Dance challenges gender roles

A man typically asks a woman to be his date for school dances like Homecoming and prom. However, Sadie Hawkins’s dances completely turn this concept on its head. This time the ladies call the shots.

This tradition can be traced back to an American cartoonist named Al Capp. The dance is named after a character from his “Li’l Abner” comic strip printed in 1937. According to National Today, “American college students started to honor the idea of gender role reversal by holding Sadie Hawkins dances and other events.” When Life magazine published an article in 1939 titled “On Sadie Hawkins Day Girls Chase Boys in 201 Colleges,” Sadie Hawkins dances were cemented in history.

This dance is often held in autumn because of the country nature of the comic strip itself as well as its’ proximity to football season when Powder Puff football games also reverse gender roles, but it can also be scheduled around February 29, a date that is rumored to be one of the few times when a woman can propose marriage.