Did you ever notice when someone says "I don't want to beat a dead horse..." they fully intend to "beat a dead horse"? Like I am about to. Isn't that just a strange colloquialism?
Anyway, this comes on the heels of my post "
An argument for longer cortinas...", to which, you will find, I issued a complete retraction in the comments section. I would call it a "throwing gas on the fire" post.
The thread that prompted my post on Tango-L continues. It started out as a discussion about gender imbalance, and leaders who stay on the floor for multiple tandas when there are more followers than leaders at a milonga.
I wanted to post Stephen Brown's very lucid comments about codigos. Stephen is from Dallas and is the guy behind the fantastic website
www.TejasTango.com.
I didn't want to post this for debate or commentary really, but feel free to comment. I wanted to post it "for the record" if any beginners, or other interested parties happen across this post. There is some good info here.
Here are Stephen's comments in the thread, with some mixing of gender imbalance discussion and codigos:
I hope it's not too confusing to follow.
Wednesday, April 23Astrid wrote:
>the gender balance in Tokyo is about 50:50, or rather samll shortness of
>women, while in tango there are about 3 women for every man. The two have
>nothing to do with each other.
I would think that at least three factors could affect the gender balance
for tango in a city.
1) The cultural attitudes toward women and men participating in such
activities;
2) How the teachers filter the population to create the tango community;
3) The gender balance for *single* men and women in the city.
I'll expand on the third point a little:
In most U.S. cities, the vast majority of tango dancers are single.
Estimate I've seen place the number of single people dancing tango in most
U.S. cities around 75-80%. If most adults in a city are married, the
gender balance for single adults may be quite a bit different than for the
population as a whole.
If the pool from which tango dancers are drawn is not gender balanced, it
would seem as though the lack of gender balance should affect
participation to at least some degree. Arguing otherwise would require
claiming that the cultural attitudes and/or filtering are so strong that
they completely dominate any potential gender imbalance.
With best regards,
Steve
Tuesday April 22Chris, UK wrote:
>Actually those teaching tango have first an obligation simply not to
>sabotage the natural tendencies of intersocial behaviour from which the
>codes arise. A bit more consideration of that can save loads of time
spent
>issuing milonga etiquette directives... with the added advantage of
>actually working.
I agree. Bad teaching can contribute to poor floorcraft and an inability
to observe the codes. Tom Stermitz once commented that many people have
walked into the first tango lesson completely able to navigate through
crowded dance floor. After their first lesson they couldn't.
Let's try to get to a few details that might facilitate a natural
understanding of the codes:
Beginners should be taught the line of dance.
Beginners should be taught that tango has pauses.
Beginners shouldn't be taught rote figures.
How will beginners learn about tandas and cortinas? about the cabeceo?
What if you organize a milonga and a number of people who show up dance
performance-style tango, not social tango, and virtually none of these
people observe the ronda or other aspects of the codes?
By the way, I should mention that a milonga that I deejay for regularly is
quite devoid of problems that might arise from people failing to observe
the codes. Most of the dancers are experienced, and the facility has many
of the physical characteristics that Tom Stermitz described as
facilitating success. Sometimes early the evening, the density is a bit
low, which encourages just a bit of random navigation.
With best regards,
Steve
Tuesday, April 22 [Another Post]Previously I wrote:
"I don't think it makes much sense for an organizer or a group of
community
leaders to impose a set of rules on those attending milongas. People go
to milongas to have fun dancing tango, not to have a bunch of rules
imposed on them,..."
I recognize that in Buenos Aires, the organizers don't make the codes of
behavior for milongas. The codigos were established a long time ago,
those codigos help create a smooth running milonga where everyone can
enjoy dancing. The failure to observe these codes typically comes from
ignorance or a lack of caring. As someone who participates in the
organization of milongas and deejays on a regular basis, I understand the
desire to help people understand the codes and ensure that milongas are
run as smoothly as possible.
Those teaching tango have an obligation to teach the codes as way to help
their students participate successfully in milongas. Community FAQs and
etiquette lists also may be helpful. What I don't think will work very
well is a milonga organizer distributing *and* enforcing a formal set of
rules.
With best regards,
Steve
Tuesday, April 22 [Tom Stermitz' comments on Stephen's post above...]You can set up the milonga to discourage good behavior, or to enable a
better chance of success:
(1) Enough tables and chairs for everyone to have a seat
(2) Tables around the dance floor, with aisles BEHIND the seating
(3) Rectangular dance floor, small enough to focus the energy.
(4) Good sight-lines between the tables.
(5) Aisles to the floor so you don't have traffic jams.
(6) DJs that know how to build excitement and social interaction
The whole point is to create a good flow and navigation on the dance
floor, keep walkers OFF the floor, and make it easy to reclaim your
seat in between tandas.
Good navigation and floorcraft require a certain density of dancers.
If you have too much space, the leaders don't get used to dealing with
traffic. More than two or three steps of clearance between the
couples, and navigation gets very random.
A practice would be set up differently. For example, you may need
large open expanses of floor so people can try their moves without
endangering the navigation and social feel.
On Apr 22, 2008, at 12:28 PM, Stephen.P.Brown@dal.frb.org wrote:
> Those teaching tango have an obligation to teach the codes as way to
> help
> their students participate successfully in milongas. Community FAQs
> and
> etiquette lists also may be helpful. What I don't think will work
> very
> well is a milonga organizer distributing *and* enforcing a formal
> set of
> rules.
>
> With best regards,
> Steve
Monday, April 21Many years ago, rumor had it that a milonga organizer in a major North
American city would run out onto the floor and give people tickets for
breaches of tango etiquette. People ridiculed her for the behavior. I
would have found such behavior funny (both humorous and odd).
I don't think it makes much sense for an organizer or a group of community
leaders to impose a set of rules on those attending milongas. People go
to milongas to have fun dancing tango, not to have a bunch of rules
imposed on them, and that includes a forced rotation of partners. Various
communities have drafted social etiquette rules which are intended to be
informative rather than requirements. For some examples, see
http://www.portlandtango.com/faq.htmlhttp://www.tangovita.com/page.php?page=14http://www.tangomuse.com/TangoManners.htmlhttp://www.close-embrace.com/invitingetiquette.htmlhttp://www.tejastango.com/faq_dallas_tango.htmlOf course, severe breeches of what is considered acceptable social
etiquette may require intervention on an individual basis.
I don't think it serves the milonga well for the dj to force everyone off
the floor with a second cortina or a lengthy cortina. The cortina should
be long enough to allow the floor to clear--not to force it cleared.
Dancers know what the cortina means. If they want to stay on the dance
floor that is their choice. (If one of them is being coerced to stay on
the floor that is another issue.)
Some ideas that I've seen work at milongas (that had the right spaces) to
promote more positive social interaction (not force rotation).
1) A milonga has a break zone--an area where people could sit or stand
and talk without being asked to dance.
2) A milonga has two dance floors--one for practicing and one for dancing
the ronda.
3) A milonga has three seating zones: single males, single females,
couples. Couples who want to interact as singles may sit with their own
gender in the singles area. The cabeceo is used as a matter of social
etiquette--not rules. Anyone is always free to reject invitations that
have not been properly offered.
With best regards,
Steve
![Fedora, After the Flood :: by Sean Duggan [f1.4] on Flickr](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sAywYct7Yqc0bpuCUm50QO1ogt7TA14NDPElVYuCmORqMDX_hEbkLRmlRoSnTa3Cj6CS19aNThihAiQA7YXo9sNGhpunTMudlDoJ0Vt_GSW97hqKaMItr7dDL9c2VpiIBm=s0-d)
