Dance is an art form that generally refers to movement of the body, usually rhythmic and to music, used as a form of expression, social interaction or presented in a spiritual or performance setting.

Dance may also be regarded as a form of nonverbal communication between humans, and is also performed by other animals (bee dance, patterns of behaviour such as a mating dance). Gymnastics, figure skating and synchronized swimming are sports that incorporate dance, while martial arts kata are often compared to dances. Motion in ordinarily inanimate objects may also be described as dances (the leaves danced in the wind).

Definitions of what constitutes dance are dependent on social, cultural, aesthetic, artistic and moral constraints and range from functional movement (such as folk dance) to virtuoso techniques such as ballet. Dance can be participatory, social or performed for an audience. It can also be ceremonial, competitive or erotic. Dance movements may be without significance in themselves, such as in ballet or European folk dance, or have a gestural vocabulary/symbolic system as in many Asian dances. Dance can embody or express ideas, emotions or tell a story.

Dancing has evolved many styles. Breakdancing and Krumping are related to the hip hop culture. African dance is interpretive. Ballet, Ballroom, Waltz, and Tango are classical styles of dance while Square and the Electric Slide are forms of step dances.

Every dance, no matter what style, has something in common. It not only involves flexibility and body movement, but also physics. If the proper physics is not taken into consideration, injuries may occur.

Choreography is the art of creating dances. The person who creates (i.e., choreographs) a dance is known as the choreographer.

Dance generally refers to human movement either used as a form of expression or presented in a social, spiritual or performance setting.

Sourced

• I have no desire to prove anything by it. I have never used it as an outlet or a means of expressing myself. I just dance.
  • Fred Astaire, Steps in Time (1959), p325.

A time to mourn, and a time to Dance. Eccl. Holy Bible

• On with the dance! let joy be unconfined; No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet To chase the glowing hours with flying feet.
  • Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto III (1816), Stanza 22.

• There comes a pause, for human strength Will not endure to dance without cessation; And everyone must reach the point at length Of absolute prostration.
  • Lewis Carroll, Four Riddles, no. 1 (1869); reprinted in Phantasmagoria and Other Poems (1919)
• As to dancing, my dear, I never dance, unless I am allowed to do it in my own peculiar way. There is no use trying to describe it: it has to be seen to be believed. [...] Did you ever see the Rhinoceros, and the Hippopotamus, at the Zoological Gardens, trying to dance a minuet together? It is a touching sight.
  • Lewis Carroll, Letter to Gaynor Simpson (27 December 1873), in A Selection from the Letters of Lewis Carroll to his Child-Friends, ed. Evelyn M. Hatch, (London: MacMillan, 1933)

• Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free, Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands, With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves, Let me forget about today until tomorrow.
  • Bob Dylan, "Mr. Tambourine Man", Bringing It All Back Home (1965)

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Fri Jul 30 22:19:35 2010