Creative Muslim Women February Photo Challenge

This month, Creative Muslim Women is holding a February Photo Challenge on Instagram and Twitter.

Please follow #CMWPhotoADay and #CreativeMuslimWomen daily.

Creative Muslim Women February Photo Challenge

I was very excited to have been able to put the list together for the month and look forward to seeing your contributions!

Do you know Raif Badawy?

One year ago today I changed my Facebook profile to Saudi Arabian blogger Raif Badawy.

Do you know Raif Badawy? by A Crafty Arab

I first read about Raif while I was doing research on how to talk my children about Charlie Hebdo.

Raif had been sentenced to 1000 lashes and 10 years in prison for criticizing Islamic clerics. There is a petition to free him on Change.com.  

Amnesty International has also set up petitions to return this family man back to his home.
 
I decided the least I could do was change my profile photo to his photo and tell as many people as possible about him.

While I did not agree with what Raif wrote on his blog, I felt that Saudi Arabia was displaying pure hypocrisy to send a representative to march in the Paris rally awash with pencils, in support of a bigoted newspaper that published offensive cartoons, while sentencing one of their own for putting his thoughts down.

As a blogger, I needed to do something for him in solidarity.

The more groups I joined, the more friends I added, the more I talked about him. Online, in person, everywhere.

I'm going to take a little break from his photo on Facebook to switch over to my mommy duties for the next few weeks.

I'm posting Raif's photo here until I switch back to keep the support going. Please help by signing both petitions and sharing them with friends.

It's not you Instagram, it's me

Around this time last year, I cleaned out my Facebook personal page of close to 600 "friend" accounts. This resulted in a major shift of my time management resources. Life has been good in 2015 as a result of this refocus to my business.

I was able to participate in a museum exhibit, taught clay classes in my studio, and released a new Arabic Color Poster. I took classes on business branding.  I continued to give tours at the Seattle Art Museum, taught art at my daughter's school, and volunteered at various organizations. I also expanded my Instagram account and started to post my tutorials there as another outreach.

Yesterday a major account swung by and "Hearted" one of my craft tutorial photos on my IG.

Of course there was s huge rush of OMA.  Then the thrill pass and nothing else happened.

There was no feeback.

No #repost.

No follow.

Crickets.

Having taken the branding courses, seeing this made me realize that the correlation between my photo and my account was lost. Somehow, what my photo was conveying, what drew a major craft account to me, was not what my ACraftyArab IG account was convaying.

And it was true, I had images from a girl scout meeting, a tree dragon and a half naked model holding a Saudi Arabian Bebsi can as my top photos.

None of those said A Crafty Arab. Nor did any of them handcraft a vibrant Arab world.

In order to help with my IG branding being more in line with my mission statement, I have decided to create a private IG, Seattle_kt, that will carry these more personal photos, while the ACraftyArab account will focus on showcasing the many tutorials from this blog.

Please do not take it personally if I have unfollowed you on IG, I am working my way back on my spreadsheet of accounts. You are welcome to find me, I am happy to let you into my peronsal world. And you can see the Bebsi can, because I'm sure you're curious now.

It's not you Instagram, it's me - A Crafty Arab

Happy New Year - 2016

Happy New Year!

A Crafty Arab would like to take this time to wish you a joyous new 2016.

I hope our world learns more tolerance, makes more love, and creates more peace.

Happy New Year - 2016

Every Muslim...

Every Muslim...really? All 1.75 billion?

Every Muslim is a terrorist who hates the West.

Every Muslim hates freedom and civil rights.

Every Muslims wants to kill a non-Muslims.

These are the words that I've read over the last few days on the internet.

With that logic...

Every Catholic Priest is a pedophile.

Every Jew wants to kill a Palestinian.

Every Mormon is anti-gay.

Every German is an anti-Semite.

Every Irishman blows up planes.
Every Native American is a drunk.

Every Somalian is a pirate.

Every Iraqi hates Kuwait.

Every Mexican is a drug dealer.
Every Indian is involved in sex trafficking.

Every Russian owns a gun.

Every Chinese person is hacking into your computer as you read this.

Every British citizens enjoys being in control of 3rd world countries.

Every Italian American is a member of the mob.

Every teenage boy in a trench coat will kill your kids.

Every postal worker is a mass murder.
Every Halloween candy has a razor blade in it.

Every bearded man wearing sunglasses puts pipe bombs in mailboxes.

Every Oklahoma citizen blows up federal buildings because they loath the government.

Every resident of Georgia despises Olympic athletes.

Every Floria local enjoys target practice on visiting tourists.

...see how stupid the original sentences sound now? 

Stop buying into the daesh goal of separating the world into Muslims and everyone else. Educate yourself. Go to a mosque and ask questions. Stop spewing hate filled bigotry into the world. We have to imagine that love will win.

Learning how to make a clay stamp

Today I got to tag along on a trip to Stroke Ceramics in Issaquah.  We are thinking of using them for a craft project for our Girl Scout camp this summer and wanted to talk logistics.

While we were there the owner, Maia Desfosses-Yang, taught us how to make clay stamps.  If you these look fun and easy, be sure to contact Maia to sign up for one of her summer clay classes.  Her schdueld is up on her website.

I was so impressed with her studio size. She can easily accommodate a number of children and everything was so nicely set up.  I was immediately envious of her clay wheel and was nostalgic for the one I owned years ago.

Maia start me off with a small ball of clay, no bigger then a walnut. She then showed me how to pinch a top with my fingers and make the edges smooth by rolling it around the table.  In the photo below you can see my original ball and then the stamp shapes in the upper right corner that she formed.

Since the stamps are small and there isn't much room to leave your name, Maia suggested using these pasta alphabet letters embedded into the clay.

These burn off in the kiln and yet leave an impressions.  Genius!

Another great idea that Maia had was to wrap the area you want to carve in plastic wrap.

This way when you carve into your clay, the carving tool won't leave a huge indentation at the end of your line. This is very helpful with children who sometimes don't know their own strength with carving clay and can accidently carve to the other side.

I carved a little stamp with my business logo that you can see at the start of this post.  I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out.  Be sure to check out the studio for class information and to learn other fun, easy ways to play with clay.

Check out Maia's Etsy shop for her fun creations!

Happy New Year 2015 (And a Huge Shukran)

Happy New Year to all my family, friends, fans, and followers.

What a year 2014 was for A Crafty Arab, and more specifically this blog full of free Islamic and Arab craft tutorials for kids. 

I am so appreciative of everyone that reads these posts and the encouragement I receive from all of you.

I just looked over my statistics and saw that I wrote over 100 posts that received 70,355,436 clicks in 2014. The majority of those came from Google.com, but I was surprised Pinterest has advanced to the second highest referral site over this past year.  It will be intriguing to see if it suppresses it next year.

Thank you to all those that pin my posts!  Please continue to share links for others to enjoy.

While checking out my statistics, I thought it was interesting that the top 10 countries that had the highest readers were
1. United States
2. United Kingdom
3. Pakistan
4. Canada
5. India
6. United Arab Emeritus
7. France
8. Saudi Arabia
9. Argentina
10. Australia

Marhaba to all my readers from these countries.  To you, and those in countries that are not listed,  I pray 2015 brings you peace in all your homes.

Farsi Happy New Year Tree of Life Card

Campbell's Soup Dress Tutorial

Every year the Seattle Art Museum staff has an event to celebrate their Docent volunteers.  This holiday luncheon is always fun to attend with a lovely lunch, festive entertainment and a raffle. 

The theme this year was Andy Warhol's Factory, in celebration of the exhibit Pop Departures  currently at SAM. 

Everyone was encouraged to dress in period outfits, so I decided to make a Campbell's mushroom soup dress for the occasion. 

Below is the tutorial in case you'd like to make your own!

I started with three pieces of clothing to come up with my one outfit.  I found the red sleeveless dress, red jacket and white dress all at my local thrift store.  I took a photo of the pricetags because I thought it was very funny that the more material equals less expensive.  As you can see, the dress was $4.99, the jacket was $6.99 and the white lingerie was $8.80. I was able to make the new dress for a little over $20.

First I had to get rid of the ruffle that went all the way down the red dress, you can see a little of it here.

However, while trying to cut it out, I made a nice hole in the red dress. Learn from my mistake: be careful with your seam ripper, as sometimes they have a mind of their own!

I then took out the top part of my white dress you can see one photo up.  Don't forget: I was making a 70s dress and wearing bras on the outside of an outfit wasn't made popular till Madonna in the 80s.

You'll need to excuse the shameless plug of my hand's cool henna design I got on Saturday at Redmond Lights. Pretty, huh?

I wanted to sew the red jacket to the sleeveless dress because the luncheon was going to be held at the Seattle Asian Art Museum Board Room, which I am always cold in.  It doesn't matter that it's December, I'm cold in the summer months too.  I blame my Mediterranean blood.  So I went ahead and sewed the sleeves of the jacket into the sleeves of the dress so I wouldn't have to keep tugging on the jacket at the event. We all hate that, right?

I was finally able to put down the dresses and get to work on the letters.  First I printed out the word S O U P in very large boring font.  I cut out the letters from the paper, from mushroom fabric (in yellow!), and from a stiff stabilizer so my letters won't fold on themselves.

After I cut out the S O U P letters, I printed out the word Campbell's and made sure it was the correct size to fit on the dress. I cut out word from red felt. I'm not sure why the logo didn't print the apostrophe after the last L, so my proper English friends will have to excuse this little error.  I only noticed after my dress was done and the cursed machine had been put away.

Now the fun part!  All that applique sewing that feels never endinng!  First the word Campbell.

Then the yellow letters.  Check out the mushroom soup design on the fabric.  Isn't it the cutest? You'll have to excuse the uneven edges of the sewing.  The last few steps of this dress were done later in the evening when my threshold for perfection had long peeked.

Once all the applique was done, I found a round lid that I put in between the two words and lightly drew out a circle with a pencil.  I painted the circle yellow with fabric paint.

As a final touch, I added a silver ribbon I had in a drawer to the bottom of the dress to replicate the edge of the metal can.  It was the perfect pièce de résistance.

 

It was great fun to show off to all my friends. There were so many other women that got into the spirit of the party and dressed up also. 

During the event, the staff hired an Elvis impersonator that serenated us, and I won the raffle of a beautiful Chihuly coffee table book.  All the docents got a gorgeous book on the art in the Wright collection and I managed to leave with one of the table centerpieces. The adorable metal leaves were a wonderful surprise to discover when I got home.

Thanks SAM staff for a wonderful afternoon!

It's not you, facebook, it's me

I'm a people hoarder.

I didn't know this about myself until a recent epiphany, but it's true. I collect people and can't seem to let them go. 

My "aha" moment occurred with Facebook over the past two weeks. I've got close to 800 "friends" on there and while most of them I have no personal connection to anymore, I can't seem to let them move on.

Despite joining Facebook quite a few years ago, I have only unfriended four people ever. Two for bullying, and two were husbands of women that unfriended me. It's amazing to think that somehow I can't seem to click that unfriend button, even if a person hasn't crossed my path for years.

I have my best friend from high school who shared an afterschool job at Long John Silvers.

I have my housemate from college, and her husband, a neighbor from my childhood home.

I have my favorite roommate (I had seven total) from my internship at Walt Disney World.

I have friends from every single mother's groups I've been a part of over the years.

I have friends from old jobs as an arts commissioner, board member, docent, dj at a radio station, waitress, Microsoftie, art gallery manager, merchandise hostess, teacher, book club, craft meet ups, student, the list is endless.

You name any continent, I've probably got a friend in it.

My epiphany occurred the week of Thanksgiving when I had two of these friends stand me up on two different occasions. On Thanksgiving day, I found myself not invited to a gathering of friends I've known for close to 10 years.

Some call it a hat trick, but having all three events happen within days of each other hurt my heart deep and hard.  Something snapped in my brain and I found myself, for my first time ever, searching for the Facebok Deactivate button on Thanksgiving night. I needed a friend break. More importantly, I needed to put my heart back together.

Suddenly, everyone was gone.

I wasn't getting hourly updates of my girlfriend's new baby that arrived on Monday.

I received no posts on Ferguson, #ICantBreath, or names of police officers that are members of the KKK.

I didn't see any photos of headless children from Palestine.

My girlfriend who is traveling with her daughters in Spain and was posting photos of Miro's studio disappeared.

Poetry writings, both in Arabic and English, and Harlequin romance novel quotes were gone from my life.

Videos of cats showing dogs who was boss, kids being cute, and a parody called All About the Paste were no longer attacking my eyes.

For days, my world was cut off, except for Twitter, where I had just unfollowed over 1,000 people in October.  I had done it after reading an article about clutter. So things were pretty quiet over there too.

Interestingly enough, disappearing on Facebook caused real friends that needed to find me contacted me via other means to make sure I was alive.  I got flowers with a heartfelt apology from the gathering that hadn't invited me and it was sweet.  Inquiries were coming in from Pinterest, my website contact form, emails, evite and phone calls. The friends that noticed I was gone and needed to check on me found a way to do it not on Facebook.

Now, almost two weeks later, I am amazed at the amount of work I have gotten done. I'm ahead on my products for one store, I made three custom pieces, two Arabic clocks, 26 sets of earrings, 109 sarcastic cards, I planned and taught two art class to second graders, I cleaned my studio top to bottom, my daughters and I completed three craft projects, we also made cookies for an upcoming cookie exchange, I made an Andy Warhol dress for a holiday party, I wrote up a time management plan, I went into Seattle midweek to take an optional museum class, I finished a book, caught up on my movies list and started my business plan. My To Do List was getting done at the speed of light as projecs were getting being completed left and right.

Not having Facebook on 12 times a day has made me realized that I'm a people hoarder and I need to stop. I've decided I'm only holding on to the people that I've physically seen in 2014, or have Liked my business, or that I'd have no problem calling up today and inviting to lunch.

Starting in January, I need to let go of those that I haven't laid eyes on in awhile or aren't invested in my passion. I have some big business goals for 2015 and need to make sure I'm not distracted by a friend's videos of cats getting into tight boxes.  

After two weeks without 800 friends, I've realized it's not you, it's me.  I need to stop hoarding you and set you free.

How can all not be forgiven with such a beautiful apology?

Goodbye Arab Artists Resouces & Training

As my A Crafty Arab business has grown (Alhamdulillah), I'm finding myself with less and less time to do other pet projects of mine.

One that has fallen off the waste side has been Arab Artists Resources and Training. I started this non-profit organization back in June of 2001 as a way to connect Arab artists with museums and galleries.  I received a substantial grant from the New York Ford Foundation and Doha Qatar Foundation to publish a resource guide of Arab artists around the globe.

Then along came the internet.

Suddenly no one wanted to buy a physical book, everything moved online.  I spent months putting all the information on the world wide web for free.  I even added a database of grants and job opportunities available to Arab artists.

But I just couldn't keep up with this project, my master's degree, starting a family of three girls and now my full time business.  So, after two attempts at hiring web companies to keep the website spam free, I've decided to throw in the towel.

I'll try my best to add the database to my Pinterest boards, this one for painters and sculptors, one for writers, and this one for entertainers. If you think of others, let me know.

I hope you all wish me luck in mailing my last tax forms to the IRS.  I've decided to send a little joy by adding Eid sheep tape on the back.

Goodbye Arab Artists Resources & Training

All monies from AART is being sent to other nonprofit organizations doing good in our world.  More details about this later with everything is confirmed.

2014 Nobel Peace Prize winners

Fall is in the air.  I can feel it from the chill in the air, the smell of burning leaves, and my Twitter account going aflutter with the hashtag #NobelPeacePrize.

Yeah, I'm a geek that way, I like seeing what I'll be reading next.

This year, however, there seems to be an extra buzz as people are realizing that yet another Muslim has won!

And while a major news network is telling our fellow Americans that Islam is "one big bad idea," the rest of the world is awarding members of it the Peace prize.

As a matter of fact, eleven Nobel Prize winners have been Muslims, seven in the Peace category.

For the first time in days there was some Muslim news that doesn't involve beheadings, bombings, or complaints about pumpkin spice in our hummus!

I'd like to present you with these eleven Muslims here for your educational enjoyment.

Peace
1978
Anwar al-Sadat
Egypt

1994
Yasser Arafat
Palestine

2003
Shirin Ebadi
Iran

2005
Mohamed El Baradei
Egypt

2006
Muhammad Yunus
Bangladesh

2011
Tawakel Karman
Yemen

2014
Malala Yousafzai
Pakistan

Literature
1988
Naguib Mahfouz
Egypt

2006
Orhan Pamuk
Turkey

Physics
1979
Abdus Salam
Pakistan

Chemistry
1999
Ahmed Zewail
Egypt

Reactions to Why I can't stand any belly dancers

I had some really great comments (from ACraftyArab.blogspot) on my How to talk to your Why I can't stand any belly dancers post yesterday that I wanted to preserve -

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

You make an interesting analogy.

And honestly, I do think Jarrar makes some good points about stereotyping in her article. It is something that needs to be examined. And it's a reason I've shied away from belly dancing, despite learning originally from an Egyptian roommate and having turkish roots myself. Whenever I looked up classes online, the offerings left a bad taste in my mouth, with the "Arabian nights" themes and what not.

Where I REALLY disagree with jarrar is that learning belly dance is inherently racist. I think that's absolutely ridiculous. According to her, even if you choose a teacher from a culture where belly dancing originates and treat it as respectfully as a ballerina would ballet, a white woman is still racist for her interest. Although I do believe it is possible to appropriate sacred dances, belly dancing has such a long and varied history that it's impossible to tie it down to one culture, one origin, one religion.

So, for me, it's a matter of the stereotyping being racist, not the actual interest in the dance. And I'm sorry, but Jarrar has yet to convince me of otherwise. I guess its good she started a dialogue, though.

(Sorry for being anon; I just don't really feel like getting into it with random strangers via email (not meaning you!)).

March 8, 2014 at 2:05 AM

Tamalyn Dallal said...

From a "bellydancer" with 38 years experience dancing and teaching in 40 countries:
Hollywood inspired the Egyptian film industry to put the dance into bras and belts. American bellydancers get their costumes from Egypt and Turkey, which are conservative compared to what Egyptian dancers wear , or what Turkish dancers wore in the 70's.
This bellydance costumes for foreigners industry keeps thousands of Egyptians employed during a time when there is little employment.
I see the points you make (and laughed my head off at the speedo analogy). I see the pointes Randa Jarar makes too. I have spent a lot of time in the Middle EAst, North Africa and EAst Africa. I would love to arrange a dialogue between women "of the culture" and belly dancers who are not.
But dialogue, not hate is what is missing.
Tamalyn Dallal www.tamalyndallal.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdKeKkuuOco

March 8, 2014 at 2:32 AM

Tamalyn Dallal said...

Oops. I wasn't finished. I see the points, but don't agree with all of them because they are under researched. I can't take Randa Jarrar's article seriously because of the way it is presented- niot in the spirit of encuraging understanding. It is divisive and racist in ots own right.This is too bad because some of the things she says with hate are what I have been hoping to find ways to resolve through bringing western and Asian "bellydancers" to Zanzibar and the Siwa Oasis of Egypt and spending time with local women (6 trips so far), writing, film making, teaching workshops...
Not spewing nastiness toward other women.
BTW, how does one determine if they are brown, white or beige? Is there a device to measure that? (LOL) I'm getting tired of trying to figure out what color people are.

March 8, 2014 at 2:45 AM

Leela said...

Professional Egyptian-style dancer here. I love your speedo analogy and think the image is hilarious, but it doesn't really speak to the story of how the bra and belt combo became de rigeur for the bellydancer. Or, it does, but only part of the story. Fifi Abdo remains one of the greatest practitioners of the art no matter what she wore, but the performances she did in the white galabeya are very specific to a particular style and character that she was portraying in that portion of her show. If I showed up to a gig in a galabeya, no one would want to watch me, and it's not because they want to see my body, it's because they didn't hire me for a folklore show if it's a restaurant or a party. The white galabeya performances she did are famous and iconic, but they're only part of her repertoire, and if you search for her on Youtube you will find her in many different costumes, from bra and belt sets with a flowing skirt, to melaya leff, to beledi dresses, etc.

I'm very sorry if a bellydancer got her fringe in your baba ganoush in the past. We all fear that, and try to avoid it. Those of us who care deeply about the art also care deeply about our audiences and try hard not to get our beads and sequins in their food.

I'm glad you posted this, it was a needed laugh after such a poisonous attack piece. But I also want to point out that 90% is a pretty high figure. I don't think that many dancers are "white" (whatever that means, because as you point out, how do you measure that?). There are many, many bellydancers of African-American, Dominican, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Argentinian, Brazilian, Persian, Native-American, and other backgrounds, out there performing all over the world. Many people saw Jarrar as silently condemning them, too, without wanting to actually come out and say it. We're a diverse bunch and many of us deeply love the cultures the dances come from, and care about how we perform those dances. We would love to dance with you and your girlfriends, and I promise you that many of us would never be caught dead in Hammer pants and a coin belt.

March 8, 2014 at 5:36 AM

Anonymous said...

Ridiculousness. Clearly is what this article is all about. You are a Purist, and that is ok. But the Bach analogy made no sense whatsoever. I have lived in New York for 15 years, I have performed and have watched many dance performances in many different venues. The only place that the Bach example would even exist is in a Comedy Club. Yes I do understand what you were trying to explain, but it is simply an opinion with a bit of hostility. I am also a Professional Flamenco dancer. I have also cringed at the Americanized Gypsy Kings version of Flamenco Dance and music. However, To lay claim, that music and or dance was derived from once place in the world and from one people and only one influence and there for is owned and controlled by same, is nothing short of ignorance. There are roots of any type of dance and influences of same in different areas of the world, ethnic backgrounds and cultural flavor. There are different variations and interpretations to every form of art in the world. There will be persons that will will either be open or completely closed off. You are of the later category me thinks, and what a tragedy. If this is an area that causes you disdain, then it is up to you, especially if you are living in American, to do the research to make sure that your special "evening" will go as planned. Just like any other important evening, be in control of your own destiny. And one more thought in closing...I couldn't imagine living in an "artistic" world if we were told as artist, how to perform, what to wear, who can and cannot perform to certain types of music and what music to use and not use, etc.....How exhausting and demoralizing a task that would be... this is a very close minded and small way of thinking in the plethora of artistic energy...had I been sitting there and a guy been playing Bach in a Speedo, I would have started to DANCE!!!! <3 LIVE, LOVE and DANCE

March 8, 2014 at 7:29 AM

Ruth Schleifer said...

Thanks for your well reasoned and meticulously factual reply. Clearly, Salon.com will not be publishing your work as their intention was to gauge the ease with which "white women" will embrace another reason to hate themselves. It was not only a racist article, it was oddly mysogynistic. :-)

March 8, 2014 at 7:33 AM

Anonymous said...

If Fifi is the example, what about the hundreds of times that she also performed in sequined bra and belt costumes?

March 8, 2014 at 7:48 AM

Anonymous said...

Honestly, I am surprised at how critical the bellydance community is of anything Arab American women say. There is always a reason to dismiss or disvalidate the perspective. Anyway, I think one of the reasons that bellydance has become so sexualized has to do with the fact that Arab men are the ones that connect with the bellydancers. I just do not see bellydancers connecting with Arab women. And from the reactions that I have seen; I am not sure that they are ready. That is what I see. Even though I love the sexy costume that Dina wears I cant agree more with the author that the more traditional aspects are grossly under-represented.

March 8, 2014 at 8:25 AM

Anonymous said...

The difficulty, of course, is that all public interactions are highly constrained, even in societies that are ostensibly "free." Since artists are required to place their work in the public sphere, despite their fantasies about themselves that they are free to do anything they want, the truth is that they must mold and shape and twist what they do to conform to certain expectations. I am quite convinced this is why we artists are often such unhappy and warped people -- we want nothing more than to connect to others, but we are forced to twist that in highly artificial and manacled ways.

The freedom of dance as flow of exchange that you are talking about here is private discussion amongst friends, when those strictures have been loosened. This is a different kind of art, freeing because it is something that takes place amongst equals, not something that requires hiding itself in acceptable garb to be received by "better" people. Public and private performance take on different meaning and form because the constraints are different.

I think you and Jarrar are speaking of private, egalitarian forms of conversation while the other dancers responding to this are talking about public performance. These are very different things. I would agree with you that the ideal and more humanizing form is that that takes place amongst friends and equals. Sadiqi truth. But there is a role for the more constrained public forms to slip a reminder of humanity to others, in the guise of entertainment. This is subversive in its own way, precisely because it is not amongst equals but is an attempt, with time, to bring the high down to the level of equals, speakers and listeners.

March 8, 2014 at 8:37 AM

Anonymous said...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNY7Opude4c

March 8, 2014 at 10:34 AM

rashabellydance said...

The origin of the 2-piece bellydance costume is kind of unclear, but it has been worn by professional dancers in Egypt for the best part of a century. And you might find these photos of Cairo dancer in around 1900 interesting - http://www.gildedserpent.com/cms/2013/06/10/nisaa-20thcentury-bellydance-crossroads/#axzz2vPm1BAIA. Their costumes aren't quite the modern two-piece, but nor are they a Fifi-style galabeyya by any means, and you can definitely see a relationship between their embellished cropped vests over sheer blouses, and the embellished bra tops that came a couple of decades later.

I think an important part of the context that is missing in this post and in Randa Jarrar's article is the difference between social dance and professional entertainment. Raqs has always existed as both, as far as I can tell, with normal people dancing at home in their normal clothes, and paid entertainers performing in public in special costumes which varied depending on the era.

The 2-piece costume is standard for *professional* Raqs Sharqi dancers in Egypt today except for during the folklore parts of their shows, but I'd guess (hope)that most Western dancers are aware that ordinary Arab women would never dress up like that when dancing socially. It's not meant to represent 'Arab women' as a whole, but professional performers of Raqs Sharqi. Of course it's not normal clothes, any more than a samba costume represents normal day-to-day Brazilian dress, or French people actually walk around Paris in tights and tutus. People watching a professional entertainer, on a basic level, generally don't want to see someone looking normal and everyday.

March 8, 2014 at 3:16 PM

Anonymous said...

Since the title of the original article was "Why I can't stand white belly dancers," I should point out that Fif Abdo is as white as you can get.

March 8, 2014 at 6:51 PM

Anonymous said...

Your analogy of Bach being performed in a Speedo is definitely amusing but it does not really coincide with the history of bellydance performance and its costuming. First of all Hollywood did not put dancers in the 'speedo' so to speak. During the time that professional raqs sharqi rose to prevalence, Egyptian music, dance and film was certainly taking a lot of inspiration from the West, but they took the things they wanted and incorporated them into their own expression. The two piece, sparkly costume was invented as the iconic costume for the perfomance of raqs sharqi by Arabs. As noted in the article that rashabellydance links above, it took at least as much inspiration from professional dance costumes that preceded it as it did from Hollywood. Yes... that's professional bellydance..which though related movement wise to social dance, has its own history. When I, or any other dancer, of any color, puts on a bellydance costume (even if its a cheesy costume) and makeup, they are not dressing as an Arab woman, they are dressing as a bellydancer...in the costume designed for performance of that dance.

March 9, 2014 at 2:02 PM

Leela said...

To tha anonymous poster who commented that bellydancers are dismissive of anything an Arab woman has to say: I and my colleagues aren't dismissing all Arab female opinion. We are dismissing Randa Jarrar's Salon article because it is factually incorrect, completely ignorant of the history of the professional dance, and written from a place of bitterness and rejection. She conflates the social dance with the professional dance, and between the lines, many of us heard a very different point being made: that very familiar Arab discomfort and prejudice against professional dance and its practitioners. There is much to unpack there, but at the moment I don't have the time. The short answer is that the professional dance in Egypt and elsewhere has always been performed by non-Arabs. It would be hard for Jarrar to find an Arab dancer to hire, or at least one she would approve of.

There are also glaring class issues in Egyptian dance, and massive racism against black people there. Again, more on that later.

I'll just conclude by saying that I don't dance "for Arab men". I don't sexualize my dance. I dance for families. Arab women have been some of my biggest fans and supporters. And teachers!

March 10, 2014 at 8:40 AM

Anonymous said...

“When in reality, all we want is for YoYo to wear a suit, just like when Bach is performed in Germany. Otherwise YoYo doesn't really understand Bach and what he means historically to the German culture. Because no matter what his skin color is, if he is in a speedo, he is not showcasing Bach.
Let me repeat that because it was missed in the article by Ms. Jarrar: If YoYo is in a speedo, he doesn't know Bach.”

I would not have a problem with your example except that it’s not a good comparison for what Jarrar said. She WOULD have a problem with a white belly dancer no matter what they wore. She clearly stated that white women should not belly dance ever, for any reason. She says/implies it more than once but the first time was this: “Find another form of self-expression. Make sure you’re not appropriating someone else’s.”

Also – regarding attire. All her named belly dancers that she approves of, including FiFi, have worn the costume you claim is offensive. FiFi has worn a variety of outfits when dancing – sometimes in the more traditional white covering, sometimes she wore the two piece sparkly jangly costumes. It depends on the environment and nature of the performance - key word being performance – Fifi and others PERFORM in public which is different than the more family/community oriented social dancing. You are talking about two different things. It only took a minite to find a plethora of photos and videos of them wearing a variety of costumes – Fifi included.

March 14, 2014 at 3:24 PM

Laila said...

Thank you for your support of the article as the barrage of rants against her are overwhelming.

I always had a negative visceral response when I saw belly dancers (Arab or not) in skimpy outfits and globs of glittery makeup and I never had the words to express where that discomfort came from. So, when I first read Jarrar's article I felt validated that not only am I not the only one who felt that way but she gave me the rationalization for the response. And it made sense to me, if it's about the dance and not the Orientalization of the dance then what is the need of all this over-sexualization.

Upon re-reading the article and I can see how saying white women shouldn't belly dance can rub people the wrong way. Nobody wants to be told they can't do something. And yes, she could have been more diplomatic with her words but I just want to give a few more examples of why I feel Randa has a valid point.

It's one thing to appropriate culture. We as Americans do it (and do it poorly) ALL the time; we have yoga studios on every street, we have Taco Bell, I think I make a great tamale. But, in general it is not acceptable to add racist components to our appropriation; what we don't do is wear Turbans to yoga, or ask all employees at Taco Bell to wear sombreros and take on a "Mexican" name. And I wouldn't open up a food truck and call it Rosita's Tamales and sell them wearing a poncho.

So, she is challenging this on the belly dancing front. Why can a person (and I do wish she left out the word white as it seems to be the focus of the responses) come out in a bad stereotype of another culture and have it be acceptable.

March 19, 2014 at 7:28 AM