Dancing with Myths: The Misogynist Construction of Dancing Mania

Abstract

The European ‘dancing manias’ represent the first recorded episodes of ‘epidemic hysteria’. These behaviours are typified within the psychiatric literature as spontaneous, stress-induced outbursts of psychological disturbance that primarily affected females. This depiction is typically founded on secondary sources or the selective use of period quotations by medical historians George Rosen and Henry Sigerist. However, based on a series of translations of medieval European chronicles describing these events, typically firsthand, it is evident that contemporary depictions of ‘dancing manias’ have been misrepresented by these misogynist scholars. Contrary to popular psychiatric portrayals, females were not overrepresented among participants, episodes were not spontaneous but highly structured, and involved unfamiliar religious sects engaging in strange or unfamiliar customs that were redefined as a behavioural abnormality.