Changes: The Boom Of A New Generation

We’re seeing a sea change in generations within street dance culture. In the early 2000s, there was a wave of new schoolers in the greater LA area coming into the poppin’ and bboyin’ cultures. Many of them were in their late teens to early twenties. A decade later, these dancers are now at the head of the class for the new school. Some of them have a career as professional dancers performing on television shows and films.

Now in 2010, there’s a new generation quickly coming up. Many of these new cats were from ages 5-10 in the early 2000s. Today, they’re in their teens and early twenties. But these two generations are vastly different in their approach to our dances just like how Generation X, Generation Y, and the Millenials have differences. For the sake of this discussion, let’s call the dancers who started in the early 2000s, Gen I. For the dancers who started in the late 2000s and in this new decade, let’s call them Gen II.

Gen I grew up in an age before Youtube. The poppin’ and bboyin’ scenes were growing in the early 2000s, but they were still small in scale. Gen II has emerged along with the rise of Youtube and the street dance culture has exploded in numbers. Both generations co-exist with each other in today’s world, but Gen I dancers are at higher skill level because of time invested in their craft as well as the striving to learn from OG dancers. Gen II has a wide range of skill level because of turning to Youtube as part of their dance education and perhaps taking fewer steps to seek training from OGs. What we’re left with is a widening gap between these two groups.

Is it possible for Gen I to step up and mentor Gen II? The top new schoolers are visible in mainstream media. Gen II dancers are imitating them but they don’t understand the technique. Gen I does. As OGs grow older, it will rest on Gen I’s shoulders to guide Gen II and the generations that follow. We’re at a crucial crossroads for our culture. Without committed mentoring, Gen II will lose the heart and soul of our street styles. They can go on to evolve and create their own styles, but the original styles will lose their relevance. If Gen I nurtures Gen II as their younger brothers and sisters, our entire culture will move forward to higher levels of artistry in this new dance landscape.