The gumboot is a percussive dance developed by black miners in South Africa. Wearing their work boots, rubber boots, the dancers produce rhythms by tapping on their boots, in their hands or on the ground. Dancers wear boots that they padded to produce a better sound and avoid hurting themselves by tapping the boots. They wear burnt beer caps on their ankles, or small boxes of shoe polish filled with small pieces of metal, to make a cowbell. The names of the step sequences are associated with the daily life of miners. In the 1920s, through the names of the sequences and what they represented more or less explicitly, miners commented on their situation without employers noticing.