Folkdancing, Math and Linguistics

(Under construction, last updated: 5 July 2005)

This page provides a home to interesting connections between folkdancing and mathematics, folkdancing and linguistics, and related topics. I've always been avidly interested in all three, but Donna Jo Napoli's course at Swarthmore College "Movement and Cognition" provided the impetus for me to actually make the page.

Suggestions and contributions are most welcome!

Square and Longways Dances

* Connection with symmetry.
* Connection with permutations
* Connections with Group Theory, e.g., Jim Blowers's article Mattresses, Contra Dancing and Quilts

Clark Baker wrote a thesis as an MIT undergraduate entitled ?? describing a computer program to call modern western square dances

Balkan Dancing

* Interesting rhythms
* Bob Liebman's thesis on footwork parity.

Couple Dances (not in formations)

* Zweifache patterns
* Dialectical diversion: Lindsey Newbold's Thesis
* Syntax in Norwegian Dance: Rachel Ficthenbaum's Thesis

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