Talk:Lindy hop today

1st draft 2006

This is only a first draft of this article. I have yet to cut the sections from the original lindy hop article which i've copied to make this article.

Please edit - I'm sure there's some nasty stuff in there, and this article is too long. I'd like to cut all the technique stuff (which isn't really edited properly at all) and put it in another article - perhaps the swing dance book. Comments, feedback, advice? PlainJane 05:53, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

I removed the "History" section entirely (but couldn't resist putting a "See also link to Lindy hop history"). My reasons are a)there's an entire article on lindy's history, b) readers will probably get here throuth the "lindy hop" article which means they'll just skip the history anyway or go to that specific article, c) it shortens the article by quite a bit, and d) the historical influences on today's lindy are scattered throughout in the text anyway. Any objections?--Koeppen 03:21, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. I've been using the African American articles as a reference for dividing up big articles, and they handled it this way. But I don't mind either way. Good work on all these lindy articles btw. PlainJane 09:45, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

...actually, Cswrye notes on the lindy hop:talk page that it is wikipedia policy to include a short summary pgh of linked-to subarticles on the main article page. Should we add back in the deleted history pgh (I have no real opinion either way, though it might make reading the article a bit easier for the uninitiated)? PlainJane 09:53, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

My preference would be to include a short summary of each spin-off ONLY on the main "lindy hop" page. It's not explicitly said that way (I don't think), but there is a guideline in the Guide to writing better aricles guideline that suggests something to the effect of "the mainpage is where all the summaries of subtopics should go". It cites the Cricket article which has lots of subtopics (e.g. History of cricket) which don't include summaries of other subtopics or the main page. Of course this is only a guideline.--Koeppen 18:55, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Categorization

I was afraid this might be controversial, so I decided to follow the saying "It's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission," (or, as Wikipedia calls it, "Be bold") and remove this article from the swing dances category. I have two reasons for doing so. 1) Based on the other entries in that category, its purpose seems to be to include the articles about the dances themselves, not the subarticles that further describe dances. Part of the reason the lindy hop subcategory was created was to hold those subarticles. 2) The normal guideline is that articles in a subcategory should not also be placed in its parent category (with few exceptions, which the lindy hop article falls under). Since the lindy hop category is a subcategory of the swing dances category, articles should not be placed in both. If anyone objects, feel free to put the category back. --Cswrye 04:33, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure - your reasoning makes sense. So long as the primary lindy hop article is in the 'swing dance' category... Any other comments?

PlainJane 09:27, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Demographics

The demographics section in the article really needs some citations. It's not that I don't agree with the information (in my experience), but its explanation of why middle class youth seem to dominate Lindy seems just on the edge of being "original research" without some footnotes. Also the last sentence of the first paragraph doesn't really say much.--Will.i.am 05:42, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I know, I know. I guess it is original research - seeing as how I did some field work on it for my thesis. Do I need to publish something on it to make it other than original research?

Maybe we could just add something like "anecdotal evidence shows..." PlainJane 09:24, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Oy. I just read through most of WP:NOR because I've struggled with this question before of "what constitutes original research." For example, no dance moves have references, but it's still good information from people with experience.

Nonetheless, the language in WP:NOR is pretty strong (e.g., "this policy cannot be superceded by the consensus of editors"), and they even explicitly state something to the effect of: if you have original work, the best thing to do is first publish in a peer-reviewed journal and then bring it to Wikipedia. (They also have some interesting statements like "Wikipedia articles include material on the basis of verifiability, not truth. That is, we report what other reliable sources have published, whether or not we regard the material as accurate.)

For dance moves I believe the verifiability lies in common (dance) knowledge. As 100 people how to do a sugar push it the mean answer will probably be the same. For the demographics section though (as it stands at least), I wouldn't say that 100 people would come up with what's presented here (which is also what's going to make your dissertation exciting to read, it's not just common knowledge being written down for the first time.)

Unfortunately, I think this is bad news for a lot of this section (at least for now in this venue). I would predict that even if we all agree it's useful information, it would get specially called out in our Featured Article candidacy and need to be removed. I guess I would advocate liberally trimming this section out of the article until you've published your dissertation (sorry!), which is REALLY hard for me to say, because I do think that it's useful information and I trust your field work. I'm happy to hear other thoughts though too.--Will.i.am 01:20, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

The Demographics section is 100% counter to my 10 years of experience in the Lindy scene. I've always remarked how the typical dance is always populated by a wide range of people from early teen to people in their 80s, and by all races and groups... white, Asian, Hispanic, black, and probably others I'm not even aware of. From what I've seen, the average age is solidly in the mid 30s to 40s. I would grant that it's predominantly single people, which makes sense, but there are plenty of married couples, and even married individuals who leave their spouse at home. I can see no justification at all for any of the demographic claims made in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jfraze (talk • contribs) 22:29, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Demographics coffee shop

With all this stuff going on, I've been thinking about the demographics of Lindy a lot. Perhaps the thing to do is copy the paragraph off the page and put it here on the discussion page, for perusal and comment. (I can't help it, I love to peruse and comment.)--Will.i.am 01:20, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

For me, I questioned the causality of the demographics of Lindy outlined in the article. I follow the logic presented, but I realized that I have no idea what economic class encompasses most people in my local scene (where the main question is "do you want to dance?", not "what is your socio-economic status?"). Additionally, I found the argument about the high cost of U.S. universities prohibiting lower-class dancers from learning Lindy interesting. Does this mean that ALL dancers are predominantly middle class? Lessons are expensive no matter what dance it is. But if Lindy does seem to cater to a specific demographic, is it really only based on economic status?--Will.i.am 01:20, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

To me, the demographics appeared to be complete WP:OR, not appropriate for Wikipedia unless it can be attributed to a source, so I removed it. Anyone curious about what it used to contain can see my diff here. -Verdatum (talk) 22:03, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Images

I [finally] got around to adding a few photos to the page, but I'd love to see many more. Please move these around (or delete) if you think they'll work better elsewhere.--Will.i.am 23:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Performance dancing - Removed text

Removed text:

• Minnie's Moochers, Ithaca, New York
• Loose Change, San Francisco, California. Blends Lindy Hop with hip hop and African-modern dance.
• Silver Shadows - American/Swedish troupe comprised of young dancers performing historical African American lindy hop.
• 23 Skidoo - American troupe based in Denver, Colorado. They are consistently ranked top 5 in the competition world and have helped popularize recent Jazz and tap variations.

I removed the above text from the Performance dancing section as it is highly contestable. Is there any reference that would back-up the above as having an impact on the development of Lindy Hop? –panda 19:25, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Updating the Competition section

The competition section seems significantly out of date on a number of points:

• I can see how having a "no rules" section made sense when rules were the norm, but my understanding is that competitions based on rules are now relatively rare - or at least the rules are very minimal and do not characterise the competition. The way this section characterises No-Rules as being explicitly influenced by audience reaction, and thus relying on comic moves and aerials is no longer representative.
• "Strictly Lindy" is a term very widely used to refer to a partnered showcase competition - it surely deserves to be on this page.
• A word on judging systems might be relevant: Crowd cheering (ULHS, Herräng) vs relative placement (Most competitions, including ILHC?) vs points-based scoring (WRRC competitions?)
• There are a wide range of competition formats of varying degrees of popularity which are possibly worthy of a mention:
  • A distinction between showcase competitions which do and don't allow aerials (e.g. the 'Classic' at ILHC)
  • Team showcases vs couple showcases vs cabaret
  • Pro/Am showcases - though that's maybe Only ILHC
  • Particularly for Jack and Jills: Phrase-based Spotlights (ULHS, ESDC, Snowball and most european camps) vs Extended shines (ILHC, Lone Star)
  • Couple-on-Couple battles - no strict phrasing (ULHS, Herräng)
  • Short Showcase - (Montreal Swing Riot, used elsewhere as an encouragement for newer dancers to explore choreo)
  • Jedi - where one or more couples are blindfold - often used in J&J's (Crazy Swing - Belgium, more usually used as an informal competition)
  • Crossover competitions - Two songs to different styles - often lindy and West Coast Swing - (MXDC, Canadian Swing Championships)

I can have a look into this myself, but I'm new to editing so would appreciate some guidance e.g. on level of detail: this could easily amount to a separate article!

I'd suggest a structure broken into Improvised and Choreographed competition formats, with a third subsection on Judging. The Improv section should reflect that competitions are commonly made up of different segments and might include a description of a common format for both strictly and J&Js: judged all-skate prelims, unjudged all-skate warmup, 8 8's of spotlight twice through, judged all skate where commonly all the dancers swing out towards the audience. Swingoutlondon (talk) 10:04, 10 April 2013 (UTC)