Why “choreomania” is a great word
CHOREOMANIA — [Noun] An uncontrollable urge to dance, especially in a frenzied, convulsive manner, historically associated with epidemic outbreaks. From the combining form choreo-, from Greek choreia ("dance"), and -mania, from Greek mania ("madness, frenzy"). Unlike chorea, a neurological disorder of involuntary, purposeless movement, or tarantism, a specific cultural syndrome tied to a spider's bite and its musical cure, choreomania describes a collective psychogenic fever. It is the cobbled square filled with bodies jerking to a silent, terrible music; the percussive gasp of feet scraping stone until they bleed; the sight of a community dancing itself past exhaustion into collapse—a testament to the mind's terrifying power to translate unspeakable distress into a desperate, shared rhythm.