Sephardic? Music was: kosher belly dance

[Yoram Gelman <gelman...>]

On Sat, 7 Dec 2002, Judith R Cohen wrote:

> -snip-   I've studied it <dance> under whatever name 
> -snip 
> (in fact, working with these
> traditions was one of the reasons I decided to focus on Sephardic
> music).

In light of Judith's disagreement, claiming that there is not something
that should be specifically called Sephardic dance, would it not be
consistent to claim the same thing about Sephardic music, namely that
there is nothing that is specifically Sephardic music?  But she in
fact uses the term Sephardic music -- and should not take issue with
Sephardic dance.

When we describe something using a generalization, we help to identify it
even though it contains smaller parts.  Seems to me that "Sephardic" dance
and "Sephardic" music both tell us something that distinguishes them from
other categories -- even though there is some overlap.

Hope we lighten up (after all, we just celebrated Chanukah),
Yoram

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