Events
June 1982: When Disco became Dance
Wednesday 28 November 13:00 until 14:00
David Osmond-Smith Recital Room, Falmer House 120
Speaker: Dr Mimi Haddon
Part of the series: Music Research-in-progress seminars
On June 19, 1982 Billboard magazine released a special issue on “Disco Dance Music” that described disco’s transformation into dance music and celebrated the union of former enemies, rock and disco. “In place of an uneasy coexistence,” wrote journalist Brian Chin, “is a true fusion […] essential to the music America and the world dances to.” However, in the years leading up to this moment, the music press disavowed such hybridity in a way that might be read as an essentialist racial code derived from the historical tendency to reserve dance as a black (and gay) mode of expression. So, what happens/ed to this racial code in the new context of early-80s rock-disco? Was dance still black- and gay-associated? What happened, other words, to rock’s scepticism of otherness as dance ascended in both underground- and mainstream appeal?
Posted on behalf of: School of Media, Film and Music
Last updated: Monday, 26 November 2018