Ballet classes

[Awholelotofhot]

I took my two year old to a ballet class today as she loves a dance. I was surprised to find the class was all girls and one of them also had a tutu on! Also it was all very 'graceful' (as I guess ballet is!) however it made me wonder if going to a class like this would start to ingrain in her that ballet is for girls and girls are graceful and pretty etc. Am i over thinking this?

Sport is traditionally male - therefore must be a good thing, must get more women involved.

Sport is positive in a number of ways: for self-esteem, fitness, confidence, feeling part of a team (in many sports). I'm very glad I play competitive sport and think it is good for more girls and women to be involved and have the chance to take part in sports which interest them.

I see nothing wrong in anyone doing ballet and think it's a positive thing if more children have the chance to do it and see if it's for them too. I haven't seen anyone rubbishing it.

I agree that female gymnastics includes prancing... Sorry if it sounds dismissive but I don't think that element requires or shows particular skill. It's a legacy of Soviet-dominated sports where there is a strong element of subjectivity and judges award points. Again personally I find their aesthetics and scope incredibly limited.

IMO they are particularly restrictive for women. When I see male gymnasts I don't see that they are wearing the smallest possible and tightest outfit, make up and only one possible hairdo. I just see a person doing some gymnastic moves in a sequence, in order to be assessed - there is no "artistic" pretence.

It would be great to see gymnastics, artistic skating etc freed from the shackles of these outdated ideas.

'I asked whether you thought the girl in the link was "masculine" since you've deemed martial arts masculine. I think she's another example of a powerful, inspiring girl.'

The whole of our history and society deems combat sport to be part of masculinity. I didn't pluck it from nowhere.

If bringing up boys to be violent isn't part of masculinity, why do you think almost all violent crime is carried out by men?

I am not convinced a person can be defined as masculine or feminine. I mean, dying of lung cancer is a masculine thing to do in many cultures, but I would treat that as part of class analysis, not a judgement about an individual person.

Oh yeh, I don't think girly is bad, I like ballet because it makes me feel pretty and graceful and stuff that one could argue is 'girly'. But I do think that the idea that ballet is girly is bad, or that being pretty and graceful is girly is wrong. I wish there were more male ballets (like Bourne's Swan Lake) and that male ballet dancers were viewed as good role models for boys and young men. Ballet does keep you incredibly fit, and is useful to more than just potential professional dancers (some sports teams use ballet to improve flexibility and foot dexterity for example).

For young children it teaches rhythm and coordination, and balance and spatial awareness (so do a lot of dance forms ofc but ballet is kind of the 'essence' of a lot of other dance styles)

Because other people think that those movements from the creative arts are skilled, athletic and interesting to watch, and many think that the male gymnasts should do them too, and are displaying less skill by not doing them
Exactly. Not applying the default view that what the women are doing is wrong or lesser.

Anyway, I love to watch Sergei prancing about...

I thought the whole point of feminism was that women and girls should be able to do whatever they damn well please, unencumbered by the expectations and constraints of others.

If that means they want to do ballet (or karate, or fight fires or whatever else) then so be it. They should be entirely free to make that choice.

Come on, we shouldn't pretend that ballet can be harmful to girls and young women. Eating disorders are rife amongst aspiring dancers, partly because of the focus on the "perfect" physical shape

Eating disorders are rife in both dance and sports. It's around a third of female athletes. I'd assume similar for dancers, or maybe even higher. I don't know what we can do about it, how much is to do with the physicality and how much is to do with the striving for perfection and high achievement that so often accompany eating disorders.

None of the ballet dancers I have met look anywhere near as skinny as the 2 female track athletes I mentioned. Indeed most dancers have a female shaped body with breasts, waists and hips, albeit slim, unlike many female athletes.

Olennas I think it's less to do with the perfect physical shape, that's not super skinny in ballet...it's muscled and strong, neither of which can exist with disordered eating. I think professional dance companies and schools are much better at managing mental health of their dancers/students as well as their physical health. In a recreational setting that job falls to the parents primarily. I think you're looking at it wrong, do more dancers get EDs, or do more people who are predisposed to EDs choose to do ballet/gymnatics etc...things that require a lot of control and a level of perfectionism not present in tons of other activities.

Ballet requires strength and stamina and is actually a hardcore form of exercise. In fact, If I were writing a tagline, the phrase "it's not for girls" would seem appropriate.

The trouble is that we then deny all that tough stuff by pretending it's all about being floaty and princessy. Seemingly, male dancers do all the heavy lifting and the female roles are effortless. It doesn't help that Ballets usually tell misogynistic fairy-tales.

It doesn't help that Ballets usually tell misogynistic fairy-tales
Not all that many actually - just the few that are based on them.

Have a look on youtube and watch English National Ballet perform at Glastonbury the other year. (I'd post a link, but I'm crap at that sort of thing).

I have a dancer friend (male, professional) who's T-Shirt reads
"If football were harder, they'd call it ballet"

And in my training, we did the "boy's" steps along with them. So I learnt all the traditionally "male" jumps, and my favourite thing was racing a (male) friend in class doing brisés across the room (they are a particularly fiendish small jump with beaten footwork - hard work, so racing each other takes your mind off the effort).

Thing is, no child is assured of becoming a professional dancer, and there are a lot more types of professional dance in addition to ballet. But learning ballet, or contemporary dance, or tap, or jazz - taking it seriously & learning the skills & technique - that's a set of movement skills, knowledge of how your body works, and how you interact with others in space, that s very valuable throughout your life.

Oh how I hate the sodding mobile app. The mobile site isn't working.

So far as ballet stories- the last one I saw was Woolf Works - a three Act ballet based on the life of Virginia Woolf. There are many ballets which are not based on traditional fairy stories.

It seems that ballet (like much else) has been princessified to the nth degree. When I was little I went to ballet and you were only allowed to wear a plain leotard until you reached a certain grade. There were still more girls in the class but a decent number of boys too.

Now even the more serious looking ballet classes have pink frilly websites and tutus/floaty skirts as standard for very young children. Not a boy in sight. I have seen a couple of separate classes for boys but they always include street dance and other elements.

So sad that we have pushed the sexes so far apart that girls have to be persuaded it's pink and fluffy enough and boys have to be persuaded it's non-girly so they won't feel they are denigrating themselves by taking part.

I don't think the main RAD site is at all "fluffy" or pink ...

RAD might have changed pre primary uniform to pale pink, but it was turquoise until recently. They change the colour every few years I think. The older grades are purple and navy.

Loops - I think that's right (it's a combination of predisposition to EDs along with the discipline) - research seems to come to the same conclusion. Ballet dancers don't have the stunted development of, say, gymnasts but it's a bit of a stretch to say that they have curves - what looks curvy on the stage is in comparison to the slim bodies next to them. Stood next to a regular size 10, they would look skinny in the extreme. Though English and American companies seem to be better in this regard than in the past, the Russians still seem to like the very very thin look.

Little girls aren't introduced to ballet through a three part telling of the works of Virginia Woolf, though, are they? And those aren't the programmes that sell out theatres or get put on for the Christmas specials. Those pretty firmly rotate around the Nutcracker / Cinderella / Sleeping Beauty / Giselle / Swan Lake - none of which are really feminist icons (though some versions are better than others)

Olennas Yeh, I think curvy is a stretch, especially in professional companies. I do think that's sad, I also think it should be very different in children's classes, and recreational classes. Russian training is still pretty brutal, they take children very young and do work them to extremes.

The Royal Ballet School are much much better, although they do still have a 'look' they want for their own company, which is to do with their current dancers (other women in the corps, men who will partner, costume sizes etc...) dance companies are not wealthy, and they do reuse costumes and shoes and stuff, so they basically want dancers that will fit, rather than having to alter things too much or buy new things.

There will also be the need for dancers to do the steps, modern choreography is a hell of a lot harder than the old stuff, audiences want crazy high legs, and insane lifts, and slightly alien levels of bendiness. Non-traditional companies, who take dancers of different body types, or who have more men, have less people going to see them. That sucks too. But it all contributes, skinny people weigh less, they can be lifted higher, short people can wear pointe shoes without changing their centre of gravity too much or being too tall to partner, slim legs look longer and show a cleaner line, which is what people 'expect.

These expectations are wrong, but they are real. They are NOT real in kids classes or recreational dance schools, then they are 'enforced' by shitty teachers who probably have a superiority complex and imagine they are training future professionals who need to look the part. Largely, they are not, any kid good enough will be in an associates program heading for a pre-pro school at 11 or 16.

Those pretty firmly rotate around the Nutcracker / Cinderella / Sleeping Beauty / Giselle / Swan Lake - none of which are really feminist icons (though some versions are better than others)

Why should they be "feminist icons"?

Lass - when one pp points out that most of the stories in ballet are based on misogynistic fairy tales, and another counters that it isn't really the case and there's a ballet based on the life of Virginia Woolf, I'm going to call it out as the BS that it is. They don't have to be feminist icons any more than anything else in life, but let's not try to pretend that everything is A-OK on the ballet narrative front.

My beef with ballet is less about the princessification and more about its unhealthy relationship with the female body.

Our girls need to grow up with a healthy relationship with their bodies. An art form that teaches that there's such a thing as 'naughty toes' isn't the best way to achieve that.

I LOVE ballet and did it myself, but I've decided it won't be the first dance class DD does. (She's only 11 months at the moment!) We'll start with creative movement/dance etc and then later, when she's had the opportunity to learn about the joy of moving her body for its own sake, we'll introduce ballet if she wants to.

They don't have to be feminist icons any more than anything else in life, but let's not try to pretend that everything is A-OK on the ballet narrative front

It is as far as I concerned. I expect the packed out audiences at Covent Garden feel the same. Call bs if you like but equally there are many, many ballets beyond the few which you have mentioned (and The Nutcracker doesn't even have the type of plot you are objecting to).

I said right at the beginning it's this sort of joyless hand ringing and determination to do down anything beautiful or feminine (that Caitlin Moran "if men don't do it must be wrong " argument )which is why I won't call myself a feminist.

I love ballet and none of the arguments on here as to why it's so awful are remotely convincing- particularly " the body image" one. Skeletal thin athletes get a pass but a size 8 ballet dancer doesn't.