Belly dancing

Belly dance is an expressive dance which emphasizes complex movements of the torso. Originally a Middle Eastern folk dance, it has evolved to take many different forms depending on the country and region, both in costume and dance style. New styles have evolved in the West as its popularity has spread globally.

The term "belly dance" is a translation of the French term "danse du ventre", which was applied to the dance in the Victorian era, and probably originally referred to dancers from the Ouled Nail tribes of Algeria. Its current use is something of a misnomer, as the Ouled Nail dance used more abdominal movements than the dances described today as "belly dance".

In Arabic, the dance is known as Raqs Sharqi ("Eastern Dance") or Raqs Beledi ("Country Dance" or "Folk Dance").

Belly dance is primarily a torso-driven dance, with an emphasis on articulations of the hips. Unlike many Western dance forms, the focus of the dance is on isolations of the torso muscles, rather than on movements of the limbs through space. Although some of these isolations appear similar to the isolations used in jazz ballet, they are sometimes driven differently and have a different feeling or emphasis.

In common with most folk dances, there is no universal naming scheme for belly dance movements. Some dancers and dance schools have developed their own naming schemes, but none of these is universally recognised.

Many of the movements characteristic of belly dance can be grouped into the following categories:

In addition to these torso movements, dancers in many styles will use level changes, travelling steps, turns and spins. The arms are used to frame and accentuate movements of the hips, for dramatic gestures, and to create beautiful lines and shapes with the body, particularly in the more balletic, Westernised styles. Other movements may be used as occasional accents, such as low kicks and arabesques, backbends, and head tosses.

Belly dancing is believed to have had a long history in the Middle East, but reliable evidence about its origins is scarce, and accounts of its history are often highly speculative. Several Greek and Roman sources including Juvenal and Martial describe dancers from Asia Minor and Spain using undulating movements, playing castanets, and sinking to the floor with 'quivering thighs', descriptions that are certainly suggestive of the movements that we today associate with belly dance. Later, particularly in the 18th and 19th centuries, European travellers in the Middle East such as Edward Lane and Flaubert wrote extensively of the dancers they saw there, including the Awalim and Ghawazee of Egypt. In the Ottoman Empire belly dance was performed by both boys and women in the Sultan's palace.

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