18 minute read
The Digital Age of Dance: TikTok and the Digitization of Choreographic Expression
Words by Amanda Ryvkin
Photographs by JD Renes
Last summer, it was “Barbie” and Beyoncé's “Cuff It.” This summer, it was Charli XCX’s “Apple.”
Over the past few years, social media has become a digital stage for dancers, hosting everything from performance excerpts and studio class clips to people dancing in their living rooms or at McDonald’s.
In 2023, groups of friends moved their hips side-to-side, grooving and clapping to Beyoncé, or took on the jazzy bounces and turns from the “Barbie” movie, lighting up smartphone screens. This past summer, social media feeds filled with people (and the Archer Panther!) using their hands to punctuate diagonal lines across the screen and mime driving as they showed off their “brat”-itude to Charli XCX.
TikTok has played a particularly important role in the proliferation of dance on social media. The famed TikTok “dance challenge” has led to an influx of dance videos online. Participants in these challenges—who are often not trained dancers— learn, record, and post themselves doing short choreography by an original dance creator. While The New York Times noted last year that dance challenges—a “mainstream phenomenon” during the pandemic shutdowns—are “on the wane,” the last two summers have shown that people are still excited to connect with others around the world in the shared language of familiar choreography.
There are also plenty of professional dancers and choreography on TikTok and Instagram. A number of popular dance challenges originate from professional projects, like the “Barbie” movie or Rihanna’s Superbowl halftime show. Dance studios will also often post videos of their classes and combinations; and dancers, such as Alex Wong, have built large social media followings, sharing videos of themselves for hundreds of thousands and sometimes even millions of followers.
Is the TikTok-fication of dance influencing the art form and the industry as a whole?
Social media has opened up opportunities to learn how to dance. Dancer Sydney C. ’25 notes, “Not everyone can go to a dance studio five days a week and take dance classes, but everyone can hop on Instagram and learn a TikTok dance or anything like that.” Andrea Locke, who has been teaching dance at Archer for almost 20 years, said, “I think the difference is it’s more accessible, where they feel like they can do it...‘Oh yeah, I can do that. I can dance.’”
Using the internet to watch and learn dances is not new. In 2009, Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies” dance racked up millions of views on YouTube, with fans trying to mirror the moves. As a platform, YouTube has hosted sloweddown dance videos and tutorials for over a decade. What seems different with TikTok is the choreography itself and how these dances are used.
The rise of TikTok dance challenges has had a massive impact on the artform’s place in today’s zeitgeist. While dancing on Youtube was about showing off one’s moves or executing polished choreography, dancing on TikTok has become a social medium, connecting people across the world through the same set of movements. Dancing on TikTok has become about inviting others in and encouraging people around the world to try one’s dance. While some TikTok dance challenges are intricate and difficult, others, like Jason Derulo’s “Savage Love” routine, are simple and just require a few hand gestures and hip sways. They have a low barrier of entry for those wanting to get up and move. It’s a lot easier to mirror these movements than to learn something that was choreographed to be performed by professionals.
Dancer Bryce C. ’25 shared that more of her non-dancer friends are dancing because of social media. One of her friends who used to dance before but had lost touch with it re-engaged with the art form, in part, because she liked TikTok. Bryce noted, “I think it also is a way to reinvigorate your love for dance, because if you already have those skills…you might start doing a TikTok dance and …[realize] ‘Oh wait, I’m really good at this…’” Sydney C. ’25, said, “It’s funny because I have friends who are not interested in dancing, never took dance, but they love doing TikTok dances.”
The rise of TikTok dance challenges has had a massive impact on the artform’s place in today’s zeitgeist. While dancing on Youtube was about showing off one’s moves or executing polished choreography, dancing on TikTok has become a social medium, connecting people across the world through the same set of movements. Dancing on TikTok has become about inviting others in and encouraging people around the world to try one’s dance. While some TikTok dance challenges are intricate and difficult, others, like Jason Derulo’s “Savage Love” routine, are simple and just require a few hand gestures and hip sways. They have a low barrier of entry for those wanting to get up and move. It’s a lot easier to mirror these movements than to learn something that was choreographed to be performed by professionals.
Dancer Bryce C. ’25 shared that more of her non-dancer friends are dancing because of social media. One of her friends who used to dance before but had lost touch with it re-engaged with the art form, in part, because she liked TikTok. Bryce noted, “I think it also is a way to reinvigorate your love for dance, because if you already have those skills…you might start doing a TikTok dance and …[realize] ‘Oh wait, I’m really good at this…’” Sydney C. ’25, said, “It’s funny because I have friends who are not interested in dancing, never took dance, but they love doing TikTok dances.”
Social media is also diversifying the types of opportunities available to trained and professional dancers. Archer Dance teacher and professional choreographer Ashley Fisher cites Cost n’ Mayor as an example. Cost n’ Mayor, a dance duo that performs off-thebeaten-track hip hop choreography, has amassed millions of followers on TikTok.
Fisher finds that, because of social media, Cost n’ Mayor were able to make a name for themselves. She said, “Some of the things that made them popular were creating movements and choreography to ring tones, for instance, and that’s really kind of off the wall and cool, and where else would they have had that opportunity, aside from social media?” This meant that they didn’t have to “fit themselves into some sort of bubble—for like a specific job or for the ‘industry,’... They can be really true to themselves when it comes to their brand.”
YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok enable artists across art forms to create exactly what they want, how they want it, and share it with the world directly, building their own audiences. This enables artists like Cost ‘n Mayor to control their brand and careers.
Their quirky approach to dance and authenticity attracted online audiences, and opportunities to work in the industry followed. Cost n’ Mayor have been hired for stage choreography and performances, going on tour with Pentatonix and choreographing for a production of “Waitress: The Musical.”
Cost n’ Mayor are an example of the rise of a new type of career for dancers: being a “dance influencer.” Large brands and companies are now partnering with dancers with massive followings in order to promote their goods or services via their social media platforms.
Dancers not only train, maintain their skills, and learn choreography, but they are also now asked to be camera-ready.
Even more “traditional" dancers at professional companies, like American Ballet Theatre ballerina Isabella Boylston, are bringing their talents to larger audiences. For example, when she’s not highlighting grand jétés across the Met Opera stage, Boylston posts videos of herself dancing in Gap clothes, highlighting the movability of their linen pieces.
Being a dance creator online isn’t always a straight line to success though. Archer dancer Sydney C. ’25 said, “You can create a dance but you may not be the person who popularizes it, and I think that gets hard. Because it was your work—that’s your creation—but people might not recognize you for that.” She cites the Renegade dance, a dance that took over TikTok in its early days.
Sydney shared, “There was a creator who made it, a Black creator [Jalaiah Harmon], and she didn’t really get the full acknowledgment for it, but then you like see people like Charli D’ Amelio who popularized it, and now she has sponsorships, and she’s connected with Dunkin’...” Unfortunately, this sort of lack of dance credit affects many Black creators, such as Harmon. There is a pattern of choreography by Black dancers not becoming popular until another creator with a large audience posts a video of themselves doing the dance.
This sort of disconnect between Black dancers and other users who popularize their dances seemed particularly stark in 2020 when TikTok creator Addison Rae did a segment with Jimmy Fallon that featured a number of TikTok dances created by Black creators, who weren’t featured or credited. After criticism and backlash online, Fallon invited the original creators to talk about their dance moves on the show. In 2021, Black users launched a #BlackTikTokStrike in response to this sort of failure to properly credit Black creators, refusing to post dance videos for others to profit from. For most dancers, it’s difficult to legally get choreography credit or seek recourse for stolen choreography.
The Copyright Law of 1976 was the first piece of legislation to allow choreographers to protect their work. The law defines choreography as “the composition and arrangement of a related series of dance movements and patterns organized into a coherent whole.” Some types of movement are not copyrightable— such as common movements and gestures, basic dance positions, and social dances—and the choreography must be “fixed in some tangible medium of expression,” such as a video.
Because of these stipulations, it can be difficult to copyright dances. What is the bar for a dance to count as a “coherent whole”? What counts as “common movements and gestures” and “basic dance positions” and where is the line between doing a standard series of ballet steps for a short video and creating new choreography?
Even if a piece of choreography is deemed copyrightable, any copyrights cannot be enforced until the choreography is registered with the U.S. Copyright Office. Recently, Alfonse Ribeiro, who created a short move known as “The Carlton” for the TV show “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air,” sued Epic Games for recreating his moves in Fortnite. Ribeiro’s dance was deemed ineligible for copyrighting by the U.S. Copyright Office because it was a “simple” routine, and not complex enough to count as choreography. While this lawsuit, and other similar ones, have not been successful, there is now a new movement to start copyrighting dances, led by JaQuel Knight, who choreographed and copyrighted Beyoncé’s famous “Single Ladies” dance.
Social media is changing how dancers secure more standard dance work as well. Dance teacher Andrea Locke has noted that now people can learn about auditions from social media posts. Business Insider has reported that agents are now, in turn, using social media to scout new talent. This means that anyone around the world—unlimited by location—can build a portfolio online and be “discovered” and also that those who might be outside of a particular network can learn about new opportunities through these larger open auditions. While this creates a new type of accessibility in the dance industry, it is also shifting the expectations for aspiring and working professionals.
The global shift toward using social platforms like TikTok as a portfolio means that dancers’ social media presences become key to booking jobs. Archer alum Jordan Alberstone ’16 is an NFL Cheerleader (dancer) for the New England Patriots. While she doesn’t feel that social media is a large part of her dance career, she said, “I do know my Instagram was reviewed while I was auditioning to make the NFL team.”
It’s also a great way for dancers to build community with other dancers. Georgia Ehrlich ’23 has trained in commercial dance since she was three and is currently pursuing a dance major at Barnard College in New York. She recently went “public” with her Instagram, so anyone can follow her. While she doesn’t post videos “with the intention of getting work or getting seen through it,” she finds that it’s a “great way to connect with other dancers and other people…great way to keep people…updated with where I’m at in my journey, what I’m creating…”
Social media is becoming part of the job of being a dancer. For those who are working professionally, the number of Instagram followers you have can now be a factor in securing dance jobs since performers posting about the projects they’re working on bolsters the project’s PR. Ehrlich said that having more followers can help you get work teaching at prestigious dance studios, like Millenium in Los Angeles. Even dance companies are asking their dancers to engage in social media. Business Insider reported that American Ballet Theatre pays two senior dancers to film content for its TikTok, which has 610,000 followers.
One of the upsides of this online dance community is the ability to connect with other passionate people and grow your skills. Alberstone said, “I am able to discover choreographers that I would love to take [a] class from. Social media is a great marketing tool to help promote dance classes. Since moving back to Boston recently, I have struggled to find studios to take classes at, but social media has helped me find amazing teachers and studios to dance at.”
In turn though, the social media-ification of the dance industry is creating pressure for young dancers. Students aspiring for careers feel that they need to be on Instagram and TikTok. Archer dancer Julianna H. ’25 shared, “I definitely think I’m at a disadvantage in the dance world for not having a social media account.” Bryce C. ’25, who aspires to work in musical theatre, said she, too, has felt that she should have an active Instagram account to “put [her] name out there.”
Even dancers who might not post their own dance content online, like Bryce and Julianna, are often being posted by their dance studios outside of school. Bryce sees this as a positive—“I’m proud of myself that they want to share some work I did…work we did as a group.”
At professional dance studios such as Millenium in Los Angeles, dancers not only train, maintain their skills, and learn choreography but they are also now asked to be camera-ready almost constantly. Millennium, for example, sometimes posts multiple videos in one day of students in classes executing choreography.
The camera then ends up serving as an additional mirror. Sydney C. ’25 said, “I think it helps you to reflect on yourself as a dancer, because I think when you’re dancing for the camera, you can see a lot of things that you may not notice when you’re just performing. It’s much easier to see your body positioning. It’s much easier to see when you didn’t point your feet.”
This additional mirror makes it even easier for dancers to compare themselves to others. Julianna shared that while she doesn’t really go on social media, she sees her dance friends always comparing themselves to other people online. “There is...always this feeling that someone else is going to be doing one more pirouette on an Instagram video than I am…” All the plagues of regular Instagram and social media still exist when it comes to Dancestagram or DanceTok.
For Georgia Ehrlich ’23, filming at the end of class, which can take anywhere from 1020 minutes of class time, often changes the dynamic. “It sort of detaches everyone in the room from each other.” It changes the space from a learning environment to more of a “speculative” one, as Ehrlich puts it.
It can also create added stress. As Bryce put it, “Every time [the studio] whip[s] out the camera at the end of class, it’s like, ‘Okay, it’s go time. Don’t mess up.’”
At large studios, not everyone gets filmed. The choreographers will choose groups or dancers who are performing the combination the way they prefer it to be executed. The other dancers just watch as the filming is going on. Ehrlich has noticed a certain level of “social media politics” as well— choreographers often choose to include dancers with larger followings online.
TikTok is also shifting the type of dances people are creating and consuming. To start, there are basic restrictions built into social media platforms. As dancer Lily P. ’25 shared, “You can only fit so much in a vertical frame that’s like this big... [indicating the size of a phone screen]”
That’s why so many TikTok dances are largely stationary, since you need to fit everything into the 1080x1920 frame that Instagram and TikTok offer you. Take the Charli XCXApple dance. There are no turns, footwork, etc.—just arm movements.
Then come the time constraints. Currently, Instagram has a 90-second time limit for its Reels (its main video format), which obviously can have a limiting effect on what sort of video or choreography someone can post online.
Ever forboding, TikTok and Instagram’s algorithms are also having an impact on the types of dances we see online. Tricks like doing fifteen pirouettes in a row or jumping ridiculously high pull viewers, because they have shock value and can appeal to the general public. It is easy for the average person to understand how astounding it is for a dancer to be able to turn 15 times in a row. This feeds the algorithm and in turn affects the kind of dance videos that get made.
Lily, who creates dance videos on social media, said, “I do feed into the kind of trendy stuff where it’s very quick moving. It’s just a video of me flipping or doing some cool trick ‘cause that is more entertaining per se than someone ...doing slower movements and things… because that’s what pulls the algorithm.” When it comes to professional dancers, choreographers are prefacing the most dynamic moves at the beginning of their routines to grab audiences.
If you don’t hook a viewer in three seconds, they scroll to the next video. While social apps like TikTok have a lot of formatting constraints, they have also opened up a lot of creative possibilities. One of the big advantages has been the diversity of styles of dance that have flourished online.
Lily shared that she’s learned more about different types of modern dance, like Limón technique and Middle Eastern dance. Archer Dance teacher Ashley Fisher noted, “I think the cross cultural dance that we’re exposed to definitely makes a difference.”
This exposure is changing dance itself. Fisher said, “Just the amalgamation of types of dance on TikTok is birthing new styles, because the more that people are exposed to different styles, the more that they’re going to take those styles and reinvent them…” Viewing lots of dance can also inspire young dancers. Fisher said, “Dance is a very visual art form, so even by watching, you get a lot of new ideas in terms of the way that you can move.”
While getting inspired is important, Fisher also highlights the significance of taking the time to reflect and make dance an “internal experience.” “Things outside of ourselves can inspire us. But then we have to go back within and find out on a deep level [what moved us]...”
Archer Dance teacher Andrea Locke sees a larger trend of externalization of dance on social media. Locke says, “Social media has created an outer activity.” Dancing on social media is about learning the steps, but “it’s not an internal journey to those movements or creating.” That’s why for her, it’s so important to help students get in touch with their feelings. “I challenge them to really think about what’s important to them, what moves them,” said Locke.
Dance has proliferated across social media platforms like TikTok, where the camera serves as an additional mirror, an additional reflection. Even once many dancers step away from the mirror in the studio, they are faced with a front-facing camera or the video they (or their dance studio) recorded.
For every dancer, the mirror is a wonderful tool for learning movement, but at a certain point, they have to learn to dance without it. If their focus is always on what they see their reflection doing, they aren’t fully in their body, their emotions, or the movement.
TikTok has created a bevy of opportunities for people to consume, try, and share dance. At a professional level, it’s changing how people are building and managing their careers. However, at the end of the day, sometimes a dancer just needs to face away from the mirror.
