Magical gesture dance, the most popular short video imitation sample in 2022!

Starting from gesture dance, this article objectively analyzes the development of gesture dance on short video platforms from the perspective of its expression, traffic inclination, and commercial realization possibilities. It is recommended for those who are working in the short video industry.

As one of the most representative cultural phenomena on short video platforms, gesture dance has been popular for many years. This is of course inseparable from the unique communication, emotional and traffic attributes of gesture dance itself. Today, gesture dance has also evolved from its original entertainment function to being given richer connotations and matched with more segmented scenes.

Tsamina mina eh eh, Waka Waka eh eh, Tsamina mina zangalewa, This time for Africa..." Accompanied by the music of Waka Waka, put your hands together, then stretch out your hands, turn your hands, and finally do a "overwhelming" finger movement. This is the World Cup gesture dance that has been very popular on short video platforms recently.

This song "Wakawaka" is the theme song of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Because the song is classic and easy to listen to, this year with the opening of the Qatar World Cup, the Wakawaka gesture dance became a hit on short video platforms, and the number of views of related topics reached 2.9 billion.

In fact, this is not the first time that hand gesture dance has become popular on Douyin. As early as 2018, hand gesture dance became the most popular dance category on the Douyin platform. Behind the well-known hits such as "Learn to Meow", "Youth" and "Lone Hero" all brought a wave of hand gesture dance craze. Why has the seemingly simple hand gesture dance been so popular for so long, and how will it develop in the future?

1. Why is hand gesture dance so enduring?

As the name suggests, hand gesture dance is to use the hands to perform movements to the rhythm of music. There is no clear origin of hand gesture dance on the short video stage. It seems to have become popular on the platform overnight, but now it has become an influential vertical category in the dance track. The "2018 Douyin Big Data Report" released by Douyin shows that among the top ten dance categories, hand gesture dance has become the most popular dance of the year.

Of course, this is inseparable from the guidance of some excellent imitation samples. It was also in this year that some gesture dance masters emerged on short video platforms. In 2018, Ukrainian dancer Aleks Kost created a unique "Chicken Eating" gesture dance with gesture dance elements and the hit song "98K". With the sound of bullets being loaded, bolted and fired, Aleks Kost's hands moved back and forth, his movements were crisp and clear, and the strong sense of immersion and visual sense made him win 2.6 million likes and triggered countless netizens to imitate.

△Source: Tik Tok @Aleks Kost

In addition, the communication attributes, emotional attributes and traffic attributes of gesture dance videos themselves allow them to occupy a place in the short video field.

2. Gesture dance with meme genes

Most short videos are 15 seconds long. How to quickly catch people's attention in a short time? Gesture dance short videos use dynamic and brainwashing music and simple and easy-to-learn movements to provide the answer. Compared with professional dances that are more entertaining and aesthetic, gesture dances mainly focus on the movement of fingers, palms and arms, such as making a heart shape with both hands, crossing arms, making an OK sign, snapping fingers, etc., which are simple to learn and easy to imitate.

At the same time, the gesture dance has a strong adaptability to the music. When singing "Holding Hands in the Summer Night", two hands are put together, and when singing "More Than Just Like", a heart gesture is made. Such a dance with direct translation is more friendly to most ordinary people, so it has a "gene" that can be copied in large quantities.

In addition to the movements, the auxiliary role of the divine song cannot be ignored. In some videos that list the most popular gesture dances in 2022, you can hear a lot of familiar background music. "Youth", "Lone Brave Man", "Mang Zhong" and so on are all songs that were once very popular. Philosophy professor Francis Wolf believes that people's pleasure for rhythm comes from our instinctive reaction. Once the familiar music sounds, it is easy to grab the user's attention in a short time and make people move unconsciously.

Easy to imitate, eye-catching, and highly popular among the public, these characteristics of gesture dance video texts have laid the foundation for its survival on short video platforms.

3. Gesture dance that can express emotions

Gestures are the most commonly used body language in our daily lives, and they play an important role in communication and expressing emotions. Different gestures also contain different meanings and emotions. When we want to express love, we make a heart shape; when we want to show recognition and praise, we applaud; the sign language we are familiar with also has language attributes.

Gesture dance, which uses hands as an important performance "tool", naturally has the function of expressing emotions, so this type of short video is also more appealing and attractive. At the same time, it means that it can be combined with hot topics and social events to form an interactive universe of "gesture dance +" to meet the needs of users for emotional interaction. Compared with direct oral expression, the emotions expressed in gesture dance are more implicit and friendly.

For example, the Waka Waka gesture dance combined with the opening topic of the World Cup, with topics such as #My World Cup DNA is moving# and #The World Cup extra-staff cheerleaders are here#, uses "World Cup" as the ignition point, providing users who love football and the World Cup with a channel to express their excitement and participation.

Similar to this is the "New Year Gesture Dance" which is popular during the Spring Festival. The changes in the "three, two, one" gestures arouse netizens' expectations for the New Year. During the National Day, the "Patriotic Gesture Dance" that netizens rushed to imitate expresses the theme of strong patriotism through gestures.

△Source: Tik Tok @Sun

4. Gesture dance with traffic tilt

Because of its strong interactivity and participation, the gesture dance challenge has become an important way for short video platforms to stimulate users to create content. From the "Gemini Meteor Shower Gesture Dance Challenge" in 2017's "Wish Post-it Notes" to the present, many popular gesture dances are launched on short video platforms every year, triggering a wave of imitation among users.

At the same time, more and more brands, major events, and film and television dramas have included hand gesture dancing in their promotional periods. For example, during the promotion of the Beijing Winter Olympics, official accounts successively released videos of the "Together Towards the Future" hand gesture dance performed by stars such as Yi Yang Qianxi, Cheng Xiao, and Tang Yan, using the celebrity effect to encourage netizens to unlock the same hand gesture dance as the stars. On the one hand, this enhanced the topic of the event, and on the other hand, it also brought more exposure to hand gesture dancing.

△Source: Douyin @Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics

Even many celebrities are keen to join the hand gesture dance challenge even when it is not a promotional period. During the World Cup, Zeng Li, Mao Xiaotong, Bai Lu, Yu Shuxin, Lan Yingying and others have danced the wakawaka dance, which can attract fans to watch and even join in, injecting more traffic into this dance.

△Source: Douyin @虞书欣Esther

It can be seen that behind the popularity of gesture dance videos, there is not only an expression of interest and hobby, but also elements of trend-following and imitation and multi-faceted marketing through platform media.

5. Gesture dance is nurturing more possibilities

As a type of content that appeared earlier on short video platforms, gesture dance has both "longevity" and periodicity. Each wave of gesture dance craze is like a flash in the pan, fleeting, and soon there will be new gesture dance videos

With wave after wave of popularity, gesture dance videos have also spawned more possibilities.

1. Possibility of commercial realization

Gesture dance videos are a tool for national entertainment, meeting people's social and entertainment needs. At the same time, they have also become a powerful tool for some video experts to increase their followers and realize their value. Many "hand" artists have emerged on short video platforms, and their account styles are also quite diverse. Some have become popular with their talents, and some have become popular with their looks. Different accounts have their own unique styles, such as gesture dance innovation, gesture dance teaching, gesture dance display, etc.

Click on the homepage of the nickname "Sun", and you can find basically all the gesture dance tutorials adapted from various Douyin hit songs such as "Youth" and "Mang Zhong" here. Real-person gesture dance demonstrations with text explanations, sweet smiles, cute and smooth movements, plus movement tutorials, have brought his number of fans to more than 6 million.

This expert has accumulated the first bucket of "traffic" on the Internet with simple gesture dance. Having a certain fan base also means the opportunity to realize it. There are more than 200 good things in her homepage window, and more than 10,000 fans follow her to buy.

The Ukrainian guy who created the PUBG dance mentioned above also gained tens of millions of fans in half a year, and now has more than 15 million fans. He also creates some more matching dances according to the tone of some brands. For example, when promoting a skincare brand in an e-commerce festival, Aleks Kost created a set of facial mask dance.

△Source: Tik Tok @Aleks Kost

2. Possibility of vertical development

Shifman believes that in popular participatory culture, incomplete texts are like bait, inviting users to fill in the blanks in the text. Initially, gesture dance appeared as a text for entertainment, but in recent years, with the extension of its influence and the deepening of interaction with users, it has occupied a huge traffic pool on short video platforms. Various types of gesture dances have emerged one after another, and are being given more diverse meanings.

From the "Ice Cream Love" gesture dance performed in relays by major universities to the "Listen to Me Say Thank You" gesture dance presented to frontline anti-epidemic personnel, the application scenarios of gesture dance have become more enriched and segmented.

△ Tik Tok @Victoria and @希希老师 gesture dance

VI. Conclusion

Communication scholar Paul Levinson once pointed out that when a new media first enters society, it is often just a form of entertainment, often playing a role on the margins of society, and then as technology develops, it becomes a realistic tool.

The development of gesture dance videos on the platform has also gone through a process from "toy" to "mirror". On the one hand, people enjoy the entertainment pleasure brought by imitating gesture dance and immerse themselves in this brainwashing and cheerful video consumption. On the other hand, it also reflects the survival dilemma and anxiety of modern people, who are accustomed to using homogeneous repetitive methods to make up for the emptiness of life.

Nowadays, hand gesture dance has long gone beyond the small circle of "self-cultivation" and has entered the public eye. Although the craze of the World Cup hand gesture dance has gradually subsided, there are still countless new hand gesture dances rising in the wind.

What will be the next gesture dance that everyone will follow?

refer to

1. All Media. Behind the controversy of "Listen to Me Say Thank You", the hand gesture dance short video has been popular for many years

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/Jvk0FUpz9yoDpgTbgjNp8g

2. A real "hand" artist on Douyin! The secrets of hand gesture dance from 01

https://view.inews.qq.com/k/20210105A02H8Z00?web_channel=wap&openApp=false

3. Ma Chunliang. “Gesture Dance”: Body Politics in Micro-Movements

4. Limo Shiffman. Translated by Yu Weishen, Wang Xu, and Wu Yiran. Mim

5. Francis Wolff. Translated by Bai Ziyang. How is Music Possible?

Author: Zhou Kexin

WeChat public account: Cultural Industry Review