Background

Everyone yearns to know more about his ancestors. Even the simplest American feels a thrill when a researcher digs up his "family tree" and unearths his "coat of arms", and finds far back along the line, perhaps, a king! The farther back he goes the more exciting it becomes. Here is a small, not-to-far-back study of the family tree of our American Square Dance.

Dancing is the oldest of the arts. Only one other art, the art of architecture, goes back nearly so far into man's past. And dancing is probably older than his attempt to build a shelter for his family, for we know that primitive tribes have become expert dancers long before they have bothered to build what we would call houses. Dancing was a fine art before it was a folk art, and a religious and ritualistic performance long before it became a recreational art. It is only quite recently in the history of mankind that all of the the people, if they chose, could join in the dance. And, as for women, there was a vast majority of dances in which they might not join at all, and there were some that they might not even see.

Historically, dance seems to have reached its low point during the days of the classical Greece. There it was looked upon as an ignoble activity. Aristotle was supposed to have said: No citizen shall be active in these arts (music and dancing), but shall leave it to the slaves, the released slaves and the strangers. The great Roman Cicero said : No one shall dance, except he might be drunken or mentally disorientated. Italy saw the return of dancing during the 15th century, but France may be said to be the Mother of the modern art. Many of our dance terms show this French connection, in square dancing too. Calls like dos-a-dos, which can be described as back-to-back, and allemand can't hide their French origin.

In a little study like this one, we cannot take time nor space to go back very far into the past. Let us decide that we shall travel back about 500 years. And let us prune out, before we start, the many tiny twigs that clutter the remote branches of the family tree. Let us reduce our story to approximations!

First something about the main author. There is no one we know is better qualified to take you on a guided tour through the fascinating past of square dancing than the author Dorothy Stott Shaw. Mrs. Shaw and her husband, Dr. Lloyd "Pappy" Shaw, became the centre of the rebirth of the great square dance movement in the 1930's. For many years the leaders in square dancing have sought out the Shaws at their home in Colorado Springs for guidance, philosophy, history and encouragement. From their great storehouse of information, Mrs. Shaw has gathered the special gems that fill these pages. It is her hope, and ours too, that they will serve to enrich your enjoyment of this great activity.