Agnes DeMille had the theory that African American dance was heavily
influenced by Irish folk dance. The Irish were another downtrodden
population in 19th-century America ("no Irish need apply"), and the
Mississippi River basin was filled with Irish dockworkers in steamboat
days. The Blacks saw the Irish doing their slips and reels and were
amazed by the footwork. The upper part of the body is held rigid in
this kind of dancing. Blacks wondered why and began experimenting. The
cakewalk and later tap dancing grew out of these experiments. At least
that was DeMille's theory.
I think the best we can say is that America (and by that I mean the
United States) was a melting pot in the best sense of these two words.
Peter Danner --
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