This news may not necessarily be breaking, but these dancers are.
The sound of speakers booming, shoes squeaking and people cheering echoes from the fifth level of Art South. In what they call a “sesh,” the members of Stateside Breaks gather together to try out some moves and enjoy some fast-paced hip-hop mashups.
In their own little corner of campus, the art of breaking comes to life.
Breaking, a form of street dance and integral part of hip-hop culture, involves quick movements, intricate footwork and often spinning on one’s hands, head or back. The dance style was created by African American and Latino youth in the Bronx, NY during the 1970s. DJ Kool Herc is also widely credited for engineering the specific type of music that led to the trend of breaking through his extensions of the drum “break” in funk records.
“I love the freedom of [breaking], freedom of expression, the freedom of the culture,” said Jayden Pagsolingan, a fourth-year management information systems major at San Diego State University and treasurer of Stateside Breaks.
Stateside Breaks has been at SDSU since the early 2000s, a time when breaking was at its prime.
Pagsolingan emphasized that all non-breakers must know one key fact: it’s called breaking, not breakdancing.
“The media termed breakdancing because they weren’t part of the culture and they didn’t know about it, but it was originally breaking,” said Pagsolingan.
While many may think breaking is a dying art and is nowhere near the hype it had in the early 2000s, Pagsolingan says it is still very much thriving, but has just been thriving “underground.”
The persistence of breaking and Stateside Breaks wouldn’t be as strong as it is without the pivotal role of alumni as mentors for the other breakers.
“You have people, like veterans and OGs in the community that give back to people like me that are younger, and teach us, and host events, and just are good people,” Pagsolingan said.
Makoto Ikeda, a 2020 University of California, San Diego graduate and regular at Stateside Breaks, has been all around the city’s breaking community. Originally from Portland, Ore., Ikeda has participated in breaking around San Diego for the past 11 years.
“Out of all the scenes, [my favorite] has been San Diego because I feel like San Diego has this chill, but also very community-oriented kind of environment,” said Ikeda.
Ikeda discussed how, when he teaches breaking, it reminds him of the beginning of his own journey and when he first picked up the hobby.
“When I first started, I didn’t think I could do any of this crap at all,” Ikeda said. “But now, over time, because I learned the joy of doing that, I was like, you know what, for me, I kind of want to be able to do that for other people too.”
This year, Stateside Breaks hopes to create an inclusive space where breakers of all experience levels and walks of life can feel at home.
“I think it’s a community of individuals that like to better each other,” said Alan Ngo, a 2020 SDSU graduate. “You can go to any session and you can ask anyone anything about how to get better, or you can just come to share energy.”
The COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 hit breaking culture hard, as the energetic atmosphere of a breaking “sesh” is nearly impossible to capture over Zoom, but dancers like those on Stateside Breaks are determined to keep the dance style in the mix.
Since the pandemic, the club has been working to start building the community back up again. On Sept. 6, they performed in an exhibition and battle against UCSD’s team, Bodyrock, and on Oct. 8, they will be performing at the Asian Pacific Student Alliance night market in the Student Union.
“Last semester it didn’t really pop off, but this semester, now we’re able to table and bring actual people in, so this is like the official revival of the club,” said Lesti Carmelo, a fourth-year management information systems major at SDSU and president of Stateside Breaks.
Influenced to start breaking by his older brother and friends, Carmelo finds beauty in the freedom it allows dancers and how it encourages them to “be weird.” Carmelo describes breaking as its own art form, one that allows participants to experiment without fear of judgment.
“When you practice alone you only have so much fuel, but when you come into a practice room where everybody’s going at it, we actually feel the energy,” Carmelo said.
“San Diego breaking culture is actually like one of the biggest around,” Carmelo continued. “People actually drive and fly down for our events very often.”
Breaking culture in San Diego is starkly different from Los Angeles, according to Pagsolingan. Rather than trying to bond over breaking and shared experiences, breakers in LA are primarily focused on getting noticed and hired, which Pagsolingan says creates a less supportive culture than in San Diego.
“We really love everybody in the community,” Carmelo said. “When we see somebody pop out and it’s a new face, maybe we’ll get in contact and keep inviting them to different sessions to help the community grow.”
Newcomer Mason Deville, a first-year statistics major at SDSU, first saw Stateside Breaks tabling outside Love Library and immediately knew he wanted to join because of his long-time interest in freestyling.
“I like the community and how they’re all kind of like mentors themselves, and I like how I’m able to learn so much from just watching them,” Deville said.
Michael Lusung, who doesn’t attend SDSU but joins the breaking sessions for the “good vibes,” says people in the breaking community will almost never judge. No matter the level of experience someone has, breakers know everyone was a beginner who may have looked a little silly at one point, and everyone has to start somewhere.
“It’s just the energy and the community,” said Gabe Custodio, a second-year accounting major at SDSU. “Even for me, I’m still pretty new to this, but it brings you out there, it kinda brings the whimsy out in you. That’s what I love most about it.”
Stateside Breaks will showcase some of their moves at the APSA night market on Oct. 8 in the Student Union and will continue to put themselves out there within San Diego’s unique sphere of breaking culture.
