Why Do Dancers Have A Reputation For Being Dumb?

or Port de Blog; Blogging on my Grave; Blog Fosse


Why do dancers have a reputation for being dumb? This question has dogged the dance community since the Isadora Duncan tragedy (pictured). Exhaustive research has led me to the only plausible theory: dancers don't speak!

According to Mirriam-Webster.com, which is listed under "Favourites" on my computer, the word dumb is defined as: lacking the human power of speech; lacking the ability to speak. In other words, dancers lack the human power of speech and also the ability to speak. No sounds from a dancer. If a dancer falls and no one is around...

Dancers tell stories through movement. When they want someone to know something, they don't speak it. They port de bras it, they plie it, they temps du cuisse it (at Juilliard we called it temps du queefs--LOL!).

To be fair, not all dancers are dumb; Bill T. Jones sometimes annunciates while he is allongeing. Also, I once saw a performance by the Second Avenue Dance Company of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts (at Juilliard we called it the Kleenex School of the Farts--lol) in which some of the performers spoke as they spoked. I refer to this phenomenon as Le Double de Menace, or the "Threat of Two", and will join its ranks later this year, blogging and bourreeing simultaneously during the DancenOwnyc Festival.