Let's Square Dance
In the 19th and 20th centuries square dancing was an integral part to rural communities ranging from the Appalachian Mountains to the American Southwest. Phil Jamison in his article "Square Dancing" in Haywood County, North Carolina, describes Square Dancing as an “integral part of social life in the southern mountains. . . Dances, often called shindigs, hoedowns, or frolics, were often held whenever the community gathered together. . Dances took place at house parties during Christmas and other holidays, at weddings, and after corn shuckings, barn raisings, molasses making, or other "workings" at which the locals came together to help a neighbor.” Square dancing was a similar social gathering for the Okies, which found themselves displaced and alienated in California. According to Peter La Chapelle in his book Proud to be an Okie, California was a hostile environment for migrants: “In the eyes of native white Californians, poor whites from the Ozark and Ouachita mountains, the southern plains, and the prairie Southwest had transformed from model frontiersmen into unwanted others” (22). Therefore, Okies constructed spaces outside of the popular community in which to celebrate their unique heritage.
In The Grapes of Wrath, the first instance the Joad’s experience a sense of community and belonging is when they arrive at the Weed Patch Labor Camp, after constant mistreatment at the hands of local law enforcement and Californians. Ma mentions gleefully, “Praise God, we come home to our own people . . . I feel like people again” (307).
In the novel, a Square Dance is held at the Weed Patch Labor Camp. The Square Dance becomes a space were the migrants in the camp re-create the community they left behind. For the Joad family, it is a space in which a level of security and community is experienced. Moreover, during the square dance the community is able to gather and celebrate their musical heritage. The dance is commenced by a Caller who calls the dancers to the floor. Olcutt Sanders in his article “The Good Ole Days,” detains the importance of the caller in guiding dancers: “Some variation and display of individual skill was encouraged in calls that brought men to the center to cut the pigeon-wing, or do the buck-step, the doubleshuffle, the hoe-down, or the clog, Women usually did not take active part in such goings on but simply kept time with the music until a promenade was indicated and the men returned to their admiring partners” (5). The Caller is accompanied by a band playing Chicken Reel, a fast paste tune which accompanies the square dance. Steinbeck writes, “The Caller stepped to the middle of the floor and held up his hands. ‘All ready? Then let her go!’ The music snarled out ‘Chicken Reel,’ shrill and clear, fiddle skirling, harmonicas nasal and sharp, and the guitars booming on the bass strings” (341).
What is important about the square dance is that everyone is able to participate, creating a space of acceptance and community belonging. Amid a hostile environment, square dancing becomes incredibly important. Steinbeck writes: “Now perspiration stood out on the foreheads of the boys. Now the experts showed the tricky inter-steps. And the old people on the edge of the dance floor took up the rhythm, patted their hands softly, and tapped their feet; and they smiled gently and then caught one another’s eyes and nodded” (342). Indeed, square dancing is a way for the Okies to create a community, a people, a unit; among the hostile environment of California.