Caroline_afifi

A'isha,

An all male show wont be holistic but shows dont have to be.
If it is an all male showcase then this is ok. People will decide if they want to pay the money to see it. Do you feel it threatens womens dance in someway?

I saw a show in Luxor once which was all male apart from one not very good token Belly dancer. It would have been better to leave her out rather than just stick her in for the token sexiness.
I think your definition of raqs sharqi may narrow all this down a bit too much?
Dance is dance and men can dance beyond the token tanoura and saaidi.
Dont you think?

Aisha Azar

Dear Caroline,


I am one of the staunchest supporters of male belly dancers and have been sponsoring them for many more years than it has been the most popular thing to do. I coached one of America's most famous male dancers and love him dearly as a dancer and as friend. I have had men in my classes for many years off and on. I have sponsored both Mark Balahadia and DaVid in the last couple of years as belly dancers and had Ra'ed Azar and Jakobi as part of my shows, too, in other capacities. I had planned to have men in my show next Fall. But, frankly, I feel quite stabbed in the back when people start having all male shows. It makes me see no reason whatsoever why I should continue to sponsor men, especially those who are buying into the idea that they are so special that there should be all male shows.
Dance may be dance, but exclusionary shows are exclusionary. Some will say that women have often had shows without men in them. Though, frankly, I can remember even Jamila Salimpour having men in the Bal Anat shows in the late 1960s and early 1970s, so that's kind of a myth, too. Bobby Farrah was around forever, along with Rashid and John Compton, Bert Balladine and Horacio Cifuentes and a host of others. They stuck around because they were working, not because no one was paying any attention to them. But, there are still more female dances than men and so it really is not that big a deal. And, sometimes there are no men in the area as well. For that matter, we see more men teaching than women these days if we go by the numbers gender-wise. We outnumber them, but they seem to have just as many dance engagements as we do per capita, making the all male review unnecessary and damaging in ways that I have gone into on another part of the forum.
Regards,
A'isha

Tarik Sultan

FEAR:

False

Evidence

Appearing

Real

Dear Caroline, Jenc and others. I think you can all see clearly that male dancers are no threat to female dancers or the dance for that matter in any way. There was a time when men were excluded from Ballet to the point where the men's roles were often done by women. Not only have men once again been allowed to participate, but choreographers always create special sections for the man to show his athletic prowess. This is a far cry from the romantic era of the 19th century when the Ballet was seen as the quintessential expression of femininity. The two leading celebrities of the Ballet in the 20th century were men, Barishnakov and Nureyev. Did this hurt the ballet? No.

The only certainty in life is change. It is inevitable. When Raks Sharki was developed it was a radical change from the Baladi style of the Ghawazee and Awalim of the old quarters of Cairo who had previously dominated the dance scene. Men are becoming more involved in the dance, heralding another development in the dance. Will it hurt the dance? No, it won't but the landscape and what is viewed as normal will change. Some people are fearful of this because they can't in-vision a world of multiple or parallel realities. There are just some people who are comfortable in their world. They thrive on the certainty of the routine because it gives life a sense of security. The airplane, the car, the telephone, electricity, the railroad. These are all things that scared the bejesus out of some people because it represented change and that change represented uncertainty, the unknown.

We are dancers, and dancers need audiences. I give women credit for having .... just a little bit of brains. Just between us, do you think women will really stand for men attempting to exclude them from performing? There will never be enough men in any one location to sufficiently impact on women. It will never ever be anything but the occasional event and I don't know any man in this business stupid enough to think that we can survive without the support of women. From a financial point of view alone, unless they plan to only have ONE show a year or every other year, how could they possibly exclude women from performing? We've all seen shows that were geared at being a celebration of womanhood. I don't see anything wrong with this. What I do have a problem with are schools and teachers who feel that men have not legitimate part in the dance and these are two completely different things. As someone said earlier, the audience will decide with their own pocketbooks if they want to see a show or not. I don't think women would be stupid enough to support an artist who discriminates against them, nor do I know any male dancer who could afford to exclude women from performing. They still have to teach seminars and workshops and until we see a rush of men beating down the doors to learn Oriental dance, who could you have a seminar show, Hafla etc that did not include women on a regular basis.

jenc

I would F-A-R rather see this show than BDSS anyday. I imagine there will be more real dancing and less aren't they beautiful.

Caroline_afifi

I am not aware of women going to watch male dancers to ogle their bodies but who knows? nothing surprises me.

When Khaled mahmoud first come to the UK and was unknown here, he took part in one of my shows. He did his thing in a galabiya (after we persuaded him not to wear his gold hot pants) and then did a zar with me and another friend at the end. He was the talking piont of the show and he was nowhere near as good as he is now. One teacher told me she was getting hot flushes and an orgasms watching him. HOW??? Lucky he never wore the shorts.

In the past however many years, I only know of Shafeek and locally a lovely guy called Marco who is from Rhodes and does Greek dancing too.

The UK is not a place which is going to home grow male dancers even if we tried hard. there are probably many more I dont know about but I do travel around the country and teach at festivals etc and I dont come across too many.

America is of course a much bigger country but how many men do you think you have taking over there per kilometre?

Dance generally in the past 15 years has seen a growth in popularity for men. Here is it generally salsa classes but even that has cooled right off.

A'isha,
It is not nice to feel stabbed in the back. although I am not really sure why you do?
did you make agreement with the men you taught never to go off and do it alone or what?

When costumers are making more mens costumes than womens, then it is time to worry. Til now, no one is making any, unless by special order, so the business cannot be worth the while. Oriental Moon were trying but they told me there was very little feedback and the few who did wanted very different types of costumes so it is was really worth producing a collection.

Suheir

I think Ozgen's audience definitely has that component.

Oh, my word - gold hot pants?! I went to a class with Khaled when he first came here and there was a woman in the class wearing what amounted to a bikini and a hipscarf, no skirt. You are right, he was nowhere as good a dancer (or teacher) as he is now, he's worked very, very hard since then.

Not least because so many teachers won't "allow" men in their classes but some are more than happy to ban them from the student ranks yet pant and dribble all over male teachers.

Caroline_afifi

I have heard of this. If a man turned up at class, how could anyone say you are not welcome here? I couldnt do that to anyone.
Anyone who is brave enough to walk into a class as a newcomer deserves respect.
I have heard women say they want a class to be just woman as it makes them feel uncomfortable. There is plenty of places men can observe women without needing to put himself through that.
I will see Ozgen for the first time at Raqs B.

Suheir

Well, if you advertise your classes as "Women Only" that would put all but the most persistent men off, for a start. I wonder if teachers who use local council premises are actually breaking the law if they practise sexual discrimination?

Aisha Azar

Dear Caroline,


Since there are many more women than men dancers, the costume example is not a good indicator of whether or not we should worry about how men are treating women in this business. Many professional women do not buy their costumes off the rack, either. I stayed with Hallah Moustafa when I was in Cairo and she got plenty of business while I was there, all for custom work. There is no ready to wear for men, but they are still performing and teaching disproportionate to their numbers among us. Even then it is not a problem for me until they start excluding women, which is beginning to happen, obviously.

Regards,
A'isha

Tarik Sultan

Dear Caroline:

America is a very big country and attitudes can vary greatly from section to section. I don't know why, but the west coast has always been more progressive and open to innovation than the East coast. When I started in the late 80's there were only three or 4 on the entire East coast, including Canada. I have no idea about the midwest.

As I've said before, male dancers could not exist without female dancers. In New York, there were only 2 people willing to teach me. One teacher refused me on political reasons when I mentioned I was taking classes with Morocco, and the two other major teachers have a policy of not teaching men at all. One even wrote an article in which she stated that men had no place in the dance. I took classes in the very beginning with a woman who was glad to have me, but excluded me from participating in the weekly studio shows. She would always say to me, "you don't want to dance on stage like a woman". So there I would be, the best dancer in the class, but stand by and watch as she would put ladies in the studio show that had only been coming to class for 3 weeks. Morocco was the only one who not only taught me, but when I couldn't afford classes, allowed me to barter for them, invited me to rehearsals, created a role for me to integrate me into the company, and then forced me to start teaching. She had taught Alfredo before me and Sergio before him and initially started her dance company because she had some black students who could not get work in any of the clubs, no matter how good they were. As a lady who was refused entry to law school because she was a woman, so she knows about sexism, yet she doesn't feel threatened or betrayed at the idea of an all male show.

Another thing to consider is the fact that a lot of time the producers of all male shows are in fact WOMEN. On March 28th both Mark and I will be dancing in an all male show for Kaieshi. I recently saw Mark a few weeks ago at Kaieshi's weekly event at Ja Bon. It was by coincidence that it was my first time there and I guess Mark's since he moved to the NYC area. She originally wanted me to do the show as one of the guest performers, then she got the idea that since Mark and another male performer was in town, why not make it an all male show. I've had several female dancers approach me about the same thing. The problem is there aren't enough men to make it happen.

Jim Boz and I have been planning a Men of Middle Eastern dance show. The problem is finding enough male dancers who can really dance. Jim and I have often talked about the same thing many people here have brought up. We call it the lizard boy syndrome. people going ape shit the second any guy steps on stage just because he's a guy. The reason why we are both disgusted by this is because we are serious about our craft and want to be judged on the strength of our merits, not because we're some sort of side show attraction. Women may be put off seeing men get an undeserved amount of attention, but the flip side of that is that legitimate male dancers feel just as insulted. When we see some guy lurching around like he's got rickets and the crowd is going wild we fell like WTF? We spend so much time and energy perfecting our craft and then these guys get all this attention for doing jacksh*t?

This sort of thing does not sit well with any legitimate artist. This is why I get soooo bent out of shape when I see nightclubs hiring girls who can't dance a lick. I personally feel offended that older women who CAN dance are discriminated against. This is why as soon as I have my act together I will do shows that are JUST for older women who do not have as many opportunities as the younger ones. I believe that when all is said and done, the public wants to be entertained, if you're good, they will love it. The tone is set by the owner of the venue or the promoter and as the promoter of my own event, it will be talent first. One of the ideas that I have is to do a big and beautiful event. For large women who can dance but are not deemed commercially viable. My only criteria is that the dancer top notch.

As for men having all these opportunities, that only exists within the dance community because we, for the most part, value the dance as an art. So yes, we are included in seminar shows and haflas, there are more of us teaching classes and seminars, but when we talk about performing in the general public, no, we don't have the same visibility or acceptance. How many people male or female, can build a viable career dancing at studio seminars and haflas? We al know that unless we are the teachers at these events, most of the time those of us who dance in these events do so for free.

MEn are not EXCLUDING women from performing in shows and never will. But it is common throughout the dance world to have shows that highlight certain categories of dancers. There are shows that feature children, shows that feature senior citizens, dance companies with full sized dancers, and yes, even shows that feature men. If having type specific shows and companies has not hurt any other dance form, why would it hurt ours? And like I said before, the promoters of all male shows are in fact often women. In fact there was a show late last year in Florida put on by Tamlyn Dallal and her studio that only featured male dancers. I don't think Tamlyn was stabbing herself in the back. Do you?

The last I'll say on this subject of men invading the dance world is this: If a person chooses, they can take issue with any type of show. They can chooses to interpret things their own way and see slights where no slights were intended. That is their issue. It's not based on fact or logic but emotions and irrationality. and no matter what you do or say to prove otherwise, they will hang on to their grudges like its a life vest on the Titanic. All you can do is go ahead and do what you have to do. If they or anyone else objects, they are free o do so and not come. The day will never come when women are excluded from performing. Every now and then a teacher or promoter chooses to do a special event and that is all it is. The men and women who have done gender specific shows have and do promote many more shows that are open to both sexes. That's the way it is, that's the way it will be. So right now, because male dancers are a minority, because they are still largely unknown or un seen even in the World wide Middle Eastern community, there will be the occasional all male show. However, as more and more men get into it, the male dancer will no longer be viewed as such a novelty and these types of shows will diminish in number. No harm done, no harm intended.