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Project short description

Young Chinese swing dancers reveal serious attitudes toward cultivating such a hobby with considerable financial and emotional input. Via continuous engagement in dance scenes, they build “swing connections” and construct a sense of belonging to the local swing communities.

Project long description

Swing dance, a social dance that originated in the 1920s African American communities and prevailed in the golden age of capitalist Western societies, is in vogue as a retro trend in Chinese first-tier cities.

It is not just nostalgia. Chinese swing dancers, especially younger generations, have revealed serious attitudes as hobbyists, with considerable financial and emotional input to gradually nurture their identities as “swing dancers.” When their original lifeworlds connect with their alternative dancing path, individuals also internalize expectations from their community and push the boundaries of swing dance cultures.

We conduct participant observations, interviews, and ethnographic films on swing dancers in Hong Kong and Shenzhen.

This ongoing research has found that the swing dance scene consists of a set of ritualized events for its group members to interact, share experiences and emotional rises and falls. Via continuous engagement in both socials and training, dancers build further relationships with each other, and construct a sense of belonging to the swing community- a “swing connection”.

Through swing dance – this musicalized bodily connection – partners dance into a groove, forming an improvisational non-verbal dialogue and are involved in swing-mediated intimacy and serious leisure groups.

Their interpersonal communications become contingent and situational, subjecting to particular swing scenes. Even strangers in social life can physically connect on the dance floor – holding hands, waists, or hugging, and the line between physical and emotional resonance can be blurred. Dance partnerships also have the chance to extend beyond the dance floor into broader social networks.