ABSTRACT

The joy of moving to rhythm and music, creativity, expression through one’s body: there are lots of reasons why people dance. Although in dance the body is trained, challenged and strained just as it is in sports, competition is not of prime importance. Comparing dance with gymnastics is frowned upon, as dance embraces more than the purely physical aspect. Most dancers do not consider themselves athletes but artists. The consequence of this is while sportsmen and sportswomen do not need to hide their physical effort – a strained expression on the athlete’s face does not reduce the effect of the performance – dance is generally supposed to appear free of physical effort. This is not altered by the fact that in many dance styles technique becomes increasingly more demanding and acrobatic.