Reggae Dancer Hanna Herbertson, center, showing participants how to "wine," in her reggae aerobics class in Manhattan. (Photo by Dervedia Thomas/CNS)

In nightclubs tucked away all over New York City, fast-paced reggae music called Dancehall prompts dancers to engage in what seems to be a textbook example of “dirty dancing” called daggering.

As the music gathers momentum, the man thrusts his pelvis repeatedly against the rear of his female dance partner, who is bent over submissively. The motion is set to the lyrics of the Jamaican song “Dagga, Dagga, Dagga,” which is a fairly blatant metaphor for their movements.

This bump-and-grind dance originated in Jamaica about five years ago and has caught on far beyond that island nation, becoming a fixture in Jamaican-themed night clubs around the world. Like other Caribbean dances that feature suggestive movements, it has become as popular as it is controversial.

In addition to daggering, there is perrero from Puerto Rico and from Brazil–the country that gave us the lambada — the surra da bunda, in which women jiggle their derrieres in the faces of their male partners. In both Barbados and Jamaica a dance called the six thirty is also gaining popularity. Derived from the way the hands of a clock are positioned at 6:30, this dance involves women jiggling while bent over with their hands on the floor.

Whatever form it takes however, some defenders claim critics are overreacting. “Dance is never dirty, that’s an extremely biased, Western cultural viewpoint,” says Michael Manswell, a choreographer and professor of dance at City University of New York. “If you want to call it sexual, then it is just sexual play. We have this extremely Christian, Westernized viewpoint that everything to do with the pelvic region is taboo.” The critics “just don’t understand the value of good strong pelvic motion.”

Case in point: New York’s Finest. In September  2011, several New York City police officers made headlines by daggering with some women in the city’s West Indian Day parade. The women were shown in YouTube videos bent over while bumping and grinding with the laughing, dancing officers. The officers were criticized for “dirty dancing” and the NYPD launched an investigation. The NYPD did not respond to emails for an update on the investigation.

The dancing may have offended some sensibilities but, “for West Indians it’s not indecent,” says Renée Marie Baron, a professor of Caribbean literature at The Juilliard School. What happens at the parade “is part of a larger culture.”

The debate over the appropriateness of dancing is age old. The waltz was considered in appropriate in the early 19th century because couples could dance with their arms around each other, and the Argentine tango was flat out scandalous, and Christian missionaries were shocked to see Hawaiians dancing the hula. And who could forget Elvis Presley’s swiveling hips omitted from his CBS appearance in the 1950s, because they might overexcite young people.

The West Indian Day parade is an adaptation of Carnival celebrations in the islands. In these countries, thousands of costume clad revelers are encouraged to “let loose,” by jumping, waving and “wineing,” an age-old form of movement derived from the word wind (to turn). “Wineing” involves rotating the waistline and is thought to be the the predecessor of other forms of provocative dancing.

For Careen Bennette, 25, daggering can be fun, but for this Jamaican dancer, whose YouTube video “Bruk It Down,” features her performing different types of gyrating movements, daggering is only fun if it is not “excessive.” Meanwhile, dancer Hanna Herbertson incorporates “wineing” into her reggae aerobics class.

Perreo from Puerto Rico employs similar gyrations. (Perro is the Spanish word for dog, which approximates the woman’s position as the couple dances.) The dance is virtually synonymous with Reggaeton, a form of music that combines hip-hop, Jamaican dancehall, techno and Latin rhythms. This genre and its accompanying dance moves have been embraced by many in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean region and it has become popular in cities like Miami and New York.

“People have found joy in being rebellions and expressing themselves in a way that the general society doesn’t understand,” says Dr. Raquel Rivera, a freelance journalist and co-author of the book “Reggaeton.”  These dances are “a way to rebel against social and sexual restrictions,” she adds. Such rebellion is hardly new Rivera’s parents used to tell her about a dance in their generation called brillando la hebilla, or “shining the belt buckle” because partners danced so close.

A decade ago, Velda González, a senator from Puerto Rico, introduced legislation to censor perreo in Reggaeton videos. She called perreo “overly erotic and degrading to women,” but although the controversy led to a wider acceptance of perreo, Reggaeton artists self-censored, making the dancing less sexually explicit.

Despite the claims of cultural significance, issues of morality and decency have been raised about many of these dances. Last fall, the Rev. Andrew Struzzieri, a parish priest of Italian ancestry at St. Mathews Roman Catholic Church in Flatbush, Brooklyn, participated with his church members in the West Indian Day Parade — the same one that got the police officers in trouble.

His mostly West Indian parish danced to  fast-paced Catholic hymns and wore T-shirts with religious iconography, calling their part of the parade “Jump-up for Jesus,” but Struzzieri acknowledged the issue of certain dances can be complex. “To my eyes some of it crosses a boundary,” he says. “Especially the dancing where men and women are rubbing against one another.” While it must be taken into cultural context, he says, he would advise his parishioners to draw the line when it is more than just dancing and becomes sexually arousing.

As for the NYPD officers caught dancing, their fate is uncertain. However, one New York City newspaper took a poll of its readers on the appropriateness of the officers’ actions. Some 26 percent said that they should be disciplined, 43 percent said they shouldn’t, and 29 percent said they should be promoted to an NYPD special dancers unit.

E-mail: dmt2146@columbia.edu