Turfing

Turfing (or turf dancing) is a form of street dance that originated in Oakland, California, United States, characterized by rhythmic movement combined with waving, floor moves, gliding, flexing and cortortioning. It was developed by youth from West Oakland and organized by dancer Jeriel Bey, who coined the name "turf dancing," or "Turfin" and named his Organization The Architeckz™. Bey named the dance form as an acronym for "Taking Up Room on the Floor."[1][2][3] The style was originally known by the terms "having fun with it" or "hitting it", but these names didn't seem marketable. However, another claim for the nomenclature considers the acronym as a backronym and that turf dancing originated as a way to describe dances that different "turfs" (locations or territories) from Oakland performed to represent where they were from (the same as "blocks" or "sets"). The dance form had its earliest influences in the Boogaloo movement of the mid-1960s, but it developed into a distinctive dance style.[4]

  1. ^ Burkey, Shannon (2005-07-26). "Freestylin' Freestylin' Freestylin' The Architeckz aim to". Oakland Tribune. Archived from the original on 2008-09-15. Retrieved 2009-02-17.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference Zamora was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Savion-Royant, Yoram (1 May 2008). "Letter Home" (PDF). Berkeley.edu. Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Project, University of California Berkeley. Retrieved April 24, 2017. TURF stands for Taking Up Room on the Floor
  4. ^ Phaneuf, W. (2013 Aug 21) "Turfing Grows Up." Eastbay Express.