Thread: Dispelling Myths about Bellydancing and other information

One of the things that I do here in Phoenix, is go around to public highschools and volunteer to teach a workshop to the dance program about bellydancing. The students and I usually talk about what THEY know about bellydancing, dispel some of those myths, go over the history of bellydancing, go over some of the basic moves and then I put on a little 10 minute show for them. It is really rewarding because not only am I getting the opportunity to make a positive influence on impressionable young girls but I also get to educate the staff. It is hard for me to even get my foot in the door at some schools because of the leaderships perception of bellydance and bellydancers.
One of the things I am doing is revamping the cirriculum, so what I want to know for my fellow bhuzzers is;

If you could tell young impressionable girls one thing about bellydancing, what would it be?

Let's exclude the "belly dancers are not strippers" as that is a permanant part of the cirriculum already!

I can't wait to read your responses and incoorperate them in my cirriculum!

Do you only target girls, or is this open to any comers? Is there a particular reason you are limiting this to girls? The few times we have done school presentations, it is generally the full class, so I am just curious about your particular situation.

Without knowing what you already cover, it's hard to know what to add- and sometimes voicing myths or concerns they haven't heard can be counter productive, so I think asking THEM what THEIR perspective is would be the most productive thing anyway, which sounds like what you are doing ..g.:

i would tell girls and boys that it hooks up your brain to parts of your body you had no idea you could control. thus starting a life of depth and awareness of ones own self.

Originally Posted by Sariah_Kiram

If you could tell young impressionable girls one thing about bellydancing, what would it be?

It's just dancing. It might be formally staged and artistic, or it might be informal and social, but it's always about hearing a wonderful song and wanting to move to it.

Let's exclude the "belly dancers are not strippers" as that is a permanant part of the cirriculum already!

A couple of people have suggested that constantly saying, "It's not stripping!" might actually be reinforcing the association in the same way that saying, "Whatever you do, don't think about white elephants!" makes a person more likely to think of white elephants than they otherwise would have. It's a difficult problem. We can't NOT address that particular misconception because it's so prevalent, but maybe we need to be more indirect about it?

Lara,

It is not limited to just girls, it just happens that at the schools I do workshops for I have only had girls in the class. I guess what I am looking for from my fellow bhuzzers is if you were in my position what would you say? I'm looking for common themes and ideas because essentially I will be one of the first people in the bellydance community theses students have contact with, I want my information and presentation to be the best it can be in the limited time I have!

I don't spend a lot of time on what it isn't as much as I do on what it is.

I start with talking about what countries it originates from, that it is a sort of amalgum of many different cultural dances glitzed up for stage. I tell them about Badia Masabni because I think she is pretty pivotal for what we now recognize as "belly dance". Then if I have the opportunity I'll pull out some rhythms, help the students identify and play them on their bodies and then put it in a cultural context, and tell them a little about that piece of the culture - like "here is a Saidi rhythm, it comes from this part of Egypt where the culture is like this....and these are some appropriate dance steps" and you can see how you can slip in the Men's martial art Tahtib, trained horse dancing and how that leads back to a belly dancer's show. Then hit Khaliji next, or ayyub is a good one, karsilama, - there are so many great choices. Then they come away thinking rich diverse cultural danceform. You could talk about birthing rituals too, and in the context of the rest of this information, they would hopefully come away understanding that it is only one piece of a much larger picture.

If somebody brings up negative associations like stripping, I'd acknowledge it. As much as we try to deny it, some belly dancers are strippers and prostitutes (even now, in the Middle East and elsewhere). However, not all belly dance is stripping and not all stripping is belly dance. I'd liken it to any dance form. Some pole dancers are basically gymnasts in the feats they perform, but are all gymnasts pole dancers? I think most kids would already know the answer to that is no. I knew a professional modern dancer in a respected company who would choreograph routines for stripper friends on the side. The famously scandalous can-can dancers of France were ballet dancers moonlighting in the clubs for extra money. It isn't the dance itself but what you choose to do with it that makes it what it is.

Understood.
If your goal is giving them info they might otherwise be hard pressed to find, I'd want to let them know about the sheer diversity in this dance- even with a very traditional leaning, there is so much to learn & so much room for personal expression, & then you look at other styles, folkloric, fusion, etc...

I think too many people are exposed to one style & think that's all there is.

& what Zamorah & Tourbeau said too :)

This article on Delilah's web site might offer you some ideas, both with respect to what you say when you approach schools and also with respect to things you might talk about in your class: http://visionarydance.com/archive/revivingophelia.html

Originally Posted by zamora

i would tell girls and boys that it hooks up your brain to parts of your body you had no idea you could control. thus starting a life of depth and awareness of ones own self.

Yes! Plus it's empowering like any art form - to be able to master your body - learning is always empowering so exposure to new music/different cultures is mind-expanding, opens so many doors.

I like what Tourbeau said too, right away if we approach the issue from the negative, ie the stripping angle we're reinforcing it.

Originally Posted by zamora

i would tell girls and boys that it hooks up your brain to parts of your body you had no idea you could control. thus starting a life of depth and awareness of ones own self.

Love this, Cory. That was certainly true for me.

Like Shems, I would focus on what bellydance is, rather than what it isn't. I do think that constantly, preemptively addressing negative stereotypes can reinforce them, so I would avoid bringing up, for instance, the stripping issue unless asked by a student.