North America
15 countries🇧🇿BelizePuntaA hip-driven Garifuna dance of Afro-Indigenous origin, its drumbeat rhythm central to Garifuna identity along the Caribbean coast.🇨🇦CanadaRed River JigA fast, syncopated fiddle dance born from Métis culture, blending Indigenous and French-Canadian footwork traditions.🇨🇷Costa RicaPunto GuanacastecoCosta Rica's official national dance, a courtship dance from the Guanacaste region marked by an improvised sung interlude.🇨🇺CubaDanzónCuba's formal, unhurried first official national dance, danced in couples with a distinctive paused, elegant restraint.🇩🇴Dominican RepublicMerengueThe Dominican Republic's fast-paced national dance, its simple side-to-side step making it one of the most widely danced Caribbean forms.🇸🇻El SalvadorXucEl Salvador's national dance, its swaying hip rhythm named after the marimba beat that drives it.🇬🇹GuatemalaRabinal AchíA pre-Hispanic Maya dance-drama performed almost unchanged for centuries, recognized by UNESCO as a masterpiece of oral and intangible heritage.🇭🇹HaitiMéringueHaiti's national dance, an elegant couple's form that predates and shares roots with the Dominican Republic's merengue.🇭🇳HondurasWanaraguaA Garifuna masquerade dance performed at Christmas, dancers in wire masks and elaborate headdresses reenacting resistance to colonial rule.🇯🇲JamaicaDinki MiniA Jamaican dance performed at nine-night wakes to celebrate rather than mourn the dead, rooted in West African tradition.🇲🇽Mexico3 dancesA regional-dress dance tradition drawing on Mexico's Indigenous, Spanish, and mestizo heritage — style varies sharply by state.🇳🇮NicaraguaEl GüegüenseA satirical Indigenous-Spanish dance-drama mocking colonial authority — the first work of Nicaraguan theater and a UNESCO-recognized tradition.🇵🇦PanamaTamboritoPanama's national dance, built entirely around call-and-response drumming and singing, rooted in colonial-era Afro-Panamanian communities.🇹🇹Trinidad & TobagoBéléA French Creole dance of African origin, danced in a circle around a drummer and considered the root of many of Trinidad's other folk dances.🇺🇸United States2 dancesFour couples in a square, guided by a caller's rhymed instructions — an American folk form that is the official dance in over 30 states.