HI Valerie Just curious: where in North America do you dance? Here in Portland, OR both methods of asking are used, a lot! -- even tho the floors don't completely clear during cortinas, even tho there is no such thing as "my" table. I usually solicit and accept dances by cabeceo -- from across the room, from up or down the row of tables, from across the snack table. Not academic. Not essential either, just immensely helpful. :-) Megan
On Nov 24, 2009, at 11:16 AM, Valerie Dark wrote: > On Mon, Nov 23, 2009 at 10:11 PM, Anton Stanley > <an...@alidas.com.au> wrote: >> The cabeceo gives ultimate power to the woman to refuse a dance >> without >> publicly injuring the ego or dignity of the suitor. Why is it such a >> problem for Western women to practice it? > > > The whole cabaceo discussion is academic, at least in North America. > Are you in Australia, Anton? Do people use the cabaceo where you are? > > In North America, there are a few people who try to do it, but it > isn't practiced uniformly. It is't that Western women have a > particular hard time doing it. It's simply hard for anyone to do it > unless everyone does it. > > Remember in the climax of the movie "Ghandi" when the whole country > suddenly laid down their arms and practiced non-violent resistence all > at once? You'd need something like that here to get the cabaceo > adopted. > > Even if you do want to cabaceo between partners, it's hard to do here. > For one thing, people don't clear the floors for cortinas. That means > partners can't find one another by sight from a distance. Where I am, > there is no reserved seating in milongas and never enough chairs for > everyone in attendance. We just don't conceive of a milonga like the > ones in B.A. Without a "home base" to return to after dancing, > everyone mills around and hooks up for dances by walking up to each > other. A few dancers "in the know" try to practice a cabaceo mutation > by walking up to someone and, instead of sticking out the hand, > nodding from a distance of approximately 2-and-a-half feet. It's a > cabaceo in form, if not function. > > It's a cultural difference that can't be bridged here. It would > require a country to decide, spontaneously, to be different! > > Valerie > > -- > Cryptic Ember - The tango blog of Valerie Dark > http://crypticember.blogspot.com > _______________________________________________ > Tango-L mailing list > Tango-L@mit.edu > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/tango-l _______________________________________________ Tango-L mailing list Tango-L@mit.edu http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/tango-l