Thread: Which other dance style is most related to Belly Dance?

Hey everyone,
I was contacted to do an interview about bellydancing. She has asked some interesting and compelling questions that I thought I'd put out to you all to see what you think. I'd like to give her not only my thoughts, but a compilation of what the bd community thinks.

Here are some selected questions, including the one in the headline:

Which other dance style is most related to Belly Dance?
What step is central to Belly Dancing?
What is your favorite step?
What role does Belly Dance play in modern day society and in the future?
What role did it play in the past, as compared to the future?
Which other dance style is most related to Belly Dance?
What is unique about Belly Dance as compared to other dance styles?

Thanks!
Zaheea

Jazz has to be the closest. Modern Jazz was created by Denishawn (Ruth St Denis and Ted Shawn) in the 1920s. It blended dance elements from east Indian, South American, and Afro-Arab cultures (the later is credited mainly to Jack Cole). It also is a dance form which allows emotional expression and improvisation - like belly dance.

For me the central movement is the hip shimmy - in all its glorious variations.

Favourite step - downward vertical hip figure eight.

BD has roles in entertainment, leisure and self expression.

Its role in the west would have been minimal. In the ME it was used for celebration for most of the population and as a means of making a living for a tiny proportion.

What makes it "belly dance" - it has to be its links to the Middle East. No cultural link and it ceases to be belly dance. (Everything else is shared - jazz has torso articulations and improvisation, hula has hip circles and shimmy, the costume is shared with India, Indonesia and Orientalist Europe, veil is part of the Modern Dance movement etc etc)

Flamenco is a cousin to Belly Dance.

I'd have to ask a lot of questions back...

Originally Posted by zaheea

Which other dance style is most related to Belly Dance?

Regionally, culturally or in the sense of how the music is interpreted? (like dancing the melody instead of expressing the lyrics like in many Indian dances or Hula)

Originally Posted by zaheea

What step is central to Belly Dancing?

That's a very Western question! :-) Like dances are only made out of steps.
Actually, no step at all, but the movemts of the hips.

Originally Posted by zaheea

What is your favorite step?

I don't have one... I have a favourite combination though.

Originally Posted by zaheea

What role does Belly Dance play in modern day society and in the future?
What role did it play in the past, as compared to the future?

Where - in the States or in the Middle East?

Originally Posted by zaheea

What is unique about Belly Dance as compared to other dance styles?

The fact that it is based on an improvised dance form and of course the link to Middle Eastern music!

MEISSOUN

Wow... that's a lot of complex questions. Glad she gave them to you ahead of time.

When it comes to related dances, the first thing I thought was flamenco - thinking of these dances as being influenced by the Moors. Then I also thought of the dances of northern India, where some people think the ghawazee came from. I would be basing it on history and which dances came in contact with eachother and influenced eachother.

On movements alone, I guess you should say that tahitian dance has a lot of similarities.

I would venture to say I see a lot of similarities between BD and East and West African dance - in terms of physical movement: shimmies, undulations, abdominal movements, how the dance is inextricable from the drum...they both even share a cane dance and the zaghareet!

Central step to bd? Hip drop

My two fave moves are the jewel and the egyptian twist - gooey.

I would say BD is unique in that it is one of the few forms of dance that can be seen on stage or as part of a restaurant show, or at a party, etc. and one of the few forms that comes with such cultural and social controversy - the dichotomy of the Middle East both loving and disdaining the art of BD.

Good answers! I appreciate the feedback.
I never considered Flamenco before.
And true, Meissoun, some of the questions need a question back in order to answer them completely.
Thanks everyone!

I would have to say that the dances closest to belly dance would be the folkloric forms from which it came -- beledi for the Arabic styles and the Rromany dances for the Turkish style.

Some of the other North African dances also share similarities with belly dance -- Tunesian shaabi, Moroccan Shikaat, etc.

Originally Posted by ssipes

I would have to say that the dances closest to belly dance would be the folkloric forms from which it came -- beledi for the Arabic styles and the Rromany dances for the Turkish style.

Some of the other North African dances also share similarities with belly dance -- Tunesian shaabi, Moroccan Shikaat, etc.

I would have put all those folkloric forms under the umbrella of bellydance itself, and thus was looking outside of the Middle East for the closest dance form.