The ability to move and express through street dance styles rooted in hip-hop music and culture. Covers bounce, groove, and isolation through battle competition, choreography creation, and cultural contribution.
Hip-hop dance is a street dance culture born in 1970s New York, encompassing breaking, popping, locking, krumping, and choreography-based hip-hop. Starting from synchronizing your body to the beat and groove of hip-hop music, it expands into freestyle in cyphers, battle competition, choreography creation, and workshop instruction. Beyond technical mastery, this guide values understanding and respect for hip-hop culture, developing personal flavor, and contributing to the community.
You are taking your first steps into hip-hop dance. You can recognize the drum beat and bassline in hip-hop music and attempt to bounce (riding the rhythm up and down), but your body feels stiff and often falls out of sync. You follow along with basic grooves like the two-step and rock, and begin to understand 8-count structure. This is when you first become aware that hip-hop dance includes distinct styles such as breaking, popping, locking, and hip-hop choreography.
Defines official competition rules and judging criteria (technique, vocabulary, performance, musicality, creativity) for Olympic breaking, used to calibrate battle and competition competency boundaries at Levels 4-6.
Provides the competitive structure and judging standards of top-tier hip-hop dance battles and events, referenced for designing battle and performance competency checklists at upper levels.
A foundational text documenting the history and evolution of hip-hop culture, referenced for contextualizing the cultural dimensions of hip-hop dance and designing cultural contribution competencies at upper levels.
