Ballroom Dance Lessons - The History of ballroom Dancing
03/20/2010 - By Credit to Ballroom.org Ballroom Dance Lessons
Social Dancing, which is simply group dancing for pleasure or recreation, has probably existed in some form since the beginning ofhuman society. Most group dances were originally ceremonial rites grouped around three basic aspects of human existence:
Social Dancing, which is simply group dancing for pleasure or
recreation, has probably existed in some form since the beginning of
human society. Most group dances were originally ceremonial rites
grouped around three basic aspects of human existence: food supply,
sexual impulse, and relationships with the spirit world. For primitive
people, dancing was a formal expression of religion or superstition.
When dance abandoned its primitive, pantomimic forms, when it ceased to
be specifically about crops, war, wooing, initiation, or religion, it
became pure social interaction, with no aim or purpose but the
participants' employment.
As the conditions of human existence change, so do social dances.
Although they serve no concrete purpose, propitiate no gods, and
celebrate no military victories, they are related to the fundamental
concerns of modern life just as intimately as their ritualistic ancestors
were to primitive life. Unlike art, social dance is not consciously
formed, but its development is far from random of accidental. Unfailing,
the dances of an epoch faithfully reflect the spirit and structure of
that of technology, and its social customs and predominant ideologies.
Establishing historical cause and effect is often difficult;
similarly, social dance has not only mirrored cultural patterns, thereby
to some extent maintaining them, but it has also on occasion altered them
radically, revolutionizing the prevailing trends of thought and manners
rather than reinforcing them.
Various changes in social dance through the ages clearly
demonstrate its interdependency with the world around it. During the
14th century, for example, when social dance and folk dance were
virtually indistinguishable, popular ring dances moved inside English
upper-class homes as part of the evening entertainment. As long as the
hearth occupied the center of the room, the dances retained their
circular, and egalitarian, form. With the introduction of the chimney
about 1368, however, the hearth could be moved to a side wall, which
cleared the floor of obstacles and allowed processional dances--then
favored in the royal courts where rank determined the order of
procession--to replace the ring formations.
Throughout the Renaissance and the 16th century, social dance
became more firmly ensconced in the courts, whose members systematically
dressed up and formalized the lusty folk dances to suit their elaborate
codes of manners and attire. Styles emanated particularly for France,
where the royal court dictated etiquette and moral behavior for all
European gentry. The 17th century Minuet was nothing but manners, the
final flourish of aristocratic elegance before national and then
industrial revolutions returned social to the masses.
When fine demarcations of rank and title vanished, square
formations like the Cotillion and Quadrille, with partners constantly
changing, filled the ballrooms. The Waltz--whose dizzying speed was
derived as much from the newer, more polished surface of dance floors and
the abandonment of hobnailed shoes as it was from the public's
enthusiasm--also became popular. The embracing, closed hold of the Waltz
successfully defied the polite convention of the period.
Advancing technology and two world wars so continually
restructured life in the 20th century that social dance has been changing
almost constantly, quickly altering with the values and practices
surrounding it. The syncopated rhythms of American Ragtime music
inspired the Foxtrot and Shimmy. After the 19th Amendment gave women the
vote in 1920, they became "emancipated": the flapper was born, as well
as the Charleston. The Jitterbug burst from the Swing improvisations of
the 1930's and 40's. Long playing phonograph records appeared in 1949;
thus, in the 1950's, the teenagers born during the postwar "baby boom"
could launch the Rock 'n' Roll phenomenon in both music and dance. By
then, the once-shocking Waltz position and the sexual attitudes it
represented were passe. Because everyone performed the steps
individually, men no longer always "led" women, and couples were not
essential. The emergence of Disco dance styles in the 1970's and later
popular dance forms continued this trend, although some of the more
formal dances required a partner.
In a world that prides itself on the speed of its
transformations, new forms are inevitable. Social dance no doubt will
continue to evolve as society does.
