Between the styles of popping and locking it is usually locking that is the one more commonly confused and mixed into the general idea of popping. Many people will call a pure popping performance 'popping and locking'.
So why so much confusion? First of all people assume that all performances featuring popping can be called popping and locking.
Secondly many people think that because a dance performance has popping, that it will also by default have locking in it also.
Thirdly people are miseducated about what locking really is or what it looks like.
All these factors contribute to the confusion. This is often made worse by the fact that new dancers today still refer to popping as popping and locking, upload their videos to YouTube and confuse yet more people.
Barring an educating of every single dancer and also the media which often confuses styles, this problem is not going to go away for a while.
So what can you do about this? It's not an easy task as this is a large scale problem and every new generation of dancers is growing up with this problem also.
One way you can make a difference is whenever you see a homemade popping video titled 'popping and locking', to leave a comment asking if it isn't just popping.
This frame of thought can of course be easily extended to friends and acquaintances you may or may not know well. Simply tell them if they make a mistake in naming the styles.
Something which you cannot account for of course is when there is actually popping and locking in a performance. Here it might be best to tell them where the popping is and where the locking is.
The interesting thing is that lockers rarely call what they do 'popping and locking'. This may have something to do with the fact that locking is a somewhat niche category with a smaller community.
They're unlikely to have become educated by the media, but probably came across locking that was also correctly named locking and in turn were inspired to take up locking.
The more people that know what locking is, the more that people will cease to call pure popping performances 'poppin & lockin'.
So while this problem is not going to go away overnight you can do your bit by correcting any misuse of these terms, so maybe just maybe the next generation will be better informed of which is which.
On the next page: When Did Locking Become Popular?