# The Greatest Sociological Question Of Our Times: The Wave **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 3, 2004, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338 "2004-02-03T17:15:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![svirone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7bcc69/32.png) [@svirone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/svirone)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/1 "2004-02-03T17:15:02Z")
How the hell did some drunk guy at a stadium get people to do the wave for the first time? How did he convince everyone around him that it would look cool if somehow they could convince the rest of the stadium to do it? When was it first done? The Roman Coliseum? ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/2 "2004-02-03T17:25:51Z")
[One claim.](http://gohuskies.ocsn.com/trads/020498aad.html) Can’t say for sure if it’s definitive or not, however. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/3 "2004-02-03T18:42:20Z")
I dunno, but my husband and I went to the strip to support a friend who was racing. We did a two-man wave that killed. We giggle about it to this day. ---
**Author:** ![svirone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7bcc69/32.png) [@svirone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/svirone)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/4 "2004-02-03T19:21:07Z")
I’m going to have to call BS on that story. I remember doing in my youth, this would be 1982ish in Pittsburgh. Would it have spread across the country in a year or so? Does anyone remember doing it earlier? Plus there is the mention of Elway being beat, which makes me trash any story because of my sick love of the man…but that’s another topic. ---
**Author:** ![Critical1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Critical1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Critical1)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/5 "2004-02-03T21:27:28Z")
the UW story is true to the best of my knowledge. its been a seattle thing and thats the common story you hear around here. as for traveling across the country in less than a year? lol the macaraina did it in less time and is at least 500X dumber… ---
**Author:** ![flano1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f14d63/32.png) [@flano1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flano1)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/6 "2004-02-03T21:48:31Z")
IIRC the wave was originally called " the Mexican wave" because it began during the 1968 Mexican Olympics. I have no cites ( too lazy ), but I remember clearly thinking " How strange…". Of course, the bloody thing is everywhere now. _sigh_ ---
**Author:** ![aenimiac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/df788c/32.png) [@aenimiac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aenimiac)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/7 "2004-02-03T22:58:39Z")
AFAIK, it did originate in US colleges. The name Mexican Wave came after it appeared in the World Cup (soccer for you Americans reading ;)) in 1986 in Mexico. I remember hearing a story about it being recommended there to stop heat exhaustion or something. Not quite sure how it would work though! [http://www.guardian.co.uk/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-21439,00.html](http://www.guardian.co.uk/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-21439,00.html) ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [February 3, 2004, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/8 "2004-02-03T23:07:45Z")
At football games in Berkeley, circa 1972, the student section would do a vertical wave: starting from the bottom row, progressing to the top. This was before I’d ever seen an around-the-stadium wave. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2004, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/9 "2004-02-04T03:01:15Z")
I saw it for the first time in the Miami-Notre Dame game of 11/27/1981, where it was called the “Hurrican Wave.” And, no I didn’t remember the date. I had to look it up. ---
**Author:** ![Quint\_Essence](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/54ee81/32.png) [@Quint\_Essence](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quint_Essence)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2004, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-greatest-sociological-question-of-our-times-the-wave/227338/10 "2004-02-04T03:31:16Z")
The most amazing “wave” that I have ever seen was at the Live Aid concert in philadelphia in 1985. During stage changes or during events in the wembley portion of the concert, the “wave” was spontaneously started and stopped repeatedly. Often it would spontaneously reverse directions and at one point we had a wave which started in the middle and went to both ends of the horseshoe stadium, then ran back and crashed together in the middle at which point the entire stadium got to its feet. Really was an amazing thing to watch throughout the day (the concert lasted like 16 hours or something) there were strobe like effects from multiple,spaced, “waves” and all sorts of starts and often sudden stops. It was really amazing to see such a large crowd (202,000 people) seemingly think the same thing simultaneously and cooperate in ways that didnt seem possible. It was a pretty amazing event all the way around…