Breakdancing or breaking, also called b-boying (when performed by men) or b-girling (when performed by women), is a style of street dance developed by African Americans and Puerto Ricans in the Bronx borough of New York City.
Breakdancing consists mainly of four kinds of movement—toprock, footwork, power moves, and freezes—and is typically set to songs containing drum breaks, especially in funk, soul, and hip-hop. Its modern dance elements originated among the poor youth of New York during the 1970s and early 1980s. It is tied to the birth of hip-hop, whose DJs played songs featuring rhythmic breaks for dancers.
The dance form has expanded globally, with an array of organizations and independent competitions supporting its growth. Breaking became an Olympic sport at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, as per a December 7, 2020 decision by the International Olympic Committee, after a proposal by the World DanceSport Federation.
Terminology Breaking has interchangeably been called "breaking", "b-boying", "b-girling", and "breakdancing", but many in the culture prefer not to use "breakdancing." They argue that the original practitioners of the dance used breaking, and that breakdancing was used by the media to commercialize the dance.Johnson, Imani Kai. "Hip-Hop Dance." The Cambridge Companion to Hip-Hop. Ed. Justin A. Williams. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. 22–31. However, many still use "breakdancing" due to its popularity. Breakdancing is also inaccurately used as an umbrella term to describe other funk styles like popping or locking. Major competitions like The Olympics, Red Bull BC One, and World Breaking Classic use the term "breaking".
There are several contradictory explanations of where the term "breaking" came from. One of the most common is that it refers to the drum "breaks" in songs that are commonly looped in breaking music. However, early practitioners say that 'breaking' came from a slang term used by African Americans in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In The Freshest Kids, DJ Kool Herc says: Several other original breakers support this origin of the term.
The terms "b-boy" and "b-girl" were coined by DJ Kool Herc to describe dancers who came to his parties. These terms that would later spread to describe breakers in general and eventually to describe people influenced by hip hop culture.
History
Influences Many elements developed into breaking long before the 1970s. Michael Holman writes that West African dances performed by slaves, such as Juba, introduced the cipher — a circle of dancers where each dancer takes a turn to dance — and an enduring element of competition into early African American dance. After Irish immigrants started arriving in the United States in the 1850s, African Americans combined Juba dance with the Irish Jig to develop Tap Dance. According to Holman, Tap dance has "connections with all the other dances that eventually did evolve into breaking."
According to dance researcher Harri Heinilä, "It has been clear that the 'Breakdance' and other Hip Hop-related dances at the very least resemble or even were inherited from earlier African American dances, which have been collectively called jazz dance" The jazz/tap connection is corroborated by The Legendary Twins, early breakers who directly cite jazz dance figures like the Nicholas Brothers as inspiration for their developments and popularized jazz movements like the sweep.
When many of the early Bronx breakers were asked to name the first bboy, they responded with "James Brown" Brown's music and dance were the embodiment of black pride, self-expression, and individuality which stood out to pioneers like Kool Herc. In interviews, Herc said "I was listening to American music in Jamaica and my favorite artist was James Brown, "
Capoeira and breaking share several moves. Some claim that capoeira and breaking share a common African origin, while others claim a direct connection. However, several early breakers deny the possibility of direct influence. Since capoeira was present in New York around this time, the connection remains unclear.
Early breakers Richard "Crazy Legs" Colon and Kenneth "Ken Swift" Gabbert cite James Brown and Kung Fu films (notably Bruce Lee films) as influences. Many of the acrobatic moves, such as the flare, show clear connections to gymnastics.
Kool Herc and Early Breaking Clive "Kool Herc" Campbell is often credited as the founder of hip hop, and while people were breaking before his parties, he was a central figure in the early development of the dance, and he is credited with taking breaking out of the underground and into public spaces.
Before Kool Herc was a DJ he regularly went dancing at local clubs, house parties, and community centers in the Bronx that were predominantly attended by African American teens. One of the most popular of these clubs was the Plaza Tunnel, in the basement of the Concourse Plaza Hotel. Young dancers would dance irreverently at parties like these in ways that were called "freestyling", "going off", "burning", or "breaking".
These parties also introduced key breaking moves like the "pin drop" or "knee drop", and emphasized core values of uniqueness and individuality that are still prized in breaking. They included burning, a competitive dance that both males and females would take part in where they acted out insults or attacks towards each other. This part of the dance would later be known as battling.
Herc's approach to DJing was based in his background as a dancer at these parties. He wanted to improve upon the mixes other DJ's would play in ways that would make people more excited to dance. This commitment to playing music for breakers spawned innovations in music choice and turntable techniques that would make his events popular.
On August 11, 1973 Cindy Campbell threw a back to school party to raise money to buy schoolclothes. She asked Kool Herc, her older brother, to DJ. The location was the rec room of an apartment building on 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the Bronx, which is now sometimes called the "birthplace of hip hop".
This party was such a success that the siblings continued renting out the room on an almost monthly basis, eventually filling up the courtyard. By 1975, the parties had grown so big that Herc had to rent out local dance halls instead.
As Herc's parties continued, he noticed that the breakers were waiting until the percussive drum breaks in the songs to do their most exciting moves. After about two years of throwing parties, Herc took several records with these drum fills and played them back to back, creating an extended section of the party just for breakers filled with songs like "Apache" by the Incredible Bongo Band, "The Mexican" by Babe Ruth, and "Yellow Sunshine" by Yellow Sunshine. This section of the party was a hit, and people started coming just to see the dancers.
Several core movements from breaking developed at this time: The two step toprock was developed at Herc's parties as a way of making space before starting to break. The Legendary Twins also developed the first uses of extended footwork at these parties, taking breaking to the floor, while Cholly Rock and Pow Wow built on this footwork by doing fast rotations on the hands and feet now called "Zulu Spins".
Cultural Expansion, Rock Steady Crew, and Mainstream Adoption In the late 1970s, DJs like Grandmaster Flash had begun looping just the breaks in the songs, spurring a new style of breaking where dancers emphasized more acrobatic moves and extended floor work as top rocking became less important and receded into the background.
It was around this time when Latinos, especially Puerto Ricans, started learning the dance from its African American practitioners after breaking parties started being held outside. At this time, a lot of the original African American practitioners were ageing out of the dance or moving onto other dances. The formation of Rock Steady Crew was a good example of the racial integration and generational changes of this era. It formed when Jimmy Dee, an African American bboy, and Jimmy Lee, a Latino bboy formed a crew to keep the Rock (the dance) steady (alive).
Rock Steady Crew was soon passed down to Richard "Crazy Legs" Colon, who moved to Manhattan and expanded the crew by battling others in the area. Rock Steady Crew met photographer Henry Chalfant, who was interested in breaking through its connections to graffiti. He started running events with Rock Steady performing, and in 1981, invited Rock Steady to battle the Dynamic Rockers at Lincoln Center, which garnered major attention from major news sources like ABC News and the New York Times.
Soon after, Michael Holman started regularly inviting Rock Steady to battle the New York City Breakers at his hip hop nightclub, the Negril, where they danced alongside celebrities and built city wide reputation. In 1982, Rock Steady Crew got a part dancing in the movie Flashdance, which propelled breaking and Rock Steady to worldwide fame.
Breaking "hit the West Coast with a fury in '82" after Flashdance. Crews like the Shake City Rockers and Air Force crew emerged. These West Coast crews innovated spinning and power moves to their more modern forms. Many of the first LA breakers started at the Radiotron community center, which became a hub for west coast hip hop. Breaking would become so popular, it was featured at performances like the 1984 LA Olympics, providing people worldwide with their first experience of breaking.
Return to the Underground and International Resurgence Breaking was considered a fad and by 1986, breaking had largely faded from public consciousness as many dancers quit or moved on. However the dance spread internationally to countries like Japan, Germany, France and Canada through movies featuring breaking and breakers from New York touring internationally. Few people continued practicing the dance during these years, and it took years of slow development for scenes to reform and reconnect with one another.
In 1991 the first international breaking competition, Battle of the Year, was held in Hanover Germany. Battle of the Year, along with more international competitions like BBoy Summit and Freestyle Session brought new energy and motivation to the scene in the 1990s. Crews began to redevelop independently around the world. These new dancers traded VHS tapes and traveled across countries to dance and trade knowledge with one another as the dance reached new heights of popularity towards the late 1990s.
Major competitions
Battle of the Year (BOTY) was founded in 1990 by Thomas Hergenröther in Germany. It is the first and largest international breakdancing competition for breakdance crews. BOTY holds regional qualifying tournaments in several countries such as Zimbabwe, Japan, Israel, Algeria, Indonesia, and the Balkans. Crews who win these tournaments go on to compete in the final championship in Montpellier, France. BOTY was featured in the independent documentary Planet B-Boy (2007) that filmed five dance crews training for the 2005 championship. A 3D film Battle of the Year was released in January 2013. It was directed by Benson Lee who also directed Planet B-Boy.