What the heck is moment of inertia?
Simply put, moment of inertia[1], or rotational inertia, is how hard something is to turn. You may have heard of Newton’s second law, which is force equals mass times acceleration. This law describes things that are moving in a straight line. Whenever we start doing turns, however, we turn towards the rotational version of it, which is, torque equals moment of inertia times angular acceleration.
Have you ever watched those wonderful videos of ballerinas holding very, very long balances, and wondered, how on earth do they do that? Then, if you’re like me, do you go immediately into asking, could I ever do something like that, because just letting go of the barre in class is a struggle?
When I went to university, I was fully prepared to stop dancing. That was the usual narrative, right? Unless you are looking to pursue dance professionally, you stop dancing when you get to university. I don't know where this cliche came from, but for me, it was a combination of being away from my old studio and the new limitations on my time that caused me to stop dancing for a year. I still took classes every now and then, but all of them felt hollow, almost like a battered car coming to the shop for yearly maintenance
If you have ever tried landing a jump with straight legs, you would immediately feel the impact rattling your ankles and knees and maybe even all the way up to your shoulders. But, when we land our jumps in a plié like our teachers told us, we feel less impact upon landing. But why does this happen? And what’s the physics behind it?
It brings great joy to my heart to finally announce that The Fifth has found a place to call our own. The process has been long and sometimes felt like an impossible task but at long last!
Barre Tales is a compilation of short stories. These stories tell the tale of how our adult students found their way to the barre and what it means for them to keep exploring this wonderful movement practice.
