Ah, the million-dollar question...

Here is my current working definition, honed by countless practitioners:

SHORT: Where Aikido meets Yoga meets Tango, you'll find this post-modern social and performance dance form, commonly called Contact, CI, or Contact Improv.

LONG: Contact Improvisation (CI) is a 36-year-old dance form which incorporates a fluidly moving body, awareness of breath, and trust in shared weight and momentum which can propel seemingly impossible moments of defying gravity. It is practiced as a source of performance partnering and as a holistically enlivening recreational activity.

"CI fundamentals" (ie, basic movement pathways) are not a set of static positions, but a series of embodied concepts about the utility and physics of the moving human body. (Eg, falling, weight-bearing, levels of effort and pressure, disorientation, levels of awareness.) If you have a body, you can do CI. Therefore, CI is less intimidating for those with no prior dance background. Fundamentals take about a month's worth of classes to learn, give-or-take one's own learning process (and eagerness!). And then, the subtleties and exultations of CI will keep surprising you with new lessons for a lifetime.

(written by Ali Woolwich, 2003.)