Opinions vary widely throughout the world on how old a girl should be before taking up bellydance. In light of the huge story of the seven year old "Samba Queen" this year on CNN I thought I would offer my thoughts as the mother of an up and coming bellydance star. As always, these thoughts are only my opinions and I don't claim my opinions to be right for everyone.
Bellydance class in my experience is an excellent device for helping preteen and teen girls cultivate a healthy body image. At a time when girls are first developing curves it can help them learn to accept and like their bodies as they are. Many of the movements look as nice on a softer body as they do on a more muscular body and as a result the classroom environment is more accepting of different physiques. This type of atmosphere helps young girls to overcome the stereotypes of what beauty is and they begin to see real tangible beauty in themselves and the women around them. A good bellydance class taught by the right teacher can also help women and girls of all ages maintain a healthy body weight by burning calories not to mention helping them develop and maintain coordination, grace, muscle strength and flexibility.
At the youngest ages (say 3-7) girls are really just learning about dance class etiquette, spatial relationships and the basics of what their body can do. Before enrolling I would consider a little ones attention span and her interest level. There aren’t a lot of bellydance classes designed for very young girls so between the ages of 3 and 7 it might be a better idea to start her in ballet and let her revisit bellydance at a later age. That way when she does come back she’ll have some understanding of posture, frame and footwork. This is what I did with my daughter, Babette. She took ballet on her own and whenever I was lucky enough that she wanted to come with me to bellydance class I brought her as a drop in. Looking back I am so grateful to have had the gift of spending time in dance class with Babette. Dance is the cement in our relationship. It gives us something to talk about, laugh about and dream about together. Mostly it allows us to be together without focusing on the frustrations that go along with being a mother or a daughter and this is especially helpful now that she is 13. I would highly recommend the experience of taking your daughter to bellydance class with you if the circumstances allow.
Performing is a another thing. Besides Babette, I have had the pleasure of a couple of other young girls in my class who became graceful, beautiful dancers at a young age and wanted to perform. I don’t think bellydance movements are sexual any more than Latin ballroom, jazz and hip hop. However, because there are a lot of ignorant people out there who are uneducated about dance and performing arts in general I am very picky about the circumstances of my younger dancers performing. My opinion is young girls should only perform in theatrical shows where they are more removed from the audience and haflas and student shows where the audience is very supportive. I just don't like the idea of my girls circulating an audience where tipping might be done. I also don't particularly care for a "bra" on really young girls (to me it just looks a little strange) and in general I feel costumes should be a little more covered up. For all of these reasons I tend to enjoy them in the tribal style and folkloric dances but if your little dancer just happens to love Arabic music and sparkles like mine did cabaret can be done. Babette had one costume she wore a leotard underneath and another one that she wore her jazz pants under her skirt. Girls should only perform if and when they want to and parents or some other guardian should be there for all performances. As long as these types of protective measures are taken there is no reason why some younger girls can’t perform bellydance. It’s not for everyone but what a pleasure it is for us big girl dancers to watch them grow! And for anyone who disagrees they probably only know of the stereotypical sleazy bellydancer in some half lit tavern and have never seen an artistic bellydance show. Anyone who would have a problem with that probably dosen't allow themselves to dance at all.
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