If you listen, her tapping very much adds to the music.

Love this💗💗💗💗💗

That’s Emma O'Sullivan! She’s a famous tap dancer (all-Ireland champion) and you can see her often if you walk the streets of Galway, dancing in the street!

I’d just like to add (for non Irish people especially) that she isn’t actually a tap dancer but a sean nós dancer. Sean nós is a traditional Irish dance (sean nós means “the old way”) but it isn’t the same as the mainstream Irish dance which people would be familiar with. In mainstream Irish dance the dancers have carefully choreographed routines that need to be learned and replicated and keep a rigid upright position at all times. They either wear soft shoes which make no sound or hard shoes which make a tap sound which are worn for different types of dances. People can also usually recognise Irish dance pretty easily at a glance due to the extravagant colourful costumes, white “poodle” socks, white undershorts and heavy wigs and make up that the dancers wear at competitions.

Sean nós is a totally different type of dance separate to this mainstream “Irish dance”. It is a much more loose and free type of dance where the dancers always wear hard shoes since the sound of the feet is very important. There are a few basic moves (the “shuffle, shuffle stamp”, the “heel and toe” and the “slide and shuffle” being the basic foundation steps) but once you have the basics you can combine steps, free style and even make your own steps. You can move your hands and arms to the music unlike in mainstream Irish dance too. Sean nós is often seen as the sexier Irish dance as the dancers are allowed much greater hip and general body movement and can laugh and interact with the audience as they move. There are no particular costume rules for sean nós competitons. Unlike Irish dance, people can really wear whatever but the norm is comfortable and simple dresses or skirts or trouser/top combinations made up from whatever the dancer chooses from their own wardrobes, a huge contrast to the heavy Irish dance costumes and the expense and pageantry associated with them. Part of the appeal of sean nós is that it has not been commercialised and commodified to the degree that Irish dance has and has a much more casual and fun feel to it in contrast to the strict routines and costume norms of Irish dance.

The most skilled sean nós dancers are able to dance a “barrel dance” where they dance at high speed on top of a barrel without knocking it over. It usually takes years to get to this level of skill so people normally start on the ground and then work their way up from a quarter barrel to a half barrel until they can dance on the top of a full one. This is Emma again doing a barrel dance on a half barrel:

Another sean nós dance is Damhsa na Scuibanna “The Brush Dance” where dancers pass a brush between their legs at speed. The still images don’t really do it justice so here’s a clip of three members of the Cunningham family dancers performing it: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX3Z8qG7AKo

It’s important that people call it by its correct name of sean nós or damhsa ar an sean nós rather than just “tap dance” as it’s an important part of our cultural heritage and a type of dance that is barely known about outside of Ireland. Sean nós had almost fallen into total obscurity outside of small pockets of rural Ireland until dancers like  Emma O Sullivan and the Cunningham family dancers repopularised it in the early 2010s through their acclaimed performances and TV appearances as well as their classes for children to keep the tradition going into the next generation. Sean nós is still threatened with falling back into obscurity, if you search online most of the popular videos and photos of it are from about nine years ago during this revival and it’s still largely a rural, West of Ireland phenomenon which even people from within Ireland don’t really know about. Calling it by it’s correct name helps to keep it alive and allows new people to find out about it.

me @ myself: why is she doing this to herself

— Glennon Doyle Melton, Carry on, Warrior

Space, guys… SPACE!!!!

— Sufjan Stevens Prospect Park July 18th, 2017 (via karibu-nyumbani)

This my bebe. Bebe is bigger than me. Strong bebe

ok friends i wanted to confirm this story’s accuracy before reblogging so i googled it and yes it’s TRUE 

AND ALSO the mom cat raised the lynx baby ALONGSIDE HER KITTEN so we have all these cute pictures of the lynx cub with the kitten please look at them

^^^ FAMILY PORTRAIT

Stop that’s fucking adorable

in therapy my therapist and i were talking about my own feelings of self worth in relationships. and she asked me to say qualities about myself that someone else would be attracted to, on a romantic and platonic level. so i named some things like compassionate, empathetic, etc. and she said “you named things that you can give someone. ways you can serve, rather than ways that you are” and y'all..my mind was blown that’s gonna stick with me forever like she then proceed to tell me actual innate qualities about myself that she liked and thought anyone else would like as well and i hadn’t even considered those because like she said i was focused on things i could do outwardly to attract and maintain connections rather than who i was as a person..goddamn!!! thats tea!!!

With this in mind, this also makes me think of the ways people describe us. When people say the reasons that they love/like you or describe you as a person, are they only naming ways that you serve them? Are they equating your worth with how much you do for them?

ex. “You’re such a good listener. You’re so generous, you’re so compassionate. You’re always there for me. You always hold me down. You’re reliable”

vs.

“You’re so funny! You’re very vibrant. You’re creative, passionate, and intelligent. You’re optimistic. You’re so talented at ____” , etc. I think that’s very telling.

black cats are wonderful because you can stare into the void and not only does the void stare back, sometimes it trots up to you happily and begs for pats

the void is loud and wants chicken

Untitled

his afro is made of cassette tape

@dynastylnoire He look like big Worm

He do 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Donald Trump on climate change

Damn that’s a fantastic analogy.

Funny story from the other night:

A dad came into my cafe with his 3 year old daughter.  He bought her a cookie and himself a coffee.  They sit down, and I go back to my pre-closing cleaning.  Three minutes later the dad walks up to the counter again, so I stop cleaning and walk over to greet him again.

As I’m in the middle of saying “hi” he cuts me off and says “Water.”

Not “Can I get a glass of water, please?” not “Where can I get water?” not even a confused “water?” like he’s not sure how to get water in this cafe.  Just a single word demand.

I work in silicon valley, so I’m kind of used to techies talking to me like I’m Siri or Alexa, but it still always drives me crazy when they do this.  Like, I don’t even care about the “please” anymore, I just want people to talk to me in complete sentences.  So I get the guy a cup of water, and he sits back down. 

As I’m about to go back to cleaning I hear his daughter go “Daddy, you did that WRONG.  You have to say ’CAN I have a glass of water PLEASE’”

My jaw hit the ground.  The dad suddenly became flustered and tried coming up with excuses “I-I said please…” “No you didn’t!” “Well she was busy…. I didn’t want to bother her…..” “You still got to be polite!”

When they were done eating the dad brought the dishes back to the counter and said “Thank you so much!” It’s amazing how fast someone’s manners can improve when a 3 year old calls them out.

Shout out to whoever is teaching that little girl manners, because you know it’s not her dad.  I hope she never stops calling rude people out.