From: pedersen@polar.bowdoin.edu (Sharon L. Pedersen)
Newsgroups: rec.folk-dancing
Subject: Re: Etiquette Question
Date: 14 Apr 92 06:53:44 GMT

Apropos same-sex swings:
  Let me distinguish between "sex" (your biology) and "gender" (your
societal role).  So the "same-sex swing" should really be called the
"same-gender swing".

I personally prefer to use the ballroom swing position for whichever
gender I happen to be dancing.  And, were I calling a dance, I would
follow Jim Saxe's lead in instructing dancers to do the same.  (Well,
leaving out the times when my partner and I start fooling around and
improvising other swings for fun....)

I would like dancers to be aware that they may _choose_ to use the
same-gender swing, as a same-sex swing, but that it's not logically
necessary.  (Actually, if contradancers introduced a Scottish
dance-type rule "The first woman/man gets right-of-way in the
woman's/man's role", a same-gender swing wouldn't be needed either,
but who wants to be that precise when contradancing?)

However, when I am dancing "what has traditionally been called the
man's role", I have discovered that many women, for a variety of
reasons, prefer to use the same-gender swing with me.  The other woman
may use this swing because:
    * it's a more fun swing ("I never get to do this with the men")
    * it's a less intimate swing ("I don't want the sexual overtones
	of a ballroom swing here")
    * it's a same-sex swing ("two biological women always use this
	swing when they meet")
    * it will make my life easier ("she'll probably get confused
	trying to swing like a boy")
    * it will make her life easier ("she'll probably get confused
	trying  to swing like a boy")

I'm sure men use same-gender swings with other men for all these
reasons, too.  I started out by getting annoyed when women wouldn't do
a ballroom swing with me, but have since mellowed out and am willing
to let their preference, whatever the reason, override mine.  That
way, we both have fun.

Greg Tillman had some very perceptive comments:

>I wasn't going to jump into this thread, but it seems to need at least 
>one response from a more reserved (you can read that "inhibited" if it
>makes you feel good) dancer.

No, no, I'll refrain, now that you've put me on the spot!

>Maybe I just have more hangups than y'all, but I don't really care
>for dancing with other men.  There are just too many sexual overtones
>in dancing for it to be a comfortable thing.  If I'm ever asked, I
>think a polite "No, thank you for asking" is (I hope) an acceptable
>decline.

Ah, yes, sexual overtones.  When does friendly flirtation become
lecherous flirtation?  (Hint, guys: don't lick your lips at me!)  "No,
thank you for asking" sounds just fine (with, in this situation, no
obligation to then sit out a dance!); I can live without careful
explanations (as women have offered me) about how they're pining for a
boyfriend and dancing with a woman just won't satisfy that urge.

>Similarly, I don't like to ballroom-swing with other men - it seems a
>little more intimate than the symmetrical swing.  I don't have a dance
>partner handy so I can't analyze exactly why that is, but that's the
>way it seems to me.

Well, I don't have a dance partner handy either (at 2 a.m. at work),
but I can analyze exactly why: it's because a ballroom swing is one
person taking the other person firmly in their arms.  The (usual)
symmetrical swing has more of the character of bracing or spotting
your partner for an athletic event.

--Sharon Pedersen			Mathematics Department
  pedersen@polar.bowdoin.edu		Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine