Right and wrong

I met and danced in swapped roles with a guy, a beginner.  I shared a story about the contradiction in terms of teaching an embrace (third paragraph) in an “open hold”. He told me in reply that indeed, he had seen in milongas men "driving" women as though driving a tractor. He illustrated what I have seen so many times, in class and in the milonga, by class dancers. 

In the photo above there are no embraces.  You could pretty much drive a tractor through the huge gaps between the guys and the girls.  So what are they doing if not embracing?  Steps.  They are practising steps learnt in class.  People who do this move like zombies.  Typically, they take one step, together, pause, then they take another.  Then he tilts his chest.  She obediently pivots.  Lead (pause) Follow.  Their dance mimics the roles they have accepted.  Obviously, the music - if there is any - is irrelevant.  Speedy zombie version here.   You could argue that music like that doesn't help at all.

It could be so easy.  If only they would embrace, listen, not think.  Not listen hard, not try to walk on a beat, not even listen - just allow themselves to hear the phrasing.

In fact this practica (in photo above) was more like what we in Britain would call a class. There (ART. 13) I saw only one couple embracing. You can see similar things by browsing the photos of milongas near you or that you are thinking of going to on e.g. Facebook and comparing whether what the dancers are doing looks more like the photo above, or more like the embraces here at the Encuentro Porteño in Amsterdam.  Of course the EP dancers are more experienced, but it isn't that. What they are doing is in essence a different dance.

The instruction model based on right and wrong ways of moving means you get class types who (if you were to let them get that close) would "drive" you the way my friend described. Meanwhile, such dancers insist or imply you're “doing it wrong” or that you're not really good enough for them. Inexplicably they still want to get their hands on you. No surprise then when they inherit from class this perspective of “right” and “wrong” steps. This “rightness” and “wrongness” is a strange idea.  The dance is improvised and social, we do it for pleasure. It is not sequenced, choreographed or for performance where “rightness” and “wrongness” of steps or technique might be more relevant. 

But class dancers are quick to criticise “wrong” movements - even on the floor and to lecture you in how to fix them.  At that point you might as well give up.  Many do - the healthy ones. Or they go to the milonga instead.

But many, sadly, do not. They assume the problem really is with them, that they are impaired in some way, that they are wrong and this is what gets to me. Women do this more than men in my experience or maybe more of them tell me. They feel terrible, inadequate.  "I feel so rubbish, so hopeless" they say, over and over.  "I can't do any of what they want me to do in class. The steps and technique are so hard.  It doesn't make any sense to me."  They doubt themselves in just the same way as when the teacher says "Just a few bad habits developing - keep up the classes and you'll be fine".  They don't realise that most people have - sensibly - dropped out because they all felt like that.  In fact they have been wounded.  With many women I meet it's as though they have been wounded in their backs but they don't know where. They just know that they're hurt but they don't even really know why or how or if they've been wounded because none of it adds up.    

The man they dance with who might tell them they're "doing it wrong" - or (more often) the teacher says "Well if you trust me, come back next week and make sure you do the whole course I can fix everything.  And there are always private lessons you know..." Even children know that anyone who says "Trust me" or "Honest!" is as trustworthy as this.