Passion, Experience, and Biography: What Can Tango Dancers Tell Us?

Biographical researchers depend upon communication with their informants, usually in the form of a chronological story about their lives. However, not all experience can be put so easily into words, let alone into a linear narrative with a beginning and an end. Drawing upon my research with people who are passionate about dancing Argentine tango, I will explore how they make sense of this passion – a passion which is highly embodied, attached to strongly-felt emotions, and often implicated in biographical transformations, yet difficult to capture in words. I will argue that their attempts to talk about their passion for dancing tango can help us as sociologists to expand our discursive approaches to the investigation of biographies in productive and provocative ways.