SHOUT OUT TO THE J-SETTERS.....

J-Setting is a is a highly stylized modern lead and follow style hip hop dance, characterized by cheerleading style sharp movements to an eight-beat count music.

Popular in southern U.S. African American gay clubs, like the vogue-style before it, it became popular by exposure in a pop music video, this time the 2008 Beyonce Knowles single Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It).

In 1970, former majorette Shirley Middleton became troupe leader of the Jackson State University cheerleading group, The Prancing Jaycettes. Middleton wanted something different, and so threw away their batons, and began dancing in formation. Based on a classical cheerleader eight-beat style, the signature thrusts, pumps, and high kicks were developed into a lead-and-follow "wave" through the troupe.

However, the style was strictly reserved for women only until 1997, when male troupe baton twirling member DeMorris Adams, was asked to fill in for an injured female troupe member. After this, although the performing troupe was still female, the crowd supporters started to grow from the colleges gay community


In the early 1990s, young gay men brought the style back to their home towns, and the distinct and often intricate style that is now J-Setting developed in nightclubs like Club City Lights in Jackson, Mississippi; Incognito, Allusions, and 901 in Memphis; and Club 708 in Atlanta.

J-Setting gained popularity in part because it was sharp, and due to its lead and follow nature, meant another dancer could intimate interest through following someone elses lead.