Street Dancing

Street Dance

Street dance refers to dance styles—regardless of country of origin—that evolved outside of dance studios in any available open space such as streets, parks, school yards, car parks, and nightclubs. They are often improvisational encouraging interaction and contact with spectators and other dancers. These dances are a part of the culture of the geographical area that they come from. Two examples of street dance include breakdancing and the Melbourne Shuffle which originated in Melbourne, Australia.

The hip-hop dance style b-boying and the funkstyles popping and locking are some of the most popular street dance styles. Those forms of hip-hop dance are the most prominently practiced street dances. These street dance styles are so common that commercialized versions have been professionally developed and choreographed for dance routines in pop, hip-hop, electronic, and R&B music videos. B-boying helped bring about street dance crew culture, whereby the dance crews would learn various street dance styles for impression and competition. These street crews usually perform in outdoor jams, leading to further styles of hip-hop dance.

Another example of a street dance is house dance, which is prominently danced to house music. House dance evolved out of Chicago clubs but grew and developed in the clubs of New York. Due to the modern mainstream popularity of clubs, street and fad dances tend to evolve more often in nightclubs rather than outdoor spaces. However, they may be practiced in outdoor spaces.

From out of the electronic dance community, street dances like Electro Dancing and Jumpstyle have emerged. Unlike many hip-hop dances, house and rave dances are usually heralded more 'fun' than 'competitive'. Generally dances like the Melbourne Shuffle are not applied as a dance for battling, rather for dancing in the crowd at a rave party. This distinguishes rave dance from partner and competitive street dance forms. However, many people do perform rave dances as an expressively competitive dance.

Punk dance, also known as the thrash dance, or simply thrashing, is a form of street dance that is performed impromptu in large crowds. While the punk dance is considered a fad dance, its origins also make it a street dance. The dance originated amongst the punk rock community and was made popular by the band, 'Sex Pistols'. The dance styles are most popular amongst hardcore styled music concerts or raves, as well as busy nightclubs. The most modern form of punk dance is hardcore dancing.

Adaptations to these street dances are today practiced at both dance studios and other spaces, i.e. studio hip-hop dance is the commercial version of hip-hop dance. Dance studios often dub the commercial adaptations as street dance, regardless to the fact they aren't 'absolutely' by true definition. Some schools use street dance as a form of physical education. Another example is the Cha Cha Slide, and Cupid Shuffle, which are street dance influenced line dances.

"We dance for laughter, we dance for tears, we dance for madness, we dance for fears, we dance for hopes, we dance for screams, we are the dancers, we create the dreams."

Angela Monet

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