ABSTRACT
It is worth asking why dance figures so prominently in light entertainment on television, and what the relationship is between the dances we perform in discos and ballrooms, and programmes like Come Dancing and the staged spectacular dance on television. Uses and gratifications theory and functional theories say that light entertainment programmes satisfy our needs for diversion by reducing tension and offering us fantasy or escape. Semiotics asks the questions that come next – from what do they divert us, towards what, and how do they manage it?
