by Zanne Miller

There are many theories about the ancient origins of the belly dance. The names of some of the various steps, such as the Maya, the Egyptian and the Turkish, suggest it draws on diverse sources and folk traditions. The dance has also been called “the mother-goddess dance,” “the birth dance” and “the woman’s dance.” Dance historian Curt Sachs in his book World History of the Dance suggests that belly dancing, with moves that emphasize the inherent power of the female body, most likely came from the earliest agricultural societies. Artistic representations of the female form from that time, dating back as early as 7000 B.C., have led many to believe it was a time of widespread goddess worship.

In more recent history, forms of belly dancing have been encountered in Middle Eastern, Near Eastern and Asian cultures. The dance steps and associated lore of Egyptian, Eastern European and African performers are thought to have migrated over centuries, in many cases with nomadic people such as the Romany Gypsy tribes. What can be defined as belly dancing differs among women who perform it in America. The style of Troupe Nubia, if there is a specific style, might be best described as American tribal, incorporating various traditions.

Easter is well-versed in the history of the Romany Gypsies. Her troupe is named after a people of Arabic and Egyptian descent who lived along the Nile in southern Egypt, but Easter says that a definitive origin is hard to pin down. She says belly dancing is a living language that is interpreted by each woman who performs it over time.

She starts the class by teaching yoga postures, then moves into the basics of the dance, trying to work in as many variations as she can. But each woman really does her own dance, mixing the steps she has learned and following her own choreography. Easter says the dance comes from within. “When you open up your muscles and body, you open your mind and open your soul,” she says.

It is difficult to reconcile the inherent beauty of the dance with some of the societal images of it. Most people have seen live belly dancing as the sideshow in a Middle Eastern restaurant where women dance for tips. As Easter puts it, “there’s always been a thin line between belly dancing and stripping in this country. I think it’s very sad that we live in a time and place where women aren’t allowed to move their bodies.”

When entertainment promoter and world traveler Sol Bloom introduced the dance du ventre, or belly dance, to America at the 1892 Chicago World’s Fair, the Algerian dancers shocked the sensibilities of the Victorian-era fairgoers. They called it “salacious and immoral,” but the show was a huge success. Bloom later wrote in his diary that he had found “a gold mine.”

“Bloom was a genius,” says Melissa Miller, M.A., a marriage, child and family therapy intern and panelist at the 1997 International Conference on Middle Eastern Dance in Orange County, California. “Belly was a shocking word. This was at a time when Victorian morality wouldn’t let you say the word ‘breast’ even if you were asking for the white meat of chicken. So they flocked to see it.” Miller, who dances under the name Ghanima Gaditana, has studied the dance and its transformative effects.

American interest in the dance surged and became more mainstream during the 1970s, coinciding with the sexual revolution. “It’s no longer this bizarre, alien thing,“ Miller says. “Most people have seen at least one belly dancer. That helps in terms of people accepting it as something regular people do.” But America remains a sexually confused culture, she says. “The American psyche is still uncomfortable with women who enjoy their sexuality. We get all these conflicting images. The images we get in our popular culture: Be sexy but don’t be sexual. Fat women are not sexy. Conventional morality says a ‘good woman,’ in particular, doesn’t display herself sexually.”

“Hollywood added to that image of belly dancers,” she points out. In the movies, “we saw dancers vying for the attention of a fat, jaded sultan smoking a hookah; women using their sexual powers to get the attention of men.”

But there are no men in Easter's classroom, only women. And, while they do dance in public—the troupe makes regular appearances at a weekend open-air food and crafts festival and at a funky performance hall—they say they dance primarily for themselves.

“It’s always been about women dancing for women,” according to Theora. “People on the outside think belly dancers are flaunting themselves, but that’s because they don’t understand. To me, it’s a lot more honest to be right there with your sexuality. It’s about how powerful it is to be female and feminine. In the United States, to be powerful, you have to turn yourself into a man, with your clothes and with your body. It’s a hideous message. But this empowers women as women, not as imitation men.”