A b-boy or break-boy is a male dancer who practices breaking or b-boying, the original hip-hop dance style. Equal terms for this are b-girl, to refer to a female who practices breaking, and breaker which is gender neutral. The word b-boying is the proper term for what the media calls breakdancing.

The breaking documentary The Freshest Kids: A History of the B-Boy presents two reasons of why the ‘b’ stands for ‘break’. The first is that it's a reference to the musical ‘breaks’ on the record. Crazy Legs, the president of Rock Steady Crew explains the origin of the term - “the word b-boy originated from Kool Herc … b-boys and b-girls - break boys, break girls." His colleague Mr. Freeze of Rock Steady Crew states, “the break of the record… ‘b’… break, we are the b-boys.”^[2]Mr. Wiggles of Rock Steady Crew and Electric Boogaloos says, “the DJs used to cut breaks, and the b-boys would break to what? The breaks. So you know, it’s just common sense.”[edit]Terminology

An alternative theory is that it comes from the street slang terms 'break' and 'breaking' which at the time meant to fight or to lose control. Grand Mixer DXT says, “breaking boys - because people would be breaking at the party, starting trouble… when somebody would get mad - 'yo he’s breaking, stop breaking man,' and when Kool Herc says it, it’s official.” DJ Kool Herc himself (billed as ‘The Father of Hip-Hop’ in the documentary) says, “b-boy – boys that break, it didn’t come from breaks on the record, it comes from… this man he ‘broke’, he went to a point, a breaking point… we just used the exaggeration of that term to the dancing – the b-boys, break boys.”

History of breaking

Main article: b-boying

Breaking or b-boying, commonly called breakdancing, is a style of dance that evolved as part of hip-hop culture among Black and Latino American youths in the South Bronx during the 1970s. It is danced to both hip-hop and other genres of music that are often remixed to prolong the musical breaks.

There are four basic elements which form the foundation of breaking. The first is Toprock, a term referring to the upright dancing and shuffles. The second element is Downrock which refers to footwork dancing performed on the floor. The third element is the Freeze, the poses that breakers throw into their dance sets to add punctuation to certain beats and end their routines. The fourth element of b-boying is the Power moves. These are the most impressive acrobatic moves normally made up of circular motions where the dancer will spin on the floor or in the air.

Though widespread, the term "breakdancing" is looked down upon by those immersed in hip-hop culture. This is because the word "breakdance" is a term created by the mediato describe what was called breaking or b-boying in the street. The majority of the art form’s pioneers and most notable practitioners refer to it as breaking or b-boying.

There are many different individual styles used in breaking. Individual styles often stem from a dancer's region of origin and influences. Although there are some generalities in the styles that exist, many dancers combine elements of different styles with their own ideas and knowledge in order to create a unique style of their own.

A beginner b-boy doing a baby freeze.

• Powermoves/Airmoves: This element of breaking is what most members of the general public associate with the term "break-dancing". Power moves comprise full-body spins and rotations that give the illusion of defying gravity. Examples of power moves include headspins, backspins, windmills, flares, airtracks/airflares, 1990s, 2000s, jackhammers, crickets, turtles, hand glide, halos, and elbow spins.
• Toprock: The most fundamental element of breaking. Toprock refers to the standing up aspect of breaking that involves full body movement to the beat. Compared to other upright dance styles, toprock seems to be more aggressive and energetic due to increased use of the limbs and less use of isolation as compared to other styles. Examples of steps include indian step, march step, salsa step, brooklyn rock, star step.
• Footwork: A fundamental element of breaking, that often involves but is not limited to stepping patterns around the floor. There are many different styles of footwork but the term usually refers to the fundamental style of aforementioned stepping patterns. Dancers usually use footwork to transition their combos with more detail, but some dancers prefer to focus on footwork and try to take their footwork to a very high level, mostly by introducing more complexity and detail into their style, all the while being able to control such movements to the music flawlessly. Some very basic footwork techniques may include six step, three step, shuffles, pretzels, scrambles, backrocks, CC's and miniswipes.
• Freeze: A very fundamental element of breaking that involves holding the body in a certain position in a way that will often require a combination of strength, balance, and technique. Examples include baby freeze, chair freeze, air chair, elbow freeze, airbaby, headstand, and hollowback.
• Burns: A type of move intended to embarrass the opponent by creating obscene or comical moves (i.e crotch grabbing) during battles.
• Abstract: A very broad term used in breaking which may refer to incorporation of threading footwork, free and unorthodox movements, broken link styles, and "circus" styles (tricks, contortion, etc.)
• Trick (Blowup): A style of breaking which focuses on the explosiveness of a certain power moves, freezes, and circus style movements. A blowup consists of performing a difficult or visually explosive transition into a clear ending, often a difficult or visually explosive freeze, in order to "smack" or exceed the virtuosity of the other b-boy's performance. This is usually attempted only after becoming proficient in other styles due to the fact that most blowups require a combination of different elements into a difficult freeze. The emphasis of a blowup is the combination of different elements turned into one explosive move. An example would be spinning in a 1990 and catching in a hollowback, rolling backwards into a threaded airfreeze, doing a backflip into an airchair, or doing an elbowtrack and freezing one on elbow.