How to dance vosho

Jump to comments sectionPrint this page

Receive free Digital health updates

We’ll send you a myFT Daily Digest email rounding up the latest Digital health news every morning.

A few years ago a dance craze called the Vosho swept South Africa. The dance involves variations on a hop, a kick, a drop and a pop — hop on your left foot, kick out your right, drop your backside into a crouch and pop back up. Not for the weak-kneed, it is both endlessly adaptable and quite specific — you know a good one when you see one.

Babusi Nyoni, a developer and designer, saw in the dance an opportunity to test a new machine learning model called Tensorflow — which was released by the Google Brain deep learning artificial intelligence unit — that can estimate and judge a body’s movements.

In December 2018, he and his team at Triple Black, the Amsterdam-based agency he co-founded, released Vosho Fo’sho, a mobile app that judges users’ ability to perform the perfect Vosho.

“The intention was just to take something that was fresh off the shelf — the latest in the trend of computer vision — and put it in the most unexpected space, and have it have this context that the creators of that technology would never have envisioned,” says Nyoni, 32.

Nyoni soon realised he could take it somewhere even more unexpected and, he says, meaningful — a home for the elderly in his hometown Bulawayo in Zimbabwe. The Vosho app was, at its core, an assessment of movement over time, which is the kind of assessment necessary to diagnose Parkinson’s disease.

“The idea behind that was: ‘How can we build this world-first application through an African lens?’” he says. “I’m building the tech. I’m going to do the research in a small city in Zimbabwe. We’re going to build this for black health practitioners, for black patients and then in a sense . . . reverse engineer it to the rest of the world.

“Everything else is done with the west first and then [applied to Africa],” he adds. “So it was a very deliberate act of Africa-first innovation.”

Nyoni presented a prototype of his Parkinson’s diagnosis app at a conference at Oxford university in April last year, but then got caught up in another AI project he had launched — a Facebook Messenger chatbot that answers medical questions (see box below).

In January, Nyoni refocused on the Parkinson’s app, called Patana AI, partnering with the Ekuphumuleni Geriatric Nursing Home in Bulawayo.

Everything else is done with the west first . . . it was a deliberate act of Africa-first innovation

Babusi Nyoni

The app launched in March in a small pilot phase, as Nyoni and his team collect data and feedback on usability and the performance of the AI tech. It is designed to work on the low-end smartphones that are common across Africa, so that users can simply point and shoot in order to perform the assessment.

Nyoni has a history of turning seemingly trivial technology toward more meaningful use. In 2016, while working at an advertising agency in Cape Town, he developed a custom AI football commentator for the brewer Heineken, which was deployed during that year’s Uefa Champions League. The algorithm collected football-related tweets from around the world and converted them into language that allowed a Twitter bot to banter with fans about the sport in a natural way.

But Nyoni then realised that he could repurpose it to predict forced migration patterns across Africa. His team removed the football banter and plugged in information including population growth, food production, extreme weather and gross domestic product changes.

The results revealed patterns showing when countries had reached tipping points that led to mass migration in the past — and, crucially, can help to predict under what conditions countries might reach those points in the future.

That project led to a partnership with UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, trying to predict the movements of displaced people in Somalia. However, the project hit a snag when they realised the available data was too limited to provide insight into how or when people might move.

Then the project team discovered that people sell their goats — a key vessel of wealth in rural Somalia — when they are preparing to move, which sends prices down. Those types of unorthodox data points are now included in the system, which provides for a more complete picture of potential mass displacements.

Nyoni says his ability to tap into innovative solutions is borne of his impoverished upbringing in an economically devastated Zimbabwe.

“Growing up in an environment where you have to always constantly be solving in some way or another, just to improve the quality of your life, is something that I guess prepared me for that moment where I could look at what I built and then imagine the use case for it that would be much more impactful than a dance move assessment or a football commentator.” 

How small talk made a big difference

Babusi Nyoni’s biggest success so far is Sis Joyce, a Facebook Messenger chatbot that answers medical questions. It was purpose built for a chat app because many young Africans use them to communicate.

“Africa has some of the worst healthcare in the world, and there are opportunities for tech to plug some of the gaps that governments fail to,” Nyoni says. “But Africa also has some of the most expensive internet in the world. What it means is that innovations have to leverage existing behaviours as opposed to creating new ones — don’t try and invent an app culture where there isn’t one, because there isn’t one for a reason. ”

Coronavirus-related messages to Sis Joyce have jumped in recent months, prompting Nyoni to partner with the city of Bulawayo to provide users with real-time data and health trends, as well as a resource centre to address citizens’ Covid-19 questions.

Sis Joyce is based on a natural language processing model trained on 800,000 doctor-patient transcripts. It was rolled out in eight African countries last year but one problem was that the model was not trained on social interactions.

Nyoni added a second layer of natural language that could both engage in small talk and answer simple questions such as “what is a CAT scan?”. Sis Joyce is now growing in the US, even though it has not been promoted there.

Reuse this content (opens in new window) CommentsJump to comments section

Follow the topics in this article

• Digital health
• Disease control and prevention
• Technology
• Neil Munshi

Dancing - DK Voskhod

Dance direction

Published

was founded in September 2017 on the basis of MBOU secondary school 4, since 2020 it has become a creative
formation of the House of Culture "Voskhod".
The team repeatedly received the title of Laureate at the All-Russian and International
competitions.
The team has performances not only in Moscow and the Moscow region, but also in
other cities of Russia.
Children from 7 to 16 years old are involved in the team.
The main direction is street dance.
However, the band members do not stand still and master other modern trends
: variety dance, contemporary, jazz funk.
The program of classes includes:
• physical training,
• stretching,
• working out new elements
Children regularly participate in master classes from famous choreographers of Russia and the world!
Head Alexandra Sergeevna Pakholkina.

Posted

Jazz dance
This dance direction of extraordinary beauty impresses
with its sincerity and apparent simplicity.
The main difficulty in modern jazz - as well as the most interesting thing in mastering it
- is that it
largely opposes the laws of classical choreography, while at the same time being its
logical continuation!
BUT this is by no means a denial, but just an option! Violating the rules
of gravity, which is possible only in modern jazz, we comprehend
the laws of classical dance. No wonder the world's greatest ballerinas are not
shied away from performing original numbers in this style - remember Maya
Plisetskaya!
The roots of this direction should be sought in the dance culture of
African Americans. Improvisation, inherent in the very nature of Afro-jazz,
receives its logical continuation in modern jazz and reaches
a certain round of historical development.
Clarity of lines, completeness of movements, while not denying
the smooth flow of poses from one to another. Quirkiness and in some
degrees of "cosmism" of choreographic solutions reflect the musical idea
- following the music, the body sensitively repeats its whimsical pattern!

About jazz-modern
A lot of attention in dance is given to finding balance and
using the body to create form in space.
The most important feature of jazz dance is improvisation. It helps the
dancer to reflect the changes that are taking place in the world around
(aesthetic and social). Distinctive features of jazz dance are
also sensuality, emotionality. The soul in jazz dance lives together with the
body, in the same rhythm, mood ...
Blues jazz is a slow, sensual and emotional dance,
performed to blues music. Blues-jazz dance can express
loneliness, sadness, melancholy, suffering, anger and joy, as well as love,
passion - any experiences from the whole spectrum of human feelings and emotions.
Expression is a very important factor in jazz dance. The music is expressed through
dramatic grandiose movements.
Blues-jazz dance is a more flexible version of jazz, keeping
a clear rhythm. A striking feature of jazz dance is the independence of
body parts from each other, in which they each move along their own trajectory.
Parts of the body are prepared so that they can move not only
in isolation, but also in opposite directions. Today's jazz dance is hard

rhythms, emotional pressure, even some aggression. It contains
elements of hip-hop, break, rap, funk. Dance figures combine
complex hand translations and intricate body movements that fit into the
intense rhythm of the music. Broken movements, asymmetrical figures,
spectacular throws to the floor - the dance depends on the music and the choreographer's imagination.
Modern jazz dance offers unlimited possibilities,
demands creativity and individuality from the performers. Someone wants to
have fun, someone seeks to convey the mysterious, incomprehensible
life ups and downs, others are fascinated by pure movement, composition,
rhythm….
Head:
Vinogradova Irina Valerievna, teacher of additional education
in the direction of "Dance Sport", judge of the 1st category of the Moscow Dance Sport Federation
, master of international class in
Latin American program.
Over 20 years of coaching experience.
Appointment by phone:
+79191008900
8(495)527-73-19

Published

The Avangard dance ensemble was created in 2000 on the basis of House
culture "Sunrise".
The founder and leader of the team is Victoria
Anatolyevna Chalkina-Krupko.

In the first years of work, the variety-
choreographic direction was chosen as the main one. But over time, folk dance took a significant place in the
repertoire of the collective.
"Avangard" - a team of different ages. It brings together children and
teenagers from 4 to 18 years old, there are also older participants who do not want to part with their
favorite business and continue their choreography classes. At
Today, more than 100 people are involved in the team. Work
is being conducted with six age groups.
The band's diverse repertoire includes more than 60 numbers.
These are Russian dances, dances of the peoples of the world, story-play performances,
variety numbers, suites.
The ensemble actively participates in all city events.
In the nominations "Folk Dance" and "Variety Dance" represents
the city at regional reviews, All-Russian, international festivals -
competitions, with competitive programs, the team members visited
Kerch, St. Petersburg, Kazan, Kaliningrad.
In the curriculum:
parterre gymnastics
classical dance
folk dance
variety dance
children's game dance
stretching
Class schedule:
Studio "Fidgets" - preparatory group at the ensemble
"Avangard", 4-6 years old - Tuesday, Thursday 17.00-18.00
Studio "Solnyshko" - junior group at the ensemble "Avangard",
6-8 years old - Tuesday, Thursday 18.00-19.00
Studio "Avangard" - middle group at the ensemble "Avangard", 8-12 years old

• Tuesday 19.00-20.00, Friday 18.30-20.00, Sunday 11.00-12.00 Ensemble "
  Avangard” main team, 13-18 years old – Tuesday, Thursday
  19.00-21.00, Friday 20.00-21.00, Sunday 12.00-15.00, 18.00-20.00

Dance Theater "Traffic" - MAUDO Khabarovsk

Municipal Autonomous Institution of Additional Education of Khabarovsk Children and Youth Center Collectives / Choreography / Dance Theater "Traffic" Dance Theater "Traffic" Exemplary Dance Theater "Traffic" The team was founded in 2005. Artistic Director of the Exemplary Choreographic Ensemble "Rainbow" and the National Theater of Modern Dance "Traffic" - Duboenko Tatyana Nabievna. Teachers - Sakhno Natalya Anatolyevna, Erina Alexandra. The members of the team are dancers and creative youth who are not indifferent to what is happening in the world around them, who are looking for harmony and strive to know their own bodies. 2008, 2012 - GRAND PRIX at the Regional Competition of Choreographers. In May 2012, the Youth Theater of Contemporary Dance "Traffic" was awarded the title of "People's", the only group in the field of modern dance in the Far East. 2007 Laureate 2nd degree, Isadora International Festival of Contemporary Choreography, Krasnoyarsk 2008 Jazz Congress Vortex, Moscow, 2010 "Curts", Vladivostok 1st degree winner in the nomination "Modern Dance" 2012 International Festival of Arts "Gue-2012", Vietnam Diploma, certificate of high performance skills. 2012 Interregional theater festival of unscheduled independent works "New Facets" Diploma of the laureate - nomination "Creative Search" STD RF All-Russian Theater Society. 2012 Participation in the Guangzhou International Contemporary Choreography Festival China 2013 participation in the international festival Beijing Dance Festival, China, where 2 miniatures and the performance "Heart rattles" were presented 2013, September - laureate of the IX International festival of choreographic art of the countries of the Asia-Pacific region "Rhythms of the Planet" Repeated participants in various government concerts, dedicated to memorable dates of the Far East region. Learn more How to do dirty dance moves How to become a dancing bear How much money do dancing with the stars pros make How many episodes are there in dancing on the edge How to lose belly fat the fastest latin dance How to improve dance marathon How to photograph dancers How to do the riverdale dance How to wear saree for lavani dance How to dance the rock and roll Telex how do you dance 10841 Bluegrass Parkway, Louisville, KY 40299 Site Map (502) 836-2348 .