The Function of Dance in Pride and Prejudice In Jane Austen's novel Pride and Prejudice, set in the Regency period, dance serves several important functions. The dance patterns emulate courtship rituals, marking the dance as a microcosm for courtship and marriage, two major themes of the novel. The Regency period spread the belief that no ingredient was more essential to a courtship than dancing: "To love dancing was a certain step towards falling in love..." (Austen 7). Therefore, knowledge of dance – of dance steps as well as dance etiquette – was a crucial necessity and was often acquired through study and awareness of codes of conduct. These crucial codes were disseminated through popular courtesy/conduct books, which informed readers of correct dance steps, movements, and patterns, as well as socially acceptable etiquette. Regency codes of conduct also influenced interpretations of individual character, as social behavior was often considered physical behavior. embodiment of character; thus, Austen's characters typically reveal their inner selves through their ways. And, in the manner of polite writers who were "concerned with behavior, not only towards others but also to themselves" (Fritzer 4), Austen was interested in the patterns of behavior exhibited by her characters, especially on the dance floor. In this era, in particular, a person's individual value was manifested through performance on the dance floor: as courtesy books suggest, dancing is a sign of character, both negative and positive. Austen shows that lack of restraint combined with too great a love of pleasure reflects a questionable character. Other negative indications include poor dancing, des... middle of paper... Honan, Park. Jane Austen: Her Life. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987.Kaplan, Deborah. Status Structures: Eighteenth-Century Social Experience as Form in Jane Austen's Courtesy Books and Novels. Diss. University of Michigan, 1979. Poplawski, Paul. An encyclopedia of Jane Austen. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998.Rubinstein, E., ed. Twentieth-century interpretations of pride and prejudice. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1969. Tanner, Tony. Jane Austen. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1986.Wells, Richard. “Culture of Manners and Dress of America's Finest Society.” Online access. September 25, 1998. Available http://www.burrows.com/other/manners.html.Woods, Karen Sue Radford. Dance in England through a study of selected 18th century texts. Diss. Cornell University, 1980.