go-go dancing

The term go-go derives from the phrase "go-go-go" for a high-energy girl,{{cite web|url=http://www.alphadictionary.com/goodword/date/2010/07/12 |title=agog - alphaDictionary * Free English On-line Dictionary |publisher=Alphadictionary.com |date=13 July 2010 |access-date=13 June 2015}} and was influenced by the French expression à gogo, meaning "in abundance, galore",{{cite web|url=http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gogo |title=A-go-go | Definition of a-go-go by Merriam-Webster |publisher=Merriam-webster.com |access-date=13 June 2015}} which is in turn derived from the ancient French word la gogue for "joy, happiness".Le Petit Robert: GOGO (À), 1440; de l'a. fr. gogue "réjouissance" The term go-go dancer originated from the French bar Whisky a Gogo located in Juan-les-Pins, a seaside town near Cannes, which was among the first places in the world to replace live music with records selected by a disc jockey and to provide the spectacle of paid dancers known as go-go girls.

On 19 June 1964, Carol Doda began go-go dancing topless at the Condor Club on Broadway and Columbus in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco. She became the world's most famous topless and bottomless go-go dancer, dancing at the Condor for 22 years. In Canada, in 1966, Bonny Rush was mentioned as the country's first topless go-go dancer in the news media.{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=O5UtAAAAIBAJ&sjid=4p8FAAAAIBAJ&pg=6003%2C6201208|title=For Doing Her Part in Canadian Nationalism|newspaper=Montreal Gazette|date=31 December 1966|page=41 of 52|via=Google newspapers}} In general, however, go-go dancers in the 1960s did not work topless.{{cite book|title=Girl Culture: An Encyclopedia, Volume 1|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LLbZ8Q2PFb8C&pg=PA330|first1=Claudia|last1=Mitchell|first2=Jacqueline|last2=Reid-Walsh|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|date=2007|isbn=9780313339080|page=330}}

In 1964 the Los Angeles–based club Whisky a Go Go began suspending go-go dancers above the audience in glass cages.{{cite news|title=Go-Go Dancer Shares Secrets From the Platform|url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/go-go-dancer-shares-secret-from-the-platform_b_3049522|website=Huffington Post|first=Nicole|last=Glass|date=10 April 2013}} Located on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, the club hired scantily clad dancers wearing knee-high vinyl go-go boots (or occasionally the Courrèges boots which inspired them) and mini skirts or mini flapper dresses.{{sfnp|Mitchell|Reid-Walsh|2007|page=328–330}} The club began to hire go-go dancers regularly in July 1965.

Go-go discotheques began to open across the United nations

. In 1967 an article in Newsweek estimated that there were 8000 go-go dancers working in the US, aged mostly between 18 and 21.{{sfnp|Mitchell|Reid-Walsh|2007|page=330}} The majority of go-go dancers in the New York metropolitan area were migrants from Brazil.{{cite book|title=Street Therapists: Race, Affect, and Neoliberal Personhood in Latino Newark|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gzmPhtmRZiAC&pg=PA359|first=Ana Y.|last=Ramos-Zayas|publisher=University of Chicago Press|date=2012|isbn=9780226703633|page=359}} Go-go dancing was generally performed to recorded music rather than a live band.{{cite magazine|magazine=Texas Monthly|date=August 1974|title=Pappy's Girls|author=Gregory Curtis|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TCwEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA74|page=74}} The go-go dancers danced on tables, in cages, on dance floors{{cite magazine|magazine=Ebony|title=Á Go-Go Girls|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kUBLURuzOxEC&pg=PA143|date=April 1966|volume=21|issue=6|issn=0012-9011|page=143}} or on small go-go stages. Their role was to entertain the audience and demonstrate dance moves. Many dancers hoped that go-go dancing would provide them a way into show business. Others simply earned money while travelling around the US as part of the counterculture of the 1960s. Earnings from go-go dancing in the mid-1960s were around $125–$200 per week.

In Germany, Der Spiegel, in an article on discotheque trends in April 1965, described the Scotch Kneipe and the Pussycat in Munich as the first discotheques in the country to feature go-go dancers performing in cages above the audience.{{cite web |url=https://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-46272248.html|title=Diskothek: Irre laut |trans-title=Discothèque: Insanely Loud |language=de |date=14 April 1965 |work=Der Spiegel |pages=150–151 | access-date=19 May 2020}} In Canada in 1967, a club in Montreal's York Hotel began to employ the city's first go-go dancers. Other Montreal venues followed, including bars, hotels, taverns and strip clubs. The dancers initially wore pasties but over the years the amount of nudity shown increased.{{cite book|title=Organizing for Sex Workers' Rights in Montréal: Resistance and Advocacy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m6nODwAAQBAJ&pg=PA34|first=Francine|last=Tremblay|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|date=2020|isbn=9781498593908|page=34}}

Go-go dancers were employed as background dancers accompanying performances (real or lip-synced) by rock and roll bands on teen music programs in the mid-1960s. Hullabaloo was a musical variety series that ran on NBC from 12 January 1965 – 29 August 1966. The Hullabaloo Dancers—a team of four men and six women—appeared on a regular basis. Another female dancer, model/actress Lada Edmund, Jr., was best known as the caged "go-go girl" dancer in the Hullabaloo A-Go-Go segment near the closing sequence of the show. Other dance TV shows during this period such as ABC's Shindig! (16 September 1964 – 8 January 1966) also featured go-go dancers in cages. Sometimes these cages were made of clear plastic with lights strung inside of them; sometimes the lights were synchronized to go on and off with the music. Shivaree (syndicated, 1965–1966), another music show, usually put go-go dancers on scaffolding and on a platform behind the band which was performing. Beat-Club, a German show in the period, also used go-go dancers.{{cite web|website=MeTV|location=Chicago|date=2 October 2015|title=Shindig, Shivaree, Hullabaloo and the great rock & roll shows of 1965|url=https://www.metv.com/lists/shindig-shivaree-hullabaloo-and-the-great-rock-roll-shows-of-1965}} Each show of the period had a particular method of bringing the go-go dancers into camera view.

British go-go dancer Sandy Sarjeant became popular performing on the ITV music show Ready Steady Go!.{{citation needed|date=October 2022}}

The US TV crime drama series Honey West (1965–1966) included an episode called "The Princess and the Paupers" which featured a go-go dancing sequence.{{citation needed|date=October 2022}}

Go-go dancing became the subject of 1960s pop songs such as Little Miss Go-Go (1965) by Gary Lewis & the Playboys and Going to a Go-Go (1965) by The Miracles.{{sfnp|Mitchell|Reid-Walsh|2007|page=329}}

File:Go-go boys.jpg]]

Many gay clubs had male go-go dancers, often called go-go boys, from 1965 to 1968, after which few gay clubs had go-go dancers."Going to a Go Go: Up Close with the Dancers and the Dance" Bay Area Reporter Thursday, 2 May 1991, "Arts and Entertainment" section Pages 29–30 In the early 1980s New York's Anvil club featured go-go dancers and drag shows.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sY4BDQAAQBAJ&pg=PT260|title=Life and Death on the New York Dance Floor, 1980–1983|first=Tim|last=Lawrence|publisher=Duke University Press|date=2016|isbn=9780822373926|page=260}} In 1988 go-go dancing again became fashionable at gay clubs (and has remained so ever since). Nowadays, gay male go-go dancers are a lot more popular and common in American culture, especially in bigger cities such as Los Angeles and New York. There are more gay go-go dancers than female go-go dancers in today's club scene, a big turnaround from the 1960s.{{bsn|reason=Outdated source, and likely never true to begin with.|date=March 2025}}

During the 1970s discotheques became less popular and few nightclubs employed go-go dancers. Opportunities for go-go dancing work mainly continued at strip clubs where the audience was all male.{{sfnp|Mitchell|Reid-Walsh|2007|page=330}} Most of the strip clubs in the 1970s abandoned traditional burlesque striptease in favour of live sex shows and go-go dancing which was performed topless{{cite magazine|title=Between illusion and the studied art of the tease, strip clubs are the last bastion of the American Dream|url=https://www.documentjournal.com/2023/01/between-illusion-and-the-studied-art-of-the-tease-strip-clubs-are-the-last-bastion-of-the-american-dream/|magazine=Document Journal|first=Rachel Rabbit|last=White|date=3 January 2023}} or naked.{{sfnp|Mitchell|Reid-Walsh|2007|page=330}}

However, in the late 1970s, there was a nightclub at 128 West 45th Street (the same location where the Peppermint Lounge had been) in Manhattan, New York City, called G.G. Barnum's Room, patronized largely by transgender women, that had male go-go dancers who danced on trapezes above a net over the dance floor.Miezitis, Vida Night Dancin' New York:1980 Ballantine (Photography by Bill Bernstein) "G.G. Barnum's Room" Pages 94-102--Has pictures of male go-go dancers go-go dancing on trapezes above a net over the dance floor{{cite web|url=http://www.disco-disco.com/clubs/identify-clubs.shtml |title=Identify these NYC Clubs |publisher=Disco-disco.com |access-date=13 June 2015}}

In 1978, the Xenon night club in Manhattan became the first night club to provide go-go boxes for amateur go-go dancers to dance on.Anthony Haden-Guest The Last Party: Studio 54, Disco, and the Culture of the Night New York:1997 William Morrow Co. See numerous references to Xenon in the index

During the 1980s go-go dancing continued in strip clubs and peep shows. Lawmakers in some jurisdictions passed regulations prohibiting nude dancing, requiring go-go dancers to wear pasties and a G-string. These laws were challenged under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution using the argument that naked go-go dancing qualifies as free speech.{{cite book|title=Raw Judicial Power?: The Supreme Court and American Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D-nBAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA234|first=Robert J.|last=McKeever|publisher=Manchester University Press|date=1995|isbn=9780719048739|page=234}}

Musical styles such as techno, house music and trance music appeared during the 1990s as part of underground rave culture. As these styles became mainstream, an increase in the use of go-go dancing accompanied their rise in popularity. Dancers performing to these musical styles began to appear at music festivals and nightclubs to encourage the crowd to dance.

Today, go-go dancing has also found an outlet in mass media. Horrorpops, a Danish band, is known for featuring go-go dancers in their live performances and their music videos. The music video for "Horrorbeach" was dedicated entirely to the band's go-go dancers. Go-go dancers can be employed to enhance a band's performance, or a DJ's music mix.

In Russia, in the 2013 elections the Civilian Power party put forward four female go-go dancers as candidates for deputies.{{cite web|url=http://tol.arriva.ru/publications/news/19928/|title=Из go-go в депутаты Тольятти: продолжение|language=ru|trans-title=From go-go to deputies of Tolyatti: continued|publisher=Arriva.ru|last=Privolnov|first=Sergey|access-date=13 June 2015|archive-date=5 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150905083726/http://tol.arriva.ru/publications/news/19928/|url-status=dead}}{{cite news|author=ЗАО ИД «Комсомольская правда» |url=http://www.samara.kp.ru/daily/26118/3012669/ |title=В тольяттинскую гордуму баллотируются go-go танцовщицы |date=13 August 2013 |newspaper=Samara.kp.ru |access-date=13 June 2015}}

File:Go-Go Dancer.jpg, Las Vegas in 2009.]]

American shows of the 1960s featured dancers that were highly trained, but many modern dancers are not always professional (for example some nightclubs in tourist areas in Magaluf or Ibiza). However, there are many companies that supply professionally trained dancers to nightclubs for podium work around the world.{{citation needed|date=March 2020}}

Currently, the City of West Hollywood celebrates the history and culture of go-go dancing by hosting an annual "Go-Go Boy Appreciation Day" that includes a street festival and competition.{{cite web|url=http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2013/11/03/west-hollywood-starts-voting-for-go-go-dancer-appreciation-day/ |title=West Hollywood Starts Voting For Go-Go Dancer Appreciation Day |publisher=CBS Los Angeles |date=3 November 2013 |access-date=13 June 2015}}

Go-go dancers that are hired to dance at night clubs, special parties, festivals, circuit parties or rave dances in bright, colorful costumes are called performance art dancers."A Revival of Go-Go Dancers". San Francisco Chronicle 12 July 1991, People section page B3 Most often, go-go dancers are typically women who perform to entertain a crowd in public or at clubs and they often wear sexy clothing or printed clothes.{{cite web|url=https://www.costumet.com/misc/go-go-dancer/|title=How to Make Go-Go Dancer's Costume|publisher=costumet.com|date= 6 July 2022|accessdate=2022-08-08}} {{bsn|reason=This is just an commercial site with no credibility, surely a cultural magazine has covered this?|date=March 2025}}Their costumes often include accessories such as glow sticks, light chasers, toy ray guns that light up, go-go shorts embedded with battery-operated fiber optic tubes in various colors, strings of battery-operated colored lights in plastic tubes, fire sticks, a musical instrument, or an animal (usually a snake). In the early to mid‑1980s, the performance art dancer John Sex, who performed with a python, played a role in making go-go dancing popular once again at gay and bisexual night clubs along with his life partner Sebastian Kwok.{{Citation needed|date=March 2012}}

• Erotic dance
• Fire performance
• Go-go bar
• Pole dance
• Stripper

• Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! (1965)
• Monster a Go-Go! (1965)
• Girl in Gold Boots (1968)
• Go Go Tales (2007)
• It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie (2002)

{{Reflist}}

{{commons category}}

{{wiktionary|go-go}}

• [http://www.sixtiescity.net/Culture/dance.htm "Sixties Dances and Dance Crazes"] (the origin of go-go dancing – with step-by-step instruction)
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20150112092513/http://www.tofu-magazine.net/newVersion/pages/gogogo.html Go! Go! Go!] by Marie Menken (1964) (archived 12 January 2015)

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Category:Erotic dance

Category:1960s fads and trends