 01:12, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, better pictures are needed.--Balthazarduju 00:06, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Done.KTo288 18:59, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Chun-Li

Well, when she made her first appearance, she literally wore a peach colored qipao, although in-game she wore blue, although all later games, she wore blue throughout the game. The first game where she only wears a blue qipao throughout the game is Street Fighter II: Champion Edition. --PJ Pete

Cheongsam and qipao

There is a problem in this article. The cheongsam in English is identified with the tight-fitting Shanghainese (later Hong Kong) style of qipao. But the article goes through the history of the qipao, and shows pictures of clothing that is worlds away from what we regard as a 'cheongsam' in English!

I think that we need to reach some kind of consistency in usage. My suggestion is that we should use the original Chinese words (in Mandarin pronunciation) for both the original baggy qipao and the male item known as changshan. It's ridiculous to use "cheongsam" for either of these, because no matter what 长衫 means in different dialects of Chinese, the word 'cheongsam' in English will always be associated with the sexy Hong kong style!

So my suggestion is that we should use qipao historically, and restrict the use of cheongsam to the modern tight-fitting garment -- noting, of course, that qipao is also used in Mainland China to refer to the modern tight-fitting article. That will perhaps mean a little rewriting to disentangle these meanings. The semantic complexity can be represented as follows:

Garment -----------MANDARIN---------------CANTONESE----------------ENGLISH

Baggy female (old)-----qipao---------------cheongsam?/keipo?-----no name

Tight female (modern)--qipao---------------cheongsam/keipo------cheongsam

Male version---------changshan------------cheongsam---------------no name

Instead of pushing 'cheongsam' to fill in the gaps in English usage (gaps caused by the fact that these are Chinese items of clothing outside of English-speaking experience and history), I suggest using the Chinese terms instead. Otherwise the article could be utterly confusing.

What do people think? Bathrobe (talk) 12:15, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I've rewritten the article to refocus on English-language usage. In English, the cheongsam is a tight-fitting dress for women. That was the original term in Shanghai, where the modern cheongsam was invented, and it's the predominant usage in Hongkong. It's also the traditional usage in English. I'm sure there are people who've never heard of a cheongsam but have recently (maybe in the last 5-10 years) discovered that the sexy dresses worn by girls outside fancy restaurants in China are called qipao in Chinese. That's fine. The article mentions the Chinese word qípáo, and also discusses Chinese terms 旗袍 and 长衫. But mixing Chinese and English language usage together is really confusing. This is especially so when the qipao (but not the cheongsam) refers to the baggy old Qing dynasty style, so I've tried to distinguish between them by using qipao for the old style and cheongsam for the modern style. This is a useful and makes things much clearer for the English reader.

I'm sure that in the process of rewriting some mistakes or inaccuracies have crept in. I welcome people to come in and fix them up.

Bathrobe (talk) 03:57, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

Qipao → Cheongsam per Wikipedia guidelines ("Use common name" and "Use English")

While qipao is certainly used in some English contexts (especially by those familiar with China), cheongsam is the more widely-used general English word found in dictionary usage[1] and other explanatory notes[2], academic works[3], and commercial websites[4][5].

There is an argument that, in Chinese, cheongsam also refers also to a man's gown whereas qipao doesn't but, in English usage, cheongsam and qipao are interchangeable[6][7][8][9][10] with cheongsam predominant.

Though I'm normally loath to rely on Google searches, they are a good illustration here with exclusive use of cheongsam[11] almost double the exclusive use of qipao[12] (253,000 vs 125,000).

See above and Talk:Changshan for previous discussion of this issue. — AjaxSmack 21:04, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

"The use of cheongsam as a cultural marker of Chineseness can be thus perceived as ironic and a cultural stereotype of Chineseness as the cheongsam is not associated to any specific ancestral clothing of Chinese immigrants.[4]: 277" Shouldn't "ironic" be "iconic"? I think someone made a typo. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 111.102.184.193 (talk) 05:17, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.

• Support English terms should be used for titles. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:07, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose These 2 terms are not interchangable, but a lot of people thought it's interchangable. Let's bring it back to english context. Weight and mass are 2 different things, yet in real life they are mistakenly used interchangable. Cheongsam is for guys, qipao is for girls. To furthur prove my point, please go to Chinese Wikipedia (follow the interwiki). In the last sentence prior to "See more" section, you will see a phrase that says

另外，英文裡的Cheongsam雖然是「長衫」的音譯，在實際應用上僅指女裝旗袍。

Although you don't understand Chinese, I can translate the phrase for you. The phrase says "Cheongsam is the translated term in English, however, in daily context it should be qipao."

Who are you trying to kid? The Chinese says:"Also, although cheongsam in English is a transliteration of 长衫, in actual use it refers only to the female qipao". In other words, it completely disproves your point!

Bathrobe (talk) 04:33, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

You stated that we should use common name in here, so the move should be the other way around. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:09, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm not disputing Chinese usage and have not tried to move the Chinese page, I'm only concerned with English usage here and it's cheongsam for the women's dress. Please look at the copious links I provided above. (I wouldn't presume to move zh:荷蘭 to zh:低地國 because the Chinese doesn't match the Dutch so don't presume the English name is "wrong" just because it doesn't match the Chinese.) — AjaxSmack 04:31, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

• Support Cantonese usage is what English adopted for this. 132.205.44.5 (talk) 19:08, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
• Support My reasons have been explained very thoroughly above. Bathrobe (talk) 04:30, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
• Support nom and Bathrobe Mcmullen writes (talk) 20:45, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
• I guess as nom I should support the move. — AjaxSmack 08:48, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Discussion

Question - if the current Qipao article is moved to Cheongsam, what will happen to the Qipao article? Will it be a redirect... or a disambig page? --Novelty (talk) 11:53, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

It should be a redirect.

Bathrobe (talk) 03:43, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Move completed

Per the discussion above, I have moved the article. Please make whatever clean-up is neccessary (eliminating double-redirects, adjusting article text, etc.). Kaldari (talk) 15:44, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

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Suggest removing "cheongsam in culture" section

Seriously. It currently lists 5 video games, 2 animes, and one movie. Sometimes to say that some girl wears one "at some point during the story" or "during the ending credits". Are we going to list every person and character in the world who has once worn a cheongsam? Please check http://www.xkcd.com/446/ Ratfox (talk) 22:02, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

After one week, no opposition? Done. Ratfox (talk) 21:47, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Definition, geography and photograph

The definition and the first section of the article are a little messy in terms of defining what cheongsam and qipao are. I suggest using an initial definition with hanzi for both cheongsam and qipao in Mandarin, Shanghainese and Cantonese.

Then I think the article should focus on the geography and what Mainland China, Shanghai and Hong Kong call what, once again using hanzi for each area.

The type of qipao I am familiar with looks like this: http://beverlys.net/photos/2009/shop/Qipao500.jpg. I don't see any similar photo in this article. I would be nice to add such thing since this is they type of qipao we see around these days.

ICE77 (talk) 05:08, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Western influence

The article talks about the dress getting "more form fitting and revealing" as a "modernization." The article doesn't talk about it being the result of European/American influence which is why the dress radically changed after hundreds of years being basically the same baggy, long-sleeved form. It looks like the Cheongsam had two changes to it's form because of European/American influence in the 1920s from the flapper dress and in the 1950s from Christian Dior's "New Look" fashion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:558:6031:4F:6D07:E3AF:A9AD:4C43 (talk) 21:36, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

Etymology of Cheongsam

The anglicized word Cheongsam is not Mandarin. It is Cantonese, a dialect of China. The literal translation of the word is long shirt/dress in Mandarin.

In the article, the initial description refers to the males' as Changsan. This is the Hanyu Pinyin of the term "Cheongsam" in Mandarin.

I believe the male version of said dress, changsan, is the Chang Pao (long robe), while the ladies' is QiPao.

The thickness of the clothes depends mainly on the location it was worn. Material of the dress depends largely on the wealth of the wearer.

Body-hugging?

Quote from the intro: the cheongsam is "a body-hugging one-piece Chinese dress for women". Later on there are pictures of cheongsam which are not "body-hugging" but lose and it is claimed that some cheongsams used as uniforms are "usually straight, with no waist shaping".

So that's a major inconsistency. Maybe it should be pointed out that there are different styles of this dress, and one modern, fashionable variant can be of the close-cut type. Thanks, Maikel (talk) 08:20, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

What makes a dress a cheongsam?

The article fails to name specific design features of a cheongsam, which I (as a complete layman) presume to include the high, stiff neck and the peculiar, asymmetrical fastening with hooks on one side of the chest.

I'd appreciate it if somebody could amend this article. Thanks, Maikel (talk) 08:20, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

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Just Dance 3

@Qualcuno dei miliardi uguali e diversi: The second dancer of one song in a dancing game is in no way noteworthy. Do not edit war to re-add the material until you have achieved consensus for including the material on this talk page. Doing so will require citing some professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic sources that demonstrate that anyone cares about the second dancer in one song in the third video game in yet another DDR knock-off.

You'll notice that we don't even list Chun-Li or Shampoo from Ranma ½ or any of the far more prominent examples of the Cheongsam in entertainment -- because we don't just list every single example of something that appears in popular entertainment that only fanboys would care about. Ian.thomson (talk) 16:55, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

I Don't care. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Qualcuno dei miliardi uguali e diversi (talk • contribs) 15:24, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

@Qualcuno dei miliardi uguali e diversi: Don't care about what?

If you don't care about including the material any more, fine.

If you don't care that we don't include more prominent examples of the Cheongsam, then that's blind and unreasoned hypocrisy.

If you don't care about our policies and guidelines, which are social contracts based on site-wide consensus, then there's not much of a reason to welcome you into the community.

As you have not tried to restore the material, I will try to assume the first case, even though this makes it very easy to assume the last case. Ian.thomson (talk) 15:37, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

"Modern Use"

Teresa Teng. OH MY GOD!!! That should be the example of modern use. The ultimate example.Starhistory22 (talk) 01:35, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

@Starhistory22: Wikipedia only cites, summarizes, and paraphrases professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic sources. It does not rely on user opinion or original research. You would really need a non-primary source that reviews a variety of professional sources and summarizes those as citing Teresa Tend as an especially noteworthy example of someone wearing a Cheongsam, and even then we wouldn't be able to say "the ultimate example" because of WP:NPOV. Ian.thomson (talk) 01:50, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

Cheongsam sounds like Korean?

Can't Koreans understand if they wore Korean Cheongsam? 124.106.130.148 (talk) 04:47, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

"Prom dress controversy"

The section Prom dress controversy reads a bit like content for someone's social media feed, rather than for an encyclopædia. Surely it is not very notable, and the point is not clear. —DIV (120.17.94.169 (talk) 14:02, 16 February 2019 (UTC))

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长衫 is not the correct name for the content of the article

A cursory image search reveals that 長衫 is primarily worn by men. What the article deals with is qipao, worn by women. 2001:4C4E:24A8:E000:44E4:1A6E:C8AD:BB11 (talk) 18:07, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Recommendation to change article name back to qipao or merge article with Changshan

Currently, there are two articles, one for the cheongsam, in reference to the garment worn by women, and for the changshan, in reference to the garment worn by men. These two words are just different romanticisations of the same Chinese word, as the editors of this page knows.

As this article is tailored for English speakers, this makes sense since many English speakers are only familiar with the female cheongsam or qipao. However, it makes further research into this topic difficult for readers, since looking up the word in contemporary sources outside wikipedia will almost exclusively end up with information about the male changshan.

Changing the name back to qipao will differentiate the two articles more and make it easier for readers trying to learn only about the female garment. Meanwhile, the current article already refers to the changshan as the male counterpart while the changshan article refers to this one as the female counterpart.

Wouldn't a single article about the garb introduced to China by the Manchu people that developed over time in different ways at least be easier than the current two articles which have the same name using different romanticisation of the same Chinese word.

BCnadian (talk) 12:44, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

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