Lipsi (dance)

The Lipsi is a dance created in East Germany as a communist alternative to decadent Western rock and roll-influenced dancing. Specifically, the group dancing was seen as less sexual than partner dance, where the female follows the male's lead.

The Lipsi was created in 1959.[1] It was poorly received by youth, with protests beginning in summer 1959 that mocked Walter Ulbricht and supported Elvis Presley.[2]

David Byrne described Lipsi as "a weird sexless popular dance ... that the government attempted to insert into popular culture as a kind of immunization against Elvis’s rock-and-roll gyrations."[3]

See also

References

  1. ^ Taubert, Klaus (13 December 2013). "Der Lipsi: Modetanz, made by SED". Spiegel Online (in German). Retrieved 5 August 2015.
  2. ^ Wiener, Jon (15 October 2012). How We Forgot the Cold War. University of California Press. p. 172. ISBN 9780520271418.
  3. ^ Byrne, David (2009-09-17). Bicycle Diaries. ISBN 9780670021147.