4342  Tango reflec---- LEGS

Date: Wed, 31 May 2006 03:10:01 -0400
From: "TangoDC.com" <spatz@tangoDC.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Tango reflec---- LEGS
To: tango-L@mit.edu

Hi Astrid,

Thanks for appreciating both my humor and my billboard-sized use of
synecdoche. Thanks also for the anecdotes about man-on-man dancing,
especially the part about either Manuel or Christian (it's hard to tell
which one you mean) "showing off his legs in long steps."

But lest I be pilloried as one enamored of the human figure, which would
surely make me unique in the worldwide tango community, I should point
out that (a) I'm not a crane-necked, drooling leg-hound or anything; (b)
it's usually pretty hard to see my partner's legs from where I'm
dancing; and (c) a lot of tango moves Do seem to exist for the purpose
of showing off a lady's legs-- not to her partner, but to the gods, to
her own self-esteem, and to other such spectators... I mean, in the
fashion world there IS something called a "tango skirt" for a reason,
and I'm not the one who invented it, so...

Or have I stumbled upon some part of the tango world in which dancers
have *entirely* ceased to be sex objects? Should I pretend to be
bashful, and not say these things aloud? Are there children present?

Have I been posting to a yoga list by accident?

I'm glad to hear that there are men out there showing off their
movements, in the follower's position. We already do this to some extent
in the leader's position, however; and I wonder if there's a way for men
to reinvent other "slinky-sexy" moves usually done by followers, the way
women have done their own thing with the leader's role. Are there any
male followers out there who can share what they've discovered? E.g.,
how to do a volcada "like a man"? (However that might be interpreted...)

Jake Spatz
Washington, DC

p.s. As for the origin of the molinete, I don't know if the dagger duel
is really it, since the sequence is a pretty standard drill for all
kinds of sports. I've also read that it came into the tango by way of
immigrant Jews doing the hora, which sounds about as credible as the
West Side Story version you mentioned, Astrid... But lacking anything
else, I propose we combine them, and posit that the molinete ultimately
derives from dueling rabbis, until Sergio can set us straight with the
pollyanna version of Argentine history.

astrid wrote:

> While on one hand I may thank you for your fascination with the beauty of women's legs, on the other hand, I (and probably most of the rest of us here, I imagine) do not quite agree with you