
Elements of Dance Etiquette (2005) - Tomte
http://www.utdallas.edu/~aria/dance/etiquette.html
======
SamWhited
I dance most nights of the week, and one thing that I wish this mentioned
(that a lot of dances will tell you in advance now) is "don't wear scented
deodorants or perfumes". When you get an entire room full of people with
different colognes and perfumes, it makes a lot of people gag. Scentless
deodorant or antiperspirant is fine, but beyond that avoid the sprays and
lotions.

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AdrianB1
Tango has a very different etiquette, especially the Argentinian tango danced
in saloons in South America and Europe. The invitation, accept and decline is
very different being completely non-verbal and it is as easy to accept as to
decline; it makes it easy to decline without causing tensions. It took a while
to learn to do it well, but it is well worth.

I know that US has different, non-traditional and relaxed rules, but in no way
better.

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viraptor
> A cute trend, especially in Lindy Hop circles, is to wear vintage outfits
> from the 1930's and 40's.

Some scenes in the US apparently went too far with that. When too many new
people started coming in in their best vintage outfits, there were a few
(current teachers) who made a point of going to competitions as casual as
possible.

> In the past it has been the tradition that men asked women to dance. But
> this custom has gradually changed. Today, women should feel equally
> comfortable asking a partner for a dance, even in a formal setting.

Also fortunately these days many scenes are closer to "smash the patriarchy"
idea and people are happy to dance with whoever. There's no role assignment,
which also helps when there's no balance in genders in the room.

~~~
lambdaphagy
It's not as clear to me that this development is fortunate. The customs of
social dance have evolved over centuries, and I'm leery of doing away with
things simply because we no longer understand them.

I learned to contra dance in a groovy, gender-free group, and I found it
frustrating for several reasons.

Contra dance is designed for bodies that fit together, statistically, as men's
and women's bodies do, and it was far more often the case that a figure
designed for a man and a woman would become physically awkward when attempted
with two men.

Many of the figures involved four or eight partners, and it's honestly
confusing for beginners when you lack a visual reference point for whom you're
supposed to dance with next.

Dance is a pretty mystical thing, and I don't find the question "why should
the sex of your dance partner matter?" to be that compelling. It matters
because I want to dance with women who want to dance with men. I don't
begrudge anyone for setting whatever ground rules suit them, but I wish the
STRICTLY GENDERFUL, PROBLEMATIC AND PATRIARCHAL dance groups would advertise
themselves a little more loudly.

~~~
viraptor
I'm not familiar with contra, so can't comment on the fitting part. Where I
danced in social scenes, if you need a man's/woman's body specifically,
(whatever that means...) that would mean you're either doing it wrong or in a
really inappropriate way.

> The customs of social dance have evolved over centuries

The fun part is that in many cases they had to evolve first to gendered
dancing, and now we're coming back. Which is what people are often not aware
of and think it's somehow weird.

> It matters because I want to dance with women who want to dance with men.

And nobody can force you to do otherwise. I think it's a fortunate development
that you can do that, or you can dance with everybody. You get more
possibilities, not fewer. (And because it reduces the number of people without
partners)

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faitswulff
I was curious if this was some generalized guideline, but it is in fact only
for social dancing. Hip hop has extremely different modes of engagement, for
example.

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csytan
I'm curious. Could you elaborate?

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Silhouette
Every dance style has its own culture, though of course many people enjoy
dancing more than one style and there is a lot of common ground.

The advice given here would be appropriate for many partner-dancing social
styles, such as tango, salsa, ballroom or lindy hop.

Many street dance styles are also social but with a very different dynamic.
For example, in some styles you tend to gather around in a circle and everyone
is doing simple moves to mark time, then one person or maybe a small group
goes into the middle to do something more impressive, then they step out and
let someone else take a turn.

Stage dance styles are more about performance than social dancing, so again
you have a different kind of etiquette. You might still be dancing with others
but usually in predetermined movements rather than improvising, and in this
environment you're also working with people like choreographers and the
production team for the show.

~~~
viraptor
> For example, in some styles you tend to gather around in a circle and
> everyone is doing simple moves to mark time, then one person or maybe a
> small group goes into the middle to do something more impressive, then they
> step out and let someone else take a turn.

That's also popular in swing/blues scenes. I guess they're all rooted in the
same environment in the end so that makes sense.

~~~
faitswulff
I'd venture to guess that the specific culture of call-outs and battles in hip
hop are different, however.

~~~
viraptor
Yup, similar but not the same :-) Have a look at
[https://youtu.be/zpeUnWrteQM](https://youtu.be/zpeUnWrteQM) for solo jazz -
the elements are definitely shared.

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difosfor
Man I'm happy Cuban Salsa is not about all of these rules; just be nice, move
freely and have fun together! A nice update might also be to just talk about
leaders and followers instead of ladies and gentlemen.

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chris_st
If you're interested at all in Swing (or like fun and interesting
documentaries), the movie "Alive and Kicking" is a lot of fun. Looking forward
to learning some day.

~~~
mjcohen
Thanks. Looks like fun. Ordered it.

