Hokey Pokey

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For the other uses, see Hokey pokey.

The Hokey Pokey (also known as the Hokey-Cokey) is a participation dance that became popular in the USA in the 1950s. Larry LaPrise, Charles Macak and Tafit Baker were granted the copyright for the song in 1950. According to popular legend they created this novelty dance in 1949 as entertainment for the ski crowd at Idaho's Sun Valley resort. However, as the dance was wildly popular with American servicemen and Britons during WWII, this date cannot be correct. There is another contrary belief that states that Robert P. Degan and Joseph P. Brier, both natives of Scranton, Pennsylvania, wrote the original song as confirmed by the U.S. Copyright Office in 1996, thus giving two groups of musicians the rights.. Ray Anthony's big band recording of the song turned it into a nationwide sensation by the mid-1950s (The "Hokey Pokey" appeared on the B side of Anthony's "Bunny Hop" single). Its rights were purchased in the mid-1960s by country-western music star Roy Acuff's publishing company, Acuff-Rose.

It has virtually the same lyrics as the "Hokey-cokey", a song and novelty dance which has been popular in England since the mid-1940s. In addition to similar lyrics, these two songs share similar dance moves, as well as remarkably similar names. "Hokey-cokey" is also known as "Okey-cokey".

There are many theories and conjectures about the meaning of the words "Hokey Pokey", and of their origin. Some scholars attribute the origin to the Shaker song Hinkum-Booby which had similar lyrics and was published in Edward Deming's A gift to be simple in 1940:

I put my right hand in,

I put my right hand out,

I give my right hand a shake,

And I turn it all about.

Other scholars have found similar dances and lyrics dating back to the 17th century. A very similar dance is cited in Robert Chamber's Popular Rhymes from 1826. The Oxford English Dictionary says that "hokey cokey" comes from "hocus pocus", the traditional magicians' incantation derived from Puritan mocking of the Latin Mass: during the consecration of the Eucharistic wine and Host, Roman Catholic priests stand with their backs to the congregation and say the magic words, "Hoc est enim corpus meum" (This is my body). It seems probable that this is also the origin of the phrase "Hanky-panky" and the word "hoax".

Martin de Maat used the words of the song in his lessons to comedy students at The Second City, saying: "The Hokey Pokey. Think about it. At the end of the song, what do we learn? What is it all about?... You put your whole self in!"

At Virginia Tech, where the athletic teams are known as Hokies, fans dance the Hokey Pokey between the third and fourth quarters of football games.

The song is humorously and existentially dealt with in Jimmy Buffett's song "What If The Hokey Pokey Is All It Really Is About?" in his 2002 album "Far Side of the World".

In the universe of Babylon 5, the Hokey Pokey has apparently survived to the 23rd century, as it is referenced by Londo Mollari as "the one song that nearly all humans sing to their children at some point or another."

The final word on the Hokey Pokey was given by the actress Teri Garr one night on the David Letterman show: "It's the most liberating of all dances: you put your whole self in, you put your whole self out! You do the Hokey Pokey and you turn yourself around. And that's what it's all about!"

[edit] Dance moves

Participants stand in a big ring formation during the dance. The dance follows the instructions given in the lyrics of the song, which may be prompted by a bandleader or another danceleader.

Specific body parts are named, and these are then sequentially put into the ring, taken out of the ring, and finally wiggled around maniacally inside the ring.
After this is done one raises one's hands up to the side of the head, wiggles them, and turns around in place until the next sequence begins, with a new named body part.

A sample instruction set would be:

You put your left ear in
You put your left ear out
You put your left ear in
And you shake it all about.
You do the Hokey Pokey and you turn yourself around
That's what it's all about...

In some cultures, this step is repeated to a new chorus,

Oh, the hokey pokey,
Oh, the hokey pokey,
Oh, the hokey pokey,
That's what it's all about.

In parts of the UK the chorus is entirely different:

Woah, the hokey cokey,
Woah, the hokey cokey,
Woah, the hokey cokey,
Knees bent, arms stretched, ra ra ra!

For this chorus all participants are stood in a circle and hold hands, on each "woah" they all move in toward the centre of the circle and on "the hokey cokey" they all move backwards out again. On the last line they bend knees then stretch arms, as indicated, and for "ra ra ra!" they either clap in time or raise arms above their heads and push upwards in time. More often than not, each subsequent verse and chorus is a little faster, with the ultimate aim of making people fall over.