ABSTRACT
Chapter II starts by taking our attention to a shift in the Westernized urban societies from hard work and production-oriented structure to a more consumption-oriented structure with a focus on self-realization that affected the formation of contemporary identities. Claiming that entertainment industries and leisure activities provide possibilities of forming and reflecting a way of being and self-identities, especially for the new middle and upper-middle classes, it directs us to the idea that Argentine tango dance is such a leisure activity practiced in urban areas of the globe, including Istanbul. Referring to the concept of class and its theoretical development, the chapter poses that orientation to and the management of the body is a matter of class which reflects dispositions, tastes, and tendencies that come with socio-economic class belonging. In other words, different social classes orient and manage their bodies in different ways which make body an unfinished entity and reshaped in time as the imprint of social classes. The chapter emphasizes that tango dancing is one way that the upper and middle classes choose to orient, to shape and to discipline their bodies with, in many urban contexts, Istanbul being a prominent one with its historical and religious particularities.
