The Beginning of Hip Hop Culture and B-Boy Battling

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Music screeching through the room, crowds going wild, and anticipation growing inside while holding a b-boy stance in the South Bronx. A young boy holds his ground as his peers dance to the music, but as the break segment of the song awakens, the young boy rushes to the middle of the dance floor. As few people know, this is established the start of a worldwide phenomenon and lifestyle. Hip hop is a misunderstood culture that has been driven out from its roots by media and the new generation. Society knows little behind the birth of hip hop, but as for the dance portion of hip hop, b-boying is the true art form. Clive "Kool Herc" Campbell, an African American DJ known to hip hop pioneers as the father of hip hop, gave the name "b-boy" to the young African American and Puertorican dancers who danced to the break of the song. The word "b-boy" itself refers to "break boy", "beat boy" and "Bronx boy". This represents who they were and were they came from. From what began in the bureaus of the Bronx, leaked and spread through the world since its massive exposure in the 1980's film Flashdance.This film featured the pioneers from Rock Steady Crew as b-boying's first début in the spot light. But behind the scenes, b boying offers more than meets the eye, so it does not make it a simple task. B-boying not only opens the doors for physical endurance, but allows a student of the dance form to experience a lifestyle full of passion, as well as the imagination and confidence to fight through a battle and life.

As far as physical endurance, dancing in general feeds on a workout. But as for "breaking", another name for b boying, gives off an aerobatic workout as well as a dance workout. See, breaking consist of a foundation based on top rock, f...

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...e involved in it.

A b boy battling on the dance floor is a human fighting for life. For some students of this culture b boying is what made them grow as persons. “B boying made me develop a competitive nature, and helped boost my confidence level. It opened my mind to ideas and creativeness which I wasn’t able to grasp before. I met and interacted with a lot more people… b boying is the center of my life PERIOD. I would be nothing without it” (Demerin, Donovan). In other words, if you are passionate about something, it will become the center of your life and thoughts eventually. Knowing all this, you can see how a student of this dance form—b boying—experiences a lifestyle involved with passion, imagination, creativity and confidence without having to only care about physical endurance but to fight through life the same way they can battle across the dance floor.

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