So for the past few years I have heard about this hot new dance craze called krumping. I honestly had no idea what it was, but I am a dancer, so of course I was interested. The first time I heard about krumping was when I was at a wedding shower and my cousin Kali showed everyone her krumping skills. I honestly thought it was kind of crazy looking, but at the same time she did look kind of hardcore, so I wanted to learn more about it. She told me to type “krumping” into Youtube, so I did. I didn’t know whether to be impressed or weirded out by this dance style.
On “So You Think You Can Dance,” a popular TV show, I say them do a few krump numbers and a krumper even won a season of the show. I saw what he was doing and I’ve decided to try it, but it is definitely intense. I have always wondered where this type of dancing came from.
It turns out krumping started out in the nineties in the more ghetto areas. Troubled teens started to use krumping to express themselves. It is a street dance kind of related to hip hop and break dancing, but with stronger movements and more intensity. It turns out krumping is used as an alternative from actually hurting people. Instead of getting into a dangerous knife fight, teenagers well have a dance battle. It sounds like a wussy way of doing things, but krumping is a very violent dance and is performed to rapid, fast-paced rap or hip-hop music.
Krumping is unique because there are no rules. Dancers just use their bodies to express themselves in a healthy way, and everyone does their own thing. Krumping is good for teens because is it is an alternative to violence, it is good exercise, and it gives them confidence for the street cred they get from winning a dance battle.
I guess I was pretty wrong about krumping. I thought it was crazy and weird, but it really has an art to it and beneficial to society by giving our troubled teenagers something to do that is actually kind of productive and helping them to stay out of trouble.
Works Cited
“The Life and Art of Krumping.” Krumping. October 2009. Web. 28 Oct. 2010
Krumping definitely sounds really dirty. That's nice to to know that it's not.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I always wondered what krumping was and assumed it was just another form of dirt dancing. But that's really cool to learn that it started out as a healthier, safer form of teenage expression. Dance battles are an awesome alternative to violent fights...
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