Copyright In Dance And Dance Steps

Dance is the most expressive of art forms as the performer participates with both, her mind and body with full swing and energy and yet manages to maintain the discipline that the dance form mandates. Cultures all over the world have seen the advent and growth of numerous dance forms with every dance having a typical form and routine associated with it. Some dance forms such as Bharatnaatyam or Kathak have a predefined set of rules and routines for the entire dance performance, while steps like the Bhangda step, the Bihu style or the famous pop-singer Psy’s “Gangnam style” are singular steps complete in themselves. Recently, the US Copyright Office refused to register the “Carlton dance” routine by ‘The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’s star Alfonso Ribeiro. According to the copyright office it was a mere combination of three dance steps incapable of registration. In the case of Academy of General Edu., Manipal and Ors. vs. B. Malini Mallya, the Supreme Court held that a new