The official folk dance of North Carolina, clogging, is unique to the state, and according to club member Katie Craven, a junior in meteorology, it is still evolving today.
“Clogging originated in the Appalachian mountains from dances like line dancing,” she said. “But now clogging has elements from country to hip-hop. It does still use some traditional elements though.”
Jamie Liles, a sophomore in international studies, agrees that clogging is a traditional dance but says the Wolfpack cloggers have integrated modern elements into it.
“A lot of people think clogging is really country, but not all of it is,” he said. “At a lot of the events we do use a lot of modern music and techniques that people really like.”
Originally, clogging was only offered through the University as a physical education course. The course was dropped from the catalog, but clogging lived on through the club. Founded in 1989, the club was designed as a student organization which performed at campus and community events.
According to Craven, the club shares the same focus today.
“We do a lot of performances around the community, like art festivals and benefits for charitable groups,” she said. “We also perform every summer at concerts at Walnut Creek and at the State Fair every year. “
The team requested for club affiliation in 2007 and was granted it in 2008. Since then, the club has been run and organized completely by students. Composed of 13 members - 11 females and two males - the team has no “official” coach, instead relying on two former Wolfpack cloggers for guidance.
“We have two alumni who come every week and help us,” said Andrea Carroll, a graduate student in agriculture management. “They’re not really our coaches, but we call them our coaches because they do so much.”
One interesting element about clogging is the use of males as well as females in the dances. Unlike other more well known dancing clubs, such as the N.C. State dance team, the clogging team utilizes both male and female dancers. The inclusion of both sexes is necessary for many types of dances the club performs.
“Guys are important because a lot of the dances we do are couple dances,” Craven said. “Right now we’re having to use girls in place of guys in some of our dances. We need more guys.”
The team is constantly recruiting, and Carroll said the team has an open-door policy for all those interested.
“We had tryouts, but if anyone is interested all they need to do is come to practice,” she said. “We would have an informal tryout, and then the team would vote and decide. We always want to expand.”
