Strength in numbers: B-girls, gender identities and hip-hop education

Abstract

Abstract This article examines the experiences of females in local, community breaking (dance) programmes. The Toronto B-Girl Movement is a series of programmes offering lessons in breaking led by KeepRockinYou, an arts collective of women. Through ethnographic methods, researchers considered what motivates novice b-girls to take up breaking and what their experience of the scene and programme are. Building on the seminal work about gender performativity (Butler 1990), popular music education and gender (Green 1997), and female-led spaces (Björck 2011), we argue that novice b-girls do not necessarily identify their dance practice as resistant, empowering or ‘badass’ (Johnson 2014), instead these discourses are learned, performed and/or rejected. We suggest that intergenerational exchanges between women are productive in facilitating social rewards for new dancers (friendships, access to codes and conventions of hip-hop culture, mentorship and moral support). A growing number of females participating in the hip-hop scene locally is one result.