Middle Eastern Dance And The Internet
Even dancers without web sites can promote their classes on the Internet. Online directories such as mine at http://www.shira.net/directory.htm and the one at http://www.bhuz.com/ offer free listings to dancers worldwide.
Better Knowledge
Many belly dance teachers don't know much about dance history, Middle Eastern culture, or even the music used for dancing. They just know bunches of moves, where to get costumes, and how to use props. From 1981 to 1997, I was very frustrated because I took regular weekly classes from 8 different people plus attended a number of workshops, and just couldn't seem to find the answers to basic questions like what my favorite songs were about, what role belly dance played in Middle Eastern society, etc. All these teachers dismissed my questions as unimportant or unknowable.
When I ventured onto the Internet in 1997, I quickly found two wonderful web sites with great dance information: Stefan's Belly Dance Home Page, and Kimberly Cyr's Middle Eastern Dance Resource Guide. Both sites are still worth visiting, even though neither one is updated any more.
Another resource that I found to be tremendously helpful in expanding the depth of my knowledge about Middle Eastern dance was the "med-dance list". This is a listserver (a type of discussion forum technology that delivers the messages via e-mail). Even though many Yahoo clubs and other online discussion forums have popped up over the years, the "med-dance list" still has the largest membership and highest message activity of them all. To join, just send a plain text (do NOT used the "Styled" option in your mail software) e-mail message to majordomo@world.std.com whose only text says, "subscribe med-dance" (without the quotation marks, of course!) You'll get an automated reply asking you to confirm your subscription request. Follow the instructions in that e-mail, and then you'll start receiving about 30 e-mails a day.
Since then, of course, many additional interesting web sites have appeared on the scene with information about Middle Eastern dance. Today, there are hundreds of them. You'll find my favorites listed right here on Suite101 in the Links section for this Middle Eastern Dance topic.
In addition to the dance-oriented sites, there are many, many web sites put up by Middle Eastern people with information about Middle Eastern culture. My two favorites are Al Mashriq and The Egyptian Castle.
Community Building
The communications-oriented corners of the Internet such as the discussions here on Suite101, the med-dance list, and
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