Dancing Bodies, Religion, and Gender in Egypt
摘要
This chapter provides a background to the developments in the field of singing and dancing in Egypt over the last century. On the one hand, there seems to be a loss of esteem for popular weddings, and on the other hand, there appears to be a growing influence of religion on the field of entertainment and nightclubs. This particularly impacted the dancing bodies of women, a highly sensitive religious issue. What makes the female body, religiously speaking, a problem? The interesting thing is that dance and weddings are so intricately linked that there developed an alternative scene of Islamic weddings. Is dancing in a religiously appropriate way possible? If yes, how does it look like? By means of the development of Islamic weddings and the way dance regained its place, the chapter will analyze how and where the female body should move in order to be considered respectful according to religious criteria.