Dance is a transient mode of expression, performed in a given form and style by the human body moving in space. Dance occurs through purposefully selected and controlled rhythmic movements; the resulting phenomenon is recognized as dance both by the performer and the observing members of a given group.

If dance has been construed as fulfilling a variety of expressive and social functions, histories of dance have likewise been structured around distinctive conceptions of dance, reflecting in both their organization and choice of subject matter specific notions of dance’s meaning. Dance, they assert, has evolved from sacred to profane, or from ritual to spectacle, or from communal play to individual discovery. What seems clear at the beginning of the twenty-first century is the historical and cultural specificity of each of these claims. The following comments, therefore, reflect this author’s and this moment’s assessment of dance’s significance. For who can say how the meaning of dance might change for those who pass their time absorbed in the virtual technologies that the future promises to offer us?

Dance provides a rare opportunity to experience body as both functional and symbolic. While dancing, the individual is embroiled in body as the creative producer of ‘ideas’, as a medium for communicating ideas, and as the disciplined executant of those ideas. Ideas generated by the dancing body can include images of physical identity, such as a body’s characteristic postures, stances, or gestures, or they might include physical representations of thoughts, feelings, moods, intuitions, or impulses. Ideas issuing from the dancing body also consist in pronouncements about its nature — its shapes, its differentiation of body parts or regions, its rhythms, and its tensile qualities of motion — as it negotiates its surroundings and the force of gravity, and as it encounters other bodies. Through the articulation of these ideas, dance both reproduces and generates key cultural values.

Bodies engaged in dancing typically learn a dance — the orchestrated movement patterns known as the choreography — and they also learn to perform the dance, according to the criteria of proper performance of the movement patterns. Both the dance’s choreography and performance resonate strongly with more general cultural concerns. Ballet, as practised in Europe and the US, emphasizes the abstract geometry of bodily form exploring the heights and extensions the body can achieve both on the floor and in the air. It constructs unique roles for male and female performers who work together to create a unified whole. Ballet recognizes a hierarchy of skills and physical prowess, and commemorates that hierarchy in the arrangements of soloists and corps de ballet. At the same time, the dancers are asked to mask the extraordinary labour entailed by their bodily elevations, and to make their jumps, balances, and turns appear effortless. In contrast, the West African dance repertoire elaborates a vital connection to earth. Its dances display the capacity of the body to engage in multiple rhythmic patterns simultaneously and to move among different rhythmic structures. It also offers opportunities for improvised dialogue between dancers and musicians. The large number of dances in this tradition, performed at a range of social and religious occasions, provide numerous opportunities for non-professional dancers to participate. In each of these cultural contexts, dance works to illuminate attitudes toward the body and to exemplify patterns of physicalized sociability through which all bodies relate.

Many dance forms require extensive bodily training in order to attain competence at performance. Pedagogies of dance training typically engage the body in extended repetition of movement sequences. These exercises may be taken directly from specific dances or they may consist of sequences that are especially designed to enhance flexibility, strength, endurance, co-ordination, dexterity, or other physical attributes deemed necessary for successful performance. Each of these training programmes produces a body with distinct capacities and limitations. In ballet, exercises develop the musculature so as to construct ideal lines for arms, legs, and torso, which the choreography then displays. In West African dance, practice is required to learn rhythmic acuity and to extend the body’s endurance and its capacity to articulate complex rhythms. For Tongan choreography, dancers work to acquire an articulateness of hands and arms, and a cordial relationship between gesturing appendages and central body, in keeping with the overall aesthetic demands of that form. Bodily competence in each of these forms is highly distinctive, and only rarely can a dancer adapt the training from one tradition for use in a different form.

Through the process of learning to dance, the body is made over into the kind of medium of expression required for a given dance form. The dancer extends and alters the body’s physical capacities, and, also, the dancer develops a new symbolic conception of body, of what and how it means. The early modern dancer Isadora Duncan established the diaphragm as the central source of bodily movement and as the place that connected body with soul. In contrast, the Argentine tango locates bodily centre and the source of movement in the constantly changing interplay between male and female partners. The eighteenth-century ballet theorist Jean Georges Noverre asserted that the face provided a window onto the soul, but that the bottom of the foot offered the key to balance and postural alignment. Dance training inculcates the symbolic interpretation of body as well as the patterned movement responses required by a given form. As these examples demonstrate, there are as many distinct conceptions of body and mappings of bodily meaning as there are dance forms.

Dance provides a vision of what it is to be a body for those who watch it, and an experience of being a body for those who do it. Dance connects this corporeal identity to subjectivity and sociality, so that the dancing body achieves a locatedness in relation to self and others. Dance’s transcendent power stems, in part, from just this ability to synthesize physicality with individual, gendered, ethnic, and social identities. At the same time, dance places this experience of identity in motion so that the dancing body comprehends the transitoriness of each moment and its changing relation to the flux of the world.

Aerobic Dancing - What Makes A Good Workout?
# Warm-up - Start off moving to something slow for about 5-10 minutes which will prepare you for more vigorous activities. Starting an aerobic routine too quickly can lead to injuries, so make sure you talk to your P.E. teacher or a doctor before starting any new aerobic routine.
# High Impact - After warming up, your main aerobic routine should last about 20-30 minutes. If you’re just starting your exercise routine, it’s better to exercise for a longer period of time at a slower pace than going all out until you feel like you’re going to drop dead.
# Cool Down - Spend the last 5-10 minutes of your aerobic dance routine cooling down and relaxing. This will give you a chance to stretch your muscles and let your heart rate slowly come down.

Aerobic Dancing - Choosing Tunes
# Whether you’re doing aerobic dancing during your school P.E. class or dancing to a hip-hop dance video, it’s important you choose music which will make your aerobic dance workout fun and exciting. For example, if your aerobics teacher insists on torturing you by making you listen to nothing but old Backstreet Boys tracks and Hilary Duff, you’ll quickly lose interest.
# If you don’t like the tunes in your areobic class, bring in a CD of your fave music to class or bring along your own MP3 player with headphones and listen to that instead.
# Whatever your choice of tunes is, remember to include slower tracks like Usher’s Confessions for your warm-up or cool down and faster songs like Outkast’s Hey Ya for your main aerobic workout.

Aerobic Dancing - Feet First
A good pair of sneakers is extremely important for any kind of aerobic activity. Choose a pair of shoes with good tread, cushioning and ankle support. Talk to your P.E. teacher or parents to make sure your shoes are suitable for aerobic dancing. Your feet will thank you.

2. Low-impact-In these types of exercises your foot should keep on the ground. As compared to high-impact these exercises don’t require jumping actions or complicated movements. Jumping actions and complicated actions can hurt the joints. This can proved boom for people who can’t move or lift heavy weights and even for the older people.

3. Step Aerobics- It requires a raised platform and makes use of body movement that needs a ‘stepping’ movement. It can also be used in low and high cardio activities.

4. Water Aerobics-This aerobic exercise done in water. Though water activity is a low-impact activity. It does require a certain amount of ability in swimming as it is done in waist-height water or sometimes deeper.

5. Innovative Hip-Hop- This routine can be learned consistently in three steps. First, learn to move a basic step of move around. Second, try your steps that you learn to actual music and last is put the moves together to form routine.

Aerobic dance combines dance movements and exercises performed on music. Different aerobic dance classes lessons combines fat burning aerobics with muscle building exercises and stretching. It is safe and beneficial exercise even for the healthy persons.

Aerobic dance has a benefit that it is a form of exercise as well as source of entertainment.

Aerobic dance is safe and beneficial exercise for the highly fit person. It can be done indoors, which makes them year-round activities. Anyone with orthopedic problems or who experiences symptoms such as chest pain or shortness of breath should not engage in these activities.

Aerobic music
There are various flavors of aerobics music flourished since the exercise became popular. A new method of obtaining music has grown over the past few years and that is obtaining music via the internet. Many companies have set up websites to sell their music programs on the internet. A few sites have been set up to exchange royalty-free music mixes. The different types of aerobic music available for aerobic exercises are  Aqua, Body Shape, Cycling, Funk, Hip Hop, Interval, Kickboxing, Mid Tempo, Pilates, Special Step, Street Dance, Stretch, Yoga, Religious, etc.
Style, speed, and volume must be considered if you choose to use music. Some specialty music might be more appreciated by some groups more than others. Make sure you use music that designed for safe performance of the moves.

General guidelines are: 120-124 beats per minute for Step and 136-148 for low impact aerobics. The slower beats are better for teaching Beginners classes.

Music is optional for some types of exercise. Instructors already compete with bad acoustics at indoor pools and planes and other noise pollutants at outdoor pools.

General atmosphere must be considered. Its better for new students to hear the instructions and save the instructors voice from straining during all the extra explaining. Sometimes a class full of regular students would need the extra boost of an entertaining tape.

There are innumerable benefits of aerobic dance. In fact, it can be said that, it provides you the best of all, if on one hand, it helps in losing weight, and then on the other hand, it helps in building your body muscles. Aerobic dance steps are actually a blend of distinctive dance forms like jazz, disco and ballet. It has acquired the status of a popular sport that can be enjoyed by all age groups, by both men and women.

Dance aerobics craze is spreading everywhere and is sweeping millions of people into trying it. This interesting form of exercise ensures your healthy heart and also it strengthens your lungs. It enhances your blood circulation, lowers cholesterol levels and also it relieves stress. So, enjoy the experience of performing this wonderful workout and lead a healthy lifestyle.