To turn, turn will be our delight
Sep. 22nd, 2004 11:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaIn any normal circumstance, saying "turn left" to someone is a useful, sensible instruction. At least, providing the person you're talking to is able to get their left, er, right.
Somehow, though, when dancing rapper this phrase loses any meaning.
I'm not quite sure what the problem is. I think it might be partly that the person being told to turn is required to turn on-the-spot rather than in a more usual left-turn sort of sense. It might be that being caught in the middle of a tangled whirl of metal is disorientating. Or it might just be that when someone is already confused, shouting "left! left!" at them is never really going to help.
We've tried various strategies to deal with this. Saying to someone "turn the easy way" doesn't help. In theory, it should. The "easy way" is either the "short way" if they know which way they want to end facing (ie turning 90 degrees instead of 270), or if their arms are twisted, it's the way that untwists them. Again, this sort of instruction tends to result in a rabbit-in-the-headlights sort of panic as someone tries to work out which way to go.
I suppose this is the sort of reaction seen in other cases, too, when someone is confused and is required to act quickly and correctly. Quite why the stricken dithering is the human body's best way of coping remains a bit of a mystery. We all seem to do it, though.
Quite a common way of explaining turns is to say something like "turn left shoulder back". This is the same way as "turn left", but gives you something a bit more definite to grasp hold of if you're feeling a bit bewildered. Move your left shoulder backwards. Now keep turning that way.
Sometimes, though, describing things via the surroundings work better. After a failure with some "turn outwards" instructions to someone a few weeks back, I eventually opted for saying "face the window every time you turn". This of course, has its downsides... next time we're dancing in public rather than in our practice hall, you have to stop and work out where the windows, the toilets and the fire exit are to orientate yourself.
Last night we had one of your Occasional Mabels (people who live too far away to make regular practices, but can be drafted in for emergencies) along, as she's coming with us to Burton at the weekend. She kept getting a particular turn wrong. Instructions like "left shoulder back" and "the easy way" having failed, a useful description was eventually reached:
Turn as if you're going to punch Liz in the face with your right hand.
She got it right every time after that.
Scared now.
Somehow, though, when dancing rapper this phrase loses any meaning.
I'm not quite sure what the problem is. I think it might be partly that the person being told to turn is required to turn on-the-spot rather than in a more usual left-turn sort of sense. It might be that being caught in the middle of a tangled whirl of metal is disorientating. Or it might just be that when someone is already confused, shouting "left! left!" at them is never really going to help.
We've tried various strategies to deal with this. Saying to someone "turn the easy way" doesn't help. In theory, it should. The "easy way" is either the "short way" if they know which way they want to end facing (ie turning 90 degrees instead of 270), or if their arms are twisted, it's the way that untwists them. Again, this sort of instruction tends to result in a rabbit-in-the-headlights sort of panic as someone tries to work out which way to go.
I suppose this is the sort of reaction seen in other cases, too, when someone is confused and is required to act quickly and correctly. Quite why the stricken dithering is the human body's best way of coping remains a bit of a mystery. We all seem to do it, though.
Quite a common way of explaining turns is to say something like "turn left shoulder back". This is the same way as "turn left", but gives you something a bit more definite to grasp hold of if you're feeling a bit bewildered. Move your left shoulder backwards. Now keep turning that way.
Sometimes, though, describing things via the surroundings work better. After a failure with some "turn outwards" instructions to someone a few weeks back, I eventually opted for saying "face the window every time you turn". This of course, has its downsides... next time we're dancing in public rather than in our practice hall, you have to stop and work out where the windows, the toilets and the fire exit are to orientate yourself.
Last night we had one of your Occasional Mabels (people who live too far away to make regular practices, but can be drafted in for emergencies) along, as she's coming with us to Burton at the weekend. She kept getting a particular turn wrong. Instructions like "left shoulder back" and "the easy way" having failed, a useful description was eventually reached:
Turn as if you're going to punch Liz in the face with your right hand.
She got it right every time after that.
Scared now.
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no subject
Date: 2004-09-22 03:55 am (UTC)I say "we"...
no subject
Date: 2004-09-22 03:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-22 04:02 am (UTC)Die messily.