18 Jan
2017
18 Jan
'17
7:59 p.m.
Hi Cara!
There is definitely a history! Many dancers don't like lead/follow as terms
because they either don't think contra has a lead/follow dynamic or they
don't want to encourage lead/follow dancing.
Some dance series, primarily ones with younger dancers, do use those terms,
but there are enough dancers opposed to them that I don't see them as a
potential community-wide replacement the way rubies/jets could be.
Jeff
On Jan 18, 2017 7:53 PM, "Cara Sawyer via Callers" <
callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
Hello all,
I am quite new to the list and am only now embarking on learning to call,
but I have to ask a question I have had for awhile as a dancer that I now
need to understand as a caller: is there something wrong with Lead and
Follow?
When I first encountered the creative alternatives in contra, I wasn't
sure what to think. I came to contra from a swing background and that is
what is used in workshops (and sort or in general now), since many people
switch in that dance style as well.
Besides being an obvious description for the dancer role, it had the same
1/2 syllables rhythm as Gent/Lady. And it seems to me to have the advantage
of being intuitively linked to how the dancer is thinking about
his/her/their role.
Just curious if there is a history, I'm sure I am not the first person to
think of this.
Thanks!
Cara
Sent to you using thumbs.
On Jan 18, 2017, at 10:40, Angela DeCarlis via Callers <
callers(a)lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:
When I called at PICD (the Portland ME dance), I really enjoyed using Jets
and Rubies. One silly thing I enjoyed any the terms during the beginners'
lesson was coaching palm direction based on the terms: "Jets' palms face
up, towards the sky; Rubies' palms face down, towards the ground."
And yes, I realize that *both* are gemstones and that some feel strongly
that we should steer away from the "airplane" association, but it did make
for easy teaching.
Jets and Rubies is also more forgiving for callers new to gender-neutral
language, since the terms are so linguistically comparable to Gents and
Ladies.
That all said, I also like Larks and Ravens fine.
Happy calling, everyone!
Angela
On Jan 18, 2017 11:30 AM, "Aahz via Callers" <callers(a)lists.sharedweightght.
net> wrote:
Not that Portland, the other Portland. ;-)
http://bangordailynews.com/2017/01/09/news/portland/contra-
dancing-takes-a-gender-neutral-spin-in-portland/
I personally would prefer to settle on "larks" and "ravens" because
that
seems to have more traction -- but it doesn't matter as long as we get
away from "bands" and "bares".
--
Hugs and backrubs -- I break Rule 6
http://rule6.info/
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