Belly dance

is a Western term for a traditional Arabic dance form. Some American devotees refer to it simply as "Middle Eastern Dance." In the Arabic language it is known as raqs sharqi (??? ????; literally "oriental dance") or sometimes raqs baladi literally "national" or "folk" dance). The term "raqs sharqi" may have originated in Egypt. In Greece and the Balkans, belly dance is called tsiftetelli , iftetelli in Turkish. The term "belly dance" is a creation of Orientalism, first used in English in 1899, and translating in French to "danse du ventre.
Native to North Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, belly dancing is based on one of the oldest social dances in world history. Support for this theory stems from similarities between poses from the modern dance form and those depicted in ancient Egyptian art.[citation needed]

There are two forms of belly dancing. The first is called raqs baladi, a social dance performed for fun and celebration by men and women of all ages, usually during festive occasions such as weddings and other social gatherings. The second form, the more theatrical version and the one most popular in America today, is called raqs sharqi. Like raqs baladi, raqs sharqi is performed by both male and female dancers.

In regions where belly dancing is native, boys and girls learn it informally from an early age by observing and imitating their elders during family/community celebrations and gatherings with friends.[citation needed] Today, these ancient dance forms are taught in classes throughout the world where skilled dancers/teachers share the knowledge that has been passed down to them.

 
Costume

Because the most visible venue for belly dance is nightclubs (as well as video and DVD recordings of popular Egyptian dance celebrities), it is this version, rather than the folk or social versions, that is most popular. The costume now associated with this dance is called bedlah in Arabic (meaning "suit"), and was adopted by dancers in Egypt in the 1930s, eventually spreading to other countries in the region. It owes its creation to the harem fantasy productions of vaudeville, burlesque, and Hollywood during the turn of the last century, rather than to actual authentic Middle Eastern dress. An enterprising dancer, singer, and night club owner in Cairo named Badia Masabni is credited with adopting this costume because it was the image that Western tourists came to expect, rather than the native caftan/kaftan - which mostly concealed the contours of the body, with a scarf or belt tied around the hips to highlight the movements. The caftan is still used by performers to cover their costumes when not on stage.

The mainstays of costuming for the bedlah style include a fitted top or bra (usually with a fringe of beads or coins), a fitted hip belt (again with a fringe of beads or coins), and a skirt(s) (straight, layered, circular, or paneled). In the western world a "veil" - a 3-1/2 to 4-yard piece of fabric - may also be used to accentuate swirling arm movements throughout an entire dance or part of a dance. In the 1940s, King Farouk of Egypt employed Russian ballet instructor Ivanova to teach his daughters, and it was she who first taught the great Egyptian dancer Samia Gamal to use the veil to improve her arm carriage. Most Egyptian dancers use the veil as an opening prop which they discard within the first few minutes of their routines.

In Egypt, dancers wear full-beaded dresses for the folkloric and baladi routines. These dresses are designed according to the type of dance and the tradition behind each dance. Similar outfits are also worn by American and European dancers when performing folk dances. Western dancers, however, have more freedom and may choose according to taste and fantasy. Costuming often varies with the particular style of dance.

 
Techniques

Most of the basic steps and techniques used in belly dancing involve circular motions isolated to a certain part of the body. For example, a circular movement "drawn" parallel to the floor by the hips is known as a "hip circle", or by the ribcage known as a "chest circle". Accents such as "hip lifts" or "drops" are use to draw the eye to hip movement such as "shimmies or hip circles", while shoulder or arm movements are to accent chest or belly undulations. Dancers often dance while balancing various props like baskets, swords or canes(canes in particular for folkloric dances.)as well as using silk or chiffon veils and wings for dramatic dance pieces.

 
Health and belly dancing

The benefits of belly dance are both mental and physical. Dancing provides a good cardio-vascular workout and helps increase both flexibility and strength, focusing on the torso or "core muscles", although it also builds leg strength. Many belly dance styles emphasize muscular "isolations", teaching the ability to move various muscles or muscle groups independently. Veil work can also build arm, shoulder, and general upper-body strength, and playing the zils can build strength and independence of the fingers. Belly dance is suitable for all ages and body types, and can be as physical as the participant chooses. The art form tones the arms, strengthens and tightens the abs and obliques, and improves flexibility. As a form of exercise, it can burn as many calories as light jogging, swimming or riding a bike.[4]

Belly dance is considered a non-impact, weight-bearing exercise, which is especially good for women, since it can reduce the risk of osteoporosis. There is minimal stress on knees and feet. Depending on the rhythms of the music and the repetitive body movements, participants can increase breathing and raise their heartbeat, which can assist in building cardiovascular strength. [5]

Prohibition of belly dancing

Belly dancing has been banned or restricted in some jurisdictions. In Egypt, there was a ban on foreign belly dancers for a year due to the complaint from Egyptian dancers that they were taking away business. The ban was eventually overturned in September 2004. [6]

Belly dancing in pop culture

 

Belly dancing has recently been made widely popular by Latin American superstar Shakira, whose dancing combines belly dance, Latino, and other modern dance styles. Although she hails from Colombia, her part-Lebanese ethnic background has influenced her music and dance style significantly.

R&B singer Aaliyah used the belly dance as her signature move, which she called the belly roll, and it was featured in many of her music videos. Other singers who have performed belly dance moves in their music videos include Beyoncé, Hilary Duff and Britney Spears among others. Of the pop stars, only Shakira has had professional belly dance training.

Belly dancing in the Western world


Fantasy-inspired non-historical Belly dancing costume, with coin bra, face veil, and beaded hip belt over skirt.

The term "belly dancing" (believed by some to be a mis-transliteration of the term for the dance style Beledi or Baladi) is generally credited to Sol Bloom, entertainment director of the 1893 World's Fair, the World Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Although there were dancers of this type present at the 1876 Centennial in Philadelphia, it was not until the 1893 fair that it gained national attention. There were authentic dancers from several Middle Eastern and North African countries, including Syria, Turkey and Algeria, but it was the dancers in the Egyptian Theater of The Street in Cairo exhibit who gained the most notoriety. The rapid hip movements and the fact that the dancers were uncorseted, was considered shocking to the Victorian sensibilities of the day. In fact, there were attempts by many, most notably Anthony Comstock, head of the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice, to have the Egyptian theater closed.

Although it is popularly believed that a dancer named "Fatima", also known as Little Egypt, stole the show, and continued to popularize this form of dancing, there is in fact no evidence to support this claim.[2] Neither photographs, nor reviews of the Egyptian Theater mention any such person. The truth is that photographs as well as accounts of the entertainments, show that there was not one solo dancer, but an entire troupe who performed in the Egyptian Theater. The popularity of these dancers spawned dozens of imitators after the Fair, many of whom claimed to have been dancers at the Chicago Fair. The most well known being Farida Mazar Spyropoulos, who it was said stayed in the States after the Fair and married a Greek man named Spyropoulos. Oddly enough she was neither Egyptian nor Algerian, but Syrian. Although she was Middle Eastern, there is no evidence that she was one of the dancers in the Egyptian theater.

The dance performed by the many dancers calling themselves "Little Egypt" was nicknamed the "Hootchy-Kootchy" or "Hoochee-Coochee", or the shimmy and shake. Due to cultural misunderstanding about the nature of the dance and misrepresentations by the many imitators in Burlesque halls and carnival sideshows, the western world considered it risqué, leading to the stereotype of an erotic suggestive dance. Another name for the dance is "danse du ventre", which in French literally means "dance of the stomach."

Because this dance style created such a craze, Thomas Edison made several films of dancers in the 1890s. Included in these are the Turkish dance, Ella Lola, 1898 and Crissie Sheridan in 1897 both available for on-line viewing through the Library of Congress. Another in this collection is Princess Rajah dance from 1904 which features a dancer playing Zils (finger cymbals), doing "floor work", and balancing a chair in her teeth.

In addition, the sensational stories about the pseudo-Javanese dancer Mata Hari, who was convicted in 1917 by the French for being a German spy during World War I, and the fact that belly dancing could be seen only at vaudeville and in burlesque shows gave belly dancing a questionable reputation in polite society. Hollywood did not help the reputation by only having three roles for a belly dancer (those of slave to be saved, a background dancer while the main characters talk, or a deceitful woman who uses her wiles to trick the main character), which created stereotypes of belly dancers that many dancers and instructors today are working hard to overcome. It is due to these stereotypes that many practitioners refer to the art as "Middle Eastern Dance".

While the beautiful classical Raqs Sharqi is still popular in the West, many dancers have created fusion forms such as American Tribal Style inspired by the folkloric dance styles of India, the Middle East and North Africa and even flamenco. Dancers in the United States, while respecting the origins of belly dance, are also exploring and creating within the dance form to address their own needs. Many women today in the U.S. and Europe approach belly dance as a tool for empowerment and strengthening of the body, mind, and spirit. Issues of body-image, self-esteem, healing from sexual violation, sisterhood, and self-authentication are regularly addressed in belly dance classes everywhere.


Tribal-style belly dancers.

With its emergence at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial, the last four decades of the 20th century moved belly dance in the U.S. more into the mainstream. The current interest in the dance can be traced back to the 1950s and '60s. It was in the ethnic nightclubs in major cities like New York, that most Americans first became acquainted with the dance. These clubs were owned, operated and patronized by members of the ethnic communities of Mediterranean countries like Greece, Turkey, Lebanon and Syria. At the time, most of the dancers were Greek or Turkish, but in time their ranks would grow to include Americans as well. One example of this is the dancer "Morocco" of New York, who started her career in the night clubs of Greek Town on 8th Avenue. These American dancers learned the dance by watching and imitating their Greek and Turkish sisters, as well as the patrons.

In the late 1960s and early '70s many of these dancers began offering dance classes. With increasing exploration of the East in the late 1960s, many people became interested in everything Eastern, including dance. Many touring Middle Eastern or Eastern bands took dancers with them as they toured to provide a visual representation of their music, which helped to spark interest in the dance. This had the effect of creating many beautiful dancers who have generated greater interest in belly dancing. The increased interest in belly dancing created diverse names for the same simple movements and the need to have a "style" as each teacher tried to distinguish differences in their way of teaching from other teachers. This has hampered belly dance from acceptance with the more established dance forms because there is no nationally recognized choreography terminology that can be used to create repeatable dances.

A recent movement in the U.S. called American Tribal Style Belly Dance, or ATS, represents everything from folklore-inspired dances to the fusion of ancient dance techniques from North India, the Middle East, and Africa. Created in the early 1990s by Carolena Nericcio, founder of FatChanceBellydance in San Francisco, ATS has a format consisting of a vocabulary of steps that are designed to be performed improvisationally in a lead-follow manner. Pure ATS is performed in a group, typically with a chorus of dancers using zills, or finger cymbals, as accompaniment. The music can be folkloric or modern, and the costume is heavily layered, evoking traditions of any or all of its fusion of cultural influences.

Suhaila Salimpour is a belly dance teacher who was born to Middle Eastern immigrants to the United States. She recently became the first American-born belly dancer to be interviewed on Arab television, and she is consistently compared to the native belly dancers in the Middle East. [1]

Multicultural trends that have shaped Western and U.S. belly dance are still at work. Ever evolving, this versatile dance keeps absorbing a blend of influences; modern fashion, film and television imagery, the world of rock, jazz, clubhouse, and hip hop, underground subcultures, and many other contemporary influences. The umbrella term used to describe these hybrid forms of belly dance is "belly dance fusion", including "tribal fusion". One of the newest belly dance fusion trends is gothic belly dance that incorporates many belly dance styles and motifs and seeks to express the darkness of the unknown that has inspired the music, philosophies, and lifestyles of the Goth subculture. [2]

Every year in the U.S. more fusion and personal styles added into Belly Dance. From ballet, Urban Tribal, Techno Tribal, Afrocuban Tribal, World Fusion, Popping Fusions, Hip Hop Fusions, Jazz, contemporary, Indian, Asian gymnastics, fire dancing, stilt walking, hoop twirling and the reintroduction of burlesque type movements,[citation needed] With dancers seeking out education in more than one dance form in order to incorporate something new into their Belly Dance choreographies; it has become one of the most diverse dance forms within the U.S. to date.