“The duties of the Diversity Chair shall include: facilitating the implementation of training and appropriate practices related to encouraging and promoting diversity and inclusion within the organization.”

Have you ever heard of a club having a “diversity chair” on their executive board? Yeah, me either– up until joining one of the intellectual sport clubs on campus during my freshman year. When one of the upperclassmen introduced themself as Diversity Chair, I didn’t know how to feel; of course I didn’t mind that the program made diversity and inclusion a priority, but why did they need a chair for that? Was that position always part of their student leadership, or did they have so many discriminatory instances that they felt the need to add it? 

My suspicion was proved to be partially correct– at the time, there were a handful of former and current members of the club that had mistreated their peers in the past. There have also been a few instances of the coaches making decisions that were ultimately harmful or hurtful to students. While their intentions may not have been to hurt anyone, the way they weaponized their various types of privilege in these situations left a mark on my perception of them and a desire to make sure it doesn’t happen again. So, come election time, I decided to run for Diversity Chair, and this is my second year holding the position.

During the first meeting of this semester, a new member posed the question, “what does the Diversity Chair even do?” And, well. I understood why she asked, especially when the head coach proceeded to stumble through an explanation about my plan to do a “Microaggressions in [name of sport]” presentation. He wasn’t even able to explain the purpose of the position when asked by a new member (which, as you can imagine, made me feel fantastic).

I feel like I was always aware of my seemingly constant emotional labor in my formative years, long before I read Arlie Hochschild’s formal definition of it. However, my “second shift” wasn’t with a husband at home, but a grandmother.

Bodies are beautiful, complex vessels of our minds and souls and hearts. Bodies deserve to take up as much space as they need, regardless of race or gender expression.

Unfortunately, that’s not how society is socialized. We’re taught both implicitly and explicitly that cisgender white men can take up as much space as they want, and if you don’t fall into any of those categories then you’re simply out of luck. Minimize yourself as much as you can, though, because God forbid you get in their way and take up their space– don’t you want to get married to one of them one day?