Belly Dance: An Egyptian Visual Cultural Expression

Belly dance is a specific and precise cultural expression; it has nothing to do with goddess worship, it did not spring from any religion, least of all any earth-centered or pagan one; and above all, it is not American, although many of its pseudo offshoots would lay claim to the contrary. It is primarily and originally an Egyptian visual form of celebratory communication innate to its culture and made known throughout the world via the Egyptian movie enclave, which featured the first belly dancers ever to appear on the silver screen; belly dancers that were at that time making a living and performing in Egypt, specifically its capitol, Cairo.

As this cultural expression was recorded on film, these movies in their popularity along with the dance and dancer, began to appear on the silver screen first in Egypt and then across the Arab countries and later in the living rooms of respective people’s homes who were wealthy or affluent enough to own a television set; movies that along with featuring popular love stories, performed the dance in popular cabaret or party scenes. It was only a matter of time before these movies made their way out of the Middle East. And in doing so, the dance, which was initially popularized and performed in Egypt, eventually and conspicuously became known to the rest of the world as “belly dance”, a term translated from the French term, “danse du ventre” or dance of the abdomen.

As these movies made their way from the Egyptian movie theaters through the rest of the Middle East, North Africa, Europe, and eventually in the mid 1950s to the United States, they provoked the attention of some women whose intrigue of the dance would spark a new and profound yet covetous interest in this unprecedented dance form leaving some to question today what authentic belly dance truly is.

Prior to the Egyptian movie era that began in the turn of the 20th Century, the public belly dance performance was seen only live in the cabarets or restaurants of Egypt’s big cities. Those who wrote about the dance and described its movement as seen first hand were usually male European artists who ventured to this exotic land for insightful artistic inspiration offered by a mysterious but compelling world, yet who looked upon the dance through their limited native cultural experience, which was more Western than Middle Eastern. In one of these first documented adventures in 1849 by male artist, Gustave Flaubert, he describes his encounter with one of Egypt’s dancers, Kuchuk Hanem, as “looking like the figures on ancient Greek vases”, an apparent interpretational observation by a 19th Century Western male perspective.

History of Egyptian Dance

Belly Dance has been around since before the Common Era (BCE) for at least 5000 years or more. By some accounts, it has been said that the dance was performed by the village female friends and family for a woman in labor to aid in the birth of her child by encouraging the mother to move in a similar fashion; and also so that the ever watchful Evil Eye, in its quest to search out, inhabit, and destroy that which was about to be born, would instead in its confusion as to who was undulating with a full womb, would inhabit an empty one of these mimicking undulating women, thus saving the child from certain death. Although these accounts may seem plausible, they have not been proven; and, for the most part, the Ancient Egyptians, as do Modern Egyptians, celebrated life every day to its fullest through the magic of music and dance.

As early as Pre-Dynastic periods, we find that Egyptian life, both religious as well as secular, was celebrated by the performance of music and dance. Large numbers of musical instruments have been found in museum collections around the world, dating back to this time period. Additionally, murals painted within the walls of Pre-Dynastic tombs depict scenes of parties and banquets with musicians and dancers; however, in these particular scenes, they appear to be more secular and idealized rather than actual. Then, around the 18th Dynasty, there appears to be a noticeable change with regards to the feel of these scenes as actual events. It is about this time that Queen Nefertiti may have made her mark.

Before the time of Queen Nefertiti’s husband, the Heretic King, King Akhenaton, hundreds of temples abounded throughout Egypt, each built to serve a different deity. However, beginning with the archaeological evidence along with religious and mortuary art and the architecture from the late 18th Dynasty, we find that rich and powerful pharaohs from King Akhenaton’s grandfather, Thutmosis IV and forward, broke traditions by engaging in grand building programs and introducing novel fashions which included the pleated kilt, full makeup, ahnd heavy wigs. King Akhenaton took the Pharaoh’s throne and ruled from 1352 to 1336 BCE and, following suit of breaking tradition, was the first Pharaoh – in fact, the first individual ever in the history of mankind – to establish a monotheistic religion, the worship of the Sun God, or rather a henotheism religion as he did acknowledge that there were other gods as well. His wife, Queen Nefertiti, was a devout follower and in fact has been attributed to initiating the new religion. As such, she held the position of a high priest.

Nefertiti, meaning, “a beautiful one”, may have indeed lived up to her name as not only being beautiful, but also as having bestowed her beauty as a legacy to this world. It is believed that as high priest, she was active in the religious and cultural changes brought about by her husband. We have little evidence of the actual dances before her time, but we do know that prior to this new religion, each temple was worshiped and kept by its own staff of temple dancers, priests, and priestesses, and therefore, each temple may have had its own style of dance worship for its particular deity. With Queen Nefertiti’s reign as “Chief Queen” and “God’s wife of Amun” as well as the high priest of all temples, and with the noticeable change we now see regarding the feel of 18th Dynasty scenes in which she is depicted, we can speculate that she may have been instrumental if not solely responsible in bringing dance together by unifying all temple dances into one dance – the dance of the Temple of the Sun God, Aten, located in Armana. Here, under the one god, Queen Nefertiti may have actively brought together all temple dancers. These dancers, having now been unified, would have shared their specific temple dance knowledge, resulting in one universal temple dance; a precursor to the specific dance we see in Egypt today.

Additionally, under the auspices of this high queen in her resolve to combine all temple dances, it appears that she may have commissioned her dancers to dance strictly barefoot portraying them as bridged spiritual liaisons between the earth and all of its former or lesser Egyptian deities and the sky of the present Sun God, Aten. To further bring attention to and enhance the exposed barefoot and to beautify its appearance in the dance, she may have instructed her dancers to apply color to their toenails with the juices of berries. Clearly, Queen Nefertiti may have been the first to apply red nail color, the original nail polish of today, to the dancer’s fingers and toenails in Ancient Egypt, a tradition that is still practiced to this day by the majority of traditional barefoot belly dancers.

As we study these ancient Egyptian banquet and party scenes as they were painted before, during, and after the 18th Dynasty, we can truly see that Queen Nefertiti had indeed lived up to her name and had come into her own as a beautiful woman. Only as high priest, Chief Queen, and God’s wife of Amun could one have been able to accomplish such monumental tasks. And in this period of change, Queen Nefertiti, no doubt could have implemented such a unified cultural dance tradition and expression.

The Bastardization of Egypt’s Visual Cultural Expression

Belly dance for the most part has been misconstrued and misinterpreted largely by the Western world and particularly by the belly dance enthusiast who sets out to learn the dance in a rather limited time frame and then goes on to teach it as she, herself, learned it from her similarly-taught teacher. Because of the Western experience and tradition as well as its cultural perception combined with its arrogance of ego, this dance has and continues to evolve into a kind of novelty or looked upon as a fad and labeled with such names as to claim the dance for itself. Under the guise of names such as Goddess Dance, American Tribal Dance, Snake Dance, Shimmy Dance, Harem Dance, Gothic Fantasy or Industrial Belly Dance, Gypsy Dance, or whatever other name one will come up with to further rationalize or enlist belly dance as part of the Western tradition and to make it strictly Western; i.e., American, these dance forms are nothing more than a bastardization of the original Egyptian expression, and have only proved to further defile and adulterate the fundamental core of this dance form.

Furthermore, among this amalgamation of mendacious fusion dance styles, a different and separate vocabulary now exists in belly dance, introduced and repeatedly secured by its delusional fusionist inventors intent on making a name for themselves in the Western world by being the first to implement either this vocabulary, which defines and describes each of their dance movements, or to invent a new and altogether neoteric dance move or step relative to the adulterated fusion dance style.

Labeling, packaging, and marketing that which is novel, unique, or unusual is not a foreign concept to the capitalistic posture of Western culture. Because of these Western dance fusions or inventions which expound on belly dance movement as its core base, numerous videos now appear on the market proclaiming sagacity of the dance with demonstrations of it by the producer calling each movement by a specific name of the Egyptian dancer from which the dance move was gleamed or labeling the movement as it appears to the Western eye with names of specific animals that walk or crawl similarly; names and labels that were and are invented exclusively by its Western disciple and which names were never a part of the Egyptian experience or instruction but rather its movements were intrinsic to the culture and learned from the time of birth through tradition and visual communication.

Additionally, to further complicate matters as the result of the distribution of these Egyptian movies throughout the Middle East, there also has evolved a Lebanese style of belly dance, a Turkish style, a Greek style, a Moroccan style, and, not the least, a Persian style which countries all lay claim to the origins of this dance. What fails to be acknowledged is that no style of belly dance could or would have ever existed had the distribution of these Egyptian movies not made their way initially from Egypt through these countries and into the Western world. So that these styles evolved in these countries within the boundaries of the respective culture makes sense as the women of these countries who also saw these Egyptian movies became intrigued by the dance, and tried to emulate the dancers so as to capitalize on the dance as did the Egyptian dancers by performing it in nightclubs for the rich Arabs who vacationed in these Gulf countries, as well as for the tourists who would otherwise not venture into Egypt and would not know enough about the dance and its origins to see a real authentic Egyptian belly dancer.

The dilemma in the interpretation and consequent definition of this controversial dance form lies in the cultural expression of each country from which this dance has evolved. The expression inherent in the Egyptian culture does not compare with that inherent in the American culture, nor does it parallel to any culture in which the dance has evolved or is performed today. And it is because of the cultural difference of expression that makes belly dance in Egypt performed by a native Egyptian look completely different from that of any other country or native. A non-native demonstrating it or performing it correctly must have dedicated a lifetime to studying the dance and delved into the culture, people, cuisine, language, and so on, from which the dance was born before thinking of venturing forth to teach it to the Western populous. Yet sadly, to the further detriment and bastardization of this dance, the majority of Western belly dancers instead disdainfully break away far too early from what should be years of dedicated physical dance study and performance and open a school of their own to teach a dance that they, themselves, have been studying for an average of only two years. Compared to a lifetime, what does anyone know in just two years about another country's culture let alone its dance?

So, to say that belly dance is a kind of goddess worship or in any shape or form religious as well as American, is absurd, for while it may have been a form of temple dance five millennia ago, there is nothing in the Egyptian culture today to support these present day claims. Additionally, to say that belly dance has its origins in countries other than Egypt, or that belly dance is in the same realm as its miscellany of byproduct or offshoot fusion styles is ludicrous and altogether false. It is simply a cultural expression of a people – the oldest civilization on the planet – whose lives revolve around the celebration of day-to-day life and who have made their dance a visual expression of that celebration. So, for this dance form to be demonstrated, labeled, packaged, marketed, performed, taught, or produced as something other than what it fundamentally is, is nothing more than a direct insult or an affront to the Egyptian people and to their culture as it does nothing but mock their rich and ancient heritage.

Egypt’s Modern Belly Dancer

Unfortunately, the inevitable melding and cross pollination of Middle Eastern and Western cultures now pose a very true and legitimate threat to the authenticity of the dance as it once graced the stages and dance floors of Egypt. As Egypt becomes more popular to the Western world as a vacation or academic destination, and as the travel opportunities for Egyptians become more available in the Western world, cultures and expressions are now being exchanged and learned leaving a more modern Egyptian culture in its wake which is finding evidence in the latest dances of modern Egyptian belly dancers. Although fundamentally Egyptian in expression and communication, today’s modern Egyptian belly dancer has picked up certain Western colloquial expressions and nuances that have entered into the dance scene. These are becoming more and more visible to the trained eye.

Additionally, as the fundamentalist religious groups continue to take a strong hold on the Egyptian populous, more and more Egyptian women are forced to don the veil and look away from the limelight of their dance heritage as well as the public dance scene. This dance is fast becoming a thing of the past both in Egypt because of these fundamentalist religious groups and by the Western interpretation and indoctrination of the dance through these self-proclaimed fusionists. Belly dance, in its fundamental presentation as it was initially filmed in Egypt and distributed by the Egyptians, is headed for the endangered species list.

Rediscovering, Recapturing, and Reapplying
the Authenticity of Egypt’s Visual Cultural Expression

Of importance in keeping belly dance alive, authentic, and true to its origins, the world has at its fingertips an entire Egyptian movie empire waiting to be meticulously studied and emulated. It is, however, interesting yet ironic to note that the impetuous that helped to explode this dance craze onto the Western dance scene and which ultimately led to less than dubious fusion dance styles, which have left Egyptian belly dance with a lot to be desired, may be the only visual medium which will make these nonsensical fusion dance styles obsolete or at the very least classified as an altogether separate dance form apart from traditional belly dance with a name and vernacular all to its own, keeping separate that which is the authentic Egyptian expression.

Belly dance is fundamentally Egyptian. It was initially performed in Egypt; it was made popular by the Egyptians, was recorded by the Egyptians, and it was made available to the rest of the world by the Egyptians – first and foremost. Anything other than Egyptian style belly dance, which should be given all rights to the coined present day term “belly dance”, is only an adaptation of movement or mixture of expression – a bastardization – that has come about through the interpretation of the dance by the untrained, unskilled or inexperienced dancer of her respective culture or country. To understand and perform authentic Egyptian style belly dance as a non-native of Egypt is to step outside of one’s original cultural experience and dedicate one’s life, soul, and self to the study of the culture, the people, the cuisine, and the language as well as the study of the dance and its fundamental core expression from which they all originated and that place is called Egypt; the very same place that gave us a glimpse of the first Egyptian belly dancers ever to perform on the silver screen, which we were and are today able to watch because of the Egyptian movie industry – the industry that distributed of these Egyptian movies.