Much Ado About Twerking… By: LaQuesha Williams admin Thursday, January 30, 2014 The Receipt, The Studio The term “twerk” surfaced a few years ago, although the dance has been popular and given several different names for years now. Twerking was once juking, which was once bumping, which was grinding. The further back in time we go, the more we’ll realize how far twerking dates back. The difference between now and then is it’s getting more provocative as time goes by and it’s influencing younger age groups. Twerking is so popular, that the oxford dictionary mentions it. To twerk is to “dance to popular music in a sexually provocative manner involving thrusting hip movements and a low, squatting stance.” If this dance was targeted towards adults in appropriate situations, twerking would have not blown up to be as big as it is today. Contrary to that, it is seen done by kids starting at the age of one up to elders who may be in their 70’s. In a video, “Hut, Hut”, which debuted some odd months ago via WorldStar, showed the dance at an all-time worse. The video featured young girls and adults twerking with leggings (which shows every curve) on turning their buttocks towards the camera. Another video, which went viral, was a girl who couldn’t have been no more than 10- years old twerking on a little boy who was around the same age. These kids were thrusting and moving body parts they shouldn’t even know exist yet. What’s most upsetting about this movement is that there are so many adults who condone this activity and think it’s cute for young girls to toot their bottoms up towards the camera and expose themselves. There is a video which features the popular Disney character ‘Minnie Mouse’ twerking at a kid’s birthday party to the popular song, ‘Don’t Drop That Thun Thun,’ as dozens of kids and adults watch. There are still people trying to blame the twerking on Miley Cyrus because of her performances and videos, but the fact is that Cyrus is just following the trend just like everyone else who participates in these videos. One of the most recent videos involving twerking was two teachers at a high school in Mississippi who used twerking as a way to get the students attention. The teachers have received both positive and negative feedback for their actions. These teachers knew how to get these students attention, because they know what’s popular. I won’t say this was inappropriate because the students are in high school and the teachers didn’t go overboard. That is less than what they see in a sex education course. This most disturbing thing about twerking is the fact that so many children are influenced by it, whether they’re introduced to it by a parent or accidently find it on YouTube. There really isn’t too much that can be done as a whole, but a parent can monitor their child and let them know what’s appropriate versus what’s not. Tune in to the video below to understand how I feel about twerking.