This just in: the-toast.net is listening in to our phone conversations! How else would they know that I was raving about Misty Copeland just yesterday?
Life Pro Tip: Check out A Ballerina’s Tale on Netflix. Super good.
msdominiqueg+8
I decided to watch A Ballerina’s Tale before work one day last week and surprised myself by crying – I was so happy for her. She is amazing!
Katiezog+4
Watched it last weekend and it was amazing! I really want to go see her dance now.
thebeagee+24
In terms of ballet docs that feature dancers of color, I also recommend “First Position” on Netflix. It’s about kids going through the youth ballet competitions to get scholarships and it features another awesome black woman dancer, Michaela DePrince, when she was just a teen.
quellthesparkle+6
I love that one too!
Apollonia+2
Oh my god, that was amazing! Michaela did a TedTalk that was really great too. What an incredible story.
Elizabeth+2
I actually was confused by it. The documentary jumps from her entering the ABT at about 17 and notes she had challenges that she resolved and then suddenly jumps to her at 29 when she started to get big but then had an injury. What happened in between?
lordpuddleglum+35
Misty Copeland is my biggest crush in the entire world. No one should be that talented of a dancer and then have such a beautiful speaking voice, and come off as such a nice, thoughtful person. It’s really not fair!
crawlkill+15
doesn’t ballet burn people out suuuper fast and ravage performers’ bodies a bit? I don’t know where I get that information from so what do I know
thebeagee+54
There are actually some performers that have continued dancing into their 40s. And even after retirement, often they will teach, choreograph, and perform “character” roles (such as older characters) on stage. It really depends on the dancer, how they manage their body, their history of injuries, etc. Don’t get me wrong, it is both an art and a hardcore athletic activity, but it doesn’t necessarily completely destroy you.
mbculver+33
Thank you for writing such a nice and mature answer. I was going to respond with something very sarcastic, but now I won’t because you’ve said what I wanted to say, but politely. 🙂
thebeagee+21
I mean, there are plenty of ballerinas who have had babies and after maternity leave went right back to dancing and pregnancy is pretty hard on a body, too.
crawlkill+2
is not knowing about ballet a thing worthy of a sarcastic reply?
mbculver+3
It’s worthy of sarcasm when instead of just saying you don’t know anything about an activity and attempting to learn more, you make generalizations that imply it’s a horrible thing to do. As thebeagee said, it depends on the dancer, and many thrive after they retire.
blushingflower+39
I mean, ballet is a very physically demanding art form, just like any dance discipline, and the pointe shoes add an extra layer in terms of the abuse that your body takes. There is a lot of pressure in ballet to have a very specific body type, which can lead to a lot of disordered eating, which certainly often leads to people quitting. Per Wikipedia, Misty’s been with ABT since 2000 and was promoted to soloist in 2007, before being promoted to principal in 2015, so that’s not exactly burning out super fast. I think it’s comparable to being a professional athlete in that it’s very physical and one injury can end your career in a way that it wouldn’t if you’re an office worker.
rhymeswitheight+23
The comparison to pro sports sounds spot on to me. Ballet dancers have gnarly feet, and my friend who trains for marathons has no toenails! (ugh lol weeping silently)
Something I love about Misty Copeland is you can see how intense these movements are. Ballerinas are supposed to make it look easy and effortless, which is beautiful for sure. But Misty Copeland … not that it seems like she’s slogging through each move, but you can see the athleticism and strength. She looks powerful.
houblonchouffe+10
Not all marathoners lose their toenails! I have never (touch wood) lost a toenail! (It’s a combination of the right shoes, the right socks, and obsessive toenail trimming. Also not doing what my dumb brother does, which is curl his toes up while he’s running so he ends up hitting the tips of his toes with every step, LOL NO TOENAILS FOR YOOOOOOU)
daisicles+4
I sometimes get the impression that it’s also some of the specific elements of ballet (whether choreography-wise or visuals-wise) favored by one company or another that can also lead to burnout or injury, rather than ballet as a whole alone.
I could be completely wrong, of course, and ballet absolutely is physically demanding regardless. But it feels like it could (and is?) less so, if that makes sense.
alder_tree+11
It can. There’s a HUGE number of factors that go into this–how good their teachers were, definitely; but some of it is just gonna be genetics.
But that’s true of any physically difficult activity. Some people find that running causes knee injuries bad enough that they have to quit, and some keep running marathons into their sixties.
austinmcarter+16
According to my extensive knowledge of ballet, 99% of which I learned from Flowers in the Attic and to a greater extent Petals on the Wind (1% of which I learned from BSC’s Jessie), yes and no.
I know I’m not the only Toastie to have spent many hours thinking through the knotty relationship of Cathy and Julian (and Madame Marisha), right?
Apollonia+6
Your references are solid and uncontestable.
yourmom2500+1
It depends on the company too! Some of them have historically been pretty brutal, though there have been lots of improvements the last couple decades. And most have always taken extremely good care of their dancers!!
fridog+10
She makes it look so easy and graceful. I could watch her forever, in the least creepy way.
aehackett+49
What gets me isn’t the insane poses she hits but the process of actually getting to that pose, where you can see her muscles like. . . unfolding her body. Just DAMN.
RudyRed+9
THOSE QUADS! THOSE CALVES! It’s unbelievable.
aehackett+10
I KNOW RIGHT. It’s like her muscles have muscles.
crystabrittany+7
And the shoulders, yo! When she has her arms curved down in front of her – DAMN girl.
mbculver+51
Seeing Misty’s rise to fame has made me JUST SO HAPPY. She is bringing ballet to new audiences, and making it a more exciting and dynamic art form at the same time. Ballet – not just for old rich white people!
thebeagee+38
I love how active she’s been in setting up programs to get non-white, non-rich kids access to training starting at a young age. That’s such a big part of the struggle to diversify ballet: who gets access to training.
Thujaplicata+78
I admit I had no idea she was 5’2″. I just assumed from the amazing power of everything she did that was was actually about 6 feet tall.
Smitty+21
Whaaaaaaat? That is crazy. I learned a few years ago that Beyonce is only 5’6″ – same height as me, and I ain’t no Beyonce. :-/
houblonchouffe+7
[sigh]
<3
houblonchouffe+28
her MUSCLES
Jungle_Red+89
Longtime mute Toastie here; username created to say that Misty is as remarkably nice and as generous as she seems. [This is, um, not always the case with very successful professional ballet dancers.] After an ABT rehearsal at the Kennedy Center last month, she met with my sister’s Anacostia elementary students and they were completely in awe. She is doing amazing things to be an epic role model for young black girls.
rhymeswitheight+16
Camping out here to talk about any and all ballet-related media. (I went through a phase of devouring lots of really cheesy YA dance novels, after reading a couple great ballet books, and was disappointed. But I couldn’t stop.)
Has anyone else read Misty Copeland’s autobiography? I thought it was excellent — also, damn, her life!!! She has had some shit! Very excited to watch the PBS documentary about her. [heart eye emojis would go here had I the ability]
thebeagee+3
Any good ballet fiction recs? I’ve devoured a lot of ballet writing, but it’s all been either history-of-ballet books or collections of ballet narratives.
rhymeswitheight+3
I really liked Astonish Me by Maggie Shipstead and The Cranes Dance by Meg Howrey.
thebeagee+4
Thanks! *adds to library pull list*
rhymeswitheight+5
Woo! Also if you want something super dramatic and fun but not “literary” – Tiny Pretty Things is an outrageous and ridiculous (in a good way) YA ballet book. And the authors (two women of color!!) wrote a pretty diverse world, which I liked a lot.
mbculver+2
Seconding The Cranes Dance – very enjoyable, with interesting characters.
alder_tree+5
I’ve always wondered, though: why don’t ballet dancers wear sports bras? I find that much, uh, “movement,” to be really uncomfortable, and I’m not much more endowed than she is.
lrljhnsn+7
my experience: ballet doesn’t have a lot of jarring movements; even jumping starts and ends smoothly. i’m pretty busty and a leotard was always enough for me.
alder_tree+5
But like, even in this video, she’s bouncing in a way I would really dislike.
OncoMouse+13
I can’t speak for all ballet dancers, but I always wore bras especially designed to be worn (and invisible or at least difficult to see) underneath my leotards.
Aunty_M+7
I have an almost four-year-old niece who has been obsessed with music and dance since before she could walk (she would bob in time to the music on our laps when she was about six months old), and we have gotten her dance shoes and tutus and her mother is looking into ballet lessons… it is absolutely adorable to see and of course we’re all convinced she’s a prodigy, but my sister and I have talked about being a little worried about encouraging her to build up this dream when it seems like something that could be really punishing to her body and mental health when she’s older? We especially worry about it since if she’s anything like her mother or aunts she’ll probably be quite busty when she hits puberty. She is the light of my life and I get so worried about all the bullshit body image expectations she’ll have to face as a girl and a woman. Anyone with ballet experience have any insight?
SarahDances+21
I have some ballet, but mostly figure skating-based insight, which is I think pretty applicable. I find a lot of people have misconceptions about both dance and skating and the supposed “stage moms” who push their kids further than they should, but here is my advice:
1. Let your niece lead the way. If she wants to go full bore, then let her (within reason; it’s still your job as her family to make sure she’s getting the rest, nourishment, and life she needs), but there’s a lot of room for just enjoying the dance. Make it clear that you support her in becoming the dancer she wants to be, not necessarily the best in her class, or a professional.
2. Support her in learning to listen to her body. If she strains something, give her time to recover. If she comes home from class ravenous, let her eat as much as she needs. If she’s getting too run down, make sure she takes the time she needs to rest. Make it clear to her that she only gets one body, and keeping it healthy is way more important than attending every class, or getting that lead role, or being as skinny as all the other girls.
3. Listen without judgment as much as possible. I had some coaches pull some pretty messed up stuff with me, tilting into an eating disorder, but I kept the worst of it from my parents for fear that they’d make me quit. My mom, who was also always naturally very thin, was pretty harsh at times when I complained that my coaches always wanted me to lose more and more weight, because she thought I just wasn’t trying. Make sure she knows that you are on her side above all else, so she feels like she can talk to you when she’s struggling.
4. This is the tough one, but here goes. As she gets older, if her body starts to be an issue, it may not be a surmountable one. I know! It sucks! I feel like ballet tends to do a better job at being real with students about the fact that sometimes a professional career just isn’t in the cards. It’s a sad truth that in some cases, no matter how hard you work or how good you get, it just isn’t going to happen for reasons beyond your control. I’d like to think that some of this is changing, and we are starting to see more diversity in dance, but… well, I’m not totally optimistic. Again, all you can do is encourage her to be the best dancer she can be, and enjoy the dance for what it is. And when it stops being fun, it just may be time to stop.
Wow, this has been long, but… yeah. Basically, just make sure she knows you have her back, no matter what, and she’ll be fine.
sneepsnake+11
So I’m completely the wrong body type for ballet, and it was apparent even when I was young that this was the case. (Like, my mom is 5’9″ and my dad is 6’3″ and I was tall even when I was a kid, and sturdy, not ethereal. And once my boobs developed…well.) Anyway, my mom had all three of us kids (including my brother) in ballet from about the time we were 3 or 4 until we were around 10 or 11 – in other words, she pulled us out right at the time that girls go en pointe. I find that the early dance training has actually given me wonderful body awareness and control; it’s been 30 years or so since my last ballet class and I still am more aware of my body and how to make it do what I want it to do than most other people. My mom also made sure we were involved in other things so that ballet didn’t become a singular obsession. And we did stop ballet before the perilous teen years–that’s when a lot of the worst body bullshit happens from what I remember, although you get that in almost any sport.
alder_tree+9
My two-and-a-half years of ballet, that ended just as I turned twelve, gave me a wonderful sense of rhythm, a love of classical music, and the ability to learn other styles of dance (and yoga) faster than I would otherwise.
daisicles+12
I think when she’s young, a good supportive school would do wonders. Odds are tremendously against her being a professional anyway, but she could develop a lifelong love of ballet. I very much feel like approaching dance as a ‘yay, moving your body around is fun!’ thing when kids are still young is a good way to go about it. My dance school when I was a kid did that – it wouldn’t’ve been a good fit for the hardcore professionally-bound students after a certain age, but as an introduction to ballet and to other forms of dance and basic tumbling for kids just going for fun, it was perfect.
Different studios have different atmospheres and you’d just have to visit them to see what suits. My mother was very keen to avoid the competition schools, which is probably something to keep in mind even more now.
ETA: I should mention that I have always been fat and nobody at that school ever made me feel bad about my weight, even as the chubbiest kid in the room. Super-important!
Diana_monkey+15
Ballet has been a part of my life for 22 years at this point in time, minus a few years when I wasn’t dancing due to injury. It’s always been clear to me that my body isn’t right to dance professionally, and since I was pretty young, it has been clear to me that nothing I do to it will turn it into a ballerina body. So instead, it’s been an avocation, a creative outlet, an exercise, a way to build discipline and interact with other girls and women outside of school. I had some tough moments with it when I was in middle and high school, but I would say that my teachers were never demanding that my body be anything than what it was, and that, with guidance and the right environment, it can be really enriching. This isn’t to say that I’ve never looked in the mirror and been frustrated by what I saw back, and that I’ve never had body image problems, but I think that I would have those experiences as a woman and girl in middle class America regardless of my activities – and ballet was a constant way for me to remember that my body, even if it was shorter and stockier than I wanted it to be, with less turnout and shorter achilles tendons and lower arches and broader shoulders etc. etc. etc. – it could still hit a 180 degree split in the air with a smile on my face, or turn a triple pirouette.
rgmarcy+11
I studied ballet seriously–I wanted to be a professional dancer and then decided against pursuing it.
Even at a young age, even if it’s only recreational, it’s really important to find a school with good training. Bad instruction can be very damaging to the body. Unfortunately, there’s no real governing body for ballet schools in the United States, so quality varies considerably. But there are things you can look for, when selecting a school:
Reputable ballet schools often have “creative movement” or “pre-ballet” classes for young children, which emphasize musicality and coordination in a fun environment. Instruction in classical ballet might start around 7 or 8, when children are better prepared, physically and intellectually, to start that curriculum. A reputable school will also outline the curriculum and the normal progression through the levels. Basically, you should see evidence of actual pedagogy. Look up the teacher bios and research the schools they trained at, the companies they performed with, and any formal teacher training they may have. There are obviously more schools in cities, but there are good teachers in small towns too.
This might not be quite the information you were looking for, but I feel the need to emphasize it with anyone considering putting a kid in ballet! Ballet is strenuous. Bad training is damaging. Good training should nurture the student.
I also concur with all of SarahDances’s points, and I would add that ballet is like Olympic sports: it takes a lot of training, but it also takes a body that’s peculiarly adapted to a certain type of movement. Ballet was based on a package of traits that’s present in a minority of the population, including a flexible back, the ability to turn out from the hip, and arched feet. Obviously anyone can do ballet recreationally, and I think it has a number of benefits. But at the professional level, it’s a whole different ballgame.
There were definitely negative aspects to my experience, but I would say that ballet made me confident in my body’s abilities. Dance teaches you to take up space and assert your presence, and that’s really valuable.
Aunty_M+3
Thank you all so much for the feedback! We will definitely do a lot of research into wherever she goes for lessons, thanks for the tips on what to look for. And also daisicles made a good point that encouraging her to enjoy and seek out physical activity will pay dividends in her health in the future (I certainly wish I had learned at some point to see exercise as less of a chore). It is easy to overthink everything but it sounds like she could have a really good experience as long as the people who love her are mindful of its effect on her and her body.
mendedspeech+12
Since my baby boy with fibular hemimelia is totally into music and dancing lately, I put this on the teevee the other day, and we practiced bouncing along and balancing on one leg together. He was riveted during the various swan dances (death of, lake).
Bittersweet
Seconding The Cranes Dance – very enjoyable, with interesting characters.
outofnapkins+1
Nothing about this is not perfect.
Including the Simpsons nod. I was just thinking that quote to myself the other day.
EeMmBb
Wait… my toes naturally curve up (I have a hard time with shoes because of this), and I'm a newbie runner… are you saying I'm going to lose my toenails if I start running intensively??? Ah, maybe I'll just stay on the couch.
Bittersweet
It's worthy of sarcasm when instead of just saying you don't know anything about an activity and attempting to learn more, you make generalizations that imply it's a horrible thing to do. As thebeagee said, it depends on the dancer, and many thrive after they retire.
This just in: the-toast.net is listening in to our phone conversations! How else would they know that I was raving about Misty Copeland just yesterday?
Life Pro Tip: Check out A Ballerina’s Tale on Netflix. Super good.
I decided to watch A Ballerina’s Tale before work one day last week and surprised myself by crying – I was so happy for her. She is amazing!
Watched it last weekend and it was amazing! I really want to go see her dance now.
In terms of ballet docs that feature dancers of color, I also recommend “First Position” on Netflix. It’s about kids going through the youth ballet competitions to get scholarships and it features another awesome black woman dancer, Michaela DePrince, when she was just a teen.
I love that one too!
Oh my god, that was amazing! Michaela did a TedTalk that was really great too. What an incredible story.
I actually was confused by it. The documentary jumps from her entering the ABT at about 17 and notes she had challenges that she resolved and then suddenly jumps to her at 29 when she started to get big but then had an injury. What happened in between?
Misty Copeland is my biggest crush in the entire world. No one should be that talented of a dancer and then have such a beautiful speaking voice, and come off as such a nice, thoughtful person. It’s really not fair!
doesn’t ballet burn people out suuuper fast and ravage performers’ bodies a bit? I don’t know where I get that information from so what do I know
There are actually some performers that have continued dancing into their 40s. And even after retirement, often they will teach, choreograph, and perform “character” roles (such as older characters) on stage. It really depends on the dancer, how they manage their body, their history of injuries, etc. Don’t get me wrong, it is both an art and a hardcore athletic activity, but it doesn’t necessarily completely destroy you.
Thank you for writing such a nice and mature answer. I was going to respond with something very sarcastic, but now I won’t because you’ve said what I wanted to say, but politely. 🙂
I mean, there are plenty of ballerinas who have had babies and after maternity leave went right back to dancing and pregnancy is pretty hard on a body, too.
is not knowing about ballet a thing worthy of a sarcastic reply?
It’s worthy of sarcasm when instead of just saying you don’t know anything about an activity and attempting to learn more, you make generalizations that imply it’s a horrible thing to do. As thebeagee said, it depends on the dancer, and many thrive after they retire.
I mean, ballet is a very physically demanding art form, just like any dance discipline, and the pointe shoes add an extra layer in terms of the abuse that your body takes. There is a lot of pressure in ballet to have a very specific body type, which can lead to a lot of disordered eating, which certainly often leads to people quitting. Per Wikipedia, Misty’s been with ABT since 2000 and was promoted to soloist in 2007, before being promoted to principal in 2015, so that’s not exactly burning out super fast. I think it’s comparable to being a professional athlete in that it’s very physical and one injury can end your career in a way that it wouldn’t if you’re an office worker.
The comparison to pro sports sounds spot on to me. Ballet dancers have gnarly feet, and my friend who trains for marathons has no toenails! (ugh lol weeping silently)
Something I love about Misty Copeland is you can see how intense these movements are. Ballerinas are supposed to make it look easy and effortless, which is beautiful for sure. But Misty Copeland … not that it seems like she’s slogging through each move, but you can see the athleticism and strength. She looks powerful.
Not all marathoners lose their toenails! I have never (touch wood) lost a toenail! (It’s a combination of the right shoes, the right socks, and obsessive toenail trimming. Also not doing what my dumb brother does, which is curl his toes up while he’s running so he ends up hitting the tips of his toes with every step, LOL NO TOENAILS FOR YOOOOOOU)
I sometimes get the impression that it’s also some of the specific elements of ballet (whether choreography-wise or visuals-wise) favored by one company or another that can also lead to burnout or injury, rather than ballet as a whole alone.
I could be completely wrong, of course, and ballet absolutely is physically demanding regardless. But it feels like it could (and is?) less so, if that makes sense.
It can. There’s a HUGE number of factors that go into this–how good their teachers were, definitely; but some of it is just gonna be genetics.
But that’s true of any physically difficult activity. Some people find that running causes knee injuries bad enough that they have to quit, and some keep running marathons into their sixties.
According to my extensive knowledge of ballet, 99% of which I learned from Flowers in the Attic and to a greater extent Petals on the Wind (1% of which I learned from BSC’s Jessie), yes and no.
I know I’m not the only Toastie to have spent many hours thinking through the knotty relationship of Cathy and Julian (and Madame Marisha), right?
Your references are solid and uncontestable.
It depends on the company too! Some of them have historically been pretty brutal, though there have been lots of improvements the last couple decades. And most have always taken extremely good care of their dancers!!
She makes it look so easy and graceful. I could watch her forever, in the least creepy way.
What gets me isn’t the insane poses she hits but the process of actually getting to that pose, where you can see her muscles like. . . unfolding her body. Just DAMN.
THOSE QUADS! THOSE CALVES! It’s unbelievable.
I KNOW RIGHT. It’s like her muscles have muscles.
And the shoulders, yo! When she has her arms curved down in front of her – DAMN girl.
Seeing Misty’s rise to fame has made me JUST SO HAPPY. She is bringing ballet to new audiences, and making it a more exciting and dynamic art form at the same time. Ballet – not just for old rich white people!
I love how active she’s been in setting up programs to get non-white, non-rich kids access to training starting at a young age. That’s such a big part of the struggle to diversify ballet: who gets access to training.
I admit I had no idea she was 5’2″. I just assumed from the amazing power of everything she did that was was actually about 6 feet tall.
Whaaaaaaat? That is crazy. I learned a few years ago that Beyonce is only 5’6″ – same height as me, and I ain’t no Beyonce. :-/
[sigh]
<3
her MUSCLES
Longtime mute Toastie here; username created to say that Misty is as remarkably nice and as generous as she seems. [This is, um, not always the case with very successful professional ballet dancers.] After an ABT rehearsal at the Kennedy Center last month, she met with my sister’s Anacostia elementary students and they were completely in awe. She is doing amazing things to be an epic role model for young black girls.
Camping out here to talk about any and all ballet-related media. (I went through a phase of devouring lots of really cheesy YA dance novels, after reading a couple great ballet books, and was disappointed. But I couldn’t stop.)
Has anyone else read Misty Copeland’s autobiography? I thought it was excellent — also, damn, her life!!! She has had some shit! Very excited to watch the PBS documentary about her. [heart eye emojis would go here had I the ability]
Any good ballet fiction recs? I’ve devoured a lot of ballet writing, but it’s all been either history-of-ballet books or collections of ballet narratives.
I really liked Astonish Me by Maggie Shipstead and The Cranes Dance by Meg Howrey.
Thanks! *adds to library pull list*
Woo! Also if you want something super dramatic and fun but not “literary” – Tiny Pretty Things is an outrageous and ridiculous (in a good way) YA ballet book. And the authors (two women of color!!) wrote a pretty diverse world, which I liked a lot.
Seconding The Cranes Dance – very enjoyable, with interesting characters.
I’ve always wondered, though: why don’t ballet dancers wear sports bras? I find that much, uh, “movement,” to be really uncomfortable, and I’m not much more endowed than she is.
my experience: ballet doesn’t have a lot of jarring movements; even jumping starts and ends smoothly. i’m pretty busty and a leotard was always enough for me.
But like, even in this video, she’s bouncing in a way I would really dislike.
I can’t speak for all ballet dancers, but I always wore bras especially designed to be worn (and invisible or at least difficult to see) underneath my leotards.
I have an almost four-year-old niece who has been obsessed with music and dance since before she could walk (she would bob in time to the music on our laps when she was about six months old), and we have gotten her dance shoes and tutus and her mother is looking into ballet lessons… it is absolutely adorable to see and of course we’re all convinced she’s a prodigy, but my sister and I have talked about being a little worried about encouraging her to build up this dream when it seems like something that could be really punishing to her body and mental health when she’s older? We especially worry about it since if she’s anything like her mother or aunts she’ll probably be quite busty when she hits puberty. She is the light of my life and I get so worried about all the bullshit body image expectations she’ll have to face as a girl and a woman. Anyone with ballet experience have any insight?
I have some ballet, but mostly figure skating-based insight, which is I think pretty applicable. I find a lot of people have misconceptions about both dance and skating and the supposed “stage moms” who push their kids further than they should, but here is my advice:
1. Let your niece lead the way. If she wants to go full bore, then let her (within reason; it’s still your job as her family to make sure she’s getting the rest, nourishment, and life she needs), but there’s a lot of room for just enjoying the dance. Make it clear that you support her in becoming the dancer she wants to be, not necessarily the best in her class, or a professional.
2. Support her in learning to listen to her body. If she strains something, give her time to recover. If she comes home from class ravenous, let her eat as much as she needs. If she’s getting too run down, make sure she takes the time she needs to rest. Make it clear to her that she only gets one body, and keeping it healthy is way more important than attending every class, or getting that lead role, or being as skinny as all the other girls.
3. Listen without judgment as much as possible. I had some coaches pull some pretty messed up stuff with me, tilting into an eating disorder, but I kept the worst of it from my parents for fear that they’d make me quit. My mom, who was also always naturally very thin, was pretty harsh at times when I complained that my coaches always wanted me to lose more and more weight, because she thought I just wasn’t trying. Make sure she knows that you are on her side above all else, so she feels like she can talk to you when she’s struggling.
4. This is the tough one, but here goes. As she gets older, if her body starts to be an issue, it may not be a surmountable one. I know! It sucks! I feel like ballet tends to do a better job at being real with students about the fact that sometimes a professional career just isn’t in the cards. It’s a sad truth that in some cases, no matter how hard you work or how good you get, it just isn’t going to happen for reasons beyond your control. I’d like to think that some of this is changing, and we are starting to see more diversity in dance, but… well, I’m not totally optimistic. Again, all you can do is encourage her to be the best dancer she can be, and enjoy the dance for what it is. And when it stops being fun, it just may be time to stop.
Wow, this has been long, but… yeah. Basically, just make sure she knows you have her back, no matter what, and she’ll be fine.
So I’m completely the wrong body type for ballet, and it was apparent even when I was young that this was the case. (Like, my mom is 5’9″ and my dad is 6’3″ and I was tall even when I was a kid, and sturdy, not ethereal. And once my boobs developed…well.) Anyway, my mom had all three of us kids (including my brother) in ballet from about the time we were 3 or 4 until we were around 10 or 11 – in other words, she pulled us out right at the time that girls go en pointe. I find that the early dance training has actually given me wonderful body awareness and control; it’s been 30 years or so since my last ballet class and I still am more aware of my body and how to make it do what I want it to do than most other people. My mom also made sure we were involved in other things so that ballet didn’t become a singular obsession. And we did stop ballet before the perilous teen years–that’s when a lot of the worst body bullshit happens from what I remember, although you get that in almost any sport.
My two-and-a-half years of ballet, that ended just as I turned twelve, gave me a wonderful sense of rhythm, a love of classical music, and the ability to learn other styles of dance (and yoga) faster than I would otherwise.
I think when she’s young, a good supportive school would do wonders. Odds are tremendously against her being a professional anyway, but she could develop a lifelong love of ballet. I very much feel like approaching dance as a ‘yay, moving your body around is fun!’ thing when kids are still young is a good way to go about it. My dance school when I was a kid did that – it wouldn’t’ve been a good fit for the hardcore professionally-bound students after a certain age, but as an introduction to ballet and to other forms of dance and basic tumbling for kids just going for fun, it was perfect.
Different studios have different atmospheres and you’d just have to visit them to see what suits. My mother was very keen to avoid the competition schools, which is probably something to keep in mind even more now.
ETA: I should mention that I have always been fat and nobody at that school ever made me feel bad about my weight, even as the chubbiest kid in the room. Super-important!
Ballet has been a part of my life for 22 years at this point in time, minus a few years when I wasn’t dancing due to injury. It’s always been clear to me that my body isn’t right to dance professionally, and since I was pretty young, it has been clear to me that nothing I do to it will turn it into a ballerina body. So instead, it’s been an avocation, a creative outlet, an exercise, a way to build discipline and interact with other girls and women outside of school. I had some tough moments with it when I was in middle and high school, but I would say that my teachers were never demanding that my body be anything than what it was, and that, with guidance and the right environment, it can be really enriching. This isn’t to say that I’ve never looked in the mirror and been frustrated by what I saw back, and that I’ve never had body image problems, but I think that I would have those experiences as a woman and girl in middle class America regardless of my activities – and ballet was a constant way for me to remember that my body, even if it was shorter and stockier than I wanted it to be, with less turnout and shorter achilles tendons and lower arches and broader shoulders etc. etc. etc. – it could still hit a 180 degree split in the air with a smile on my face, or turn a triple pirouette.
I studied ballet seriously–I wanted to be a professional dancer and then decided against pursuing it.
Even at a young age, even if it’s only recreational, it’s really important to find a school with good training. Bad instruction can be very damaging to the body. Unfortunately, there’s no real governing body for ballet schools in the United States, so quality varies considerably. But there are things you can look for, when selecting a school:
Reputable ballet schools often have “creative movement” or “pre-ballet” classes for young children, which emphasize musicality and coordination in a fun environment. Instruction in classical ballet might start around 7 or 8, when children are better prepared, physically and intellectually, to start that curriculum. A reputable school will also outline the curriculum and the normal progression through the levels. Basically, you should see evidence of actual pedagogy. Look up the teacher bios and research the schools they trained at, the companies they performed with, and any formal teacher training they may have. There are obviously more schools in cities, but there are good teachers in small towns too.
This might not be quite the information you were looking for, but I feel the need to emphasize it with anyone considering putting a kid in ballet! Ballet is strenuous. Bad training is damaging. Good training should nurture the student.
I also concur with all of SarahDances’s points, and I would add that ballet is like Olympic sports: it takes a lot of training, but it also takes a body that’s peculiarly adapted to a certain type of movement. Ballet was based on a package of traits that’s present in a minority of the population, including a flexible back, the ability to turn out from the hip, and arched feet. Obviously anyone can do ballet recreationally, and I think it has a number of benefits. But at the professional level, it’s a whole different ballgame.
There were definitely negative aspects to my experience, but I would say that ballet made me confident in my body’s abilities. Dance teaches you to take up space and assert your presence, and that’s really valuable.
Thank you all so much for the feedback! We will definitely do a lot of research into wherever she goes for lessons, thanks for the tips on what to look for. And also daisicles made a good point that encouraging her to enjoy and seek out physical activity will pay dividends in her health in the future (I certainly wish I had learned at some point to see exercise as less of a chore). It is easy to overthink everything but it sounds like she could have a really good experience as long as the people who love her are mindful of its effect on her and her body.
Since my baby boy with fibular hemimelia is totally into music and dancing lately, I put this on the teevee the other day, and we practiced bouncing along and balancing on one leg together. He was riveted during the various swan dances (death of, lake).
Seconding The Cranes Dance – very enjoyable, with interesting characters.
Nothing about this is not perfect.
Including the Simpsons nod. I was just thinking that quote to myself the other day.
Wait… my toes naturally curve up (I have a hard time with shoes because of this), and I'm a newbie runner… are you saying I'm going to lose my toenails if I start running intensively??? Ah, maybe I'll just stay on the couch.
It's worthy of sarcasm when instead of just saying you don't know anything about an activity and attempting to learn more, you make generalizations that imply it's a horrible thing to do. As thebeagee said, it depends on the dancer, and many thrive after they retire.
Er, he curls his toes under, I meant.
Ah, sorry, misunderstood! That's strange, indeed.