Thread: Intro to baladi dresses, Saidi dresses, gargars, thobes, gallabiyas, fustan raqs, and more....

There's a new article on Shira.net that's intended to clear up a lot of the questions people have about the different types of dresses used in Middle Eastern dance costuming. It talks about differences between a baladi dress and a Saidi dress, shows examples of different types of thobes, shows the traditional garments that were used as the inspiration for melaya leff dresses and fellahin dresses, and more.

See Dresses in Middle Eastern Dance Costuming

YAY!!!

Thank you, from the bottom of my confused little heart!

What a terrific article, Shira, thank you!

Thank you for this! As a baby bellydance student, I have found this quite helpful!

See Dresses in Middle Eastern Dance Costuming[/QUOTE]

Excellent! Fantastic work, Shira.

Great article Shira! I have a question, a silly one. Is it pronounced galabeya or jalabeya? Hard G or soft G? Oh dear, this really is a silly question!

Originally Posted by Starmouth

Great article Shira! I have a question, a silly one. Is it pronounced galabeya or jalabeya? Hard G or soft G? Oh dear, this really is a silly question!

This is not a silly question at all! The answer is, "It depends on which dialect of Arabic the person is speaking."

In Egypt, they would pronounce it with a hard "g", such as the "g" in "gut". In Lebanon, they would pronounce it with a "j" sound, such as the "j" in "jut".

The same thing applies in lots of other places - the Muslim attire is pronounced "higgab" (hard "g") in Egyptian dialect, but "hijjab" in most other dialects. This also applies to "Khaleegy" vs "Khaleejy", and so on.

For those who don't speak Arabic, Id' suggest that you just pick the one you like better and stay with it consistently. Ie, don't use "g" with some words and "j" with others unless you have a very specific reason for consciously doing so.

I personally choose to use the hard "g" simply because Egypt is the country I've been to the most, and Egyptian is the dialect of Arabic I've actually started learning how to speak. But the "j" sound is equally correct.

Fabulous article! I'm going to share this with my students.

I hope to replace the photo of me in the Palestinian thobe section of the article with a different photo soon, one that shows the front of that same dress, with its heavily embroidered rectangular yoke. I'll add a note to this thread to let everyone know once the photo has been changed - it gives a better view of how the Palestinian version of the dress differs from the Syrian.

In the meantime, here's a photo of the Jordanian version of the thobe: Islamic clothing by Sajeda: Islamic women clothing store. | hijab | abaya | jilbab.

Since I don't own a Jordanian one I don't have the rights to any photos of one to include with my article, but you can follow that link to a vendor's page to see how the Jordanian one differs from the others. I hope to acquire one someday!

And someday I hope to get a photo of my Egyptian Sinai one as well as maybe some of my other Palestinian ones. (I have a collection....)

Thank You for always putting so much time & effort in helping others to understand!!

Thanks for sharing this article..
I like your article Shira.I also like all the sharing of people...

Originally Posted by *Shira*

For those who don't speak Arabic, Id' suggest that you just pick the one you like better and stay with it consistently. Ie, don't use "g" with some words and "j" with others unless you have a very specific reason for consciously doing so.

I personally choose to use the hard "g" simply because Egypt is the country I've been to the most, and Egyptian is the dialect of Arabic I've actually started learning how to speak. But the "j" sound is equally correct.

I would counter that the very specific reason for consciously doing so is that if you are not in an immersion environment with a clear preference for a single dialect of Arabic, the sooner you learn to roll with the differences, the better it is. Fluency in Arabic depends on being able to recognize and navigate these linguistic variations easily. It's not geeking on arcane minutiae of grammar and pronunciation. It's everyday life in the Arab-speaking world. It's how you know that Amro Diab singing "albi" and Assi al-Hellani singing "galbi" and Mohammed Abdo singing "qalbi" are all singing about their hearts using the same word. Arabic speakers don't sweat these differences any more than a native speaker of American English freaks out when someone in New Jersey says "youse guys" and someone in Alabama says "y'all." Same thing, regional difference, whatever...

My personal feeling is that it is best to defer to the local pronunciation, which means ladies wear "higgab" in Cairo and "hijjab" in Riyadh. Natives are accepting when a nonnative speaker makes a dialect mistake (they're used to being flexible), but if you can, go with what makes sense in the current context, because that's what they do. Arabic just has a different mind set when it comes to dialect than English. It would be really weird if Justin Bieber announced his next record was going to be sung in an Australian accent, but nobody bats an eye when Hussein al-Jasmi (who's from the UAE) sings in Egyptian dialect. Dialect as a concept is both more fluid and more rigid in Arabic than it is in English.

Love ya Shira! Thank you!

Great article.

I would like to comment on the section on melaya dresses. You mention that scarf isn't typically worn with a melaya dress - it's just something the actress tied on in the scene. It might be nice to expand this - perhaps in a footnote - that people in movies are often seen tying scarves around their hips when they begin dancing in an informal and social manner, whether they are wearing jeans, or a galabeya. In fact, the melaya often ends up tied around the hips in a melaya tableau.

I liked that you talked about the braids hairstyle. I have seen little mention of this in bellydance circles and just recently started to notice it on folkloric videos. When I was in Egypt a few years ago on a tour, I ended up wearing my hair in two brunette braids because it's something I do to manage my hair when I travel. The guide commented/asked me if I was specifically doing their Egyptian traditional hairstyle (or something like that). I was surprised as I didn't know it was traditional - I think i told him that it wasn't intentional - in fact two braids is how some American indigenous people wear/used to wear their hair - but that it was cool to know that it was also an Egyptian hairstyle. Maybe there should be another whole article on traditional to modern hairstyling for Oriental and folkloric dance!

Finally you own some really nice "fustan raqs" - looking good Shira!

I think one of the reasons so many dancers have used the term "baladi dress" to refer to dresses that actually are NOT baladi dresses is because they haven't been exposed to any alternative terms that would be more correct for other dress styles.

One of the things I hoped to accomplish with my article was to help people understand that Egyptian costume makers use different terms for baladi dresses than they do for evening gowns, and we too can use those different terms.

Also, a lot of dancers incorrectly think that a "thobe" is the same thing as a "Khaleegy dress" (and they don't realize that the thobe al-nashal isn't the only style of dress worn in the Gulf), so I thought it would be helpful to show that the word "thobe" has a broader meaning, and there are a number of different cuts of garment that can all be referred to as "thobe".

Originally Posted by Nepenthe

You mention that scarf isn't typically worn with a melaya dress - it's just something the actress tied on in the scene. It might be nice to expand this - perhaps in a footnote - that people in movies are often seen tying scarves around their hips when they begin dancing in an informal and social manner, whether they are wearing jeans, or a galabeya. In fact, the melaya often ends up tied around the hips in a melaya tableau.

Hmmm, I must think on that. Yes, I've experienced the tying-on of the hip scarf in person when dancing with other women at haflas in private homes or at weddings. And yes, you certainly see it in movie scenes as well. So I agree with your observation. I just need to figure out whether to add it as a footnote to the dresses article or whether to put it somewhere separate.

Originally Posted by Nepenthe

I liked that you talked about the braids hairstyle. I have seen little mention of this in bellydance circles and just recently started to notice it on folkloric videos. <snip> Maybe there should be another whole article on traditional to modern hairstyling for Oriental and folkloric dance!

Interesting comment - you're right, dancers often don't talk about hair styles associated with Middle Eastern dance. We see it when we watch the videos, but maybe we don't always internalize it! Another one I must think about!

Originally Posted by Nepenthe

Finally you own some really nice "fustan raqs" - looking good Shira!

Thanks! I find that whenever I'm dancing in an "educational" context such as an arts showcase, dance fest (that features not only Middle Eastern dance but also salsa, tango, Irish, etc) I find myself reaching for the fustan raqs instead of a bra/belt/skirt set. I like my badlat, but I find that dresses evoke a very different reaction from audiences, a reaction that I enjoy evoking!

What a wonderful article - very enlightening!

{insert rant about the Egyptian men feeling compelled to wear suits and neckties}

I have expanded my article on dresses used in Middle Eastern dance costuming. I added some pictures to the sections on:

• Baladi dresses
• Melaya leff costuming
• Abayas

I replaced the Palestinian thobe picture with another that shows the dress better. And I added a section on the Moroccan tak****a.

Originally Posted by Nepenthe

I liked that you talked about the braids hairstyle. I have seen little mention of this in bellydance circles and just recently started to notice it on folkloric videos. <snip> Maybe there should be another whole article on traditional to modern hairstyling for Oriental and folkloric dance!

I've added a few comments about hairstyles to the melaya leff section, to offer some food for thought.

See Dresses in Middle Eastern Dance Costuming

Oh good grief. In my previous post, where I said I'd added the Moroccan dress, I see that bhuz has substituted asterisks for 4 letters of the word.

It's a taksh ita but without the blank space in the middle. Harrumph!

I have added photos to the article showing me wearing my melaya leff dress and also my gargar (fellahin dress).

Originally Posted by *Shira*

Oh good grief. In my previous post, where I said I'd added the Moroccan dress, I see that bhuz has substituted asterisks for 4 letters of the word.

It's a taksh ita but without the blank space in the middle. Harrumph!

(A workaround might be to use the spelling "takchita," which is common -- the sh sound is commonly transliterated as ch in North Africa -- and "chit" shouldn't flag as naughty. I think it shouldn't, anyhow...although for anglophones, the tendency might be to think it looks like "tak-cheetah.")

Also, it is awesome that you wrote this :)

Excellent article, Shira!

For those of you who like to do melaya leff, I've posted a NEW ARTICLE with instructions on how to make a flowered headband in the style that goes with the ruffled dress:

How to Make a Flowered Headband for Melaya Leff

This is an awesome article!! It's like putting 20 yrs plus of my sticky notes in one great place...Such a great resource you provide. Thanks Shira!

Great article! Thank you for clearing up some of the confusion I had re: this subject and I loved the pictures!

I just love your site. Thank you for all your work and I like when you give a heads up on new articles.

Hi, your page is great, Shira. Thanks for putting all that info up! It's certainly helped in my understanding of the different dress styles and their origins.

I'm wondering about colours of Saidi dresses, whether certain colours are more common or traditional than others. Does anyone know if certain dye colours were more widely available, or preferred over other colours?