Dance was one of the few cultural practices enslaved Africans were sometimes permitted to maintain, and they used it strategically. The Ring Shout — a circular, shuffling, call-and-response movement that combined African communal dance traditions with Christian spiritual content — survived plantation prohibitions by technically never crossing its feet (which might have been associated with 'heathen' African ceremony). It is one of the oldest continuous African American performance traditions, documented from the 18th century forward, and it is the root from which gospel, jazz, and early blues performance practices grew. When the cakewalk emerged in the late 19th century — a deliberate parody of white plantation owners' formal dances, performed by enslaved people for their own amusement — it eventually became one of the most popular social dances in America, performed in white ballrooms and vaudeville theaters with no acknowledgment of where it had come from or what it had originally meant.

The 20th century saw this pattern accelerate dramatically. The Charleston, developed in Black communities in South Carolina and popularized in Harlem in the early 1920s, became the defining dance of the Jazz Age for white America. The Lindy Hop, created by Black dancers in Harlem's Savoy Ballroom in the late 1920s, became the template for swing dance worldwide. The Twist — Chubby Checker's 1960 version of a move that had been in Black communities for years — became a national phenomenon and generated a Broadway show, multiple films, and a tourist economy in New York. The credit lines rarely ran back to the Black communities that had originated the movement.

Hip-hop dance forms — breaking (breakdancing), locking, and popping — developed in New York and Los Angeles in the 1970s in specific Black and Latino communities with specific founders. Breaking was developed in the South Bronx, documented by dancers like DJ Kool Herc, Afrika Bambaataa, and specific crews (Rock Steady Crew, New York City Breakers). Locking was developed by Don Campbell in Los Angeles. Popping was developed by Boogaloo Sam in Fresno. These are named individuals with documented artistic contributions. The dances were adopted globally by the 1980s — in music videos, in films, in competitions — and are now Olympic sports. The history of who created them is not always part of the story told when they are celebrated.

The social media era has made this pattern visible in real time in a way that wasn't previously possible. In 2019, a 15-year-old Black girl named Jalaiah Harmon created a dance called the Renegade and posted it on TikTok. It went globally viral — but primarily through the account of Charli D'Amelio, a white teenager who performed the dance without initially crediting Harmon. D'Amelio gained millions of followers. Harmon had to make her own presence in the conversation by going to NBA All-Star Weekend to perform her own dance. The New York Times covered her story; so did major news outlets. It resulted in D'Amelio acknowledging Harmon and a brief public conversation about credit. But the underlying dynamic — viral reach flowing to white creators who perform Black-originated content — continued on the platform. This is not unique to TikTok. YouTube, Instagram, and every content platform before them show the same pattern.

The economics of this appropriation are not invisible anymore. Professional athletes now negotiate contracts that include compensation for dances they create and perform in end-zone celebrations. NFL player Fortnite made end-zone dances famous — and the video game Fortnite later settled lawsuits with several dancers including Alfonso Ribeiro (the Carlton) and 2 Milly (the Milly Rock), who claimed the game had used their distinctive dances without permission or payment. The legal frameworks for intellectual property in movement are still being built. But the cultural argument is settled among most people who study it: Black dance culture is among the most influential and most systematically undercompensated creative contributions in American cultural history.