The Definition of Juggling

Please post questions and discussions regarding the definition of juggling here. Erik and I will answer and participate as we can. We will also try to collect all the questions and comments from other places (such as Facebook) and focus the answers here…

This forum is a great idea. I’d prefer to first define “toss juggling:” essentially more objects than hands. Then I’d say the default is not specially a cascade, but more generally is toss juggling. Among other advantages, this includes most non-jugglers perception of juggling as being a shower. Juggling can then be defined as activities that have (perhaps culturally recognizable) connections or similarities to toss juggling.

Sorry, but what a mess…
“Cultural identity exludes scatebording from beeing juggling ? So: staff spinning is not juggling ? (Hawai , I think…)
Juggling wise there is no diference between cascade and/or shower,mills mess, reverse cascade…ason.
More objecte than hands (by the way…or feet…ason) used to be usefull in the past.
But juggling has evolved ( a lot through Michael Moschen ).
So how can contactjuggling , diabolo, staff also be part of a definition ?
IT HAS TO BE DEFINED BY IT S OBJECTIVE.!
Manipulating a glas to ones mouth is not juggling because the objective is to drink.
Basketball/football …ason players want points.
A scateborder uses the scatebord to balance himself ! (same with unicicle, the manipulation of it SERVES the balance only!)
Nevertheless, spinning the scateboard underneath the feet I consider juggling.
The wikipedia definition is as well a mess !
Speaks about recreation ( that way my recreational footballmatch on sunday was juggling…lol)
The important question is: why do we manipulate the football ? To score goals !!! NOT JUGGLING !
Why does a toss jugler throw his balls ?
Why does a contactjuggler balance a ball on his head?
Why does someone manipulate a devilstick
Why do people toss a baloon in a discothec ?
Just to do it !
So, once again and simple : Juggling is the manipulation of one or more objects, with the OBJECTIVE of the manipulation itself.

I am still waiting for a contradiction of this, my old definition …

Bernardo Malabarista

P.S. The circusschool in Lisbon,Portugal is called CHAPITO

Here’s how I think of it. Why not reduce and simplify as much as possible? If the default form of juggling is toss juggling (currently generally accepted), and the default form of toss juggling is ball juggling (most common in most cases), and the default form of ball juggling is 3 ball juggling (easiest to learn and execute), and the default form of 3 ball juggling is the 3 ball cascade (what is typically returned to as a base pattern between tricks or when setting up tricks), then by transitivity the default form of juggling is the 3 ball cascade.

BernardoMalabarista:
Juggling is the manipulation of one or more objects, with the OBJECTIVE of the manipulation itself.

If this is something you want to discuss further, a start would be that you could explain WHY juggling should go under this definition.

Language does not take into account what you, I, or anyone else considers, as single individuals. Language is the consensus of a group of language users. I can use the word “dog” in my language, and everyone that shares the understanding of what the word “dog” represents, will understand what I mean. If I have my own understanding what I consider the word “dog” to represent, that differs from the group of language users, the communication will fail. We can only look at how words are used by a group of language users (for an example english speakers, in this case) and try to explain what a word means to them. What I personally consider, is completely irrelevant.

I spent much time considering whether to use shower or cascade as the default form. I went with cascade, because it seems to be the most stereotypical juggling currently. For an example, if someone asks to be taught to juggle, the three ball cascade seems to be the most common starting point.
I wanted the default form to be as specific as possible. If the word juggling is used, and little else information is given, the three ball cascade seems to be what is mostly referred to. If you ask someone “can you juggle?” I assume you mean a three ball cascade? A generation back, perhaps a shower was more common.
I do wish to point out that saying that juggling is every activity related to the default form is a fictional structure, that I made up. It is an attempt to explain how the word juggling is used in english. Neither the word, or the activities referred to as juggling, come from the three ball cascade, it is not the origin of juggling. I do not think that it is of great importance what exactly the default form is. Shower, cascade, toss juggling could all work. The point to understand is that the word juggling is used because of cultural connection and relationships between activities. Not hard lines, such as throwing, catching, manipulation, objects etc.

This is great!

I really like the approach but i am wondering if one default form is enough/accurate.

While i like how you deal with the failure of most other definitions that they either exclude activitys that are juggling (more objects than hands) or include activitys that clearly are not juggling (object manipulation with the indention of manipulating objects) through the cultural connection, i believe it can be hard for a non-juggler or beginner juggler to connect juggling(x) to the default form of cascade if they lack knowledge of history, subculture, theory etc so it may be a good idea to include more knowledge in the defintion instead of requiring it from the potential user.

Historically toss and catch = juggling was what defined juggling when the word juggling first appeared and describing juggling as tossing and catching more balls than hands is still used today so i agree that the cascade is the oldest and strongest default form of juggling. But i feel there are two other essential arche-types when it comes to the modern use juggling.
The first one being “balancing one or more objects on the jugglers body”. As you know a lot of early 20th century sources differenciated between juggling = toss and catch and equilibristics = balancing but later it seems like both skills fused into juggling while equilibristics changed a bit and rather described persons balancing themself on something instead of something on top of them. I believe the default form of balancing is quite essential to juggling and different enough to the default form of cascade that i could see use of it beeing included in a definition for juggling.
The second skill is maniplating objects by the use of another object to keep it in continious motion as in diabolo, plate spinning, devilstick etc. Again alot of these tricks have historicly been performed alongside and in the same context as toss-juggling but are quite different in their execution.

Since both of these skills are quite unique to juggling i could see both of them included in a definition on the other hand i am afraid that my approach might overcomplicate things and leave the door open to way to many possible default forms i was not thinking about.

I do think that there is value in you pointing out the inherent difference between these two categories of activity, and throwing/catching, but what I am trying to describe is that juggling is dependent on relation, and not hard lines, such as continuous motion, skill, manipulation etc. If I follow your line here, I would have to categorize rhythmic gymnastics and skateboarding as juggling, and no one uses the word juggling to represent those activities. They have a clear cultural identity of their own, maybe an even stronger one than juggling (if you would agree that more people know are familiar with skateboarding than juggling).

In the past, everyone tried to define juggling based on hard lines. It always results in a misplacement of activities, to belong in the category of juggling.

Two pictures from the lecture about the Definition of juggling, at the IJA festival, 13th of July 2017.

Did the very short version or summary of the definition get scrapped before the lecture?

I think that version was pretty nice and made sense after reading and watching the more extensive version and surrounding explanations. I noticed that the discussion on juggling edge never really begun due to complaints about the video being long-winded.

Maybe using the short version more to generate interest is something to consider, even if it would create some misunderstandings at first from impatient people?

the summary of the definition is:

juggling is a genre of activities which are related to the default form. the default form of juggling is the 3 ball cascade.

ironically i have not checked any discussion on juggling edge because i can’t figure out how that website works at all! erik gave the summary in the lecture at the IJA. but yeah, without context its pretty hard to understand i think? feel free to add it to the juggling edge discussion if there is any. and also feel free to tell me how to figure out that forum??

Here’s juggling edge forum in a rec.juggling-like view: http://jugglingedge.com/forumindex.php

Here’s the thread on the definition: http://jugglingedge.com/forum.php?ThreadID=3067

You need to create an account to post I think.

thanks! it really made the forum easier to navigate. i guess i’m too old to figure out the benefit of the original way the posts were displayed…

A problem I see is that the definition of a word changes over time. 200 years ago “juggling” had nothing to do with throwing an catching. The only definition in a dictionaries from early 1800’s related to deception and trickery. We agree that that is not what juggling is anymore. You say things like “What Cinquevalli and Rastelli did was juggling because they were the most famous jugglers of their time and everyone agreed they did juggling.” But I submit that this is not what juggling is, It is what juggling was 100 years ago. Times have changed and we cannot keep using Cinquevalli and Rastelli to define juggling. (Just as we can not still say the definition of juggling is deception and trickery.) What is juggling NOW?

i’m sure erik can respond to this much better than i can- but if i read into what you are insinuating with your response, you are trying to say for example that balancing a stick on your head is not juggling now, even though it may have been called juggling 100 years ago?

but the problem is that we are in a situation today where the word juggling represents a much more broader focus than just throwing and catching more objects than hands. take balancing for example- if its not juggling, then what is it? i’m not talking about a technique here, i’m talking about the genre of juggling. if someone says balancing is “object manipulation” that is technically correct in the same way that running is “leg movement.” what i mean is that object manipulation is not a thing. its not defined, its not a genre, its not something that people do. balancing is still under the genre of juggling. that is the situation we are in NOW.

if you don’t want the word juggling to represent balancing, among all the other things it represents, then you are free to try and change the definition of the word juggling. however, the tricky part is to get everyone to agree with you if you leave balancing out of the genre of juggling. there is no genre of balancing. its like saying soccer does not fit the genre of sports. so then what is it? soccer is not its own genre, its a very specific thing. just like ball spinning, balancing, and otherwise manipulation (juggling) less objects than hands used. you can personally believe that juggling should represent something other than what it does right now, because from your personal viewpoint you have a clear rationale for your criteria. however, we have seen both historically and in recent times that everyone has a wildly different opinion on what the word should mean. what erik has done is to show what the word actually means, the common traits of what we all intuitively suggest when we use the word?

Answer: Juggling is a genre of related activities. The word juggling can represent both the genre and a specific activity of that genre.

Why do you have to put balancing a stick into a genre? Why can’t it be just balancing? If I stand on the street and balance a stick, and you ask everyone who walks by “What is he doing?” I would guess nobody would say “juggling”. Maybe in 1920, someone would have said “That’s a clever bit of juggling”, but I don’t think it would happen today.

@jackkalvan you compared apples and oranges and I showed you how they were different. It is besides the point if you do not think that Rastelli was doing juggling. The point is that he is an established reference point to what juggling is, and that deception is not.

I am simply looking at how the word juggling is used, and trying to explain that use and what it represents in language. How I feel, or what i think about that use, is irrelevant, just like with every other word. It does not matter if I think the word “dog” should represent a large animal in India that likes to toot with its trunk. The word dog represents what it represents to the language users.

Again, it does not matter what you say or think. I am pointing out examples of how language is used. You constantly refer to your opinion, while I keep referring to the use of a word, in our culture, literature and by experts. I also disagree with all of them, on a personal level. Of course it would be much better if we had separating terms for genre/activity. I am only pointing at the reality that I see and asking if you see the same. What I, you or anyone else feel about that reality is another conversation, and you keep mixing the two up.

Say that again please. What are they the history of? Remember, we are here on the 29th of July, 2017, and not in the time of Cinquevalli. Your language use confirms my entire argument. This is the exact language use I am trying to describe.

(A relevant side note. We do not refer to Samuel Rid’s book “The art of Iugling and Legerdemaine” as a juggling book, it is a magic book, and it is well known.)

History was the important word. They are books about what juggling was.
Just as a history book about World War I will not tell you what war is like now.

@jackkalvan You refer to them as history books on juggling, and not balancing, diabolo, etc. That is why I mentioned Rid’s book as something that we have changed on how we refer to it. Juggling does not belong in that category of things we have changed our language when describing. If half of Ziethen’s book was about singing, it would be noted, as in the case of Rid. I simply pointed out that you yourself did not use language in that way. Or would you say Rid’s book is a juggling book too?

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12343/12343-h/12343-h.htm

The same goes for Francis Brunn. His act contains 26 seconds of throwing and catching, the remaining 7 or so minutes is “other stuff”. He is an icon of juggling, and never once have I heard it be disputed that he was a juggler, or that what he did would not be juggling.

I am not talking about the single opinion of you or me, I am talking about the use of language on a greater scale, with an emphasis on icons and literature. If I wrote a definition of music that did not manage to encircle the work of Mozart, do you think it would be accepted?

As a contemporary over-user of the word “juggling”, and someone who is a long-time professional juggler, currently writing a book on juggling, and running juggling competitions, what I say and think does matter. If you ignore what people are currently saying juggling is, you are either out of date or you too are trying to change the definition from what it currently is.

The material might be old, but not the way we are referring to it, which is what my argument is based on. I have pointed out examples of things that used to be called juggling, but is not any longer, for an example the activities in Rid’s book, or singing. You referred to Ziethen’s books as juggling history, not diabolo history, today. That is the language use I am talking about, not the content of the book.
You have to see the difference here, between the activities described and the language that describes them. It is the language that I am talking about, the language of today. For an example YOUR language, when you refer to the books as juggling books.

This argument does not work either. If something identical to WWI happened today 2017 (between underdeveloped nations for an example, so they would fight similarly) we would still refer to it as war.

Francis Brunn is an icon of juggling because he was an amazing performer and he did do actual juggling. He presented it with amazing style and speed and combined it with acrobatics and other impressive skills. So he was a juggler. He was also an acrobat, and a dancer, etc.
Now, if he did the same act without any throwing or catching, would he be called today, “a great juggler”? Maybe not. All the throwing and catching is what makes him a “juggler”.

Again, you are giving a report on your opinion, you do not need to give more of that. I am not doing that. I am pointing out what he was referred to as, and what he is still referred to as, today. He was/is a juggler, doing a juggling act. That is not my opinion, that is what I see if I look around in the world. I am not denying that dance and acrobatics was present in his performance, but the activities he does with his props were considered juggling, and are still considered juggling today. Regardless of how you or I feel about it. That is how language and the meaning of words are defined. It is from language use in a language community, not from your or mine opinion. You need to come up with evidence of language use that points in your direction.

first, i’d like to say thanks for engaging in the conversation!!! i really personally get a lot out of these discussions and i’m grateful you take the time to have them. i’d obviously love to figure all this out so i will keep trying my best as well.

if i’m balancing a stick on the street corner and ask someone who walks by “what am i doing?” i think i agree with you that most people would probably say “balancing a stick,” and not “juggling.” however, this is the same as if you were on the street corner with a soccer ball, kicking it against the wall, and if i asked people what you were doing they would say “soccer,” instead of “sports” or “playing a game.” yes, the literal technique of what i am doing is balancing a stick, but what is balancing a stick? what space does that occupy in culture? you ask why does it have to be in a genre? but it is in a genre… everything in the world is in some sort of genre. and if its not in a larger genre with another name (such as “juggling” or “object manipulation” or “skill games” or “insert fictional word here”), then it will be in its own genre. and there is no genre called “balancing.” people don’t go to circus school for “balancing,” performers don’t do acts that they market as “balancing” in the larger picture. its because balancing is not a genre of its own. the technique of balancing belongs to some larger genre, and my question to you then is- what genre does the skill of balancing belong to? a larger genre of another name? or is balancing a genre on its own in your mind? you can of course also maintain that balancing does not need to be put into any genre, and that will also be helpful to know so i can understand where you are coming from.

likewise, if i was passing by a scientist on the street corner and she was holding a glass vial full of some colored liquid over a bunsen burner and she asked me what she was doing, i would most likely say “heating up some liquid,” instead of saying “organic chemistry.” that’s most likely due to 2 factors which is why i thought it worth to write this example- the first is because of language… inherent in the context, at the moment of the question, we operate on a literal level, or the most concrete path possible. therefore, if you’re balancing a stick and you ask me what you’re doing, i will respond by following the shortest conceptual path. but secondly, i would not tell the scientist she is doing organic chemistry simply because i don’t know anything about organic chemistry. so just because i would not call what she is doing organic chemistry, that’s not a valid yardstick by which to measure what falls under the definition of organic chemistry or not? in the same way that a casual observer walking down the street might not recognize balancing a stick as juggling. and even more to the point, let’s say its not even a casual observer walking down the street, but rather a seasoned professional expert juggler… what would they call balancing a stick, if not juggling?

therefore, if you’re up for it, i could suggest we start over here. i think it will be faster, and way more simple than to follow up a bunch of conversational threads. i think answering this simple set of questions will lead both of us (and erik??) to a fast understanding of each others’ viewpoints:

1. if you do not agree with erik’s definition of juggling, do you have a proposal for a different definition you like better? or is it just that you identify something is wrong with erik’s suggestion and you (and therefore we) are trying to figure out the problem? i am lost as to what does not make sense to you. i kind of infer here or there that you don’t think balancing a stick is juggling, or spinning a ball on your finger is juggling, or diabolo is juggling? but i’m just kind of making that up in my mind and its good to clarify it!
2. do you wish to identify juggling by its components? meaning, are you searching for a definition of juggling which judges if things are juggling or not based on their techniques? for example, do you wish to say that some form of throwing and catching is juggling, but that placing and sliding is not?
3. do you think its important to understand where the definition of juggling has come from, and where it stands, in order to move forward with a new definition that we all want to see (if we can agree on one?)? or do you think we should just go for a new one, and not deal with the mess of sorting out what currently exists?

I have reset my brain and I now see how I misunderstood your points about genre in this post. I don’t know if it is my poor reading comprehension or that we have a bit of a language barrier. Anyway there is a lot of subtle misunderstanding.

Do you believe every usage of the word juggling is correct?
Does it matter?
Suppose someone says “Check out my latest juggling video.” You watch it and see it contains no throwing or catching of any kind. Is it possible you would say “That wasn’t a juggling video because the was no actual juggling in it.” Or is it irrelevant to this discussion what the video contains?

again, i am inferring from your hypothetical scenario here that you define juggling as throwing and catching? i think there are several ways to answer your hypothetical here, and i will do good to be careful, for i think it really highlights a lot of the issues surrounding this discussion:

1. you say: ““That wasn’t a juggling video because the was no actual juggling in it.” well… you don’t need the word “actual” in there. you could simply say- that wasn’t a juggling video because there was no juggling in it. if that was indeed what you got out of the content of the video. because otherwise, what in the world is the definition of “actual juggling”?
2. leaving out several of the other issues, you seem to be asking, in a larger sense, “if someone calls something jugging, do i simply have to accept their opinion and go along with it?” of course the answer to that is no. if i say to you, hey check out this video of me juggling. and then show you a video of me playing poker. then you are welcome to say, “that’s not a video of you juggling, that’s a video of you playing poker.” ***
3. “hey jack, check out the latest juggling video i just found on youtube”
   https://youtu.be/nksdHe7lzus
4. if i show you a video and say check out my juggling video. then you watch it and it contains no throwing and catching, you can certainly say “that wasn’t a juggling video.” but then, you and i would have to have a discussion of what juggling is, because we would both have personal definitions of the word which do not match up. and to continue discussing juggling, we would have to clear up that whole matter. hence this thread on this forum.

***- you also ask, in relation to this issue, “does it matter?” and to me, it really does matter… in fact, its the most important thing in the world. its to be conscious of what you think you are doing, and then being aware of what is being communicated to others. for example, lots of performers in america would say they are “jugglers” and asked what they do in their show they will say “juggling.” when in fact, if you analyze their performance, the main discipline in the hierarchy of what they are presenting would actually be clowning… or stand up comedy, or prop comedy, or story telling, or physical theater. and the value in that is, once they would realize the techniques through which the majority of what is being communicated in their performances, they could then go away and actually and study those other art forms which have a rich history all of their own. so if someone is performing and thinks the main value of what they are giving an audience has to do with expression through juggling technique, but actually the structure of their act is based upon clowning, and they have no idea what clowning is, or that its a whole other discipline and technique which they could learn… well then they could start to go to clown school, and stop trying to learn more tricks with 5 balls. its all about being conscious of what you are trying to do.

I would just call it balancing a stick, but if I had to put it in a broader category, I might say it is:
Balancing
Equilibristics (though that word isn’t used much)
Circus skills
“Stupid human tricks” (after David Letterman)
Feats of dexterity (or agility?)
…but describing it as “juggling” would seriously never cross my mind.

Answering your questions above:

1. I appreciate the insight that the word “juggling” sometimes refers to a genre and sometimes to a specific activity. But after that, he confuses me with the details of what those are. His “definition” seems more like “What the word ‘juggling’ has referred to, in the past 100 years, in the general context of object manipulation”.
2. I’ve been thinking a lot about the definition for the last few months too. What do you think of this?.. Juggling is a method of controlling the motion of a number of objects in a manner where the control of one object must be released to attend to another.
   A juggling act or a juggling book or a juggling competition may of course contain many other things, but if the act/book/competition does not contain this, then I say they have incorrectly used the word juggling.
3. I like knowing the history of the word, but I don’t think it is necessary to refer to the past to define juggling. Is there a new juggling definition you would like to see?

Jay, thank you for your reply to this.
I thought Erik might be thinking about the usage of the word, unrelated to it’s meaning…
Never mind. It was silly confusion.
My other post explains what defines juggling for me, and what would constitute incorrect usage.

This is great. I totally agree!

@jackkalvan There are two obstacles that we need to clear before this can continue. You either keep ignoring them, or you have not understood.

1. You need to understand the mechanism of language and the meaning of words. They do not come from your opinion, but from the community of language users. You need to stop referring to yourself and your own ideas in the matter, and instead back your position with evidence of language use. If you do not understand this, we can not get further, because we are discussing different things.
2. You need to see the difference between a reference to something that is old and the language that talks about it. Rastelli was alive 100 years ago but the language we use to talk about him is of the present. You keep confusing the two.

I think it is a good attempt at describing attributes that define the activity concisely. Is a balanced object considered as being in control?

@Erik 1. I understand that I did not make the meaning of the word.
I can, however write it’s definition as I see it.
I am distilling the essence of the true meaning of the word, as it is used by society.
Sometimes people use the wrong word: like calling a tomato a vegetable, or calling a koala a bear.
A tomato is a fruit and a koala is a marsupial. These incorrect uses of the word are common.
And people who do use the right word, don’t know why it is the right word.
From Oxford dictionary: “True fruits are developed from the ovary in the base of the flower, and contain the seeds of the plant (though cultivated forms may be seedless).”
Koalas are marsupials because their young are born undeveloped and carried in their mother’s pouch.
Fortunately there are dictionaries and encyclopedias written by experts who define words so people can get a deeper understanding of what they are talking about.
2. I understand that we can talk about Rastelli with the language we have today.
100 years ago he was the prime example of a juggler and he still fits today’s description of a juggler.
But when you list things that were done 100 years ago as the basis of your argument of “Things that are definitely juggling,” I think you may be a little out of date with your definition.

Balancing an object is definitely being in control. I don’t think it is juggling because you never have to release control. Even if you are doing a 5 ball cascade at the same time, you never have to release control of the balance.

The other nice thing about my definition is that it matches with what is really the most common usage of the word juggling in the real world, trying to do a number of tasks at once where you have to attend to them separately.