Broad terms confuse me.

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I just read an invitation to a Xmas dinner. It is something that will ooccur in Advent but that's what it is called.
I read that there will be dancing.
My first reaction was how broad that term dance is. It is a hypernym.
I was wondering why they refused to tell us what kind of dancing they are talking about.

Why do people like to use broad terms that are very non-specific? Do they want us to engage in guess work?
What would be the purpose?

"There will be dancing" means "we have a space cleared out in which we expect folks to dance in" as opposed to "its gonna be all tables because its just a sitdown dinner party". They might even have a deejay, though nowadays it probably just somebody's ipod hooked up to a sound system.

If they dont specify a TYPE of dancing it just means that they expect you to do normal unskilled free style dancing that most folks do today. No touching of your partner. Just get up and- as a buddy in middle school whispered to me when we were both on the dance floor said - "just wiggle around like a ret*d".

Or my advice would be to just do the twist, and you will be okay. You can twist to any uptempo pop music from 1960 to now.

If you happened to actually know how to do some skilled hand dancing (in which you touch your partner), and so does your favorite dance partner than you can always wait for an oldy song to come on and do a handjive/jitterbug/swing dance type dance.

Otherwise just do what Lurch is doing here...and folks will think that you're "real boss".


https://youtu.be/F3jnymeJof4

Wouldn't it be better to be more specific like you were?

Maybe. But they dont because most folks understands that it is what I said above without it being specified. Dancing to current top 40, or to some mix of current hits and oldies. And freestyle or twisting is what folks do that kinda music mix.

Hosts will specify only if its something OTHER than the above.

Like they will say "Its gonna be a square dance" so you will know to expect corny old music, and probably an instructor leading the crowd, and so forth.

Isn't twist only something that older people are familiar with?

Yes and no. I am old enough to remember the original Twist craze, and Chubby Checker (I was in grade school). But its such an easy dance to do that anyone of any generation can do it. And add your own variations. Young folks dance to rap, and house music, nowadays, but the free style type dancing you do to that kind of music is kinda derived from the twist. Just wiggle around like a ret*d...and dont worry about it. Lol!

I think people are imprecise because they assume you will know what they meant...even though their phrasing is so vague you know it could mean a lot of different things.

I think if it there were a specific type of dancing, it would indeed be specified. Square-dancing, vs. line dancing, vs. tango. The more general and non-specific and BROAD, the more generic. Dancing in this case means an area will be designated for people to stand and move their bodies to music, no particular structure.

EDIT: Also, most "Christmas" parties are held before Christmas. Implication being that it occurs during the lead-up to Christmas, but not actually Christmas day or AFTER Christmas. That's what Christmastime means, and in its broadest sense, in the USA anyway, the time after Thanksgiving leading up to and including Christmas day.

I guess they never expected anybody not to know what kind of dancing they were talking about. Neurotypicals don't seem to need the degree of clarity we do. They're aware of more social details and they infer information from context.

All this can come over as confusing or ableist to us, though I don't think much of it is intended ableism. It would be more likely to be that if you asked them what kind of dancing they meant and they wouldn't tell you. Personally I detest that "if you don't know, tough luck" attitude. A clear explanation wouldn't cost them much. Though in some cases I think they just don't know how to be clear.

Me, I'm usually the opposite. I speak or write reams of words and overexplain, probably because I know first-hand what it's like to have to decypher nonspecific, over-brief stuff. I've caught up a lot since I started out in life, but I still have my principles. People sometimes have to cut me short and say "yes, we know what you mean." If you don't know your audience, it's hard to know how much detail they want. Too little, and they won't understand. Too much, and they get bored or feel that their intelligence is being insulted.

I notice a lot Victorian writing tends to overexplain things, so much so that I wish they'd condensed it a bit. They often repeat things, which is rarely necessary to anybody, I would think. Dad (very likely an Aspie, though undiagnosed) used to say Victorian writing was much clearer than modern slipshod rubbish.

Best solution is to give them a call and ask.

Dancing could refer to this: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OkAD1z-T4IM