4449 Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 18:39:52 -0500
From: "Ron Weigel" <tango.society@gmail.com>
Subject: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
To: "Tom Stermitz" <stermitz@tango.org>
Cc: tango-l@mit.edu
<cff24c340607041639w1aa2598budf71d30f7ce787df@mail.gmail.com>
On 7/4/06, Tom Stermitz <stermitz@tango.org> wrote:
> ENDEMIC PROBLEM
>
> I've recently noticed in several different venues, that the women
> have not been living up to the skill level of the men. There may be
> many explanations, but I think fundamentally, women learn quickly at
> first, but have a much more difficult path going from Intermediate to
> Advanced. Men learn slowly and steadily from the very beginning.
What I've noticed teaching close embrace in a mixed embrace community
is the following:
- In the first 1-2 months, the women have problems with walking
backward and extending their legs to make space for the man's advance,
which is more difficult than the men walking forward and leading with
their chest. When we used to teach open embrace, the men had greater
difficulty right from the start (beginning material: walk to cross,
forward ocho).
- At the next stage (2-4 mos) men are struggling with leading the
different combinations that arise from the ocho cortado and back
ochos. Women have little difficulty with back ochos, but some 'fear'
the cross coming from the ocho cortado and are more likely to take
their leg behind (could be a back ocho if led that way) than in fromt
to the cross. Most women get past this obstacle quickly. Those that
don't either quit tango or shift to open embrace.
- At this point many women stop taking classes. They have reached a
state of 'adequacy' in following. More advanced leaders are much more
likely to ask beginning followers to dance, so the followers have
better partners and improve faster ... to a point. Meanwhile men that
continue classes are improving their leading skills. They are learning
about improvisation and musicality. Somewhere around 6-12 mos, the men
start complaining about women not following well. The greatest
complaints from continuing male students about female partners are
- steps too long
- continuing moving before lead is given (also ahead of the music)
- pull leaders off balance (often due to shifting embrace, throwing
weight back onto heels, too long steps)
The women who quit classes early are typically younger, learn faster
in the beginning, are asked to dance more at milongas (may be due to
better skills, but also because they are prettier). If has been said
many times that women prefer the best leaders as partners but men
prefer the prettiest women as followers, so the motivation to get
better is decreased for women and increased for men.
There are a few women who continue to get better by dancing with the
best dancers, but generally they are not as good as the women who
continue to study. Those that continue to study tango tend to be older
and had more difficulty in the beginning. This continued study is
often with private lessons, because many of their skill limitations
can only or are best addressed in this format.
However, the greatest inhibitor to women improving their skills is
that they continue to get asked to dance. Increasing their skill will
not increase their frequency of dancing. If the standard set in a
community by most women dancers is not high (somewhat of a silent
conspiracy not to improve) there will not be many advanced women
dancers.
Why men continue to study when they have reached a level of 'adequacy'
is another issue. I think it is because of the type of personality
that is attracted to tango. In our university community, we have a
high representation of engineers, computer scientists, physical
scientists, and biologists among the men studying tango. We also have
some women in these disciplines, but we have more women in the social
sciences, arts and health care professions. Perhaps this reflects the
gender distribution among disciplines, but I think men are even
overrepresented in tango relative to their distribution in the
physical and biological sciences. The men are attracted to the logic
of tango - particularly the improvisational possibilities. They enjoy
the intellectual challenge of tango.
To some degree women also drop out of classes because the classes
focus more on the abilities men need to acquire. However, even
emphasizing maintaining balance, connection, focusing on the mans'
axis, waiting (not anticipating), etc., has limited impact. The impact
is greatest when I, as a leader, am able to get into the line-of-dance
during a class and give direct feedback to followers, but since we
have more men in most of our classes, this rarely happens.
Although women could benefit from private lessons, we typically have
men or couples for private lessons. For couples taking private
lessons, it is almost always the woman who suggests the lessons so
their partners can improve. Sometimes women with partners send their
men for private lessons and won't join them themselves.
What also allows women to remain satisfied with their level of
adequacy is the tendency for sensitive 21st century men to apologize
for any mistakes that occur in dancing.
I haven't differentiated much between open and close embrace. Class
experience is entirely close embrace, except as otherwise noted.
Community experience is mixed. When we taught salon style, women
studied for longer. We taught our share of ganchos, boleos, and
embellishments for women. However, I've noticed in our community that
the women who are more likely to use these elements in open embrace
now are also those who stop taking classes (with open embrace
instructors) earlier. They are also younger.
Economics is partly a factor. Older women have more disposable income
than younger men, but this does not explain why younger men with
limited income continue studying tango.
We have more men than women in our tango community. This tendency for
women to stop classes earlier will not stop until one of two things
happens:
(1) some women break away from the pack and make an effort to improve,
thus becoming more highly preferred dance partners by the better male
dancers
(2) the gender balance changes towards more women than men.
I think #1 is more likely than #2 in our community.
Ron
Urbana IL
Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 00:58 +0100 (BST)
From: "Chris, UK" <tl2@chrisjj.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
Tom wrote:
> - In the first 1-2 months, the women have problems with walking
> backward and extending their legs to make space for the man's advance,
I guess from the sounds of that they are trying to follow guys who haven't
yet learnt to dance.
> - continuing moving before lead is given (also ahead of the music)
A classic sign of having learnt to humour weak leaders.
> - At this point many women stop taking classes.
No surprise there.
Whatever is the origin of this idea that girls should learn to dance by
practising with guys who cannot?
Chris
-------- Original Message --------
*Subject:* [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
*From:* "Ron Weigel" <tango.society@gmail.com>
*To:* "Tom Stermitz" <stermitz@tango.org>
*CC:* tango-l@mit.edu
*Date:* Tue, 4 Jul 2006 18:39:52 -0500
On 7/4/06, Tom Stermitz <stermitz@tango.org> wrote:
> ENDEMIC PROBLEM
>
> I've recently noticed in several different venues, that the women
> have not been living up to the skill level of the men. There may be
> many explanations, but I think fundamentally, women learn quickly at
> first, but have a much more difficult path going from Intermediate to
> Advanced. Men learn slowly and steadily from the very beginning.
What I've noticed teaching close embrace in a mixed embrace community
is the following:
- In the first 1-2 months, the women have problems with walking
backward and extending their legs to make space for the man's advance,
which is more difficult than the men walking forward and leading with
their chest. When we used to teach open embrace, the men had greater
difficulty right from the start (beginning material: walk to cross,
forward ocho).
- At the next stage (2-4 mos) men are struggling with leading the
different combinations that arise from the ocho cortado and back
ochos. Women have little difficulty with back ochos, but some 'fear'
the cross coming from the ocho cortado and are more likely to take
their leg behind (could be a back ocho if led that way) than in fromt
to the cross. Most women get past this obstacle quickly. Those that
don't either quit tango or shift to open embrace.
- At this point many women stop taking classes. They have reached a
state of 'adequacy' in following. More advanced leaders are much more
likely to ask beginning followers to dance, so the followers have
better partners and improve faster ... to a point. Meanwhile men that
continue classes are improving their leading skills. They are learning
about improvisation and musicality. Somewhere around 6-12 mos, the men
start complaining about women not following well. The greatest
complaints from continuing male students about female partners are
- steps too long
- continuing moving before lead is given (also ahead of the music)
- pull leaders off balance (often due to shifting embrace, throwing
weight back onto heels, too long steps)
The women who quit classes early are typically younger, learn faster
in the beginning, are asked to dance more at milongas (may be due to
better skills, but also because they are prettier). If has been said
many times that women prefer the best leaders as partners but men
prefer the prettiest women as followers, so the motivation to get
better is decreased for women and increased for men.
There are a few women who continue to get better by dancing with the
best dancers, but generally they are not as good as the women who
continue to study. Those that continue to study tango tend to be older
and had more difficulty in the beginning. This continued study is
often with private lessons, because many of their skill limitations
can only or are best addressed in this format.
However, the greatest inhibitor to women improving their skills is
that they continue to get asked to dance. Increasing their skill will
not increase their frequency of dancing. If the standard set in a
community by most women dancers is not high (somewhat of a silent
conspiracy not to improve) there will not be many advanced women
dancers.
Why men continue to study when they have reached a level of 'adequacy'
is another issue. I think it is because of the type of personality
that is attracted to tango. In our university community, we have a
high representation of engineers, computer scientists, physical
scientists, and biologists among the men studying tango. We also have
some women in these disciplines, but we have more women in the social
sciences, arts and health care professions. Perhaps this reflects the
gender distribution among disciplines, but I think men are even
overrepresented in tango relative to their distribution in the
physical and biological sciences. The men are attracted to the logic
of tango - particularly the improvisational possibilities. They enjoy
the intellectual challenge of tango.
To some degree women also drop out of classes because the classes
focus more on the abilities men need to acquire. However, even
emphasizing maintaining balance, connection, focusing on the mans'
axis, waiting (not anticipating), etc., has limited impact. The impact
is greatest when I, as a leader, am able to get into the line-of-dance
during a class and give direct feedback to followers, but since we
have more men in most of our classes, this rarely happens.
Although women could benefit from private lessons, we typically have
men or couples for private lessons. For couples taking private
lessons, it is almost always the woman who suggests the lessons so
their partners can improve. Sometimes women with partners send their
men for private lessons and won't join them themselves.
What also allows women to remain satisfied with their level of
adequacy is the tendency for sensitive 21st century men to apologize
for any mistakes that occur in dancing.
I haven't differentiated much between open and close embrace. Class
experience is entirely close embrace, except as otherwise noted.
Community experience is mixed. When we taught salon style, women
studied for longer. We taught our share of ganchos, boleos, and
embellishments for women. However, I've noticed in our community that
the women who are more likely to use these elements in open embrace
now are also those who stop taking classes (with open embrace
instructors) earlier. They are also younger.
Economics is partly a factor. Older women have more disposable income
than younger men, but this does not explain why younger men with
limited income continue studying tango.
We have more men than women in our tango community. This tendency for
women to stop classes earlier will not stop until one of two things
happens:
(1) some women break away from the pack and make an effort to improve,
thus becoming more highly preferred dance partners by the better male
dancers
(2) the gender balance changes towards more women than men.
I think #1 is more likely than #2 in our community.
Ron
Urbana IL
Date: Tue, 4 Jul 2006 23:24:24 -0600
From: Tom Stermitz <stermitz@tango.org>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
No, Tom did not write this.
On Jul 4, 2006, at 5:58 PM, Chris, UK wrote:
> Tom wrote:
>
>> - In the first 1-2 months, the women have problems with walking
>> backward and extending their legs to make space for the man's
>> advance,
>
> I guess from the sounds of that they are trying to follow guys who
> haven't
> yet learnt to dance.
Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 08:49 +0100 (BST)
From: "Chris, UK" <tl2@chrisjj.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
> Tom did not write this.
Sorry, Ron wrote.
Chris
-------- Original Message --------
*Subject:* Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
*From:* Tom Stermitz <stermitz@tango.org>
*Date:* Tue, 4 Jul 2006 23:24:24 -0600
No, Tom did not write this.
On Jul 4, 2006, at 5:58 PM, Chris, UK wrote:
> Tom wrote:
>
>> - In the first 1-2 months, the women have problems with walking
>> backward and extending their legs to make space for the man's
>> advance,
>
> I guess from the sounds of that they are trying to follow guys who
> haven't
> yet learnt to dance.
Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 22:01:06 +0900
From: "astrid" <astrid@ruby.plala.or.jp>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
Tom wrote:
I've recently noticed in several different venues, that the women
have not been living up to the skill level of the men. There may be
many explanations, but I think fundamentally, women learn quickly at
first, but have a much more difficult path going from Intermediate to
Advanced. Men learn slowly and steadily from the very beginning.
> Whatever is the origin of this idea that girls should learn to dance by
> practising with guys who cannot?
>
> Chris
I do not agree with Tom, and maybe his community has a very different set up
from ours, too. But Chris is right to the point.
The truth is, there are lots of things a woman can learn in classes or
private lessons, but ultimately, her range of expression and chances to put
her ability to use depends on who she dances with. In our community we have
quite a number of women who are good dancers. Women flock to lessons, and
also often take series of (private) lessons with Rivarola, Oscar Mandagaran,
Jorge Torres, Balmaceda etcetc. whenever they come to town. The men, on the
other hand, are rarely found in expensive workshops, master classes, and
even less in privadas, and some not even in milongas. So, many men either
never really learn how to dance, some do and forever stagnate around the
intermediate level, a few take workshops in California, BA, Scandinavia etc.
during business trips, and a few master classes in Tokyo, besides studying
or not with some Japanese teacher they never talk about, and every time I
meet one of those, they have either improved a lot and are just back from
some trip or busy with some master classes, or their skill has dropped to
floppy and vague again, because they have not been dancing for a while, and
have once again forgotten most of what they knew for a while.
Classes here are mostly taught by male teachers (who needs yet another
woman!) or couples, and geared mainly to the men, yes. Women are often used
as practise dummies, not given any specific guidance geared to women, or
even occasionally, suppressed in their skill by the teacher who is focusing
on the beginners. Sort of like: "you stand aside because you know
everything, and this one here needs all the attention because she is going
to need and take lots of lessons", it seems to me.
On the other hand, some of the women have ballet and other dance training,
want something difficult, and visit fantasia classes, so, also many of the
visiting stars teach lots of complicated stuff, and the vast majority of
students are female. While the only teachers that in my experience attracted
a large number of men were El Chino and sometimes Torres, and they both
taught a lot about connection and how to lead.
If Tokyo schools would insist on only couples signing up together, like in
Germany, they would quickly go out of business.
So, what happens, is that many of the women get fixated on dancing with
teachers, mostly, because these are the only really satisfying dances they
get. And sometimes they are willing to pay for it by the hour....
So, Tom, in my experience, men do not at all learn slowly and steadily from
the beginning, women do learn more quickly, and may have some difficulty
reaching advanced stage, but that is mainly for lack of a partner suitable
to their own level, not because they would not have the skill or willingness
to get there. Some of our best women here simply go to dance overseas, in BA
or whereever, to get a better choice of partners and I have heard of US
women doing the same.
Another obstacle for upper intermediate women is that certain men eternally
prefer to drag around some cute new face beginner who may not know how to
dance but is easily impressed. How do you compete with that?
In Tokyo, tango is a men's world, even if there are not so many of them
around...
Astrid's 2 cents
P.S.
Tom, what do you define as "advanced level"?
Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2006 14:59:56 -0400
From: "Caroline Polack" <runcarolinerun@hotmail.com>
Subject: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
" I guess from the sounds of that they are trying to follow guys who
haven't yet learnt to dance."
I feel as though each time I go to a Milonga, I have to get rid of all the
bad habits I picked up from practicing with my partner and re-learn tango
again. I haven't danced with him in two weeks and meanwhile been going to
milongas on my own and learning at a much faster rate than I did with him.
Bad habits I picked up were things such as as leaning harder than I should
because he won't meet me halfway and I have to over-lean just to avoid
stepping on his toes, taking too long steps just because my partner doesn't
lead well or he forgot how certain steps were supposed to be carried out.
He doesn't dance, it's more like he lurches/ marches from one imaginary
footprint to the next on the floor as if it were a diagram. And I feel as
though I've picked up his stiffness and now I have to go back and press
delete any bad habits.
Now that I've been going on my own, and asking advanced dancers for
feedback, I've been doing so much better and enjoying it more. Really
enjoying it more. No, scratch that, actually enjoying it at all. I am
learning from advanced dancers ten times, 20 times faster than I ever did
with my partner.
It's been six months of practice together and he's still as uptight as ever
with zilch sense of musicality, my right arm gets really tired when I dance
with him and now that I've been dancing regularly with good dancers, I enjoy
dancing with him less and less because in comparison to the other dancers,
he's really difficult to dance with.
Watch music videos on Sympatico / MSN Video!
Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 15:17:04 EDT
From: sherpal1@aol.com
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
To: runcarolinerun@hotmail.com, TANGO-L@mit.edu
ouch....sounds like you just moved on and beyond your partner....but in
general I think women who do advance should dance with less experienced men and
give them all their newly acquired good habits, which might conteract all the bad
stuff the men get when dancing with less experienced follows. sherrie
Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2006 15:45:50 -0400
From: "Caroline Polack" <runcarolinerun@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
To: sherpal1@aol.com, TANGO-L@MIT.EDU
I have no problem dancing with less experienced men as long as they have
some sense of musicality, it's when they haven't improved in months that I
have a problem with. And if they dance like it's a chore instead of
something they actually enjoy doing, that's yet another problem, a more
severe one.
........
ouch....sounds like you just moved on and beyond your partner....but in
general I think women who do advance should dance with less experienced men
and
give them all their newly acquired good habits, which might conteract all
the bad
stuff the men get when dancing with less experienced follows. sherrie
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Date: Thu, 6 Jul 2006 01:20 +0100 (BST)
From: "Chris, UK" <tl2@chrisjj.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
> Now that I've been going on my own, and asking advanced dancers for
> feedback, I've been doing so much better and enjoying it more. Really
> enjoying it more. No, scratch that, actually enjoying it at all. I am
> learning from advanced dancers ten times, 20 times faster than I ever
> did with my partner.
Congratulations Caroline on discovering the key to tango: dancers learn by
dancing.
There's no other way.
Chris
Date: Thu, 6 Jul 2006 07:49:12 -0700 (PDT)
From: steve pastor <tang0man2005@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Women stop studying tango: EPIDEMIC
Cc: tl2@chrisjj.com
Caroline's message does not state that she only dances. The reason that she is learning is that she is "asking advanced dancers for feedback". No doubt she is incorporating that feedback into her dance.
That, I think, can be a key to getting better.
"Chris, UK" <tl2@chrisjj.com> wrote:
> Now that I've been going on my own, and asking advanced dancers for
> feedback, I've been doing so much better and enjoying it more. Really
> enjoying it more. No, scratch that, actually enjoying it at all. I am
> learning from advanced dancers ten times, 20 times faster than I ever
> did with my partner.
Congratulations Caroline on discovering the key to tango: dancers learn by
dancing.
There's no other way.
Chris
