Thread: Styles of Belly Dance Primer - Proof read please

Okay all, here is the style primer I've put together for my students to help them navigate that ever confusing world of belly dance. I've tried to keep it succinct simple and accurate, but I could really use a proofread and your suggestions.

here's the link:

More About Shems and About Belly Dance - Shems - Professional Belly Dancer serving Washington DC & Baltimore

Also Suha and Sausan, you are both on here right? I've used the photos you posted of Kawakib and Farida Fahmi and thanked you at the end. I'll go back in and add links to your respective sites as well. Let me know if that isn't okay.

thanks!

Nice job Shems! I was only able to skim it quickly, but I noticed Jamila/Jamileh is spelled two different ways in consecutive paragraphs, and I think Laila (depending on which one you're referring to) is also misspelled (Leila of Cairo?).

A great resource!

I've only had time for a flick through but I notice a misspelling of piece near to the top.

Shems,
WONDERFUL collection of information for students, dancers and fans of the dance...but I did notice that you left out any mention of dances from Israel (including the horah and Yemenite dances).
:ctr:
Gia

Originally Posted by Gia al Qamar

Shems,
WONDERFUL collection of information for students, dancers and fans of the dance...but I did notice that you left out any mention of dances from Israel (including the horah and Yemenite dances).
:ctr:
Gia

I've left out a lot of things, but if you think these Israeli dances are important, I'm sure they are as well and I've just added them. I didn't have any Israeli dances up yet.


Also, I've gone over with spell check (so hopefully that caught most of the mundane errors and changed the Jamila and Leila, thank you!

Looks fantastic!

Some typos

- 1st para re. Egyptian dance, I think you meant 'releve' (with appropriate accents, which I can't work out how to put in here!) instead of 'relieve'?
- 2nd para re. Egyptian dance - Tahiya Karioka, nor Kariorka
- Folkloric section - 'Maghreb' rather than 'Mahreb', and 'Schikhatt' rather than 'Shikatt' (although I know there are a number of spellings for this, so I may very well be wrong!)
- Under the 'Turkish' section in Folkloric - 'Wirling' should be 'whirling'
- Under the 'Greece' section, it should be 'tsiftetelli' not 'chiftetelli' - although Maria Aya may want to correct my spelling there!

Hope you don't find the above too nit-picky!

I just want to say that this is a really interesting article, it sort of covers something I tried to do in an article of my own, so it's good to see it done from another perspective!

Thanks for sharing..g.:

Originally Posted by deelybopper

Looks fantastic!

Some typos

- 1st para re. Egyptian dance, I think you meant 'releve' (with appropriate accents, which I can't work out how to put in here!) instead of 'relieve'?
- 2nd para re. Egyptian dance - Tahiya Karioka, nor Kariorka
- Folkloric section - 'Maghreb' rather than 'Mahreb', and 'Schikhatt' rather than 'Shikatt' (although I know there are a number of spellings for this, so I may very well be wrong!)
- Under the 'Turkish' section in Folkloric - 'Wirling' should be 'whirling'
- Under the 'Greece' section, it should be 'tsiftetelli' not 'chiftetelli' - although Maria Aya may want to correct my spelling there!

Hope you don't find the above too nit-picky!

I just want to say that this is a really interesting article, it sort of covers something I tried to do in an article of my own, so it's good to see it done from another perspective!

Thanks for sharing..g.:

No this stuff is great - spell check doesn't fix the foreign words. post a link to your article, I'd love to see it.

Hi Shems! Just sent you a private message, though when I came back here and saw the stuff posted by others I think my private message was redundant. Anyway, I thought you did a great job with your article!

--Shira

found it:
http://www.desna-dances.co.uk/BellydanceOverview.pdf

this is great - I suddenly want to revise...

Originally Posted by *Shira*

Hi Shems! Just sent you a private message, though when I came back here and saw the stuff posted by others I think my private message was redundant. Anyway, I thought you did a great job with your article!

--Shira

Got it and I'm making adjustments. Thanks!

Any other input?

interesting.i guess it depends where you are, as to what is defined as middle eastern belly dance.it is a good read.

Good job, Shems! Very well-written! I read another article of yours - don't remember where, possibly on Tribe (?) and was impressed by your eloquence and the obvious effort you made to present your ideas clearly and honestly.

Originally Posted by zamora

interesting.i guess it depends where you are, as to what is defined as middle eastern belly dance.it is a good read.

What do you mean? I'm curious to know more about your perspective.

Originally Posted by SuhaDeeb

Good job, Shems! Very well-written! I read another article of yours - don't remember where, possibly on Tribe (?) and was impressed by your eloquence and the obvious effort you made to present your ideas clearly and honestly.

thanks Suha!

What an amazing pulling together of ideas. Well done.

A couple of quibbles though.
"Raqs- dance, Sharqi- Eastern, Oriental. In Turkish it is called Oryantal Dansı. It originates from the Middle East and it is believed to be called Eastern Dance or Oriental Dance to differentiate it from dances imported from the West or Occident, meaning Europe and later America. "

I have heard this before, but I'm not convinced. According to Dr Mo Geddawi (and others) "raqs sharqi" was contrasted to "raqs beledi". The "eastern dance" side wasn't to distinguish it from foreign dance but to separate it from nasty, dirty, common dance that ordinary people did; to lift it into the mysterious "other" for high class clientale.

"Golden Era refers to the stars of Egyptian dance from the 1920-1980s"

I think it's a little shorter than that. 1920s-1950s?

"Hagallah" is in Egypt mostly as an accident. It was brought by Libyan bedouins to Mersa Matruh - and is basically a Libyan dance.

"Bambooti" - I've seen from Denise Enan as "Bumbotaya"

"Ghawazee Awalim" - two separate styles I believe.

"Andalusian" - actually southern Spain! Usually refers to an Arabic/Spanish fusion piece.

What about Bedouin dances (other than Hagalla)? Raqs Sham’idân (candelabra dance)? Raqs al Juzur (Tunisan pot dance)?

But wow! Well, done.

Originally Posted by shems

found it:
http://www.desna-dances.co.uk/BellydanceOverview.pdf

this is great - I suddenly want to revise...

Hi Shems - sorry, went to bed before I could read updates on the thread Thanks for posting the link.

One thing that I do need to do now is update the section on Lebanese dance based on SuhaDeeb's recent postings here, so that's something to add to the 'to do' list...

Hi Shems,

I noticed you wrote Badia Masabni was Syrian-Lebanese. I'll explain why there is confusion about that (I've also seen Fayza Ahmad described as Syrian). Anyone born before 1943 in Lebanon was not officially Lebanese in the sense that Lebanon hadn't won independence until that date and was under colonial rule (the Levant was split into red and blue zones according to who ruled) Prior to the French Mandate, Lebanese would have had Ottoman papers. That doesn't make us Turkish either! Badia Masabni was from Zahle, which is in the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon and Fayza Ahmad was from Saida, a southern port city in Lebanon. Keep up the good work, Shems!

Originally Posted by SuhaDeeb

I'll explain why there is confusion about that (I've also seen Fayza Ahmad described as Syrian). Anyone born before 1943 in Lebanon was not officially Lebanese in the sense that Lebanon hadn't won independence until that date and was under colonial rule (the Levant was split into red and blue zones according to who ruled) Prior to the French Mandate, Lebanese would have had Ottoman papers. That doesn't make us Turkish either! Badia Masabni was from Zahle, which is in the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon and Fayza Ahmad was from Saida, a southern port city in Lebanon. Keep up the good work, Shems!

Suha, as always I appreciate your informative messages. May I ask a question about this? I was aware of the Lebanese independence and the fact that before that the region was described as Syrian. If I'm writing about someone who was born before 1943 in a place that is now modern-day Lebanon, which would be more accurate - to describe the person as Syrian? Or to describe them as Lebanese? Their home town would have been part of Syria at the time the person was born, but does that provide the correct reference point for someone who doesn't know the history and only knows what today's world map looks like? In other words, if talking about Farid al-Atrache, would it be more accurate to say, "Although Farid al-Atrache achieved his fame while working in Egypt, he was born in Syria," or "Although Farid al-Atrache achieved his fame while working in Egypt, he was born in Lebanon"?

This is why I love Bhuz. I actually really trust your sources and I trust Suha so I have some editing to do. Thank you for you time reading and sharing your knowledge!

Originally Posted by kashmir

What an amazing pulling together of ideas. Well done.

A couple of quibbles though.
"Raqs- dance, Sharqi- Eastern, Oriental. In Turkish it is called Oryantal Dansı. It originates from the Middle East and it is believed to be called Eastern Dance or Oriental Dance to differentiate it from dances imported from the West or Occident, meaning Europe and later America. "

I have heard this before, but I'm not convinced. According to Dr Mo Geddawi (and others) "raqs sharqi" was contrasted to "raqs beledi". The "eastern dance" side wasn't to distinguish it from foreign dance but to separate it from nasty, dirty, common dance that ordinary people did; to lift it into the mysterious "other" for high class clientale.

"Golden Era refers to the stars of Egyptian dance from the 1920-1980s"

I think it's a little shorter than that. 1920s-1950s?

"Hagallah" is in Egypt mostly as an accident. It was brought by Libyan bedouins to Mersa Matruh - and is basically a Libyan dance.

"Bambooti" - I've seen from Denise Enan as "Bumbotaya"

"Ghawazee Awalim" - two separate styles I believe.

"Andalusian" - actually southern Spain! Usually refers to an Arabic/Spanish fusion piece.

What about Bedouin dances (other than Hagalla)? Raqs Sham’idân (candelabra dance)? Raqs al Juzur (Tunisan pot dance)?

But wow! Well, done.

Hi Shira,

The Lebanese struggle for independence was a long one...Ottomans, Mamelukes, the French...! Syria itself was not a nation either until relatively recently, but during foreign rule 'Syria' referred to a geographic region 'Greater Syria' that included part of Jordan, Mount Lebanon and Jebel el Druze (now incorporated into Syria, although this was a region that strove for autonomy and rejected the idea of being swallowed up by Syria) This is what makes the Farid el Atrache issue complicated (whereas Badia and Fayza were born within contemporary Lebanese borders) Farid el Atrache was born in Jebel el Druze, a large Druze colony outside Mount Lebanon which is the largest and most politically active Druze minority in the Levant. The Druze of Jebel el Druze are pained by the fact that they were unwillingly incorporated into Syria. Farid el Atrache's eventual retirement in Lebanon wasn't just a choice about real estate! It was a rejection of the new country named 'Syria' that the Druze of that region felt had usurped their land. The ruling Baath party, supposedly secular, is notorious for its brutal suppression of the ethnic minorities that populate modern-day Syria.

Now, as for your initial question as to whether you would refer to someone born before 1943 as Lebanese if they were born within what are now the internationally recognized borders, then the answer is yes. As I said before even 'Syria' was a geographic reference - not a reference to a nation or a people or an identity. It was how it looked on the map of the colonizers (the area previously known as 'Trans-Jordan' is another example of this) Historic Lebanon is thousands of years old; only its independence was recent!

Hope that helps, Shira. Middle Eastern history can make the mind boggle. My former history professor Dr. Fawwaz Traboulsi wrote a very comprehensive history of Modern Lebanon (meaning from the time of Fakhreddine onwards)

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/History-Modern-Lebanon-Fawwaz-Traboulsi/dp/0745324371]Amazon.com: A History of Modern Lebanon: Fawwaz Traboulsi: Books[/ame]

Regards,

Suha

Originally Posted by shems

This is why I love Bhuz. I actually really trust your sources and I trust Suha so I have some editing to do. Thank you for you time reading and sharing your knowledge!

Hi Shems,

You're most welcome. My advice to anyone trying to understand Middle-Eastern dance and music and culture is to read diversely - I mean include politics and history in your reading list as well! You'll find you have many 'a-ha!' moments as you get to know the people better. There are plenty of resources that dancers don't usually look to, although they would actually help them greatly.

Really, really wonderful Shems! Great information and I could spend all day looking through the YouTube clips you have collected.

Hugs to you!

Miss Shems!

You accidently combined Iraq and the Levant in your folkloric dances section. Also I think what you meant by "Iraqi Women's dance" should more accurately called Qawliya (Kawliya) or Iraqi gypsy dance. Alaa Saad has good examples of this dance style on his video clips.

No self-respecting Iraqi woman would dance like this unless she was a prostitute!

Oh by the way, there are many folkloric dances in Iraqi, few of us dancers know about them. The Kurds have their own line dance. The Assyrians also have their own dances. This is where it gets complicated!

Dear Kashmir,

Shems put Andalucian or Muwashahat dances in the Egyptian sections because obviously, Southern Spain is not longer part of the Arab world! The music and dances of Adalusiyya are recreated as theater pieces in North Africa as well as in Egypt, Lebanon and Syria. It might be better to put this style in it's own category since it's technically extinct.

Singers like Saba7 Fakri, Feyrouz and Sayyed Darwish all did Muwashahat. The much loved Sherihan, the Egyptian dancing/singing/acting sensation of the 80's even did her own wacky interpretation :)

Spanish/Arabic fusion is a modern invention and has little to do with actual Muwashahat!

Thanks for your help Mark - I didn't realize Iraq somehow didn't get it's own line. You were right about why I put Andalucian under Egypt, but I think it's a good idea to give it it's own category, so I did. I might have to your help when I write more specifics down about all these dances. I know there are way more than what I have listed.

I am at your service if you need any help habibti :)

I know that many people spell her name Karioka, I've seen it spelled that way in alot of articles and I know that she was given this nickname because of her fondness for Brazilian rhythms which she used sometimes in her routines. However, the correct spelling is Carioca. It's a term commonly used to refer to anyone who is from Rio de Janeiro.

Regards
Priscilla

Originally Posted by deelybopper

- 2nd para re. Egyptian dance - Tahiya Karioka, nor Kariorka
Thanks for sharing..g.: