Ball Culture - Some Categories and Their Descriptions

Some Categories and Their Descriptions

• Butch Queen Vogue Femme/Female Figure Performance – Give a stunning performance using the five elements of vogue: hands, catwalk, duckwalk, floor performance, and spins and dips
• BQ Realness – Judged on participants' ability to blend in with heterosexuals by giving Thug, Pretty Boy, School Boy, or Executive
• FQ Realness – Judged on participants' ability to blend in with female heterosexuals
• Realness With a Twist (Twister) – Judged on participants' ability to blend in with heterosexuals, then come back and vogue fem
• BQ/FQ/FF Runway – Judged on participants' ability to catwalk, usually with a requested outfit or color
• Bizarre – Judged on participants' creativity to design a costume based on what the category asks for
• Labels – Judged on how many of the year labels a participant is wearing and their authenticity
• BQ/FQ/FF Face – Showing off your clean, perfect, smooth face
• BQ/FQ/FF Sex Siren – Giving sex appeal mostly in sexy underwear such as thongs, briefs, or bikinis
• Commentator vs. Commentator' – Allows aspiring and current MCs to showcase their chanting ability to the music and ability to hype the crowd
• Dipology – Like Vogue Femme but involves spins into dips only
• European Runway – Often a Butch Queen Category, European runway is brought in over the top effects that are more likely to be seen in a high-cost European fashion show; the person walking walks like a female or feminine model, not like the male models of America.
• American Runway – Much like European Runway, American Runway is usually a Butch Queen Category but is often walked by TransMen and Butches/Studs, but the models walk as a masculine models from America, not feminine models like in European Runway.
• Butch Queen up in Pumps – Basically the same as Labels or Runway but you must wear heels usually six inches or more
• FQ/BQ in Drag Female Figure Performance – Give a performance (usually lip-synched) of a famous female figure
• Hands Performance – Give a voguing performance using hands only
• Virgin Vogue Femme – The same as vogue femme but for participants who have been voguing for less than one year, as per Legendary Icon Selvin Khanh
• Virgin Runway – The same as Runway but for participants who have been walking Runway for less than one year, as per Legendary Icon Selvin Khanh
• Best Dressed – self-explanatory
• Legendary/Iconic Categories – Only the legends and icons of the ballroom scene can participate in categories such as Face, Runway, Realness, Performance (all voguing categories), etc.

Regarding these competitions and their importance to ball culture and the people involved, one participant wrote:

There is more to the ballroom scene than chopping, mopping, "fierceness" and shade; and there is more to vogueing than striking a pose. Drag is a form of control. By looking good one can feel good. By looking powerful, one can feel powerful. One can be powerful. Therefore, beauty begets control. Artifice equals power. Then again, it may just be a bunch of bitches competing for trophies. Either way, its fun. There is of course a distinction between the casual runway that would erupt at a "normal" club, and the formal runway of a ball, where there are judges and prizes and actual vogueing.

Having evolved over the years, the largest balls are competitions that can go on as long as ten hours. There can be dozens of categories in a single evening . No longer attracting the same number of spectators, almost everyone comes to compete. Some of the trophies are twelve feet tall and a grand-prize winner can take home $1000 or more.