salt lake city — Odd that the Utah Federation of Republican Women would hire Kismet, a belly dance troupe, as entertainment for their luncheon. Yet, hire us they did. Sequinned, tassled, and howling a loud, wavering zaghareet, we take the floor before a room full of helmet-haired Mormon matrons in pantsuits. We’ve caught them, the most conservative women in the reddest state of the union, over their first forkfuls of poached salmon.
Some watch with open hostility as we dance the dance of the enemy. Others look away. Yasamina, our director, smiles menacingly at them, shimmying in a hot pink bra and matching harem pants. She has performed at everything from Masonic initiations to Mormon bachelor parties to Podunk festivals in the desert. But in thirty years of dancing here, this is the frostiest crowd she’s faced.
Using a thick, fake Arabic accent, Yasamina (née Barbara Ann Hoagland) bids them to join her for an impromptu lesson. I cringe. But if three decades of teaching shy local women how to emulate cobras has taught the Utah-born woman anything, it’s how to proselytize. The women rise in fear and trembling.
Barking exotic-sounding nonsense at her drummer, Yasamina demonstrates an undulation, a difficult move even for a practised dancer. A few women follow stiffly along; most remain frozen.
“All right,” she sighs, nearly losing her accent, “Who ees ay sexy Rrepooblicahn?” The women exchange sideways glances, then mumble in unison: “Mitt Romney.”
“Okay,” says Yasamina, triumphant. “Vee do eet forr Meat. Meat Rrromney.”
What is belly dancing doing in Utah, where the Mormon church bars “moves that are suggestive of sexual behaviour,” where many people don “armour of God,” an undergarment they are not allowed to take off, where I am one of the few Arabs anyone has ever seen? Though its origins in the state are unclear, its appeal is strong. For a Latter-day Saint, belly dancing can be a form of rebellion. For non-lds women, it’s a way to make friends in a place where community outside of the church can be difficult to find. Just as prophet Joseph Smith wove together scraps of folklore, history, and doctrine to make a uniquely American religion, so locals have redefined the Middle Eastern art form to express the cultural, religious, and sexual tensions that pervade life here. And given that Utah’s Mormon culture has invited parallels with the Muslim world, it isn’t so strange that its equally thriving counterculture might look to the Middle East for inspiration.
Nevertheless, the Mormon community distrusts outsiders, particularly those with Middle Eastern last names, so when I moved to Salt Lake City from Toronto six years ago, I didn’t know how long I’d last. In dire straits, I surprised myself by looking to a dead ringer for Jeannie to put me in touch with roots I’d never imagined I’d miss. What shocked me further: she was by no means the only option. There are now fifty-odd belly dance troupes in and around slc — even the church-owned Brigham Young University has one, called Modest Moves — and the city hosts one of the largest belly dance festivals in North America. It wasn’t exactly Babylon, but it was strange enough to keep me interested.
My fellow dancers and I stand poised between the tables, ready to assist with a move most of us learned not so long ago in an incense-choked studio plastered with homemade model pharaohs. All that separates us from our students are makeshift costumes stitched together from Victoria’s Secret bras and Wal-Mart beads and stage names like Shamsa and Mischa, just chosen. Beneath that shoddy cloak of Orientalism, we are all phonies, some of us lds, some even Republican.
Despite these bonds, I can’t believe that the lunching Utah Federation of Republican Women are going to shake it. But whether impelled by curiosity, rebellion, Yasamina’s powers, or merely love for their potential Mormon president, a roomful of Saints begin to undulate before my kohl-lined eyes. Mitt would be proud.
Friday, July 4, 2008
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Comments (3 comments)
Douglas Cootey: What a distasteful article. It was full of straw man arguments and unsubstantiated accusations. The author's hostility towards Mormons is evident in every paragraph. She presented such an incredibly biased viewpoint. Isn't it possible the good women of the Utah Federation of Republican Women (an organization and party I am not affiliated with) were horrified not by belly dancing, but by garish fellow women mocking them with unveiled contempt and a horrible, cheesy accent?
What are we to take away from this article? That Mormons are prudish lock-stepped simpletons who need cynical belly dancers to help them see the light? Is it so shocking to learn that elderly matrons have a hard time undulating in public when wearing pantsuits? In the end, this article seems to convey the message that the author's culture is superior to the culture of her new home. It bears all the smugness and insolence of a person who suffers from an inferiority comlex. From personal experience, I can affirm that this is a poor attitude to have when moving into a new part of the country and is not inducive towards making new friends.
All your readers will learn from this article is that there is a snarky underside to Utah that holds the predominant religion in contempt. They don't understand Mormons any better now. They don't understand Utahns. This article says more about the author's poor attitude than Utah culture, which is wide and diverse and not only populated with Mormons. This is a state that supports a Japanese Obon festival at several Buddhist temples every summer, an India Festival at the Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple in staunchly Mormon Utah Valley every fall, a Shakespeare festival down south in St. George every spring, and a Bluegrass festival in Snowbird during the off season, to name just a few. The author's depiction of Utah is myopic and twisted at best.
As with all culture clashes across the world, painting one's enemies with a broad brush does nothing to break down barriers or built up understanding, no matter how much undulating or ululating they do. It simply exposes the painter as a bitter and close-minded person. November 19, 2007 03:18 EST
Joe Monson: It's really sad, Ms. Awad, that you find the need to bash the culture and beliefs of those in the place you now call home (or at least did, according to the article). Sure, members of the LDS Church tend to be more conservative than many others, and sure, there are some who find it difficult to accept things which are strange to them.
But take a look in the mirror, Ms. Awad. You are doing the very thing of which you are accusing the women at the meeting at which you danced, and perhaps even more by openly deriding the beliefs of others.
One of the main tenets of the LDS church is that "we claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may." (http://www.lds.org/library/display/0,4945,106-1-2-1,FF.htm)
Even if you don't agree with the beliefs of others, please don't publicly (or even privately) deride them and call them ridiculous (whether directly or in so many words). There are certainly more productive things you can do with your time other than make fun of others whose beliefs you apparently don't even understand. December 03, 2007 20:50 EST
Alexa Eaton: While Ms. Awar seems to have gained some really scathing comments about this article, as a college student who's lived in Utah for almost all of her life I don't think her depiction is a horrific one. The LDS church prides itself in a concept of modesty, unity, cleanliness, and following religious rules that they hold in high esteem. This is considered by many outsiders to be a one-way ticket to a heavily restricted, boring, judgemental, and hive-minded existance.
Utah Mormons are infamous for being shocked by "foreign cultures", and are widely considered one of the most judgemental groups to perform for. I have been working to try and bring performances and workshops to the Utah college I attend. And, to be flatly honest, LDS students don't show up to anything. We have LDS Institute on campus, and the only cultural enrichment program fliers that were left up were for our Scottish highland festival. African drumming, salsa dancing, Navajo rug-weaving, Mexican paper flowers, and an invitation to the International student banquets (many of which are young International Mormons trying to get money to stay in their zion) are torn down seemingly by everyone in that building. We also had a group of girls who went to the college tell us that the picture of a woman bellydancing (we had chosen a "modest" picture of the guest lecturer, whih displayed no cleavage and about two inches of abdomen), was "offensive" and it inhibited their rights to not be "forced to look at naked women".
We marched up to the provost, who told them they had no case and that it was educational, but later they were seen removing the fliers anyway.
Not one of those girls was non-LDS, and two had served international missions.
All I can say is picturing their mothers watching a cheesy belly-dance troupe is incredibly funny. There ARE very open-minded, intelligent LDS practitioners, but towing the party line is literally what these women must do to be appointed to places of power.
All LDS people? No. Wealthy ladies in good standing with the church who have a very cautiously buttoned-up appearance for a PR war about their religion? Well, I dare say I don't think they were upset about the shimmies being sloppy. June 30, 2008 19:37 EST