Chapter 11
The “Meet” Market
What’s a nice person like you doing in a place like this?
—Cheesy 1970s pickup line
A man approached a woman to request a dance, and was refused. He appeared chagrined and left quickly. After a few minutes, he approached a second woman with a similar request. But she did not hear him clearly at first since the music had started at the same moment, and hesitated. He took this hesitation as a second refusal and quickly left the dance entirely. By the time his request has sunk in, the second girl had risen to accept his request. As she stood, she saw him abruptly turn around and leave. Thus standing there embarrassedly, perhaps thinking he had left because he did not like what she looked like at closer range, she sat down again very quickly, red-faced. Another male approached her shortly, and very quickly, without even looking at him at all, she refused him the dance.1
The above excerpt is from a journal article published in the late 1970s. At the time, singles dances were a popular, although stigmatized, way to meet others in the dating scene. In his paper, Bernard Berk provides an analysis of the observation and interviews of singles at more than 70 dances. In a time before home computers, mass Internet consumption, or mobile devices, meeting others was largely relegated to physical venues—at work, school, or, in this case, the dreaded singles dance.
Dating. Cohabitation. Marriage. Whatever an individual’s end pursuit, there is a pervasive market of ...
