Essay On African American Dance

In both German and American cultures there is different types of music, dance and theater. In the German culture particularly in the arts modern dance is something that is very popular. In fact, Germany was one of the many places were dancer were stepping out of the traditional into new things. Mary Wigman was a very well known person for performing modern dance. In a different part of the world there is another culture that is African American. In this culture something called gumboot is very popular. Its when the the people of the society come together and put on boots and dance, something similar to this in America is step dance. The term for this type of step is African American step not Irish step.The students use their arms and legs to make their moves up while modern dancers use all of their bodies to dance with. Having different cultures makes people believe that these two types of dance have nothing in common however, that is not true when seen side to side, both cultures of dance are seen as a way of breaking away from the social norm. It is seen that in both cultures is a popular way of students and every day people to explore something outside if their society's norms. Also a way to show how different time periods affected the way people danced and how people were viewed for doing certain things.

German modern dance and African American step dance both used their way of movement to rebel against the society norm. An example of this is saying, “movement patterns from african and slave dance” (Moore). When looking at this a reader can infer that step was a away of going against a social norm. Modern dance in general is a way of going against “its break with the sterility of the prevailing classical ballet“(encyclopedia). This is showing how german modern dance was breaking away from all the