The Configuration of Salsa Masculinities on Salsaforums.com

This essay examines the configuration of masculinities in salsa dance based on discussions on a popular salsa website, Salsaforums.com. With a thorough combing of the popular threads on male dancers, it contends that in the traditional framework of performance of men in salsa, the issue of masculinity as a social practice embedded in the discursive structuring of various social forces has to be explored from a dynamic and eclectic perspective. Discourses are manifest in the male dancers’ pride, insecurity, and anxiety. While trying to retain dispositions or attributes traditionally ascribed to men, however, male salsa dancers are negotiating a salsa masculinity that is multiple, fluid, flexible, and on the way to embrace a more inclusive spectrum of possibilities.