Breakdancing, also called breaking or b-boying/b-girling, is a street dance in an athletic style from the United States. This style of dancing is diverse in the amount of variation available, but breakdancing consists mainly of four types of movement: downrock, toprock, freezes, and power moves. Typically set to songs with drum breaks, you’ll find breakdancing being done to funk, hip-hop, breakbeat music, and soul music. However, more modern trends allow for wider musical varieties with certain beat patterns and ranges of tempo. Created in the 1970s by African American youth, the early breakdancers were Dancing Doug, the 1st Generation Bboys, A1Bboy Sasa, Clark Kent, and The Legendary Smith Twins.
Breakdancing groups included Star Child La Rock, Zulu Kings, Crazy Commandos, and Salsoul. By the time the late 1970s rolled around, breakdancing had begun to gain wider popularity and began to spread to other communities. During this time, the style had peaked in popularity among Puerto Ricans and African American youth. Someone who practices breakdancing is known as a b-girl, b-boy, or breaker. The media began to portray breakdancing as a simplified version of the art, rather than the original b-boying or break-boying. Dedicated practitioners of the art of this dance found this offensive and even ignorant.
The problem with calling this style breakdancing is that it gives the dance a diluted umbrella term that includes locking, popping, and electric boogaloo. Those styles aren’t breakdancing, but rather are funk styles that were developed completely separately from breaking in California. However, since the term “breakdancing” has become the most widely known term, it has kind of stuck. However, one thing remains: practitioners of this amazing dance style are called breakers. Several elements of breakdancing can be seen prior to the 1970s, and some breakers cite Kung Fu films and James Brown as influences.
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In the video below, you can see the legendary Jimmy Fallon and Brad Pitt doing some breaking of their own, showing breakdancing as a kind of conversation, which is exactly how it is in some cases. Enjoy this amazing video.
