For me, it is just dance, movement. Because it has a language. It has an identity and integrity. Oriental dance is Eastern yoga. You have to think with the muscles inside your trunk.
Movement is generated by the deep muscles such as the iliad psoas .
All my teaching comes from the interior intercostal muscles and the psoas. This gets them in the sense of the Oriental column. Oriental dance is a column. American dancers execute big, sweeping movements that are not Oriental. The defining characteristics have to do with the music.