[Tango-L] Tango Creeps - A Question for Halloween

[Tango Society of Central Illinois]

On 10/25/07, Neil Liveakos <neil.liveakos at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> All,
> Has anyone encountered the situation where open dancers regard
> close-embrace
> dancers as creeps?
>
> Neil
> http://milonga.us
> _______________________________________________



Yes, but it is mostly the dancers who are not good at dancing in the (close)
embrace who get this reaction, from what I have seen. What I'm referring to
are the men who usually dance tango in an open frame and while dancing they
bring the women close to them, often holding them too tight because they
lack the proper technique, or maybe because they are motivated by hormonal
surges. They are selective with regard to the women upon whom they bestow
this (dis)honor, and they have motives other than good tango dancing. It is
the creeps like these who give tango a bad name. I tell our women students
it is OK to drop these Neanderthals in the middle of a tango.

When we teach tango, we emphasize the embrace is like a hug (same word
'abrazo' in Spanish). It is firm but not confining. It is affectionate but
not lascivious. The embrace is an essential defining quality of tango. The
Argentines know this. To break the embrace is to transform tango into just
another ballroom dance.

Given that, I have occasionally encountered women fighting like bucking
broncos to break the embrace. Once in another community, a woman told me she
felt confined in the embrace. That was because she was dancing with her
weight back on her heels. You can't dance in the embrace with your weight
back on your heels. It becomes a belly dance rather than una conexion de los
corazones.

Of course, there are those who won't dance tango close because of the strong
Puritanical values that pervade our American culture. Tango is not a good
dance for people like these.

Ron