[1] Boogaloo dancers use illusions, restriction of muscles, stops, robotic movements, and wiggling to create a soulful, passionate, animated form of street dance.

[3][4] The Boogaloo was initially a social dance within the African American community in Chicago; it also appealed to white teenagers.

The rhythmic impulse seemed to have centered in the upper torso, shoulders, and head...”[5] The Boogaloo dance step has also been described as a “single-step combination made up of a smooth repetitive side-to-side movement, based on the soul music dance beat on a 4/4 time signature, it consists of lunging motion to the side on the downbeat, held for two counts...accented by a distinct arm swing where the hand is raised to eye level...then combined with a distinctive backward head-nod to the beat...on the third musical beat, the body and head abruptly shift back and lunge in the opposite direction, before shifting once again on the fourth beat.”[6] The boogaloo dance craze would inspire a number of soul dance records, such as “Boo-Ga-Loo” by Robert “Tom” Tharpe and Jerry “Jerrio” Murray, as well as Fantastic Johnny-C's “Boogaloo Down Broadway”.

[7] Tharpe created “Boo-Ga-Loo” after seeing local African American teenagers dancing the Boogaloo at a Chicago record hop hosted by radio DJ Herb “Cool Gent” Kent.

"[10][11][9][12] Thompson formed a dance group called Pirate and the Easy Walkers, together with Cornell "Tony Rome" Reese, Wayne "Freddy Snow" Dillard, and Levi Warner.

[9] From 1967 to 1968, soul dancers in Sobrante Park in Oakland, California, would challenge Pirate and the Easy Walkers through "face offs".

The group One Plus One imitated Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion DynoRama movies, incorporating these movements as slap-stick crowd entertainment.

[10][4] Albert "Iron Man" Milton, a member of the group, took particular influence from 20 Million Miles to Earth, imitating the dinosaur-like creature birthed in the movie and dancing to James Brown.

[13] A second generation of animated dancers in the 1970s innovated this style with a less comical approach to their dance, and focused on intricately detailed dinosaur movement.

[10][13] In 1964, a Boogaloo dancer named John Murphy imitated the movements of the robot in the 1954 sci-fi movie Tobor the Great.

[16] While in costume, every mascot created in-character steps and developed "hitting" techniques to be noticed in large rallies.

During half-time football shows, he would grab his tail, point, and pose to taunt the opponents' mascot, while performing wiggling or worming movements with his chest.

[20][13] Since Boogaloo dancers would dance to the changing sounds of funk, Posing Hard matched the rhythm and intensity of the beat with their body's vibrations.

[21] In East Oakland, to outreach to militant youth, the Allen Temple Baptist Church created a partnership with the Black Panthers.

The Temple hosted numerous talent shows that featured Boogaloo groups such as the Black Messengers, as well as funk bands and singers.

We serve the people, body and soul.” Directed by Ericka Huggins and Donna Howell, OCS provided youth with culturally relevant education and challenged the public school system’s perceptions of what it meant to be Black and poor.

Through the combination of robotic dance moves of Lorenzo "Tony" Johnson and Donald Jones' Boogaloo, they would refer to this style as Strutting in San Francisco.