Thank you Alan for this information. It is a great thing to have a
dance scholar on this list. I am not one and I thank you for keeping us real.
I would be interested in your recommendation of a source for
information about community dancing in the early west. Perhaps there
are others here who would also appreciate a good reference.
The "arm band" idea troubles me a bit. If the mining camps were only
doing couple dances, why would they need arm bands?
Cheers,
- Greg
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At 10:52 AM 12/5/2010, Alan Winston - SSRL Central Computing wrote:
Greg wrote:
I was hired to call a dance and noticed, when I arrived, that there
were only two other men in the room besides myself. When I commented
on this I was informed that the group who hired me was a local
lesbian club. They specifically asked that I not make any
accommodations, even though many of them were new to contras. I
believe that they made a point of NOT informing me of their makeup
specifically so that I would not try to dance around the gender
specific terms.
It worked out very well. All had a great time, and this in spite of
the fact that there were also two deaf dancers in the room as well.
Attitude is a key factor. I understand a lot of dances were called
here in California at mining towns during the gold rush. The men
danced with each other and half of them played the part of ladies. I
don't think they ever asked for "gender neutral" terms. A few shots
of whisky probably helped as well.
All the references I've read to the all-male dances at the mining camps:
- don't mention contra dancing
- do mention wearing armbands to distinguish roles
- call out waltzes and polkas
so given that it seems to have been all-couple dancing and no called dancing,
there wasn't a lot of need for terminology.
(Incidentally, the gender-free couple dance is the only place where I feel
fully comfortable calling the roles "lead" and "follow" because that's what
they are.)
-- Alan
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Alan Winston --- [email protected]
Disclaimer: I speak only for myself, not SLAC or SSRL Phone: 650/926-3056
Paper mail to: SSRL -- SLAC BIN 99, 2575 Sand Hill Rd, Menlo Park CA 94025
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