Square Dance History Project
The rich story of North American square dance finally has a home in the digital age.

Browse Items (10 total)

  • Temporal Coverage is exactly "18th century - late"
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Les plaisirs de Varennes - contredanse française

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Contredanse française - pot-pourri of dances

This selection of dances from the period of the French Revolution begins with an introduction (in French). The actual dancing begins about 2:20. View item
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Les Quatre Berceaux - related documents

This item gathers together various documents related to the videotaped performance of the dance, Les Quatre Berceaux:• Instructions, as interpreted and explained by John Ramsay with assistance… View item
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Shoo-Fly Swing and La Boulangère

Compilation of sources that reveal the similarity between La Boulangère, a European dance around 1800 and the only dance mentioned by name by Jane Austen, and the Shoo-Fly Swing, its American… View item
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Trois-Rivières manuscript, commentary

This is a Google translated version of the site describing the history of the dances shown in the Trois-Rivières video. View item
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3 Contredanses françaises

These three dances date to the late 18th century. They are reconstructed from the Manuscrit de Trois-Rivières, the earliest dance manuscript in Canada; click here for more information about the… View item
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History of Square Dancing - Ralph Page

Between 1972 and 1974, Ralph Page wrote a series of essays entitled A History of Square Dancing. For ease in downloading, we have collected them into "chapters" that group together similar topics.… View item
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The History of Square-Dancing - S. Foster Damon

The History of Square Dancing, published by S. Foster Damon in 1957, is one of the few books that presents a broad picture of the subject. The book was a reprint of his 1952 article published in the… View item
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La naissance du cotillon et du quadrille, contredanses françaises

Article (in French) by Simonne Voyer, who is the author of La danse traditionnelle dans l'est du Canada: quadrilles et cotillons. For a translation in English by Susan Kevra, click here. View item
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The Birth of the Cotillion and the Quadrille, French Contredanses

This is a translation of Simonne Voyer's article, "La naissance du cotillon et du quadrille, contredanses françaises."The translation is by Susan Kevra, Senior Lecturer in French and American… View item