Think it’s only for women? An account of youth participation in belly dance and an opportunity to question the stereotypes.
One of the public agencies I reached out to this week replied that she was interested in broader age/gender appeal than what belly dance can offer. Presumably, she’s suggesting that belly dance is primarily for women. Well hm, really? I had to pause. I’m fully prepared to accept what is and what isn’t, but something about the statement wasn’t aligning with my reality. For example, whenever children are present at my shows, they’re usually the first to participate.
Over my 16+ year career as a professional belly dancer I’ve encountered biases, stereotypes, and misconceptions on so many hundreds of occasions, I’ve nearly become immune. I planned to go away quietly without response. Then suddenly I recalled that I’d actually already done nearly exactly what I was proposing in my email! (Too bad I didn’t recall in time to mention this in the initial communication). About ten years ago, I taught a basic belly dance sampler to the public in a major festival sponsored by and showcased in that same public center, a festival for kids and families especially! It was one of my most successful and joyful public demos to this day. Moments later, another memory of belly dance with kids followed. Then another, and another, until it was an avalanche.
In this article I collect these many treasured moments to present how belly dance is or can be experienced by youth, while questioning the stereotype of belly dance as being only for women. I’ve also had many experiences with belly dance by men, but that is a related topic for another article on another day.
Like any stereotype, this one has some historical merit. Belly dance was once a tradition shared by women with other women, including as a method for supporting healthy childbirth. With the rise of colonialism and exotic projection of this movement practice from the perspective Western patriarchy, the practice shifted toward appealing to the male gaze.
Those who hold the power and the resources generally decide the game. In fact, the dance wasn’t called “belly dance” until the term was given by an ambitious male promoter of the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893, who imported the art form to offer more variety entertainment. The dance actually requires the entire body as much as any other style, but the term inaccurately suggests it is a dance involving one body part — the belly. Imagine the distortions perpetuated by just this name alone?
But now with “inclusion” being the trend, and all the marginalization we hope to heal with it, biases around what belly dance is and who participates, should be questioned. Would more youth try belly dance if they had easy access to it? Would more men, or those not identifying as female?
Whenever children are present at a belly dance performance, they’re generally the first to get up and join, with my invitation, and oftentimes even without. They seem to innately understand the playful, social, and innocent nature of this dance, and they’ve not yet been burdened with concerns over whether it’s appropriate to move their bodies in such a manner, or whether they can do it “right.”
My teaching stint at Winterfest, the aforementioned major festival for children, was exactly this on a grand scale. A whole bunch of fun — a sense of creating magic with our bodies — a sense of community from the shared experience. Shortly after that appearance, I was hired by a mother to teach her teenage girl. What began as a few trial classes continued into several years, mentoring this young woman into performances in competitions and showcases, and on stages with live musicians.
“Suzanna has taught my daughter Sofie for the last few years. I appreciate Suzanna’s attention to authenticity and detail; she has nurtured Sofie beyond the studio to seek out performance opportunities and competitions and empowered her with confidence.” — Maria
From 2010 to 2016 I produced a belly dance competition, which included an audience participation “Shimmy Challenge” during halftime. Naturally, kids would score well in this, including this adorable girl who was elated at the announcement that her shimmies had won her a gift certificate to Mr. Gyros, one of the region’s most famous Mediterranean diners.
The competition was Belly Dance Off, which was open to all ages and succeeded in its goal to attract the broader public. Audiences received a tremendous amount of education on the intricacies of the art form while being fully entertained. The event also served as an incubator for numerous belly dance artists, elevating them to new opportunities and accomplishments, such as the young rising star, Maia.
Maia competed in multiple rounds of Belly Dance Off starting at the age of 12, with performances in top venues such as Teatro ZinZanni (Seattle) and Tony Starlight Showroom (Portland).
Belly Dance Off also had another young competitor, who won the 2013 championship at the age of 17.
In 2014 I was invited by Seattle Public Theatre to train teen actors on Middle Eastern dance choreographies for their “Arabian Nights” production. Although excited about this unique teaching request, I was also fairly anxious and prepared for any possible outcome. Having worked with teens in after-school programs, I knew they would make no attempt to hide their true feelings about the experience. If it was boring, they’d say so, or disappear to the bathroom. This scope of work involved creating short choreographies for the young ladies as well as the boys, and training them to perform them.
For the boys, I created a combination inspired by elements of Dabke (a traditional folk line dance from the area of the Middle East referred to as Levant) as well as the classical Egyptian dance theatre style of Mahmoud Reda. For the girls, I introduced just enough belly dance technique to launch their process of experimentation, improvisation, and play; then took notes on their preferences and tendencies. I assimilated these with the staging requirements of the director to create their short choreographies, which we worked on in the sessions that followed. Throughout each session, these kids were beaming with light and life. They seemed almost unable to contain themselves with gratitude for the new dimension that had been opened up for them. And their brilliance brought out the very best in me as a teacher. It was truly a co-created experience.
“Thank you so much for teaching us Arabian dance styles! Not only is it super fun in the play, but I’m probably going to just dance like that to any kind of music for a little while, especially at school dances and such like. So yeah, you’re awesome!” — Nora Hammen
“Thank you very much for your beautiful work on Arabian Nights at SPT. My daughter Olivia (Scheherazade) loved working with you…” — Steven Sterne, Board of Trustees at SPT and parent
“My daughter, Karinna, had the great honor and delight of participating in the SPT Bathhouse Youth Ensemble production of 1001 Arabian Nights, and I want to tell you that a HIGHLIGHT of that experience was your dance instruction. She was completely thrilled, and I have also heard from other parents and students that this was an incredible bonus to the educational and joyousness of the experience. As an audience member for all 6 performances, it was a delight for me to watch the girls as they brought the belly dancing to their onstage presence. It added so much to the show, and to the girls’ experience and education as well. You likely mentored the guys, too, with their line dances — those were excellent too, and very manly! Thank you so much for your awesome work!” — Caity Gerhardt
And then there’s the fairy children who performed belly dance in Cinderella — A Global Story, a live music world dance theatre production, I wrote, directed, and produced. Thus I can make no claim that this particular occurrence of kid participation was coincidental or unexpected. However, I wrote it into the script only because I knew of performers able to do the parts — little girls with their own trainer, all of which existed regardless of my production.
The Cinderella story exists in a number of cultures across the world. In the assimilated version I produced, Cinderella is an orphaned young lady employed in a household in Alexandria, Egypt, bullied and abused by three sassy maids. The children played the role of imaginary forest creatures that console Cinderella in her moments of sorrow. They performed their choreography with live musicians, a transformative experience for an artist of any age. The inclusion of kids in this project represented an opportunity to signal to the audience just one more aspect in which there is more diversity to our stories than what we’ve been told.
Documenting these many instances of youth participation in belly dance has helped me realize the potential that exists for even more participation, as it’s important to note that all of this (with the exception noted) occurred without any attempt on my part to reach kids and youth with my events and classes. All were by-request, and there are probably at least several more I’ve forgotten. How much more would there be if I actually made a focused attempt to target youth and kids? What if I actually had a formalized program? What real interest would emerge if the opportunity to participate is presented?
Realistically, I imagine that if access to belly dance ever became as widespread as yoga, Zumba, or the like, we would see some increased participation by youth, men, etc., but women would still represent the majority. But then, I can hardly think of any activity in which participation isn’t skewed toward one demographic or another. So why not offer a healthy positive activity that attracts broad participation, yet in which women constitute the majority? In fact, wouldn’t it be about time?
As a side note, I did end up courteously responding to the city employee that declined my proposal, with a consolidated account of the examples above. I guess I should also thank her for inspiring this article!
Hello dear reader, I write about a variety of things encompassing my rich experience as an artist, woman, world traveler, entrepreneur, and independent thinker. Feel free to explore my installations and follow me to be notified of new ones. Your comments are welcome too. If you’d like to learn more about my extensive work as a teacher, performer, and producer, you can find my most updated bio on LinkedIn. Many thanks! — Suzanna
