What is "stick dance"

Stick dance may refer to:

• Stick dance (African-American), a dance developed by American slaves
• Ball de bastons, a European ritual dance
• Dandiya Raas, a dance of Gujarat origin
• Jocul cu bâtă, a Romanian folk dance
• Soke (dance), a Tongan folk dance
• Tahtib, an Egyptian folk dance
• Tirere, a dance in Kiribati

Stick dance was a dance style that African-Americans developed on American plantations during the slavery era, where dancing was used to practise "secret military drills" among the slaves, where the stick used in the dance was in fact a disguised weapon.