I'm doing a research paper on whether or not Belly dancing(aka by many other names) is not a form of sex trade. But many think that it is, so I want your opinion. Is it or is it not? Thank you in advance. Also, please state why you believe it is or isnt. I will respect your answer.
cassandra581
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Well I'll give the condensed version of what's a realatively long story. But I think you'll find it may leave you just as confused as ever...
Both dang.dude's and J'nai touch on aspects that are central to this debate. No offense intended for dang.dude's or their teacher but dancers from the middle east often don't have their stories straight either, just like dancer in the US. Many people in the Middle East only view dance in the more recent history of it's development using a cultural biased not only towards their own country but also with Islamic principles. In addition they often play into some of the origin myths that have been perpetuated by westerners for a long time. I've lived in the Middle East and have talked with a lot of people about the "history" of bellydance. What I've found is that each person has a different view most if not all of which are backed by little or no supporting evidence. To really get to the heart of this particular question you have to look at the dance both historically and where it's being done. It is not known where bellydancing originated but there are many ancient dance forms that it has been suggested to have come from. Some people theorize that it came from temple dances in which the dancers served in the role of a sacred prostitute. They would invoke the goddess and a male priest most likely would invoke the god. In this way the holy union between deities was made tangible. Some also say that any man even non-priests would have access to the goddess. These theorists believe that this was a from of fertility ritual in which the men seeking to have children would engage in sex with a fertility goddess thus gaining fertility. However, none of these temple dances are well documented nor can any of them be definitively linked to raqs sharqi(bellydance). This however is directly related to the sex trade. Other's theorize that it was a ritual dance performed for childbirth. This theory is given some support by the research done by a dance ethnologist, Morocco (that's her name not the country). She did research in Morocco (the country this time) on this and was able to witness this dance ritual. She also talked with a woman from the gulf who said they do the same thing there. However it's difficult to say just how far back this ritual goes since it has not been recorded. This is not exactly related to the sex trade although as a birth ritual it is related to the aftermath of sex. Another theory is that the dance originated in India and spread with the Roma (gypsies). This does have a good deal of supporting evidence although it's not possible to tell how much they influenced or were influenced by existing dances of the local populations. However, the gypsy dances were not meant as a sex trade either and were done for entertainment purposes. Although some gypsies may also have engaged in sex afterwards for money (prostitution is the worlds oldest profession) it was not the main purpose. If you go to a hip hop dance show you don't expect the dancer to sleep with you after the show do you? However, some hip hop dancers may may engage in that sort of activity, it's not applicable to all. With the introduction of Islam, people in the middle east became much more conservative regarding their bodies and the way they are seen in public. While a woman may have danced for entertainment before it's introduction with no sexual connotations she would not have been able to do so afterwards. Once Islam enters the picture the common street performer is labeled a prostitute. This did not mean she actually would have engage in this sort of practice but it was no longer acceptable for a decent woman to show her body in public displays. However it was still a done in the home. Women danced for women and men danced for men. This segregation of the sexes meant that women could dance freely for each other still without being labeled prostitutes. In addition two classes of performers have always existed, the street performer and the trained performer. Street performers under Islam were already considered prostitutes and in order to make a living in an increasingly more conservative society that no longer wanted their wives, daughters, sisters, aunts, and mothers to be dancers many of the street performers had to turn to prostitution in addition to dancing just to make a living. However trained performers were highly valued and a large bride price would be payed for women who had such training. Slaves were also often trained in these skills and were then sold for large amounts of money because of their talents. You have to remember that there were no tv's and radios so a person who could sing, dance, play an instrument, and recite poetry was a great source of entertainment for the family. These women became wives and sometimes concubines for the upper class citizens who could afford them but that did not make them sexual slaves nor were they forced into using dance for sex. They became a member of the family and for the most part were treated with respect. Being as they were women they spent most of their time entertaining the other women in the family and then also entertaining their husband. I'd like to point out that any dance can be used seductively and when you dance for your husband or boyfriend or even significant other you may do more than dance, this does not mean that the dance itself is associated with sex or the sex trade. When the dance first came to the Westerners attention it was the street performers that the westerner saw, because no man would have been allowed into the womens quarters to see respectable women or trained dancers. The orientalists painted scenes that often were dreamed up out of their imaginations some of them based on street dancers but still these images often depicted a more exotic image that was real. Additionally western dances and ideas of womens behaviors were also quite conservative. To the point that even talking about a womans stomach in any context was scandalous and had heavy sexual connotations. The westerner viewed the dances they saw as lewd and unrefined because they differed so much from their own preconceptions of what was acceptable and proper. Western dances did not fully utilize the body and focus primarily on footwork which is almost the opposite of middle eastern dances. What the foreigners sent back by way of description and paintings gave a exotic idea to the people back home. What they read and saw formed the orientalist mentality that the harem and Mid East is a society in which men enslave women for sexual purposes in their harems in which women were forced to show sexual prowess in order to gain favor from their masters. This is not how it was and goes against the way that Muslims live their lives. It violates so many cultural practices that it's hardly plausible at all. The orientalist mentality continued and continues to be perpetuated. When the US first got it's peek at middle eastern dancers at the Chicago worlds fair in the late 1800's the promoter Sol Bloom coined the dance as "belly dance" which among the conservative Victorian population had sexual connotations which caused quite a bit of controversy and made the exhibit even more popular. The dance which featured hip movements done by women who were fully covered from north Africa was far different than the dances they population knew and allowed. This made it seem more overtly sexual to them. Hollywood in addition featured glamorous sexy women doing overtly sexual dances in seductively revealing clothing pushing the limits of acceptability even for their own time and labeled them as harem dancers, Arabian princesses, Arabian slaves, genies and so on and so forth. The dancers in the middle east soon started to adopt this costuming instead of their own original costuming because it was what foreigners visiting the middle east began to expect from watching Hollywood movies. This in turn influenced the dancers in the us who wanted to emulate middle eastern dancers. When bellydance first started to gain it popularity primarily in the late 60's, early 70's (it was around before but this was kind of the first wave of real general popularity) the dancers who learned it were not aware of what was authentic or not. This led to perpetuation of not only Hollywood costuming styles but also many origin myths such as being developed to seduce the sultan and gain his favor within the harem. In the Middle East the new costuming styles which were more reveling sort of sealed in the minds of the populous that this traditional form of entertainment was a form of prostitution instead. In the US many strippers were donning bellydance like costumes and sometimes learning a few moves to add some flavor to their routines. In the US bellydance is practiced in two ways now. It's done by some to enhance their sexuality and by others as an art or exercise. Generally the more involved and serious you become with this dance the less sexual connotations it holds for you. However because of the strict stigmas in the Middle East all dancer regardless of how they feel about the dance and what their actual conduct is they are viewed as prostitutes. So from my personal opinion I say that no the dance is not a form of sex trade. It is an art form and has been traditionally so for centuries. It is the misconceptions that the west has brought that have taken it towards the direction of a sex trade. Even though public performers are considered like prostitutes in the mid east the dance itself is done by women of all ages and sizes for each other's entertainment. I do blame the sexualization of the dance on the orientalists and Hollywood because they influenced a great deal of what bellydance has become. However, it&
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Anonymous
Middle Eastern Belly Dance is NOT a form of sex trade. Belly dance is NOT about sex and seduction. Belly dancers don't strip, they don't do lap dances, nor do they use a pole in their performance. Hollywood started perpetuating their version of a sexualized dance long ago... and still does so. Thus many people are still confused about belly dance. Raqs sharqi, Oriental dance, Belly Dance is performed by people of all ages and both sexes during festive occasions. YES, men do "belly dance". They do similar movements but they are executed differently. Alot of what is seen performed in the US is American Tribal Style and cabaret style. Much dancing in the Middle East is in the social context, not by the glamorous professional nightclub dancers. Since men and women often are segregated in some areas of the Middle East, then women mostly dance when they are with other women. Not really a dance to seduce men, if there aren't any men around to seduce. It's a celebration of womanhood.
info on belly dance
http://www.shira.net/
http://www.middleeasterndance.net/
http://www.casbahdance.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/raqs_sharqi
Oscar
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What do YOU think about Belly dancing? A form of the sex trade?
I'm doing a research paper on whether or not Belly dancing(aka by many other names) is not a form of sex trade. But many think that it is, so I want your opinion. Is it or is it not? Thank you in advance. Also, please state why you believe it is or isnt. I will respect your answer.
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