Cardinal Divas spread majorette gospel
The Cardinal Divas are business as usual after their busy and history-making first semester. Since the team’s launch in September, the team has made appearances in Essence, BET and the Los Angeles Times, and made their national television debut on “The Jennifer Hudson Show.” Now, they want the world to know that they’re more than just majorettes.
Majorette dance is a style of dance that draws on jazz and hip hop techniques that was first established in historically Black colleges and universities across the nation. It holds great significance in Black and HBCU culture.
The founder and captain of the team, Princess Isis Lang, is a junior majoring in musical theater and was at the center of the attention the team received last semester. Lang said she decided to start the team to create a space for herself after not recognizing one at USC.
“I didn’t see any dance or cheer team that I wanted to be a part of here at USC,” Lang said. “I did the research, I looked around and everything, but I knew that if I joined one of these teams that I would have to change who I was, how I look, how I dress, how I dance.”
The Cardinal Divas shot to virality Sept. 18, when Lang posted a video of the group performing on Twitter. The video has more than 3.2 million views and 102,800 likes at the time of publication.
“oh nothing… i created a majorette team at a [predominantly white institution] and performed at our first game,” the tweet read. “truly though i’m so blessed and can’t thank God enough. Thank you to my parents and to everyone who supported me along this LONG journey. and my girls FYE. The Cardinal Divas of SC are UP NEXT.”
Kyla Drew, a senior majoring in journalism and member of the team, said Lang wasn’t originally going to post the video.
“We literally made her post it,” Drew said. “We were like, ‘No, this is a good video, you need to post.’”
Though the public response to the team’s virality was mixed, Drew and her teammates are expressing gratitude for the community support they did receive amid the backlash. Detractors argued that majorette style dance belongs only at HBCUs and that the Cardinal Divas overstepped in creating their team at a PWI.
The response to Lang’s tweet was mixed. The group received support from a number of celebrities, including rapper and USC alum Saweetie, who tweeted: “SOOOOO PROUD.” On the other hand, one user demanded that Lang and her group “Stop giving these people our culture.”
We are growing as a team and people are starting to want us places. I just wish USC would open up their arms, as well.
Jada Walker, Cardinal Divas co-captain
“EXACTLY!” another user replied. “They definitely about to steal this and claim they created a ‘new’ style when HBCU’s been doing this for DECADES! It’s so irritating!”
Others sought to shut down such arguments, saying it was “such an unserious discourse.”
“Not Black folk gate keeping Black culture from other Black folk,” one such user wrote. “do yll [sic] really think the D9 [Divine 9 fraternities and sororities, also known as the National Pan-Hellenic Council] survives without chapters at PWIs?”
All the attention was a lot to handle for the team, Drew said, but “it’s been amazing,” regardless.
“It became kind of hard to balance [schoolwork and the team] when we were at our peak of media recognition,” Drew said. “I know we got some negative attention, but we really turned the negative into positive.”
Now, Ire Omitowoju, a junior majoring in arts, technology and the business of innovation and a Cardinal Diva, said the team is still busy, but boosting her culture is worth it.
“It’s a very diverse experience because we always have rehearsal, but then we’re doing a shoot or doing an interview another day,” Omitowoju said. “You know, it may be late, I may be tired, but at least I’m surrounded by people who I love, who I share similar culture to, and all we’re doing, really, is uplifting Black culture.”
Omitowoju said she felt that the media had glossed over the team’s intentions for the team’s creation.
“I hope that people outside of [the team] understand why we have this team on the campus,” Omitowoju said. “It’s not about appropriation, it’s not about shining away from HBCU culture; but it’s really about highlighting it.”
Co-captain and senior dance major Jada Walker said she also wanted to remind others that the Cardinal Divas are normal people.
“I feel like the media missed the whole part of just Black girls starting something that’s truly for us … and also just who we are as people.” Walker said. “We’re girls who laugh and talk. We do the same things everyone else do.”
Jai Robinson, a senior majoring in dance and the team’s choreographer, said he was surprised to find that the team meshed so well.
“The biggest thing that I didn’t expect was everybody to be so close. It’s really like a big family,” Robinson said. “We all go out to eat sometimes, we just hang out. Our rehearsals are a whole bunch of fun. It doesn’t really feel like work and I really love that aspect of it.”
Robinson and Lang are both members of the NPHC, a collection of Black fraternities and sororities. Robinson said he first got involved with the team after he approached Lang and asked to choreograph the audition piece, but his role quickly evolved.
“I started doing a lot of other things that really aren’t under my role but, since me and Princess are good friends, it was no problem. Then I started to be more of a coach,” Robinson said.
He said that throughout his experience with the team, his favorite memory has probably been their appearance on “The Jennifer Hudson Show.”
“We really had a good time, we were all fangirling over Jennifer and it was just really amazing,” Robinson said.
Drew said her favorite experience was the team’s performance at the Homecoming game during the football season.
“I wasn’t able to experience homecoming my junior year [of high school] and then, obviously, [the coronavirus pandemic] restricted me from attending my first two years,” Drew said. “So being able to have that first homecoming experience and being able to dance in the stands, and that energy in the band and the crowd, and then we won — it was honestly life-changing.”
Many of the team’s members are seniors who Walker said hope to leave behind a growing program that eventually gains recognition from USC Athletics. Walker said when reflecting on their Jan. 16 performance at the Martin Luther King Day parade in Leimert Park, she wishes they could’ve been included alongside the Trojan Marching Band.
“It was a fun experience; We got to see the band before they took off, but it was just very unfortunate that we couldn’t be a part of it with them,” Walker said. “We are growing as a team and people are starting to want us places. I just wish USC would open up their arms, as well.”
Lang said that while the team faces financial challenges, being entirely self-funded and reliant on donations, that hasn’t stopped her, and the team is going to keep expanding.
“Yes, tryouts are happening,” Lang said. “So, we gonna keep pushing and, as my friends say, ‘Princess make it happen.’ Period.”