Street dance: form of expressing identity in adolescents and youth ...

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Timişoara Physical Education and Rehabilitation n Journaldance, young people build new forms of behaviourthat are against the majority of ideas from theirbackground. Their purpose is to affirm their ownidentity.The objectives of the research are the foregroundingand understanding of the street dance phenomenon,its ways of manifestation, the people that practise itand the conditions in which it is being practised.The purpose of the research is to foreground thephenomenon of counterculture that sits at the basisof street dance and the reasons why young peoplepractise it, as well as to analyse the styles of dancederived from this type of dance.Research hypothesisStreet dance is practised by young people with thepurpose of forming their own identity.The identity created through street dance for theones who are practising it fights against theconformism of their background and the values ofthe society they come from.Material and methodThe study has been made between February andMay 2010 in Timişoara on a number of 149 peoplepractising street dance, 46 girls and 103 boys.Participants over the age of 18 are the mostnumerous (44.96%), followed by those agedbetween 14 and 18 (30.2%) and those aged under14 (24.83%). From the styles of dance, breakdanceis the most practised, from a beginner to anadvanced level. As concerns methods, the systematicobservation method and the questionnairemethod, that contains 18 items of which 15 demandclosed answers while the other 3 demand openanswers, to which dancers can add new meaning.Results Social background of the participantsFrom the figure 1, it can be noticed that 46.30% ofthe dancers identify themselves as belonging to themiddle class, 4.02% state they are over the middleclass level and the majority (49.66%) come fromfamilies under the middle class level. The mainissues that families from under the middle classlevel have to deal with are: significant number offamily members, low income, improper livingconditions, unemployment, violence, alcoholism.From the issues with which the ones belonging tothe middle class level, one can mention thefollowing: conformism, rigid education, lack ofcommunication. Practising street danceAccording to figure 2, we can deduce the fact that inRomania the phenomenon of street dance isrelatively new.Figure 1. Social background of the participants Figure 2. Period since street dance is practised10Volume 3 ♦Issue 6 ♦2011
Timişoara Physical Education and Rehabilitation n JournalThose who are practising it for more than 5 years –which cannot labelled as “seniority” in thisphenomenon – are over 65%. The lack ofdevelopment perspectives of the street dancer asconcerns building a career in this field determines itbeing practised only as a recreational of competitivesport. In Romania, the majority of dancers (83.89%)practise breakdance, as we can see in table III. It isnot just a national statistics; this report can also befound on a global level, with slight differences inpercentage. Characteristics of breakdance movesare physical power, dramatic character of the moves,but what makes them attractive is freedom ofexpression, creativity and oneness. Furthermore, it iscommon practice that typical street dance moves becombined with other more traditional forms ofdance, giving birth to new styles such as lyrical hiphop (more fluid movements and theatricalperformances) and street jazz (a hybrid made frommodern hip hop and jazz dance). These styles aregenerally concentrated on choreography and lessbased on improvisation and battles and are notconsidered pure street dance, but an alternativevariant of the traditional styles of studio dance(Figure 3).The majority of the participants (59.73%) limitthemselves to one or two training sessions per week(figure 4). One of the reasons for this might be thelack of proper training facilities and spaces, but alsothe lack of perspective in developing a career in thisfield or the change in status of the professionaldancer makes street dance being practised solely asa recreational activity (40.93%). From thosequestioned, 24.14% wish to follow a career in danceand the rest (28.18%) declare that they do notintend to pursue such a career.Figure 3. Practised dance stylesFigure 4. Number of training sessions per weekFigure 5. The effects of practising street danceThe effects of practising street danceWhen it comes to the effects of practising streetdance, the dancers (figure 5) appreciate thatbesides physical condition that improves followingregular practising, that results in discipline and selfdiscipline, the latter having influences on theknowledge of the own person, of the physical andpsychological limits but also a motivation for selfimprovement.Besides developing the artistic sense,this is also a creator of culture, because thepromoted values are also creators of a specific wayof life.Volume 3 ♦Issue 6 ♦2011 11
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