A Not-So-Happy contribution

This video was sold in the streets of Dakar, causing the people involved to be taken to court for 'corrupt morals'.... The dance style is not new- its traditional... and from my experience its practiced widely... Yet for some reason this time it 'hurt' Senegalese Muslim society. In the past month, numerous articles have been written about it, focusing on Ndeye Gueye in particular; a dancer with a succesfull career who has performed with Youssou NDour and often tours around the world with different artists.

The dance in this video is called Lemble and thought to belong to one of the traditional ethnicities and castes of Senegal, the Laobe. A form tracable to traditional caste practices, it has been redefined and practiced in Urban Dakar. It is mostly danced amongst women in closed places (houses, closed courtyards, etc.). Thats because the dance is considered sexual and women dont want men watching them. The only men allowed are the drummers. (A few anthropologists argue that the drummers have ambiguous sexuality in Senegalese society and thats why their presence is allowed.) The dance style suggests sexual abilities and is a way to seduce men. Women say they do it to please their husbands, which for Senegalese women is the most important responsibility of marriage. I wont get into why women like dancing these amongst themselves as i'm more interested in the contemporary, more 'public' performance.

Lembel seems to have broken through to the 'public' sphere and be performed in front of men (other than the women's husbands or boyfriends). It can often be found in night clubs and seen in music videos on TV... In clubs its either performed when there is a competition set up for the best dancer or when there are White Europeans present. In both cases the goal is to make money. With an average Senegalese salary of 40 Euros per month, its not easy to ignore prizes like that. As can be seen in this video, the judging comittee is handing out the envelopes at the end- they are white men in their fifties and probably the owners of the club.

This time Lembel touched a vain and caused the 95% Muslim population of Senegal to react calling the dancers (who are Mulism themselves), prostitutes. Why this time? Maybe because they were offered money from white men? Maybe because it was caught on camera...? Maybe the dance moves were indeed more provocative than usual? (not according to my experience)...

Confused morals? or was morality negotiated between tradition, money and aesthetics? On what grounds did those dancing, and those judging, act?

According to Islam, dance and showing off sexuality and one's body are bad.

According to Senegalese tradition, women should be desirable to their husbands. Lembel makes them desirable.

According to Senegalese current reality, dancing Lembel leeds to money... White men like it...

According to a Western view, Lembel is degrading to women...

How can one decide what view is more acceptable than the others, and who can blame who for what?

All I can say is that Ndeye Gueye as a person is a very sweet woman and a wonderful dancer and i am very sorry she had to pay the price of this 'globalised' confusion...

alot of info from

leboytown.blogspot.com


http://www.infosen.net/spip.php?article96