Transgressive Gestures in the Couple Dance in a Central-Transylvanian Local Community

In Hungarian couple dances the touch, the bodily contact between the dancing partners of a man and woman, has not been dealt with in Hungarian dance research. The question arises whether dance contains only those touches that are organic parts of dance as movement, or possibly contain such extra touches that are not necessarily forms of a formal-rhythmic flow of a dance, not inherent in its inner logic, yet often occur. My article focuses on taction in couple dances in a Hungarian village, Magyarózd, Ozd in Transylvania (Romania) and tries to detect which ones can be identified as structural elements of the dance and which can be interpreted as transgression. It is also worth exploring to what extent the transgression of these boundaries is considered as breaching social norms in a given community, what are the consequences of the transgression of boundaries, and what degrees of transgression exists. In addition to archival material, the research was based on my textual collections, dance filming (organising a carnival ball) and dance analysis. I conducted interviews with middle-aged people young adults and the older age group.