Do you have to have been a stripper to teach pole dancing?

Just wondering if all pole dancing instructors were strippers before they became pole dance teachers. If not, how did they learn?

Comments for Do you have to have been a stripper to teach pole dancing?

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Definitely not!
by: Susan from PDFF

I've been teaching pole dancing since early 2005. I've never set foot in a strip club in my 46 years, so I can tell you that there's at least one pole dance instructor in the world who doesn't come from a stripper background...me! However, I know that there are also many other excellent pole dance and pole fitness instructors who haven't had a previous career as a stripper.

Not that I'm a prude or anything, but my background is in dance and fitness and I've just never had any interest in watching strippers. Dancers yes, but strippers no. I actually taught myself to pole dance on a tether ball pole at my local elementary school LOL!

Lots of people still don't get that there's a difference between stripping and pole dancing. That's one of the things I find about this line of work - I'm always educating people about the fact that pole dancing doesn't necessarily equal stripping. Yes, pole dancing had its origins in strip clubs, but that association is getting weaker all the time as pole dancing moves more and more into the mainstream fitness realm.

Women of all shapes, ages and sizes enjoy the fitness benefits of pole dancing. And it's pretty empowering when you master a difficult trick, just as I imagine it would be very satisfying to finally run a sub 50 minute 10k or land a back flip for the first time.

From a fitness perspective, I look at pole dancing as another trend that can provide more workout options, variety and fun. I also teach Latin dance, fitness hooping, and a variety of other classes that use different pieces of equipment. But for some reason, when you put a dance pole in the room people attach all kinds of judgments to it. Interesting, don't you think?

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Definitely not! (continued)
by: Susan from PDFF

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As to how a pole dance instructor might learn the moves if she's never been a stripper, there are lots of ways she can do this. While it's true that hanging out "backstage" at a strip club used to be the main way that "industry girls" picked up their moves from other dancers, today there are lots of other options.

Many pole dancing teachers have a background in teaching fitness, dance or gymnastics. They study pole dancing just as they would any other dance form or fitness technique, and then they apply their teaching skills to this new apparatus.

Others took pole dancing classes first, and found they enjoyed it so much that they wanted to teach others. From here, they either studied to become a fitness instructor, and/or apprenticed under an experienced teacher to learn the details of safety, instructional technique, class facilitation, etc.

Of course, there are some pole dance teachers who did used to practice their art in strip clubs. In fact, some of the first brave women to take this dance form out of the strip clubs and into women's homes, fitness centers, or gyms, were strippers.

Thanks to these women who helped bridge the gap between strip pole dancing and fitness pole dancing, women can now enjoy this fun and empowering form of dance and fitness almost anywhere they choose!

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