thumb|A social dancing or [[Ballroom Dancing|ballroom dancing group class taught at the Arthur Murray Dance Studio in The Woodlands, Texas.]]
thumb|right|240px|[[Khigga is the most common social folk dance among Assyrian people.]]
Social dances are dances that have social functions and context. Social dances are intended for participation rather than performance. They are often danced merely to socialise and for entertainment, though they may have ceremonial, competitive and erotic functions.
Many social dances of European origin are in recent centuries partner dances (see Ballroom dance) but elsewhere there may instead be circle dances or line dances.
Social dance in western cultures
left|thumb|300px|Eighteenth-century social dance. Translated caption: A cheerful dance awakens love and feeds hope with lively joy, ([[Florence, 1790)]]
The types of dance performed in social gatherings change with social values. Social dance music of the 14th century has been preserved in manuscript, though without proper choreography, for dances such as the ballo, carol, stampita, saltarello, trotto and roto. The 15th century is the first period from which written records of dances exist. A manuscript from Brussels highlights the Burgundian court dance, which spread all over Europe, referred to as the basse dance in which a large group perform a series of steps in triple time. Italian courts danced balli, with a wide array of choreographed rhythms, steps and positions for the dancers. These were documented in instruction books written by the dance masters who choreographed them for the courts.
Swing dance in the 1930s has grown in popularity, taking many dance forms, some of them, such as Lindy Hop or West Coast Swing have survived to today.
Rock 'n' roll in the 1950s brought about a shift in social dancing toward rebelliousness. This shift was seen especially in teenagers who did not want to dance the same steps that their parents did. The dancing was mostly swing based but had a variations in different regions.
The 1950s brought nationwide "dance crazes" such as the mambo and the cha-cha-chá, which were popularized through nightclubs, television, and touring orchestras. These styles not only attracted Latino audiences but also became a major part of mainstream American popular culture. In the United States, the mambo craze was fueled by bandleaders like Pérez Prado whose big-band mambo music enjoyed major popularity in the 1950s.