Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Palestinian dance troupe performs in Detroit
By Faheem Khan
The South End (Wayne State U.)
06/29/2006

(U-WIRE) DETROIT — Al-Raja (meaning hope in Arabic) Folkloric Dance Troupe is an artistic dance group comprised of Muslim and Christian students of Lutheran School of Hope in Ramallah, in the West Bank. This school is administered by Evangelical and Lutheran Churches in Jordan and the Holy Land. Al-Raja was invited to perform in the United States by Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The troupe started its tour on June 13, and set out to perform in 27 various cities in the United States from coast to coast. On Tuesday, June 28, they performed in Dearborn at the Arab American National Museum. It was their 11th performance.

The dance performers are teenage students, most of them under age of 16. In view of their young ages, their virtuosity and spontaneity were impressive. Their dance and music continued for almost two hours.

Essentially, a dress show as it was, the performance took on various ideas. The dance gave the impression of men tilling the land and women sewing and cooking. They also preformed several traditional wedding songs. The most interesting of all, young guys were depicted wooing and courting to their potential sweethearts. Incidentally, this concept flew in the face of the stereotype that the Arabic society is puritanical and that there is no room for cultural expressions in it.

Though the dancers seemed confident, their performance never had the impression of abandon. They also seemed to have performed in communion with their audience.

After the performance, there was a reception in which audience members were encouraged to mingle with performers and get to know them personally. One of the dancers, Hania Halabi, is 16 years old and in the 11th grade.

"We want the United Stated to know us and understand us. We want Americans to know our stories. We have expressed our feelings through dance," Halabi said.

"We (Arabs) are not terrorists," said another performer, Sireen Shawa, also in the 11th grade. "We crave peace and affection like all children of the world."

"American media never gave us fair coverage. We are happy that we are able to reach the American audience by this dance performance."

Ann Helmke is the tour manager of this troupe and is a native of San Antonio, Texas, and she is also the Lutheran Minister of Evangelical Church of USA. She is accompanying the troupe during its entire tour of the United States.

"We are very heartened at the response of the American public, especially Arab Americans," Helmke said.

Helmke is pleased with the response the troupe has received from the mainstream media, which she views as unfair to Palestinians.

"The West is awash with drab stereotypes about Arabs," she said.

Faith (Wafa) Sufyan was in the audience watching the troupe. Sufyan, who is Yemeni and is a second-generation American, said she was very enthusiastic about the show. She previously worked for ACCESS (Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services) and said she heard about the show through the publicity campaign of the Lutheran Church of USA.

"I mostly watch CNN and Fox News where I get a very biased and one-sided view of Palestinian life. Now I am glad I got in touch firsthand with a cultural form of Palestinians," Sufyan said.

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