Dance Card

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In its most basic form, the dance card is a palm-sized booklet distributed to women attending a ballroom dance. Roughly the size of a woman's palm, the dance card is printed with a list of the evening's dances on the left side of the booklet; the right side of the booklet was typically printed with lines or space for gentlemen to "sign up" or "pencil in" their names, so to declared their engagement for a specific dance with an available woman.

The dance card was primarily a late 18th- and 19th century media, implemented at balls in both Europe and America. Ballroom dancing spiked in popularity in the U.S. during the mid-19th century, roused by increasing interest in gendered etiquette and division of male and female domestic space, as well as its application as a recreational and diversionary activity during the Civil War. Use of the dance card faded in the 20th century as dance became less gender regimented and no longer relied on the highly etiquette-based practices of traditional Victorian balls.

The Dance Card in Practice

Giordano writes that "the Dance Card was a convenient way for the lady to keep track of whom she had promised dances to during the course of the evening" (204). The dance card commonly had a braided cord attached down the spine, for the purpose of being attached to a lady's wrist or dress. Sometimes this cord was used to attach a pencil, but it was considered more reasonable for a gentleman to carry his own pencil.

The dance card operated as a file that established an protocol of heterosexual interaction, organized according to the order and length of a pre-determined schedule of waltzes, polkas, cotillons and mazurkas. The woman totes the object of her very inscriptability: she, the open book with gaps waiting to be filled, he the bearer of the mark. The card, then, plays out on its surface the first touch of social engagement--the touch of the pencil to a woman's card is a priori to the touch of the male hand upon a woman's waist. It is the gateway, but one which the female has little control over who begs entrance. A woman was expected to dance with a man who asked first; her only alternative was to sit out, which was still considered poor form.

Dance card as register of etiquette? It organizes the process of events. While the man signs his name next to a dance, it's understood that he's signing up for the woman. In this context, the dance and the damsel are merged; he writes himself upon her card. The only constant in this algebra of dances and genders is the woman

Writing the Body

The Problem of "Pencils"