It is completely accepted in our collective Hip Hop imagination that dancers must be slim and visibly muscular, so says the creator of Fatgirlsdance - Cathleen Meredith. The body stereotyping does not only happen in classical styles, it also happens in Hip-Hop.a style that was born in the street, with people from the streets, and is usually dressed in loose and baggy clothes. Brian Nolan describes it in his article The Ideal Ballet Body for Informa Dance magazine in Australia: "In reality, the ideal physique for a female classical dancer is slim, with a long neck, a short to medium length torso, long legs with complimentary long arms and high insteps." He says that if you do not have this body type, do not give up - just keep trying. In classical dance, it’s all about women who are slim and not too tall and the ensuing language which often describes them as slender and elevated. These references and stereotypes come to us from many places, they’re prevalent in dance and stem from ballet.
To Francesca Miles' question "How do we move our culture forward in a way that levels the playing field, celebrating and welcoming people of all genders?" I would add, and all sizes. This topic has been silenced for a long time, and although the industry is changing little by little, there is still a need to highlight people, give them their flowers and vindicate their talent. Yet, it seems that the visibility of our physique has a direct effect on our work - even before we’ve been seen working. Despite the prototype of the "girl 10" having changed over the years, most people still defend the flat stomach and the lack of stretch marks.
Every woman in my life has felt the need to change her body because of societal influences at some point in her life. Women's sexualisation is something that’s been very present in our history, and we’ve come to assimilate it as something normative. Even the Hip-Hop dance movies with Jenna Dewan-Tatum, Briana Evigan and Jessica Alba – they all followed the 90-60-90 pattern. If you wanted to dedicate yourself to professions like modelling or dance, our references were crystalline. Every girl in the Western world who grew up in the 2000s knows that if you were more than a size 8 (UK), people thought you were fat.
0 kommentar(er)
