Ballroom Latin Dance Made Feminine
Why Do More Women Take Up Ballroom Dance As A Hobby Than Men?
Oct 6, 2009
In order to understand why there are more women taking Ballroom dance as a hobby or sport than men, perhaps one should start by analyzing the women's approach.
The Average Women’s Approach
Many women do not like traditional sports. They find swimming, running on the treadmill and sweating in tracksuits too boring. Ballroom Dancing is something very different because it involves music and costumes and men. These elements automatically entice some women to get themselves involved in this artistic sport or hobby, without even thinking of the prerequisite of hard work before they can become good dancers.
No sport can allow an individual to express different moods, like Ballroom Standard and Latin styles. Some say that these dance styles are metaphoric of ten different life stages. And that women can adapt to different life stages much easier than men. Dancing in any of theses styles is like a walk through ten types of life.
Women simply enjoy doing something that can be emotionally involving. This also explains why some women like Ballroom Latin dance better because in most Latin dance styles, every step tells a story. And the imagination can fill up the entire dance. Also, because everybody is doing it, peer influence is also one factor attracting women to enter the scene of Ballroom dancing.
The images of the Ballroom Latin and Standard dance styles can be summarized as below:
- Cha-Cha – A cheeky dance that tells a "boys meet girls, girls meet boys" story.
- Samba – A dance full of colors and tropical feel.
- Rumba – The famous dance of love emphasizing togetherness and separation in a relationship.
- Paso Doble – Theatrical, dramatic, spiritual, love and hate and jealousy.
- Jive – A playful dance with a crazy feeling.
- Waltz – The classical Ballroom dance, graceful or even wedding dance, celebration
- Foxtrot – A dance that demonstrate life’s delightful moment as in the song Fly Me To The Moon.
- Viennese Waltz – Image of the palace and grandness.
- Tango – A rather serious, emotional, passionate dance.
- Quickstep – A more fun and merry Ballroom dance.
The Mundane Mentality
Since Ballroom Dance is a type of partner dance it gives a good opportunity to socialize with the opposite sex. Many women just enjoy the company of opposite sex. Some ladies bond with their male teachers. They treat the teachers as companions. There are real life cases where ladies book a male teacher for private lessons but they chat more than dance most of the time.
Still other women enjoy being the “flower” in the “vase” since the man is responsible to present the lady most of the time. Many just think that Ballroom dancing is easy to learn comparing to other sports. A wrong impression of Ballroom dancing as just “following” the “lead”.(More about leading and following in this related article.) In addition, many women just feel good dancing in front of a wowing audience or simply be seen at tea dances, dinner dances. The more serious lady will pride themselves of the number of trophies they win at pro-am competitions.
The dance floor also provides an opportunity to be someone very different from the normal life . Yet, no other sports can give the chance to Indulge in the world of fancy dresses and vanity.
Some women simply take up Ballroom Dancing as a fitness program. But there are rarely many successful cases unless one is really to spend time to practice and with the right technique. Ballroom Dancing may not be a bad idea as a retirement hobby for those senior ladies either.
The Reality Of A Successful Female Ballroom Dancer
Dancing is never simple. Many ladies just underestimate the hard work behind the glamorous dancing.It takes a lot of blood, sweat and tears in order to be successful on the dance floor. That is also the reason why not many women make it to top amateur if not professional level.
The professional mentality is less glamorous because good dancing can only come from tough training and long hours of practice. It is the quality of dancing not the costuming that counts. Therefore it is always more sensible to impress with the technical level of dancing than just fancy and expensive dance dresses.
Regardless of the type of mentality, there are always newcomers to join the Ballroom Dance world each day. All in all, Ballroom Dance taps deep into the nature of women.
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