I studied folk dance in college for fun (yeah, I'm a dork).

The majority of folk dances (including the Chinese ones we did) don't necessairly tell a story, but 'typify' daily activities from life. Like 'a day in the life of a housewife' is quite common in Bulgarian dance. The Chinese stuff we did tended more towards either the 'delicate court courtesan' stuff, or the 'mighty warrior' stuff.