👧🏾 Double Dutch Jump Roping: Joy, Erasure, and the Women Who Kept It Alive

Play, joy, and the women who kept a cultural tradition alive.

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EPISODE NOTES:

Double Dutch is jumping rope with two ropes instead of one. To really know Double Dutch, though, is to know a lineage of history, culture, and joy, carried by Black girls and women across generations. From Nashville to New York City, Niche to Meet You—the award-recognized documentary podcast featured by American Public Media and created by Leslie Eiler Thompson—gets in the ropes to understand how Double Dutch became a cultural practice rooted in joy, play, and community—and why the girls who built it were so often left out of the official story.

The episode features voices like Dr. Kyra Gaunt, ethnomusicologist and author of The Games Black Girls Play, and the Fantastic Four—Dolores Brown, De'Shone Adams, Robin Oaks, and Adrian Adams—the groundbreaking Double Dutch team that won the 1980 national championship and toured Europe in the earliest days of hip-hop, only to be written out of its mythology. Leslie watches Double Dutch in action at Nashville’s 40+ Double Dutch club, and gets coached in NYC’s Washington Square Park by coach Shakira “Kira” Lee, whose pop-up sessions sponsored by the Washington Square Park Conservancy turn public parks into spaces of communal joy. Then, Pulitzer Prize–winning poet Gregory Pardlo reflects on watching girls jump Double Dutch as a child, and why writing about that joy still matters.

This is a story about play, celebration, and joy. And about what happens when women step back into the ropes and remember who they were before the world asked them to grow up too fast.

Links mentioned in the episode/further exploring:

• "Pick Up Your Feet" documentary
• Washington Square Park Conservancy: We offer our gratitude to them for welcoming us to the event with coach Kira!
• Dr. Kyra Gaunt's TED talk about Double Dutch
• 40+ Double Dutch Club

ABOUT US:

Niche to Meet You is an anthropological exploration of the hidden corners of everyday life, seen through subcultures and hobbies. Each episode blends reporting and curiosity to ask how people find belonging, community, and a sense of self in the things they love. Our work has been called "masterfully written" by Malcolm Gladwell, and reporting from the project has been featured on NPR’s Morning Edition and Nashville Public Radio. Our stories introduce listeners to folks involved with things like Warhammer 40,000, Rubik’s cube enthusiasts and competitors, armored combat champions, professional Santas and Mrs. Clauses, and more. It's like if Mr. Rogers Neighborhood and Revisionist History teamed up for a Netflix special. LEARN MORE ABOUT THE SHOW HERE.

EPISODE CREDITS: 

Creator/Reporter: Leslie Eiler Thompson

Associate Script Editor: Chris Thiessen, with additional consulting by Katelynn McIlwain 

Show theme by Abigail Flowers with this arrangement of the theme Produced & Arranged by Abigail Flowers, Chris Leidhecker, Kevin Gift

Additional music by Blue Dot Sessions

Episode mastering by Kevin Morris

Show artwork created by Rachel Hardacre

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