Perhaps when the word ballroom dancing is mentioned, you can see some images of women in flowing gowns with handsome men dancing the night away on the dance floor. These types of dance can be slow and fast according to the kind of move they are doing.
This is the definition from the Webster dictionary, for ballroom dancing: “any of various, usually social dances in which couples perform set moves”. The word ball does not originate from the toy “ball†but from the Latin word “ballare†which means to dance. This is the base for ballroom (a room for dancing), ballet (a dance), and ballerina (a dancer).
In the late 18th and early 19th centuries dancing was very popular among the upper classes of England. It didn’t really catch on with the working class until the late 19th and early 20th century. The Ballroom Dance Branch was set up by the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing with the sole purpose of standardizing the modern day ballroom dancing.
One can enjoy the elegance of Waltz, the passion of tango and the liveliness of the Quickstep, the slow Fox trot and the Viennese Waltz as forms of modern day ballroom dancing. When American Latin ballroom Dance comes to mind, here are some names of famous dances Samba, Rumba, Paso Doble, Cha-Cha and the Jive. The word Latin America refers to the word Latin and America.
Ballroom dancing consists of couples moving in specific set of moves in predetermined rhythm and tempo, dancing closely together. The couples come close through five points of contact. Three points involve the hand, where his left hand holds her right and her left hand will be on the top of his right upper arm, and the Tango would need her hand to go hand his arm while other right hand will rest on her left shoulder blade. The other points come in contact through elbows and chests which rests comfortably on each other as they glide through the dance floor. This dance posture goes all the way back to the dancing in the European royal courts and makes for a very elegant look as the couples float around the dance floor.
many years ago, the men danced while wearing their swords and this helps to explain why the strange right to right chest contact between the man and the women. This is also the obvious reason for the counter clockwise movement, that serves to prevent hitting any of the people watching as he dances past them. In American Latin dancing, posture changes from one dance to another. Just as the modern ballroom dance has been standardized, the Latin American dances have been programmed with a similar standardization for easy teaching.