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Jitterbug is a generalized term used to describe swing dancing. It is often synonymous with the
lindy hop The Lindy Hop is an American dance which was born in the Black communities of Harlem, New York City, in 1928 and has evolved since then. It was very popular during the swing era of the late 1930s and early 1940s. Lindy is a fusion of many danc ...
dance but might include elements of the jive, east coast swing,
collegiate shag The Collegiate Shag (or "Shag") is a partner dance done primarily to uptempo swing and pre-swing jazz music (185-250+ beats per minute). It belongs to the swing family of American vernacular dances that arose in the 1920s and 30s. It is believed ...
, charleston, balboa and other swing dances. Swing dancing originated in the
African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
communities of
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
in the early 20th century. Many nightclubs had a whites-only or blacks-only policy due to
racial segregation Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into race (human classification), racial or other Ethnicity, ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crimes against hum ...
, however the
Savoy Ballroom The Savoy Ballroom was a large ballroom for music and public dancing located at 596 Lenox Avenue, between 140th and 141st Streets in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Lenox Avenue was the main thoroughfare through upper Harle ...
in
Harlem Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street (Manhattan), 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and 110th Street (Manhattan), ...
had a no-discrimination policy which allowed whites and blacks to dance together and it was there that the lindy hop dance flourished, started by dancers such as
George Snowden George "Shorty" Snowden (July 4, 1904 – May 1982) was an African American dancer in Harlem during the 1920s and 1930s. He and his partner Mattie Purnell invented the Harlem Lindy Hop in the dance marathon at Harlem's Rockland Palace between ...
and
Frank Manning Frank Manning (May 26, 1914 – April 27, 2009) was an American dancer, instructor, and choreographer. Manning is considered one of the founders of Lindy Hop, an energetic form of the jazz dance style known as swing. Biography Manning was bo ...
. The term jitterbug was originally a ridicule used by black patrons to describe whites who started to dance the lindy hop, as they were dancing faster and jumpier than was intended, like "jittering bugs", although it quickly lost its negative connotation as the more erratic version caught on. Both the lindy hop and the "jitterbug" became popular outside Harlem when the dance was featured in Hollywood films and
Broadway theatre Broadway theatre,Although ''theater'' is generally the spelling for this common noun in the United States (see American and British English spelling differences), 130 of the 144 extant and extinct Broadway venues use (used) the spelling ''Th ...
, starring the performance group
Whitey's Lindy Hoppers Whitey's Lindy Hoppers was a professional performing group of exceptional swing dancers that was first organized in the late 1920s by Herbert "Whitey" White in the Savoy Ballroom and disbanded in 1942 after its male members were drafted into World W ...
.


Etymology

According to the ''
Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a com ...
'' (''OED'') the word "jitterbug" is a combination of the words "jitter" and "bug"; both words are of unknown origin. The first use of the word "jitters" quoted by the ''OED'' is from 1929, Act II of the play '' Strictly Dishonorable'' by
Preston Sturges Preston Sturges (; born Edmund Preston Biden; August 29, 1898 – August 6, 1959) was an American playwright, screenwriter, and film director. In 1941, he won the Academy Awards, Oscar for Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, Best Origina ...
where the character Isabelle says: "Willie's got the jitters" is answered by a judge "Jitters?" to which Isabelle answers "You know, he makes faces all the time." The second quote in the ''OED'' is from the N.Y. Press from 2 April 1930: "The game is played only after the mugs and wenches have taken on too much gin and they arrive at the state of jitters, a disease known among the common herd as heebie jeebies." The first quote containing the term “jitter bug” recorded by the ''OED'' is from the 1934
Cab Calloway Cabell Calloway III (December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994) was an American singer, songwriter, bandleader, conductor and dancer. He was associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, where he was a regular performer and became a popular vocalist ...
song “Jitter Bug”. The magazine ''Song Hits'', in the 19 November 1939 issue, published the lyrics, including: “They’re four little jitter bugs. He has the jitters ev’ry morn; that’s why jitter sauce was born.” According to H. W. Fry in his review of ''Dictionary of Word Origins'' by Joseph Twadell Shipley in 1945 the word "jitters" "is from a
spoonerism A spoonerism is an occurrence in speech in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched (see metathesis) between two words in a phrase. These are named after the Oxford don and ordained minister William Archibald Spooner, w ...
bin and jitters' for 'gin and bitters'..and originally referred to one under the influence of gin and bitters". Wentworth and Flexner explains "jitterbug" as " e who, though not a musician, enthusiastically likes or understands swing music; a swing fan" or " e who dances frequently to swing music" or " devotee of jitterbug music and dancing; one who follows the fashions and fads of the jitterbug devotee... To dance, esp ciallyto jazz or swing music and usu llyin an extremely vigorous and athletic manner".


Early history

Jitterbugging developed from dances performed by African-Americans at
juke joints Juke joint (also jukejoint, jook house, jook, or juke) is the vernacular term for an informal establishment featuring music, dancing, gambling, and drinking, primarily operated by African Americans in the southeastern United States. A juke joint ...
and
dance halls Dance hall in its general meaning is a hall for dancing. From the earliest years of the twentieth century until the early 1960s, the dance hall was the popular forerunner of the discothèque or nightclub. The majority of towns and cities in ...
.Stearns, Marshall and Jean (1968). ''Jazz Dance: The Story of American Vernacular Dance''. New York: Macmillan. page 331. The
Carolina shag The Carolina shag is a partner dance done primarily to beach music (100-130+ beats per minute in 4/4 time signature). Today, the shag is a recognized dance in national and international dance competitions. Technique The basic step in Carolina S ...
and single
Lindy Hop The Lindy Hop is an American dance which was born in the Black communities of Harlem, New York City, in 1928 and has evolved since then. It was very popular during the swing era of the late 1930s and early 1940s. Lindy is a fusion of many danc ...
dances formed the basis of the jitterbug, which gave way to the double Lindy Hop when rock and roll became popular. White dancers picked up the energetic jitterbug from dancers at black venues. Venues in the
Hill District The Hill District is a grouping of historically African American neighborhoods in the City of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Beginning in the years leading up to World War I, "the Hill" was the cultural center of black life in the city and a major cent ...
of Pittsburgh were popular places for whites to learn the jitterbug.Stearns, Marshall and Jean (1968). ''Jazz Dance: The Story of American Vernacular Dance''. New York: Macmillan. page 330. The
Savoy Ballroom The Savoy Ballroom was a large ballroom for music and public dancing located at 596 Lenox Avenue, between 140th and 141st Streets in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Lenox Avenue was the main thoroughfare through upper Harle ...
, a dance hall in
Harlem Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street (Manhattan), 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and 110th Street (Manhattan), ...
, was a famous cross-cultural venue, frequented by both black locals and white tourists.
Norma Miller Norma Adele Miller (December 2, 1919 – May 5, 2019) was an American Lindy hop dancer, choreographer, actress, author, and comedian known as the "Queen of Swing". Early life Miller was born in 1919 in Harlem, New York City to mother Alma, a ch ...
, a former Lindy Hop dancer who regularly performed at the Savoy, noted that the dances performed there were choreographed in advance, which was not always understood by the tourists, who sometimes believed the performers were just dancing socially. A musical number called "
The Jitterbug ''The Wizard of Oz'' is a 1939 American musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). An adaptation of L. Frank Baum's 1900 children's fantasy novel ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'', the film was primarily directed by Victor Flemin ...
" was written for the 1939 film '' The Wizard of Oz''. The "jitterbug" was a bug sent by the
Wicked Witch of the West The Wicked Witch of the West is a fictional character who appears in the classic children's novel ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'' (1900), created by American author L. Frank Baum. In Baum's subsequent ''Oz'' novels, it is the Nome King who is ...
to waylay the heroes by forcing them to do a jitterbug-style dance. Although the sequence was not included in the final version of the film, the Witch is later heard to tell the flying monkey leader, "I've sent a little insect on ahead to take the fight out of them." The song as sung by
Judy Garland Judy Garland (born Frances Ethel Gumm; June 10, 1922June 22, 1969) was an American actress and singer. While critically acclaimed for many different roles throughout her career, she is widely known for playing the part of Dorothy Gale in '' The ...
as Dorothy and some of the establishing dialogue survived from the soundtrack as the B-side of the disc release of "Over the Rainbow".


Popularity

In 1944, with the United States' continuing involvement in
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, a 30% federal excise tax was levied against night clubs that featured dancing. Although the tax was later reduced to 20%, "No Dancing Allowed" signs went up all over the country. It has been argued that this tax had a significant role in the decline of public dancing as a recreational activity in the United States. World War II facilitated the spread of jitterbug across the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans. Across the Atlantic in preparation for
D-Day The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on Tuesday, 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. Codenamed Operation Neptune and often referred to as D ...
, there were nearly 2 million American troops stationed throughout Britain in May 1944. Dancing was not a popular pastime in Britain before the war, and many ballrooms had been closed for lack of business. In the wake of the arrival of American troops, many of these re-opened, installing
jukeboxes A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that will play a patron's selection from self-contained media. The classic jukebox has buttons, with letters and numbers on them, which are used to sele ...
rather than hiring live bands.
Working class The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colou ...
women who had never danced recreationally before made up a large part of the attendees, along with American soldiers and sailors. British Samoans were doing a "Seabee version" of the jitterbug by January 1944. By November 1945 after the departure of the American troops following D-Day, English couples were being warned not to continue doing energetic "rude American dancing," as it was disapproved of by the
upper classes Upper class in modern societies is the social class composed of people who hold the highest social status, usually are the wealthiest members of class society, and wield the greatest political power. According to this view, the upper class is gen ...
.''
Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
'', 24 November 1945. "Britons Drive to End Jiving as Yanks Go Home". page 88
''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' reported that American troops stationed in France in 1945 jitterbugged, and by 1946, jitterbug had become a craze in England. It was already a competition dance in Australia. A
United Press United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20th c ...
item datelined Hollywood on 9 June 1945 stated that dancer Florida Edwards was awarded a $7,870 judgement by the district court of appeals for injuries she sustained while jitterbugging at the
Hollywood Canteen The Hollywood Canteen operated at 1451 Cahuenga Boulevard in the Los Angeles, California, neighborhood of Hollywood between October 3, 1942, and November 22, 1945 (Thanksgiving Day), as a club offering food, dancing and entertainment for servi ...
the previous year. In 1957, the
Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
-based television show ''
American Bandstand ''American Bandstand'', abbreviated ''AB'', is an American music-performance and dance television program that aired in various versions from 1952 to 1989, and was hosted from 1956 until its final season by Dick Clark, who also served as the pro ...
'' was picked up by the
American Broadcasting Company The American Broadcasting Company (ABC) is an American commercial broadcast television network. It is the flagship property of the ABC Entertainment Group division of The Walt Disney Company. The network is headquartered in Burbank, Cali ...
and shown across the United States. ''American Bandstand'' featured popular songs of the day, live appearances by musicians, and dancing in the studio. At this time, the most popular fast dance was jitterbug, which was described as "a frenetic leftover of the swing era ballroom days that was only slightly less acrobatic than Lindy". In a 1962 article in the ''
Memphis Commercial Appeal ''The Commercial Appeal'' (also known as the ''Memphis Commercial Appeal'') is a daily newspaper of Memphis, Tennessee, and its surrounding metropolitan area. It is owned by the Gannett Company; its former owner, the E. W. Scripps Company, also ...
'', bassist
Bill Black William Patton Black Jr. (September 17, 1926 – October 21, 1965) was an American musician and bandleader who is noted as one of the pioneers of rock and roll. He played in Elvis Presley's early trio. Black later formed Bill Black's Combo. Ear ...
, who had backed
Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), or simply Elvis, was an American singer and actor. Dubbed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one ...
from 1954 to 1957, listed "jitterbug" along with the
twist Twist may refer to: In arts and entertainment Film, television, and stage * ''Twist'' (2003 film), a 2003 independent film loosely based on Charles Dickens's novel ''Oliver Twist'' * ''Twist'' (2021 film), a 2021 modern rendition of ''Olive ...
and cha-cha as "the only dance numbers you can play".''The Blue Moon Boys: The Story of Elvis Presley's Band''. Ken Burke and Dan Griffin. 2006. Chicago Review Press. page 146. .


See also

* Balboa *
Lindy Hop The Lindy Hop is an American dance which was born in the Black communities of Harlem, New York City, in 1928 and has evolved since then. It was very popular during the swing era of the late 1930s and early 1940s. Lindy is a fusion of many danc ...
*
Shag Shag, or Shagged, or Shagger, or Shagging, or Shags may refer to: Animals * Shag or cormorant, a bird family ** European shag, a specific species of the shag or cormorant family ** Great cormorant another species of the family People Pseudonym ...
*
Big Apple "The Big Apple" is a nickname for New York City. It was first popularized in the 1920s by John J. Fitz Gerald, a sportswriter for the ''New York Morning Telegraph''. Its popularity since the 1970s is due in part to a promotional campaign by th ...
*
Charleston (dance) The Charleston is a dance named after the harbor city of Charleston, South Carolina. The rhythm was popularized in mainstream dance music in the United States by a 1923 tune called "The Charleston" by composer/pianist James P. Johnson, which or ...


References

{{Authority control Swing dances Articles containing video clips