So You Think You Can Dance, S5 Top 20 + eliminations

[oyceter]

Instead of catching up on the bazillion book write ups I am behind on, I watch lots of TV! (Ooooo! You can actually watch it online now! Nice.)

Spoilers

cryptoxin commented about past seasons' racial diversity a while back; I'll be interested to see how it holds.

So far, I counted 5 men of color (Ade, Jason, Kupono, Brandon, Vitolio) and 3 women of color (Asuka, Karla, Janette), although I might have missed some POC. I'm not sure why there always seem to be more MOC than women. It seems like in past seasons, it was because they were getting the MOC from hip hop, but this year, both hip hoppers are white and I think all the MOC are contemporary dancers.

Still have all the same gender problems as before, along with the commentary re: hip hop. I'm also not quite sure what to think about the Bollywood routine. On the one hand, I'm glad the choreographer stayed on. On the other, am still horribly irritated by the names for the mudras, the judges going on and on about the "costumes" (as opposed to "outfits"), the "Namaste" at the end of the intro clip, and etc. Also, I'm not sure if I wish they were doing more traditional Indian dance or not. On the one hand, hopefully people would take it more seriously in terms of cultural import. On the other, they might mess it up worse. I also wish they had a judge who knew more about Indian dance judging; I don't know anything, but I feel like Caitlin was sloppier than Jason, and no one mentioned that. Then again, the judges were definitely going easy on people this week. I'm also hoping they'll bring in Indian classical dancers during one of the results shows.

I am somewhat less psyched about Brandon now than I was during auditions. On the other hand, I loved Vitolio's solo tonight, think Jason and Kupono are horribly cute, and was really happy to see Ade, whom I didn't feel got much screentime in auditions. I also think Jonathan is cute, although I'm less sold on Max. The macho male Latin dancer thing tends to not work for me. I'm kind of sad Tony didn't get another chance, but I felt he was more boring than the rest.

For the women, I haven't formed as much of an impression, save for the Latin dancers. I, uh, am slightly confusing all the contemporary dancers, although I'm super glad there's a ballet dancer and that she's older! Not much, given that it's the dance world, but still. And I think one of the women was disabled and mentioned one leg was numb? I'm just really sad about the lack of black women this year though. And there are a LOT of contemporary dancers this year overall!

Comments

[inkstone]

The Bollywood performance was the only one I caught the other night and I thought it was not... as good as the judges made it out to be. They weren't in sync and the woman was definitely sloppy.

[quivo]

I second this. Jason was much stronger than Caitlin.

Also, the way they made fun of the hand movements annoyed me no end.

[wingstodust]

Also, the way they made fun of the hand movements annoyed me no end.

WORD. ><"

[wingstodust]

I just started picking up reality tv and SYTYCD this season, and I'm still not quite sure who I'm rooting. I definitely am in love with Kupono though. He's almost criminally cute. (THE LIST. ZOMG SO CUTE. also the dancing)

However, while watching the solos, I blinked and was like "Is that Asuka singing TO BoA?!" Kinda surreal, seeing j/k-pop superstar music on an American show.

[crypto]

So far, I counted 5 men of color (Ade, Jason, Kupono, Brandon, Vitolio) and 3 women of color (Asuka, Karla, Janette), although I might have missed some POC.

I'd guess that Jonathan is probably Latino, and I read Phillip Chbeeb as being of Arab/Middle Eastern descent.

I wasn't sure what to think of the Bollywood routine either. My limited context for Bollywood comes mainly from losing hours at a time watching Youtube videos, so it still feels unusual to me to see SYTYCD routines with just two people on stage and neither of them lipsyncing to the vocals.

I kind of wish that they hadn't used Jai Ho for a Bollywood routine, and went with a less obvious or familiar choice. It would be great for a future show if they had a Bollywood routine choreographed to a hip hop song, which might deflate or at least complicate the potential framing of these routines as exotic spectacle/cultural tourism.

[oyceter]

It... well, I felt Jason did very well, at least as far as I could tell. Especially with how crisp and snappy his movements were. Then again, I don't know if they're supposed to look like that or not. I also think he was much faster in the knee bending action (going from squatting positions back upright and etc), which was very impressive! My quads hurt just looking at it...

[oyceter]

He is so cute! I am so mad at the judges for calling him feminine and making him shave his hair!

Oh, I totally forgot to comment in the audition post, but I'm still mad at the judges for being so homophobic about the same-sex Latin dancers. I thought they were awesome, and I loved the mixing of lead/follow. Also, it's really freaking hard to be good at both leading and following!

heee! I completely missed the JPop.

[oyceter]

Yeah, I was thinking Jonathan was as well, but I couldn't find confirmation! I hadn't read that for Phillip, but I also don't remember much of his screentime...

*nods* Yeah. I mean, I'm glad they pointed out that they had Bollywood prior to Slumdog, but still. This is why I'm conflicted about "Bollywood" style (Deepa had a good point in my older post on how they basically just made that name for the dancing up) vs. having Indian classical dance. If it's more ... non-exoticized, I'd hope there would be less of the cultural tourism factor, but I'm also worried that it goes the route of "But they're appropriating from us TOO!" Although I think I would be a fan of seeing a Bollywood routine that wasn't in a "costume."

[wingstodust]

Argh yes! The judges are really hung up about their guys being all "masculine" and whatnot, eh? Was it like that in the other seasons as well? And I LIKED Kupono's hair. ToT

Oh gosh yes, when that happened I was so angry! The judges were so hung up on two men touching each other. Seriously, it was like kindergarten again with the whole touching cooties thing, except it's between those of the same sex now. ><" It was just totally ridiculous. And how they couldn't accept that you can mix up the lead/follow bit, and were all confused. Actually, I was also really angry about how the producers decided to show their auditions as well, like we should find it FUNNY that there are same-sex dancing couples who are doing the samba (sp?) together. It was deliberate mockery, and just ARGH. x.x

I dunno if I'm right thinking this, but while watching the show, I felt like there was this whole restriction on the dance moves that men can do. Like, they can ONLY be powerful and "masculine" or something. I get this feeling, (mostly from the interviews and when the judges ask the guy dancers if their family supports them, what did they think of their son dancing as oppose to doing sports, etc) that it's because there's this whole "effeminate" impression thing on guys dancing, where it's considered a "feminine" thing to pursue, and it's like they're trying to get rid of this impression by getting their male dancers to dance as "manly" as possible, not allowing a trace of "feminine" moves in their dances at all. And, I dunno, aren't they going at a completely wrong way about it? Why not instead promote an atmosphere where we lessen these restricting gender expectations? Or... something. (Sorry, I actually am not a dancer, so I am most likely getting many things wrong)

It's just, I think, with this whole atmosphere where people are trying to dispel the whole feminine aspect of dance by showing how manly their male dancers can be, it makes it really easy and, if I dare say, even facilitates the whole homophobic atmosphere, and that kind of environment is toxic for any male dancers who are gay.

lol, like I said though, I don't have any formal training in dance at all, and by basing all these impressions on a reality tv show of all things, I'm bound to get things really wrong. =/

lol I loved the jpop and hollywood collision moment, it was almost surreal. >D

[crypto]

I'm going on physical appearance and last names for Jonathan and Phillip, so I could be off, and I have no idea how they would identify themselves. I was thinking about this with respect to Janette, too. I was just talking with a colleague who is ethnically Cuban, and ambivalent about identifying as a person of color because she's generally viewed as white, including by other Latinos.

In SYTYCD terms, I saw "Bollywood" as analogous to "Broadway" -- more a kind of overall routine, rather than a specific dance style like Quickstep or Viennese Waltz. But a) maybe I'm just making that distinction up in my head, and b) even if I'm not, that doesn't mean the producers & judges view it that way. And the SYTYCD cultural appropriation issues can get so layered and messy. For instance, on the Australian version, there was one group dance that mixed together costumes that seemed "inspired" by (IIRC) Australian Aboriginal people, Mayans, and some kind of movie version of African tribal! *headdesk*

So I agree that it would be great if they didn't go with the "costume" approach for their next Bollywood routines.

[oyceter]

I'm also not very knowledgeable about the dance world (I Lindy and know a little of some other partnered dances, but have zero knowledge outside that or of dance theory). But I think you are very right about the feeling that male dancers must be super masculine, at least on network TV. Past seasons of SYTYCD had this huge focus on the guys ogling their female partners (you can already see it starting with Evan's comments about Randi), especially when it comes to dances like salsa.

coniraya has mentioned a lot to me how the show has this need to reinforce heterosexuality and gender roles; you always get things on the guys "admiring" the girls' bodies and etc. Ditto with how the partnerships that go all the way to the final episode are always male-female. I really love watching the male-male and female-female dances in the finale, but I wish they would have more throughout. And in the finale dances, the guys almost always get a much better dance, imo. They get to put a lot more power into it, probably because the choreographers don't want them to read as gay. The women tend to get stuff on being girls or mothers or sexy or whatever, which so annoys me (though apparently the s1 finale female-female dance was awesome).

So... I don't know how these stereotypes work in the dance world. I know in Lindy, it is considered to be a really cool thing if you can both lead and follow, so same-sex dancing is usually admired, because it means at least one person knows both roles. And there's rhetoric about gender != lead or follow. But the majority of it still falls out that way, so even when you get same-sex dancing, the assumption and admiration is all based on the fact that we expect men to be leads first and women to be follows first. I haven't seen the same attitude in ballroom though. And I have zero idea about contemporary or ballet or etc.

But yeah. I totally agree with you re: the sexism and homophobia in the show, which so bugs me, even though I love the dancing and the relative diversity of the cast.

[wingstodust]

The women tend to get stuff on being girls or mothers or sexy or whatever

... ><"
This kind of makes me nervous about seeing the finale. Bah...
So we get worse comments than the ones we heard from Evan about Randi so far? Great, just great. Perhaps I should just skip all backstage commentary from now on or something. *sighs*

Interesting. I'm starting to get really curious about how much gender roles play out in the dance world. I tried looking up stuff on Google but (obviously) didn't get as much details as I would have liked. lol guess it's time to hit the library...

Yes, it's a real shame about the sexism and homophobia, because I like the idea of this reality show looking for a "well-rounded" dancer who can dance in multiple styles. It makes for a varied performance to watch, with all these different styles, anyhow. I guess there is some diversity in this cast but I dunno, it still kinda feels like "Oh, and the one or two token asian chicks". But then again, I'm going through the old seasons of America's Best Dance Crew while watching SYTYCD and I guess ABDC just spoiled me for choice in terms of POC cast. ^^;

[oyceter]

So we get worse comments than the ones we heard from Evan about Randi so far?

*sigh* ohhhh yeeaaaaahhh.... I think last year, it was Gev who was always filmed as putting his hands on his partner's ass (choreographed, yes, but there was a lot of salacious commentary and he eyebrow wiggled and etc.). And there are always jokes like that in the previous seasons I remember as well. It annoys the hell out of me. I do still watch backstage commentary to try and figure out who is POC or not, but sometimes it just pisses me off.

Hrm. I don't know, although I'm sure there's a good amount of dance theory that touches on gender and performance. I feel like Deepa recced me some a while back, and I forgot. Brenda Dixon Gottschild has a book I read on the black dancing body that was about black women's sexuality and race; I really liked it and have been meaning to look for more dance theory since. But a lot of the dance theory may be on classical or contemporary; Deepa's mentioned snobbery in the dance community re: social dances and Gottschild definitely talks about the devaluing of African-associated dance traditions in favor of European-derived ones.

ABDC will definitely do that! I need to catch up on old seasons, esp. the one with Dominic and Hok from SYTYCD!

[oyceter]

Re: cultural appropriation: Yaaaaai! Ugh, that reminds me of last season when they did African jazz. ARGH!

Yeah, I was thinking the same re: Janette as well. On the other hand, I do not want to play POC police, particularly when there are POC who can pass and how passing is never a simple issue.

[wingstodust]

Brenda Dixon Gottschild, eh? Will definitely check out her stuff. lol if you remember any of the titles Deepa recced, please do let me know.

Hok from Quest Crew? Man that dance group is awesome. >D

[oyceter]

Yup, that Hok! I so need to watch it!