Southern UK Jive

[Jiveonaut]

...is the motto of a famous local Public School (Winchester: I didn't go there, I had to write it out 1000 times for rolling cakes down their driveway during a cricket match....) And yet it seems a growing minority of people seem to abandon their manners when they come through the doors of a dance venue. And it seems to fall into two categories:
1) Dancing dancers: there seems to be a lot more people crashing into each other and not apologising, inappropriate moves on dance floors and an increase in people not looking where they are going and what they are doing.

Examples of this I'VE seen recently include my partner getting stood on, and a different partner getting literally shouldered out of the way and no apology in either case, a head over heels lift at a packed Minstead (3 inch heels at head height!), blokes reversing without looking into my partner and I, and a case where only my emergency stop of my partner stopped her from standing on another ladies head because her partner had done a MASSIVE dip on the crowded dancefloor.

2) Non dancing dancers: I've direct experience, within the last month or so, of: 'pedestrians' pushing me aside as they walked along the edge of a dance floor while I was dancing; singlies walking directly across the floor. Singlies with drinks walking across the floor, groups of people standing in the middle (literally) of the floor having a good old gossip, a lady with a camera on the floor getting her friends to pose on the floor with both parties oblivious to the dancers

I'm sure everyone reading this has had similar experiences: it just seems to be getting worse. Having been re-reading some of the articles on the forum cos I'm having a night in, this problem is not new, but does seem to come in waves. There have been a lot of moans in the freestyle section about this sort of thing just recently, and there were about a year ago.

What can be done, especially about the No2's? I don't think giving them a thousand lines each time they walk across the floor with a tray of beers will work, but how can dance etiquette be imparted to those who don't know the form, don't realise it, don't get it and/or are just plain rude?
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Words are good, but hens lay eggs.

[Steve]

I think floorcraft is pretty bad in some parts locally at the moment, but it's not helped by the overcrowding that's being allowed to happen either.

I think the worse offence is using 'fire or hall limits' as some guide to how many people can dance on any given dance floor. These limits are often not even for 'dancing' and include the whole hall, not just the dance floor. The net result is a nice lot of extra cash for the organiser, but uncomfortable dancing conditions and often pressure on unexperienced dancers floorcraft that their skills are not upto coping with yet.

It's not a surprize that generally floorcraft appears to be the worse at the most overcrowded venues. (average experience has an effect as well).

I can think of three ways it could be influenced, one passively and two actively.

Passively, I know I learn't a lot of my floorcraft just by picking it up from more experienced dancers. Presumably that's true of others as well.

Actively, teachers are the obvious choice, but also DJ's. I have heard DJ's ask drink carriers not to wander across the dance floor like mildly stunned wildebeest to good effect.

Also actively, organisers need to stop treating their customers like cash cattle and use dance floor limits and not hall limits.
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My local WCS dance guide: http://www.southernjive.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=726

[The-G-Man]

I think walking across the dance floor when there is plenty of room to walk around is the "Why" Factor! who does that.....

Venues should hire bumper cars to add to the fun.