[Callers] Gender Free MWSD

[Aahz]

On Wed, Oct 04, 2017, Jeremy Child via Callers wrote:
> 
> I have a question for anyone who calls or dances Gender Free MWSD (by
> Gender Free I mean where no assumptions are made about what role a dancer
> will take based on their gender).

For pedantic reasons, I'll note that MWSD doesn't use the term "gender
free", it's called "gay square dancing".

> MWSD is unique amongst folk dancing in that dancers need to know the role
> being danced by others in the square (if I'm a "boy" and the call is "boys
> trade", I need to know who the other boy in my line / wave is in order to
> do the call).

Callers also need to track gender because there are some gendered calls.
They're not necessarily what you might think.  For example, if you're
calling Mainstream, Right & Left Thru is a gendered call.

> So to my question: How do the dancers identify which roles the other people
> are dancing? Traditionally this is done with dancers taking the opposite
> role to their gender wearing bands, but that is surely inappropriate if the
> dance is GF.

Bands are especially useless when you're gender-swapping in a square,
just like contra.  (And yes, I often gender-swap in square dancing, as do
a lot of other people, mostly in gay square-dance circles but a few
coming primarily from straight club backgrounds.)

> Also, if any MWSD clubs are using truly non-gendered terms, please let me
> know.

As a caller and dancer, I really can't imagine switching to gender-free
terminology in MWSD.  Contra works because standardization of vocabulary
matters much less when you teach each dance before starting, and it's
easy to switch between gendered and gender-free dances.  MWSD requires a
deep realtime link between muscle memory and the auditory command loop.

There's also Salsa Rueda de Casino, I know almost nothing about it (and
really nothing about gender management) but I know a couple of people I
could ask.
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