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Heritage of Belly dance Essay

Heritage of belly dance through time
Module

The History and Politics of Heritage (PX3604)

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Academic year: 2016/2017
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Brunel University London

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PX3604 word count: 2539 History and heritage of belly dancing. How has movement across time and space and continuous adaptations to the dance, affected its preservation abilities as intangible cultural heritage. A woman is the guardian and hostess of the earth. As the bearer of life, she stands closest to birth and death, thus closest to life and to the earth. This linking, life itself, is a woman’s true space. 1 In its original form, many ancient civilisations believed in the birthing ritual of the belly dance. In ancient Egypt, the ‘ab’, which they believed to be one of the seven souls the human is made up of, was supposed to come directly from the mother’s heart in the form of holy lunar blood that descended into her womb to take the form of her child The hieroglyphic symbol for this matriarchal idea was a dancing figure, representing the inner dance of life perceived in the heartbeat. As long as the dance continued, life went on. Both men and women have engaged in the ancient oriental dance in one way or the other over the past five thousand years at least. Be it the practitioner of the dance or the receiver in the form of entertainment, business or pleasure. Within this vast engagement comes the passing on and receiving of cultural heritage for many. In addition to this notion of intangible heritage, comes the cross-cultural sharing of heritage. This exhibition will exploit the current knowledge on the oriental dance, attempting to pinpoint the origin of the dance and its major turning points in development which enabled the transition of cultural heritage and will examine the movement of the dance across cultures. A Description of the land on which it was always practiced and the groups and peoples who carried the dance elsewhere, will give an intuitive insight into the development of belly dance. A journey through time and space will be embarked upon, as some historical context is necessary for the analysis of belly dance as intangible cultural heritage. Through three short sections, this paper will explain just why and how adaptions and modifications to the dance have indeed depleted its ability to be enlisted under UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage. Furthermore, the question of authenticity will be a key theme, leading to a concluding insight on the limited scope for preservation. 1 Al-Rawi, R. (2012). Foreword. In: Al-Rawi, R Grandmothers Secrets: The Ancient Rituals and Healing Power of Belly Dance. 3rd ed. Massachusetts: Interlink Publishing. p. 2 Stewart, I (2000). Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance: Awakening Spirituality Through Movement and Ritual. London: Inner Tradition Publisher. p. PX3604 word count: 2539 As it currently stands, there is no exact or precise consensus on the origin of the belly dance. Generally, the literature insinuates two major ‘schools of thought’ when it comes to the origin of belly dancing. Firstly, its emergence in the ancient world as a birthing ritual. However, this cannot be confirmed as an exact source of the dance as it is held that the ancient Egyptians saw no need to describe in text something that was so familiar to them. 3 Contrary to this, there have been claims that the dance originated with the birth of women and thus time itself. Essentially, as long as woman have existed and danced, traits of particular movements associated with the belly dance have been carried though time. They are held to be ‘natural’ to a woman’s body and believed to describe a feminine energy. Any true origins of the dance are unknown, or perhaps untraceable. This nonetheless does not take away from the importance of the cultural heritage attached to the dance and treasured by many, across time and space. Links can be made to North Africa regarding the term dance de ventre. The rapid movements of the abdomen to the sound of native drums in north Africa was termed by the French to directly translate to the dance of the stomach. Having realised that there is no shared consensus on the true origin of the oriental dance, it cannot be denied that it was of popular culture in the Middle East, north Africa and Asia centuries before it made advancements into the rest of the world. If one is to discuss the danse de ventre in a meaningful way, the classificatory term ‘belly dance’ cannot be limited to the visual conjured up, of a dancer attired in the costume westerners imagine to be worn in a sultan’s harem. This imagined visual represents only the most familiar aspect of the dance. In an attempt to reconcile both real and apparent inconsistencies among dances that are now gathered together under a single term ‘belly dance’, Shay and Wood (1976) use the principal of polythetic taxonomy. By permitting dances of substantial characteristics that define the term belly dance, to be included in that classification This allows for the ancient Greek and Egyptian uses of the dance as well as its commercialisation in Hollywood and everything in between, to be included in the analysis of this paper. Within this principal, the cogent defining element, is the variety of 3 Patricia, S. (2003). Dance in Ancient Egypt. Near Eastern Archaeology. 66 (3), p-112. 4 Shay, A and Wood, L. (1976). Danse de Ventre: A Fresh Appraisal. Dance Research Journal. 8 (2), p-30. PX3604 word count: 2539 Orient, that was imagined as ‘exotic’ and ‘backward.’ 7 France, during the romantic period was able to create an imagined romanticised version of the Orient through artwork and paintings in the 18 th and 19th century. America on the other hand, used the power of Hollywood to portray this and caused, yet again, another shift in the style of belly dancing, as burlesque dancers had adopted moves from the belly dance. Furthermore, the belly dance was used to express the Gothic identity in the U. 8 Song, movements and costume are all fundamental aspects of the belly dance that differentiates it from other dance forms. The ancient origins of the dance give clear indications of there being a sense of survival. This has enabled the present to receive a certain piece of history from the past. In most cases of this ‘exchange’ through generations, there is a dominant want for protection of this ‘past’. Smith (2006) stresses the importance of redirecting the gaze of heritage away from its obsession with physicality She proceeds to argue that in actual fact, heritage is not an object at all. By way of explanation, heritage cannot exist without the intangible aspect which surrounds it. Given the total non-existence of the tangibility of the belly dance, the centre focus around its heritage is solely intangible. The preservation of intangible culture, including dance, is also widely recognised within the wider literature. Silverman and Ruggles (2007) accept that it is a shared common good by which everyone benefits, and intertwines with identity and territory. 10 As illustrated above, the ancient belly dance has constructed identity and has allowed for the movement across territory, enabling adaptations throughout the world. The World Heritage Convention (WHC) has stressed the concept of ‘the shared heritage’, of humanity through its focus on the concept of universal value of heritage. Although it has been criticised for legitimizing a particular western perception of heritage, in terms of both policy and practice 11, the spread and most importantly, acceptance of the belly dance in all its forms, demonstrates a universal value for the dance. Despite the fact that in many cases, the dance may not belong to an individual’s 7 Sunaina, S. (2008). Belly Dancing: Arab-Face, Orientalist Feminism, and U. Empire. American quarterly. 60 (2), p. 8 Frühauf, T. (2009). Raqs Gothique: Decolonizing Belly Dance. TDR. 53 (3), p-119. 9 Smith, L. (2006). Heritage as a Cultural Process. In: Smith, L Uses of Heritage. Abingdon: Routledge. p. 53. 10 Silverman, H and Ruggles D. (2007). Introduction. In: Silverman, H and Ruggles, D Cultural Heritage and Human Rights. USA: Springer. p. 3-5. 11 Smith, L and Akagawa, N (2009). Intangible Heritage. New York: Routledge. p-9. PX3604 word count: 2539 heritage, it certainly derived from the ancient world, and in some accounts, may have existed since the beginning of time. The belief that the movements associated with the ancient dance are natural to a woman’s body, and that women are the bearers of life, and so the closest to the earth, connects all human beings together. Subsequently, the belly dance, in its ritualistic, spiritual, and entertainment form, account for the heritage of the world. In accepting that this is not a globally shared consensus, there is still scope for the belly dance to be included in the 2003 ratification of the UNESCO Convention on the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. This phenomenon will be further explored, looking through the lenses of preservation and authenticity in the next section of this paper. The beautiful, meaningful and contagious senses of the dance conjure up a desire to partake in one way or another. In her memoirs, Rosnia Al Ravi, vividly demonstrates why belly dancing in Baghdad with her grandmother, demonstrates spirituality and a common past. She records a social gathering, “As one got up to turn on the music, tie a scarf around her hips, and slowly sway into another world.”12 This recollection so majestically romanticises the dance in the contemporary world, yet links it to another, perhaps a world from the past. Similarly to receiving the dance from ancient ancestors, there is an aspect of giving and receiving within the dance itself. Al Rawi (2012) writes “One of the dancers finished, got up and tied her scarf around another woman’s hips”, 13 thereby passing the dance on and maintaining the continuity and solidarity of the robust, yet intangible dance. Intangible cultural heritage material is both fragile and resilient. Unlike material heritage, which can be destroyed over a short period of time, intangible heritage survives longer. It outlives the span of the lives of those who carry it. Intangible heritage never simply disappears, rather it is transcended, adapted, hidden and retracts or expands depending on the circumstance. 14 Much like the nature of the belly dance. Moreover, the flexible nature of intangible heritage raises questions on authenticity, a question most accounts of heritage must answer to at one point in time, be it though restoration or conservation. Skounti (2009) raises the concept of ‘the authentic illusion’, deriving from the principal 12 Al-Rawi, R. (2012). Foreword. In: Al-Rawi, R Grandmothers Secrets: The Ancient Rituals and Healing Power of Belly Dance. 3rd ed. Massachusetts: Interlink Publishing. Ch 1. 13 Al-Rawi, R. (2012). Foreword. In: Al-Rawi, R Grandmothers Secrets: The Ancient Rituals and Healing Power of Belly Dance. 3rd ed. Massachusetts: Interlink Publishing. 14 Skounti, A. (2009). The Authentic Illusion. In: Smith, L and Akagawa,N Intangible Heritage . New York: Routledge. p-79 PX3604 word count: 2539 may prove difficult for all nations engaging in Belly dance to conform to an agreement on the safeguarding of one dance. Moreover, the costumes, music, movement vocabulary and scene varies between each country and then some within a single country. Whilst Shay and Wood’s (1976) polythetic taxonomy, whereby the dance is categorised by movements of similar gestures, works for generalising belly dance, it does not assist the cooperation between countries who engage in the dance differently. On the one hand, the belly dance is clearly a tremendously resilient dance form. Its rich history, along with one’s ability to trace its roots back to the ancient world, almost infers that it certainly isn’t going anywhere, despite its lack of active preservation or enlistment on UNESCOS safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage thus far. On the other hand, the ancient ritualistic dance clearly contains the necessary characteristics of intangible cultural heritage. Unfortunately, there remains to be a lack of willingness to cooperate amongst the Eastern nations. This would be necessary in achieving a common goal of preserving the oriental dance. Adaptations to the dance have proven that, over time we have been left with a variety of styles of ‘oriental dance’. Whilst they all stem from the movements and spirituality of an original source, the different interpretations make it difficult to preserve a cultural heritage without questioning its authenticity. It appears, that the belly dance has become a combination of movements, gestures and meaning from the past and from different areas, brought to light in the present world. That is not to say that there is not scope for preservation techniques, it would however, require mass cooperation, and with the phenomenon of belly dance and its revival spreading globally, possibly even global cooperation. PX3604 word count: 2539 Bibliography Al-Rawi, R. (2012). Foreword. In: Al-Rawi, R Grandmothers Secrets: The Ancient Rituals and Healing Power of Belly Dance. 3rd ed. Massachusetts: Interlink Publishing. p. Arvizu, S. (2005). The Politics of Belly dancing in Cairo. The Arab Studies Journal. 12/13 (1/2), p. Kurin, R. (2004). Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage in the 2003 UNESCO Convention: A Critical Appraisal. Museum International. 56 (1-2), p-70. Logan, W. (2007). Human Rights Conundrums in Cultural Heritage Protection. In: Silverman, H and Ruggles, D Cultural Heritage and Human Rights. USA: Springer. p Lughod, A. (2001). "Orientalism" and Middle East Feminist Studies: Colonial Fantasies: Toward a Feminist Reading of Orientalism. Feminist Studies. 27 (1), p. Patricia, S. (2003). Dance in Ancient Egypt. Near Eastern Archaeology. 66 (3), p-112.

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Heritage of Belly dance Essay

Module: The History and Politics of Heritage (PX3604)

10 Documents
Students shared 10 documents in this course

University: Brunel University London

Was this document helpful?
PX3604 word count: 2539
History and heritage of belly dancing.
How has movement across time and space and continuous adaptations to the dance, affected its
preservation abilities as intangible cultural heritage.
A woman is the guardian and hostess of the earth. As the bearer of life, she stands closest to birth and
death, thus closest to life and to the earth. This linking, life itself, is a woman’s true space.1 In its
original form, many ancient civilisations believed in the birthing ritual of the belly dance. In ancient
Egypt, the ‘ab’, which they believed to be one of the seven souls the human is made up of, was
supposed to come directly from the mother’s heart in the form of holy lunar blood that descended into
her womb to take the form of her child.2 The hieroglyphic symbol for this matriarchal idea was a
dancing figure, representing the inner dance of life perceived in the heartbeat. As long as the dance
continued, life went on. Both men and women have engaged in the ancient oriental dance in one way
or the other over the past five thousand years at least. Be it the practitioner of the dance or the receiver
in the form of entertainment, business or pleasure. Within this vast engagement comes the passing on
and receiving of cultural heritage for many. In addition to this notion of intangible heritage, comes the
cross-cultural sharing of heritage.
This exhibition will exploit the current knowledge on the oriental dance, attempting to pinpoint the
origin of the dance and its major turning points in development which enabled the transition of
cultural heritage and will examine the movement of the dance across cultures. A Description of the
land on which it was always practiced and the groups and peoples who carried the dance elsewhere,
will give an intuitive insight into the development of belly dance. A journey through time and space
will be embarked upon, as some historical context is necessary for the analysis of belly dance as
intangible cultural heritage. Through three short sections, this paper will explain just why and how
adaptions and modifications to the dance have indeed depleted its ability to be enlisted under
UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage. Furthermore, the question of authenticity will be a key
theme, leading to a concluding insight on the limited scope for preservation.
1 Al-Rawi, R. (2012). Foreword. In: Al-Rawi, R Grandmothers Secrets: The Ancient Rituals and Healing Power of
Belly Dance. 3rd ed. Massachusetts: Interlink Publishing. p.
2 Stewart, I (2000). Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance: Awakening Spirituality Through Movement and Ritual.
London: Inner Tradition Publisher. p.202.

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