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How To Dab: Dance Origin and Why Everyone Is Doing It
About ten years ago, in an article on how to blot, I gave some succinct instructions on using a paper towel or tissue to help reduce moisture on your face. Now, an article on how to do dabbing addresses the dance movement and pop culture phenomenon that dabbing.
Dabbing became one of the dance crazes that swept the internet and took everyone with it in recent years. It occupied a space that the Nae Nae used to occupy, but transcended the hip hop community and became a trend worldwide.
The question of how to dab is easy to answer. The dance simply requires bowing your head while raising your arm and cupping your face in your elbow as if to sneeze.
To say how to dab with Sports Illustrated; “The dance is pretty easy; you lean into their elbows like they’re about to sneeze. It literally is. You dabbed before. “
The dabbing dance is said to have originated inAtlanta, Georgia, but there is still controversy over who should really be credited with the dance. Much of the award for the dance goes to members of the Quality Control label (including Migos, OG Maco and Peewee Longway). Since the release of the song “Bitch Dab” on September 3, 2015, Migos has been the biggest contributor to the trend.
Bow Wow, the American rapper, also tried to explain the origin of the tap dance and say that he descended from the cannabis tapper community that started around 2012 before the dance train, but other rappers didn’t have it and took to Twitter to find out to refute his claims.
In November 2015, a local affiliate of FOX news founded in South Carolina reported that “the dab” was named after Clemson University head football coach Dabo Swinney. However, this was immediately met with backlash from the online community.
The dab dance has since hit peak popularity with some of its proponents even now declaring it tired. One of the most prominent moments of the encounter was soccer player Cam Newton’s eight-second celebration in 2015. The football quarterback celebrated for eight seconds during a game against the Tennessee Titans.
According to a Sports Illustrated coverage of the incident;
“When two Titans players faced [Newton] over the celebration, he continued to dance in their faces even as he withdrew.”
Newton explained the incident by crediting a 16-year-old for directing him to “dab on people.” The 16-year-old in question was Newton’s younger brother, Caylin. Newton announced he would no longer perform the celebration on June 9, 2016, but he dabbed again on November 13, 2016 after a touchdown against the Kansas City Chiefs.
Dabbing became a popular victory dance in sports, and hip hop group Migos’ Quavo and Takeoff gave Cam Newton the official title of “Dab Daddy”.
However, dance has transcended hip-hop to sports. Politicians, small children, everyone got involved. In January 2016, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton dabbed on the Ellen DeGeneres Show at the annual Scripps National Spelling Bee. The children celebrated their correct spelling by dabbing. Kendrick Lamar rushed into a wedding and started dabbing with his crew.
Also here in Africa, the President of the Republic of Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta, invited a dance troupe to the State House in February 2017 to perform the dabbing dance move with him. He apparently did it to urge Kenya’s youth to register to vote, but many people were not happy that there were other pressing issues in the country.
Some people are so passionate about the dance that they can appreciate the fact that it is illegal in Saudi Arabia. The dance was declared illegal by the National Committee on Drug Control as it was believed to “allude to weed and other illegal substances”. In August 2017, Saudi singer and actor Abdallah Al Shaharani was arrested for performing the train at a music festival in Ta’if.
