Diane
29-05-2006, 06:10 PM
I've become uplifted lately by something called "popping", a dance form that looks liquidy, fluid, entrancing, where the body goes different directions at the same time, limbs look like they're bending backwards. This is done by performers to music, and is undoubtably practiced into choreographic and reproducible units that others can imitate and eventually perform, like a set of tricks.. but there is something wonderful in it that even I can see, when it's done by someone from the inside out (creatively) rather than from outside in (by mimicry through mirror neurons). I'm not saying that popping IS ideomotor dance, what I'm saying is that if you want to be able to learn the difference between ideomotor movement and copied, mimicked movement, popping is a great example that will separate wheat from chaff better than any other kind of dance I've ever watched.
I could not remove my eyes from the TV while watching a contestant in the "So you think you can dance" reality show (on again now that American Idol is finally finished...). When the camera went back onto the three judges, used to seeing dancers that "look" not bad, but aren't really great either, their jaws were hanging open, as mine was, so I figured my fascination was genuinely stimulated. The guy went to the "next round" after several flattering comments.
I looked for a video clip that demo-ed "popping", and all I could find for the time being was this one from Finland (of all places). A lot of the dancing here is derivative and slightly boring (not that I'd ever be able to accomplish one zillionth of it of course.. ) but about three-quarters of the way through is a small segment just a few seconds long, of a guy wearing a blue baggy shirt, dancing alone and spotlit. He's not bad. You'll be able to get the gist of it seeing him. (He comes on right after a group dance with a woman in the center who is wearing red pants.)
Video clip (http://www.taukojalka.com/datas/video/www.dance.fi.mov).
I could not remove my eyes from the TV while watching a contestant in the "So you think you can dance" reality show (on again now that American Idol is finally finished...). When the camera went back onto the three judges, used to seeing dancers that "look" not bad, but aren't really great either, their jaws were hanging open, as mine was, so I figured my fascination was genuinely stimulated. The guy went to the "next round" after several flattering comments.
I looked for a video clip that demo-ed "popping", and all I could find for the time being was this one from Finland (of all places). A lot of the dancing here is derivative and slightly boring (not that I'd ever be able to accomplish one zillionth of it of course.. ) but about three-quarters of the way through is a small segment just a few seconds long, of a guy wearing a blue baggy shirt, dancing alone and spotlit. He's not bad. You'll be able to get the gist of it seeing him. (He comes on right after a group dance with a woman in the center who is wearing red pants.)
Video clip (http://www.taukojalka.com/datas/video/www.dance.fi.mov).