Middle Eastern Dance and What We Call It AINSLEY HAWTHORN This article traces the historical background of the term ‘belly dance’, the English-language name for a complex of solo, improvised dance styles of Middle Eastern and North African origin whose movements are based on articulations of the torso. The expression danse du ventre – literally, ‘dance of the belly’ – was initially popularised in France as an alternate title for Orientalist artist Jean-Léon Gérôme’s 1863 painting of an Egyptian dancer and ultimately became the standard designation for solo, and especially women’s, dances from the Middle East and North Africa. The translation ‘belly dance’ was introduced into English in 1889 in international media coverage of the Rue du Caire exhibit at the Parisian Exposition Universelle. A close examination of the historical sources demonstrates that the evolution of this terminology was influenced by contemporary art, commercial considerations, and popular stereotypes about Eastern societies. The paper concludes with an examination of dancers’ attitudes to the various English-language names for the dance in the present day. Keywords: Middle Eastern and North African dance, belly dance, danse du ventre, nineteenth century, history, etymology, lexicology, nomenclature According to the Oxford English Dictionary, often considered the final authority on English usage, ‘belly dance’ refers to ‘an erotic oriental dance performed by women, involving abdominal contortions’. 1 The phrase in itself sounds suggestive and perhaps a bit silly, since it incorporates an informal, almost slangy, word for the abdomen that is otherwise most familiar from jocular expressions like ‘belly flop’, ‘belly laugh’, and ‘beer belly’. English-speaking practitioners of the dance form generally credit the term to Solomon Bloom, a promoter at the Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, who reportedly coined the expression based on the French danse du ventre, literally ‘dance of the belly’, to draw thrill-seekers to his Algerian Village and the other concessions of the exposition’s midway. This paper outlines the introduction of the phrase danse du ventre to the French language, its relationship to English ‘belly dance’, and Dance Research 37.1 (2019): 1–17 Edinburgh University Press DOI: 10.3366/drs.2019.0250 © Society for Dance Research www.euppublishing.com/drs