Sausan Method of Egyptian Style Belly Dance

Initial Thoughts and Decision

So, you want to be a belly dancer. Have you thought of why? Why do you want to learn to belly dance? Is it for money? Is it for fame? Is it for your lover? Is it for exercise? Is it for weight loss? Is it for toning? Is it for or discovering your “inner” self? Is it for getting in touch with “the goddess within”? Is it because it looks exotic?

What led you to want to learn belly dance? Did you see a cabaret dancer in a local restaurant or nightclub? Did you see a dancer in an Egyptian movie? Did you go to a local fair and watch a Middle Eastern dance troupe? Does your friend take classes and so want you to also? Did you see a photograph of a belly dancer? Was it on a whim?

What exactly do you think belly dance is? Is it a kind of pagan religious dance? Is it related goddess worship religion? Is it strictly an Egyptian cultural expression?

How do you see belly dance? Do you think it is sexy? Do you think it is empowering? Do think it is beautiful? Do you think men should be included?

What intrigued you about belly dance? Was it the costume? Was it the music? Was it the way you saw the body move? Was it the glitz and glitter? Was it the limelight?

What homework have you done with regard to belly dance? Have you researched it and its history? Have you taken courses in Egyptian music, cuisine, culture, and/or its language?

In making a decision to learn to belly dance, questions such as some of these must have gone through your head. Perhaps you may have had a few of your own that brought you to want to learn this dance form. I am happy you stopped by my web site.

Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance teaches strictly the Egyptian style of dance. Any other form of belly dance is simply not belly dance. I invite you to learn the real thing.

Academia Concept

The academia of Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance is unlike any other school of belly dance worldwide. While other schools of belly dance maintain a teaching curriculum supporting different levels of dance; i.e., Beginning, Intermediate, Advanced, and Performance or Professional, Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance offers four specific courses that, when all are completed, will provide the specific tools and information necessary to belly dance the Egyptian way.

It is virtually impossible for someone who has never taken a belly dance class and, so is considered to be a beginner, to achieve any kind of speed, strength or stamina associated with that labeled Intermediate or Advanced without first applying years of proper study and training of movement and music, as the movement applied to belly dance is so culturally different from any other dance movement yet so fundamentally simple that the significance of the dance is in the manner in which it is culturally interpreted and expressed. The Sausan Method of teaching Egyptian style belly dance defines this as the Egyptian Dance Code or EDC.

The academia of Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance consists of four major 12-week courses. These courses are called Primary, Secondary, Tertiary, and Basic Principal. This academia is designed to give the student an intense one-year curriculum that includes both the concept and theory behind Egyptian dance movement and the interpretation of classical and pop Egyptian music, as well as the application of Egyptian dance to the different styles of Egyptian music. Each course builds upon the previous one. All four courses must be taken consecutively and all must be completed before the student can begin to achieve the necessary understanding of the Egyptian dance movement as well as the awareness of Egyptian music with applied dance technique.

In the four courses that are offered at Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance, the student is introduced initially to the EDC and then to all dance movement systematically and scientifically within the EDC, according to the Sausan Method, so that by the time the student has completed all four courses, she will have a complete understanding of the EDC, the theory and concept of the dance and the music, as well as the tools with which to discern Egyptian style belly dance from all others.

Post-graduate work in the form of additional Principal Courses allows the student to become more proficient in the execution of the dance with regards to speed, strength, and stamina relative to the interpretation of music. Each additional Principal Course also adds to her musical repertoire as well as to her experience and dance knowledge, and will eventually allow her to knowingly anticipate and therefore participate or perform with confidence to any Egyptian musical program without relying on structured choreography. And this is only accomplished through time spent in earnest dedicated to the study of Egyptian music and the application of the Egyptian dance technique before can she achieve performance standards.

Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance does not endorse, maintain, nor encourage its students to affiliate or assemble themselves in a troupe, as this would only undermine the blossoming growth of the individual performer and her personality as an Egyptian style belly dancer. And as males are an acceptable part of any dance troupe, Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance teaches solely cabaret, a form specific only to the female body and anatomy.

Academy Resources

Sausan Academy™ of Egyptian Dance offers a library of Egyptian movies with English subtitles, CDs and audio cassettes of classical and popular Egyptian music, books on Egypt, the dance, and its people, and videos of many Egyptian belly dancers, as well as links to Egyptian language, Egyptian cuisine, promotional dancing opportunities, and final accreditation in higher level education. Additionally, a full time staff of Egyptian scholars and musicians are available for lectures as well as for answering any question regarding anything related to Egypt.

Written by Sausan 5/3/04