Body language (dancing)

Dancing, the Art of Body Language [Learning Or Number] [Due Dancing is an expression just like language. It is probably more influential and expressive than words. Dancing is form of art and by definition it is an expression of soul. There are many different kinds of dances in the world that belong to various cultures and traditions. They all speak of different human emotions. Some express happiness and some depict romance. For instance, there is a dance originating from Jamaica called ‘ Dutty Wine’ in which the performer expresses very intense emotions with movements of the body. It involves rotating the neck like a bird while simultaneously moving wrists and posterior. Sometimes the performers also do the ‘ splits’ in it. It is a kind of sensual dance where the performer is usually a female displaying her skills through various dance moves. It is usually performed with a typical reggae-styled beat playing in the back ground. This depicts bolder female attitude and it represents the 21st century. All in all, it is not a typical delicate feminine dance (Evans, 2006). Here in this picture below the female performer is doing a very bold move by swinging her hair. It could probably represent female liberty. In this pose, she is shown sitting on the floor on all fours. History tells us that women have never been this wild in their dances. As it can be seen from the picture, the performer is shaking her hair while on the floor, this represents very bold body language. Such kinds of dance moves aren’t expected of females, that is why it comes as a shock to new watchers and immediately grabs their attention. The dance moves are rough, wild and flamboyant. It shows the opposite side of the female gender, opposite to the delicate and submissive side.

A performer doing ‘ Dutty Wine’ dance (image taken from www. google. com. au)
There are many dances which go a long way back in the history, for instance the belly dance is quite famous in the Middle East and has become a symbol of the Arab culture. It is also typical to the females and represents cultural values. It is not as bold as ‘ Dutty Wine’ but it expresses the attraction of a female body. Most famous dance steps require swift and vibrating hip motions and very delicate and synchronized movements of hands and wrists. The body language of this dance is very simple and elegant. Even though there are male belly dancers but it feels more natural when female dancers perform it, it is more natural to female muscle and bone structure. Here is a picture of a belly dancer expressing the elegance of a female body (belly-dance, 2011).
Image taken from www. bellydance. org

The picture above shows a belly dancer posing a crane like stance in which she is standing with a sensual posture, head held up high and with a relaxed smile. She is wearing small rattling shells on her breast which make nice clattering sounds when she sways and makes elegant and eye-catching dance moves. Such body language just states the beauty and fascination of a female body.
Asia has a very rich culture and so are its dances. One of the oldest Chinese dances known today is the Yangge dance (pronounced as pinyin). In this dance female performers wear very bright colors to celebrate the sun. The body movement of the performers is very smooth and steady representing winds and plantation. Yangge is also known as the rice sprout song (Wikipedia contributors, 2011). Here in this picture, the girls depict elegant spiritual moves honoring the sun. In their hands, they are holding green colored bandannas depicting leaves or greenery or crops, as it is the harvesting season. By the time the season of to perform this dance arrives, rice crop in China is ready. That is why the girls are expressing joy by holding green color. Other than that, they are wearing orange and red colored dresses glorifying the sun.
Image taken from www. chinese. cn

Traditional dances are not only limited to Asia, Native American Indians have a very rich and diverse dance culture. Most of their dances are associated with natural forces like rain and fire. Other dance forms depict victory or getting ready for war. These dances are both fun and spiritual (Bear, 2011). Many of their dances have names on animals just like Eagle dance, rabbit dance. Here in the picture below the performer is doing the Eagle-dance with eagle feathers attached to her clothes.
Image taken from www. publicdomainpictures. net

Bibliography
Bear, B. (n. d.). Native American dance . Retrieved from http://www. ani-kutani. com/nativeamericanfacts/native_american_dance. html
Evans, T. (2006, June 14). Who created the Dutty Wine?. Retrieved from http://jamaica-star. com/thestar/20060614/ent/ent1. html
The International Academy of Middle Eastern Dance. (n. d.). Retrieved from http://www. bellydance. org/
Wikipedia contributors. (2011, November 15). Yangge. Retrieved from http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Yangge