Anyone know where this move is from?

[nancylebov]

The idea is to keep your palm level through the whole move. Starting with your hand at waist level, move your hand forward, then up and to the outside, around towards your head (at this point, your elbow is bent and pointing upwards), then down towards the outside, around towards the back, and then bring it to its original position at your waist.

Decades ago, I was introduced to it in a Scientific American article, which used it as a demonstration that it can be necessary to make two loops to make a full cycle. I think the article was actually about something subatomic, and I think it's reasonably likely that someone reading this will remember what the article was actually about. Anyway, the article said it was a folkdance move. Does anyone know which tradition it's from?

IIRC, it's done with a bowl of water in your hand. And I'm not sure if I'm making this up, but I think that if you're really good, you can use a lit oil lamp.

wolfdancer has mentioned the move as a good way of improving flexibility, and I think she said it shows up in belly dancing.

I was just introduced to a more ambitious way of using it--lean as far as possible in the direction your hand is going. This is enough of a weird stretch that a little warm up comes with it. Start by doing a little standing meditation, then stand on each foot. IIRC, 30 seconds is enough, but 60 or 75 seconds is a reasonable ambition. Anyway, do the move three times forward and backward on each side for this and each of the following versions. Then have your forarms parallel for the moves. (I'm pretty sure you can't do the move accurately with both arms that way.) Then do a mirror image version--you can't lean to both sides simultaneously, so you just lean backswards and forwards.

Here's a fourth variant I came up with. Do the move starting forwards with one hand and backwards with the other. I found that it's not difficult, but I bet it looks cool.

Comments

[sterlingspider.livejournal.com]

I'm here after accidentally going to someone else's flist instead of my own so um, hi.

Anyway, it's often referred to as part of a group of dance styles in middle eastern dancing known as candle dancing. I can't find any references to it being a traditional dance and from my research as a fire dancer (albeit with different props) and an SCA member I can say that fire was traditionally really not commonly used as a dance (or theatrical) prop. The dangers and realities of fire are far more ingrained in traditional societies then they are in modern societies, and fire as prop (as opposed to tool) was a pretty rare thing (not nonexistant, but far rarer then we would think).

I know that people train to do this gracefully by placing a saucer or shallow cup of water on their hand and I suspect that if there is a traditional version of this it's far more likely to be based on this water style and not fire, but again I can't find a reference.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Thanks for replying.

Your point about dancing with fire reminds me of when I did Scottish country dancing for a while. The group I was with didn't put their heels on the floor when they danced. One of the teachers didn't warm up adequately, and got a (calf?) injury which took a quite a while to heal. I bet real folk wouldn't risk that sort of injury while dancing.

[darius.livejournal.com]

I thought I remembered Feynman giving the provenance, but all he said was "I'll show you something you can find dancing girls doing!" (From Elementary Particles and the Laws of Physics.) I guess your article must have been about the Pauli exclusion principle and why it holds for spin-1/2 particles like electrons.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Dunno where it's from, but it's something we learned in my dance classes when I was eight. . .

Thai

[sgsguru.livejournal.com]

I have no idea why I remember the SA article; it had pictures of Thai temple dancers doing this.