Within traditions of long standing in many cultures, it is unusual for men and women to dance in direct relation to each other, and they seldom perform the same style of dance—though combination of the sexes is more common in areas where the original dance has been disrupted by non-African forms. Idealized male and female qualities are normally expressed in the movement patterns of their separate dances: for example, Tiv men dance with an attack of rapid, forceful movements to express masculinity, whereas the women dance with a sustained grace to reflect their femininity. If men and women join a common dance circle, their dance patterns are usually distinct, as with the Kambari of Nigeria: men and women dance to the same musical rhythm, but they hold different postures, with the women singing and using a simpler foot pattern than the men.

Dance occasions for formalized flirtation between the sexes before marriage are common, as in the Sikya dance of the Akan of Ghana. The Bororo of western Cameroon celebrate the coming of the dry season with a dance for young men and women, and couples pair off at the climax of the performance. Among the Nupe of Nigeria ribald songs and joking insults between the sexes have replaced performances allowing for sexual license at harvest festivals. The dances of Ika men and girls (western Igbo, Nigeria) have become openly erotic since the early 1960s, when a master dancer brought the sexes together in a single dance team to entertain visitors to the palace of the oba of Agbor in Nigeria. Thus, erotic patterns of dance movement are encouraged in some societies, usually with bawdy humour, whereas the limits of flirtation are clearly defined in others for the sake of social decorum.

Work dances

Men who work together often celebrate a successful project with beer drinking and vigorous dances expressing their occupational skills. In Nigeria, Nupe fishermen are renowned for their net throwing, which they formalize into dance patterns, and young Irigwe farmers on the Jos Plateau leap to encourage the growth of crops at festivals related to the agricultural cycle. Occupational guilds and professional organizations of experts, such as blacksmiths, hunters, or wood-carvers, have their own expressive dances.

Hunters may reenact their exploits or mime the movements of animals as a ritual means of controlling wild beasts and allaying their own fears. The Akan of Ghana perform the Abofor dance, a dance-mime staged after the killing of a dangerous animal. This is meant to placate the spirit of the beast and inform the community of the manner in which it was killed. Tutsi hunters in Congo (Kinshasa) commemorate a successful hunt in their lion dance.

Dance as recreation

Dance is the most popular form of recreation in Africa. In towns, men and women of all ages meet informally in dance clubs to dance to the rhythms of popular musicians. In villages there may be opportunities in the evenings for informal dancing, but relations between the sexes there are more tightly controlled.

Highlife was a style of urban recreational dance popular in West Africa in the 1950s. It originated in Ghana, where musicians adopted Western dance-band instruments at open-air nightclubs to celebrate the exuberant spirit of independence. In Nigeria, local instruments were used as the Yoruba created juju rhythms, while the Tiv danced the Swange. Francophone countries elaborated the Latin American rhythms of the cha-cha, while Southern Africans danced to the modern African beats of the kwela. Zairian dance bands excelled in the creation of their own popular dance music. These have given way to styles influenced by Caribbean reggae and Western pop music, but they retain a distinctly African character.