Greg McKenzie wrote: > > At regular public contra dances I don't switch genders. If I see a > swapped couple approaching I will often begin calling (if the caller > has stopped calling) to help my partner, and others, avoid > confusion. >
It really depends on where you're dancing. If you did this at the scout house, some nights you might find yourself calling the whole night! Some dance communities rarely have people switch genders, in others it's quite common. Some predictors of how likely a dance community is to have gender switching be common: - the dance is in or near a big city - there are a lot of younger dancers - there are several weekly dances in the area - most dancers have been to more than 10 dances So if I went to a dance in rural PA, I would see a couple coming towards me with switched genders as a sign that they were confused and switched by mistake or at least that they were likely to be confusing the other dancers. In boston it wouldn't signal anything. I will occasionally dance with genders switched in a place where this is uncommon. When I do this, I realize that I have to be dancing especially carefully, as if I do not correctly dance the lady's part it will really confuse people. It would not be a good place to experiment with gender swapping if I hadn't done much of it before. Jeff
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