Known in life as the fun, popular, sexy and generally all-around harmless dance sensation, Twerking died in summer 2013 from apparent suffocation and brutal, brutal battery at the hands of cultural appropriation at its humble home in the underground of American pop culture.
A service will be held deep in the hearts of all Americans with rhythm after witnessing several exhausting, humid months of Twerking’s fight to remain a fun and sexy club dance instead of something that boring people in Norts think they’re doing in handstands against the wall in their trash Instagram videos.
Twerking was born in 1993 in the American Deep South and spent its early years accompanying Soffe shorts and flip flops around New Orleans and Baton Rouge to the rhythm of DJ Jubilee songs.
After a solid near-decade as a fun dance/effective-enough lower-body exercise practiced in the mirror by probably hundreds of thousands of Americans, long after Cash Money Records took over from the ‘99 and the 2000, and long before Miley Cyrus pulled up to the scene with the sides of her haircut missing, the young dance sensation found the height of its success as it biggity-bounced its way to the top of the charts under the guidance of its most famous patrons: the video models for the music video to the Ying Yang Twins’ “Whistle While You Twerk.”
Success for Twerking was meteoric from there. Hip-hop enthusiasts from all over the world gave the young star its stamp of approval: from the bastions of booty-shaking Lady Luscious and Mizz Twerksum to rap musicians as prolific as Lil Wayne and Waka Flocka Flame, to celebrated 20th-century academic and philanthropist Juicy J, Twerking received praise as varied as continued practice of its methods, the dropping of bandz and the establishment of highly competitive scholarships.
Of course, like everything even slightly sexual, fun or interesting that has roots in black culture, however, Twerking fell ill shortly after its humble, easygoing existence as a club dance was exposed to the deadly virus of Cultural Appropriation — or Miley Cyrus’ Career, for short.
Moving that thang around as if you practice in a mirror, after its “exposure” to infection by Miley Cyrus’s Career (Twerking having existed in the world for as long as Miley Cyrus herself), made it seem as if it were newly horrifying and dangerous to the success and dignity of all women everywhere doing anything ever. It became a skank ritual For Colored Maenads Only and thus open to be parodied sneeringly and viewed contemptuously.
In its final breaths, Twerking experienced the worse abuse imaginable. Having been practiced by the seemingly deflowered, pale and Juicy J’d, it was condemned as tacky, grotesque and animalistic, instead of a completely normal way to get down to a genre of music that lends itself very well to structured behind movement.
Twerking is survived by people who are really just tired of your judgement, to be honest, and seriously lament that it’s become a symbol of the downfall of lily-white purity and American values. Twerking is survived by those sad that it was being beaten and smothered to death by those who believe in slut-shaming and racial profiling but definitely don’t believe in fun and don’t understand that it’s possible to appreciate aspects of black culture, or even try some of those aspects yourself, without turning them into caricatures of themselves.
Twerking is also survived by its cute and popular cousin, Twerk Kicks.
Sierra Mannie is a junior classics major from Ridgeland.
