The Role Of Disco Dancing In The 1960's

They saw it as a night to dress up and meet new people to get higher on the social ladder. The other people that were drawn to disco were Gays, Hispanic and also African Americans because it brought them freedom as well as self-actualization.
Gays were one of the first population that was with disco since it began from the first disco club was open. The Hispanics, mostly Puerto Ricans and Cubans brought along their couple dance traditions to disco. The Hispanics kept the tradition of Bandstand-style swing alive from the 1950’s throughout the 60’s. “The structure, step patterns and figures of disco Hustle are all essentially the same as 1950s American teen jitterbug/bop, which had been mothballed for a decade. However the music was new, as was a more upright walking style, which gave this form of swing an entirely different look and feeling.”(Powers).
After the influence the Hispanics had on disco by add couple dancing, both solo and coupled dancing were used in the Disco Era. The first eight years coupled disco dancing was very popular but that changed during 1978. “…To quote Maria Torres, a disco dancer from NYC, "The thing which really killed partner dancing was Saturday Night Fever. It was originally an underground dance, done mainly by Hispanics, blacks and gays, who could really do partner dancing. They were incredible, but that was an underground thing. Then when Saturday Night Fever came out, the masses flocked to the clubs to experience what they saw in the movie. But what they thought the Hustle was was freestyle, because that's what John Travolta did.”(Powers). Although some people still did couple disco dancing it had been overshadowed by freestyle solo disco dancing for the last two years of the disco craze. Dances that also had an influence on disco dancing were the Mambo & the