Indigenous attire, exoticisation and social change: dressing and undressing among the Emberá of Panama

In the final quarter of the twentieth century, the Emberá in Panama abandoned their traditional attire in favour of Western clothes. Recently, however, the introduction of indigenous tourism in the country has encouraged a positive re-evaluation of Emberá traditional attire and enhanced its visibility nationally and internationally. Such transformations in Emberá dress – both the disregard for and re-evaluation of it – can shed some light on the fluid, non-unidirectional nature of social change in indigenous society. I argue that Western exoticization – inherent in the expectation of the authentic and/or the suspicion that particular traditions are ‘invented’ – misrepresents the complexity and dynamic nature of Emberá clothing practices. Contemporary Emberá choices about how to dress in different contexts should instead be understood as responses to two forms of exoticization: the stereotyping of indigenous practices, but also their idealization. In this rendering, the reintroduction of the old Emberá ways of dressing, when this occurs, should be read not as a static imitation of the past, but instead as a reflexive adjustment to new opportunities for cultural representation in the present.