Swing Dance Etiquette

ON ASKING SOMEONE TO DANCE

Ask someone to dance with your words. No silent hand gestures, grabbing or dragging. "Would you like to dance?" will always do the trick. 

Anyone can ask anyone to dance. If you find you're not being asked often enough, take initiative and do the asking. 

When you attend our weekly dance Thursday Night Stomp, we encourage each dancer to challenge themselves to ask A) one person to dance who is of a different skill level than themselves B) one person of a different age bracket and C) one person who you've never danced with before. 

While we encourage you all to dance with a variety of people you can say no to a dance at any time. Three examples:
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A) You might say no to a dance because you are tired, the song is too fast or you're talking with a friend. In that case you could say, "please find me again later" or "I will find you later".  

B) If you don't want to dance with someone because they make you uncomfortable, feel free to simply say no. No explanation needed. 

​C) If you don't want to dance with someone because they make you uncomfortable and you'd like to share why they make you feel uncomfortable, good for you. Direct communication can solve a lot of problems. 

ON LEARNING TOGETHER 

Please don't offer unsolicited feedback in classes or at dances. If someone asks for feedback, great. But generally we find that folks giving unsolicited feedback aren't giving the most sound advice and could probably look inward for changes in their own dancing first.

​ON BEING HUMAN

It's totally normal to get super sweaty when we dance! But if you tend to soak through your clothes it's best to bring an extra shirt or two to change into throughout the night. 

Give yourself the ol' smell test before heading out to a dance. If you think you smell, someone else probably will too. "But I'm an earthy Mainer who doesn't use unnatural products!" you might protest. I hear ya and in that case please give this simple, homemade natural deodorant recipe a try. It's worked wonders for many.

ON SAFETY

Choose moves wisely on crowded dance floors. It's the lead's primary responsibility to be sure their partner doesn't end up colliding with a person or object. It's the follow's responsibility to move their bodies through space in a controlled manner. If you do collide with someone, please offer up a quick apology, make sure everyone's okay and move onward. 

If you're practicing air steps (aerials), save those for jams or performances. They don't belong on the social dance floor.

ON LIVE MUSIC

Clap for the band! They really love it. And we really love them. 

HAVE FUN!

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Note: The message below was a special note to our dance community posted to the PSP Facebook page on 2/10/19. We wanted to make it available to folks who are not on Facebook. Thanks for reading.  

Hey Dancers! There are a couple of things we need to talk about and I hope you'll take a moment to read this (it ain't short so perhaps grab that cup of coffee?). We have such a great swing dance community in Maine (and NH peeps I won't forget about you!) and I'm constantly impressed by how eager folks are to learn, how friendships form and continue outside of dance and how kind, generous and just generally awesome our swing dance community is. That said, it's come to my attention that we're overdue for a little housekeeping and I blame myself for not making this a priority sooner.
There are two topics I want to address: The first is that a dancer recently confided in me that she was touched inappropriately by a fellow dancer in the past six months. Before every lead that reads this starts to panic about the time their hand slipped while trying that complicated new move, I will assure you that hands slip, moves go wrong, but that's not what we're talking about here. This was a blatant act of sexual misconduct. Let me be clear: Portland Swing Project and Lindy Maine have zero tolerance for that type of behavior. Lindy Hop is a very physical dance that brings us in close contact with other people and the only way we can grow a healthy dance community is if every single one of our dancers feels like they have 100% autonomy over their bodies when they're dancing. That means you never need to say yes to a dance, you can end a dance at any point and you should feel like you are respected when you're dancing with a partner. 
Some of you know that the international Lindy Hop community experienced a lot of change in the past few years as instructors and scene leaders the community held near and dear for many years were accused by a number of women of sexual misconduct. In the immediate aftermath of those events, I promised myself I'd be on high alert in our dance community to make sure nothing like that could ever happen here. But I clearly didn't do enough. So a few things: 1) Please take a moment to read the Portland Swing Project and Lindy Maine Code of Conduct: https://www.portlandswingproject.com/code-of-conduct-and-et…
We'll make this required reading for anyone who signs up for a class from here forward. 
2) If you ever experience or witness inappropriate conduct in our dance scene, please come tell me, tell Jen, or tell anyone you trust. We need to know what's happening in our community so we can keep it safe and healthy for all. Our contact info is at the bottom of the Code of Conduct page and we'll always be there to listen. The inhumane reality of sexual misconduct is that it's often experienced twice: it's the actual act and then it's the act of coming forward to recount it. We fully acknowledge the courage it takes to come forward and my sincere thanks goes to the woman who made me aware of this incident and brought my full attention to this issue.
Okay, switching gears a little bit. The second topic we need to address is ageism, specifically that women in our dance community over a certain age tend to be asked to dance a lot less often than younger women (men, this might happen to you too but I've been specifically approached by a number of women about this topic). This issue doesn't seem to require hard and fast rules, but I think it deserves our attention. When I first started a weekly dance in Portland, I would ask 3 or 4 "ringers" each week to pay a little extra attention to newer dancers or folks who were spending too much time on the sidelines. This seemed to genuinely instill an ethos of "everyone dances with everyone" in our community and it's something I've been really proud of here in Maine. (Spoiler alert: it ain't like that everywhere in the world you go to dance - we have a good thing going here!) 
Of course we all grow by dancing with people who challenge us but it's important to remember that this logic works in both directions: for more advanced dancers (or maybe younger dancers who appreciate swingouts at 250 beats per minute), while it's important that you dance with peers of your skill or athletic ability, so that you continue to grow and improve, it's also important to remember how your skill-level grew in the first place. If your experience is like mine, I know I improved because more experienced dancers generously danced with me, challenged me, asked me to dance a fast song even if I fumbled my way through it. One way to keep our dance scene healthy, friendly, and growing is if each of us makes a commitment at each Thursday Night Stomp to dance at least one song with a newer dancer, one song with someone of a different generation (this means younger ask older but also older ask younger!) and one song with someone they've never danced with before. It's a small act but I think it has larger reverberations within our community. And I also want to be clear that we encourage everyone to be proactive if you want to dance: if you find yourself sitting out too often, be bold, get yourself on the dance floor and ask someone to dance with you. One of my favorite things about swing dancing is that it's one of the few regular social outlets I can think of that's truly multi-generational. On a good night we have dancers from 16 to 90 years old! I love that. Let's keep working to make sure we don't lose that unique asset in our community. (Side note: I noticed a 20-something lead last week ask pretty much every woman over 60 to dance at Thursday Night Stomp. It was awesome. Keep it up!)
Circling back, let me be clear: while I am encouraging you all to dance with a variety of people you never need to dance with someone who makes you feel uncomfortable. You don’t need a reason or explanation to say no to a dance. 
Thanks for taking the time to read this and reflect on how we can continue to make our dance community stronger. This is an ongoing conversation so please feel free to reach out with any feedback, suggestions, thoughts, etc. You can post a comment here or contact me directly at portlandswingproject@gmail.com or 207-899-5254. Lots of love to you all! See you on the dance floor.