If you’re new to dancing, the first time you go to the studio for a lesson, you might be intimidated by other dancers whizzing around the floor. Even after a few lessons under your belt, when you’re feeling confident about your new skills, dancing at your first party or out at the nightclub may leave you feeling totally ruffled when you find it is harder to put those moves into practice when you add the concept of maneuvering around the floor. Instead of cruising around the floor with the agility of a sportscar, you may have felt more like the stalled out Ford Pinto.  And have you ever watched a competition floor full of dancers and wondered “how the heck to they not run over one another?!” Well, to get moving properly around the floor, you just need a little education in the art of floorcraft.

It goes without saying that all the regular courtesy rules apply to dancing as they do when you’re driving out on the road: let others merge, be considerate of others in “slower” vehicles (i.e. beginners), know where you are going so you don’t hold up traffic. If you are a seasoned dancer, you should be competent enough in your floorcraft that you can successfully avoid couples and beginners without being boorish or intimidating others purposefully. Everyone was a beginner once, so allow your polished floor negotiating skills to be an example for others to aspire too.  That being said, let’s take a look at the basic formulas that get you where you want to go in a graceful manner.

LOD: Line of Dance. In dances that move around the floor, like foxtrot and samba, dancers should be traveling counter clockwise around the floor in the LOD. You can think of the LOD in two ways. First, and most rudimentarily, as a big circle in which the flow of traffic moves, just like at a skating rink or race car track.

Next, as 4 straight lines paralleling the walls of the room. Imagine there a square (or rectangle, depending on the floor shape) inside the LOD circle. The four lines that make up the square or rectangle are the 4 lines of dance. When you get to a corner of the dance floor, by turning the corner, you move onto another LOD.

In order to negotiate around others on the floor, you need to be able to move to either the left or right of the LOD. Certain patterns will flow naturally when aligned to either the left or right of the LOD. Knowing what direction to start, or end, a pattern is called alignment.  We will look at just two more of the most common ones, but there are actually 8 alignments.

DW: Diagonal Wall. To practice, stand on the LOD. Turn yourself 45° towards the wall. You are now facing Diagonal Wall. Generally, patterns that turn to the right (natural turns) will start in this alignment. For example, if you are dancing a natural turn in the waltz (closed right turning box), by starting in this proper alignment (and making the correct amounts of turn), you will be able to travel with the flow of traffic down the LOD.

DC:  Diagonal Center.  To practice, stand on the LOD. Turn yourself 45° towards the center of the room. You are now facing Diagonal Center. Generally, patterns that turn to the left (reverse turns) will start in this alignment. For example, if you are dancing a reverse turn in the waltz (closed left turning box), by starting in this proper alignment (and making the correct amounts of turn), you will be able to travel with the flow of traffic down the LOD.

For dances like swing or rumba that generally stay in place, room alignment is not as important, although is utilized for the odd pattern in a stationary dance that does travel down the floor, or if you are competing or doing a show and don’t want to have the audience looking at your back the whole time.

Although females dancers may think that this whole negotiating alignment thing is not their problem and leave it all up to their partner who is driving, it will really improve your own dancing to know where your patterns should begin and end. As the lady, you yourself must know how much movement is required of you to do a particular pattern properly, and this will prevent you from feeling that you are being dragged around the floor.

Before your first dance, competition or when trying a new step, be sure to ask your teacher or research the alignment of the step. Practice the pattern on your own with the correct alignment. Then you’ll be the one on the floor zooming around with the ease of a Ferrari.