“…In the past, dance in the Middle East has, to a certain extent, been misinterpreted by dance scholars and has often been the subject of distorted, romanticized, and eroticized perceptions. Such misinterpretations have contributed to the stigmatization of Middle Eastern societies being, to some extent, antagonistic toward dance (Shay and Sellers-Young 2003;Shay 2008). However, a growing number of studies are revealing diversity in dance practices and performances in a range of communities and dance genres in various contexts across the region (Shay 1994(Shay , 1999(Shay , 2008Van Nieuwkerk 1995;Kaschl 2003;Rowe 2007Rowe , 2008Karayanni 2009).…”