May 19, 2025 • 56 mins
What if sports were designed around athlete wellbeing instead of profit? In this eye-opening conversation, Dr. Diane Williams shares the buried history of the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW), an organization that flourished in the 1970s and early 1980s with a radical vision for collegiate athletics centered on education and student development.
Dr. Williams, a professor of kinesiology at McDaniel College and former NCAA All-American athlete, reveals how this women-led organization created a completely different approach to sports governance than the male-dominated NCAA. With her interdisciplinary background in American Studies, Sports Studies, and Gender Studies, she unpacks how the AIAW's educational philosophy prioritized athlete wellbeing while still fostering high-level competition.
The conversation delves into why this history matters today, as athletes across all levels struggle with mental health challenges, restrictive gender norms, and exploitative systems. Dr. Williams shares powerful insights about creating more inclusive, body-positive athletic spaces that welcome diverse bodies and abilities. From her experience as "Lady Hulk" in roller derby to her work with current students questioning athletic norms, she offers a blueprint for reimagining sports culture.
Most compelling is the story of how the AIAW ended – not because its model failed, but because it threatened existing power structures. As Dr. Williams explains, "It wasn't just the organization that disappeared but an entire alternative vision for what athletics could be." This forgotten chapter in sports history offers valuable lessons for anyone interested in creating healthier approaches to physical activity, competition, and embodiment.
Whether you're an athlete, coach, parent, or simply someone interested in how we might build more humane and inclusive systems, this conversation will transform how you think about sports culture and its possibilities.
Learn more & connect with Dr. Williams at: https://www.mcdaniel.edu/about-us/profiles/diane-l-williams-phd
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Lisa Danylchuk (00:08):
Welcome back to the how we Can Heal podcast.
Today, our guest is Dr DianeWilliams.
Diane holds a doctorate inAmerican Studies and Sports
Studies, in addition to acertificate in Gender, women's
and Sexuality Studies from theUniversity of Iowa.
She also has a master's insocial justice education from
UMass Amherst and a master's inexercise and sports studies from
(00:31):
Smith College.
She's currently a professor ofkinesiology at McDaniel College
in Maryland, where she teachessport in American society.
Women in sport, sport coachingand management and kinesiology.
Women in sport, sport coachingand management and kinesiology.
A six-time NCAA Division IIIAll-American in shot put and
(00:53):
discus, she's been a coach andan athlete herself, earning the
name Lady Hulk during hereight-year skating roller derby
as well.
She often writes and teachesabout the Association for
Intercollegiate Athletics forWomen, an organization that
existed in the 1970s and 80s andcentered the well-being of
women student-athletes in aunique way, which we'll talk
about today.
We'll also talk about theimportance of inclusivity and
(01:15):
mental health in sports cultureand the need for deep reflection
on dynamics and powerstructures in athletics.
I've been lucky to know Dianemy whole life and see her
brilliance up close and personal, so I'm excited to share it
with you today.
Please join me in welcomingDiane to the show.
(01:37):
Dr Diane Williams, welcome tothe how we Can Heal podcast.
How are you today?
Dr. Diane Williams (01:42):
I'm good.
Thank you, I'm so excited to behere and to talk to you.
Lisa Danylchuk (01:46):
For folks listening Diane and I met when
we were zero years old.
I used to live probably like ahundred yards from your house
when I was born.
We moved pretty quickly.
But then preschool,kindergarten, elementary, middle
school, high school, all of itright.
I have memories of doing showand tell in preschool and you
(02:10):
sitting in the little corner bythe door.
I remember it.
It wasn't that long, it was awhile ago.
It wasn't that long ago.
So thank you for being here.
You have such an extraordinarycareer yourself.
We've kept in touch over theyears, but I'm really curious to
learn from you today and toshare that with our audience.
So yay.
Dr. Diane Williams (02:30):
Yay, well, I mean, yes, all of that.
I was just telling my classesbecause we read part of the yoga
for trauma book you wrote, sothey're familiar with you.
I was telling them that I wasdoing this and telling them like
, again, I told you I go wayback with Lisa, but what we've,
what we've both talked about, isthat we took, you know, like
(02:52):
since calculus in high school,when we spent a lot of time
together.
We haven't necessarily spent aton of time together, but we
have had these interestingcareers that have have come back
together in different ways andthat echo each other in
different ways that aren'tnecessarily apparent on the
surface.
right, and that's part of what Ilove about just getting every
(03:13):
time I get to see you and talkto you.
Lisa Danylchuk (03:16):
I feel like our careers are so interrelated and
if I had extra life space Iwould want to study what you're
studying right, but it's likeyou pick and choose.
We all only have so much andyou have to choose a major in
college and I mean for you, youjust keep going back and getting
more degrees.
Maybe you're done with that.
For now I'm not going to sayforever.
(03:37):
Let's share with folkslistening.
What are some central themes inyour studies, your work, your
teaching?
Dr. Diane Williams (03:48):
So I currently am an assistant
professor of kinesiology, whichused to be called physical
education back in the day, andit's this interdisciplinary
study of the body and movement,and so a lot of my colleagues
are scientists and they doexercise, physiology and anatomy
and biomechanics.
(04:09):
And then there's the other sideof the discipline and of my
department, which is humanitiesbased and social science based,
and so we have a sportspsychology professor and we have
me, and I study the history andsociology of sport and physical
activity, focused mostly in theUnited States, and so I come
(04:29):
out of a reallyinterdisciplinary background.
I was an American Studies majoras an undergrad, did American
Studies as my doctoral work,with gender studies, women's and
gender studies in there, butalso looking at sport and
physical activity, and I wantedto coach all along and I have
coached on and off for 20 yearsnow.
I was an athlete in high schooland college, so that sport
(04:52):
thing has been a part of my lifefor a long time.
But at some point I decided Ididn't want to coach anymore
Well, maybe different levels Ikeep coming back to it but I
didn't want to be a collegiatecoach, but I wanted to do
something related to sport andphysical activity.
And so now I am in thisposition that I always wanted to
(05:13):
be in, which is that I get towork with students who are
kinesiology majors Sometimesthey're not, and they just came
to take women in sport becauseit sounded interesting, but
they're usually there becausethey're interested in the body
and movement.
I get to introduce them tothinking about the history and
how identities are a part ofthat history and how sports are
inclusive and exclusive and howall kinds of different aspects
(05:37):
of studying sport and the bodythat are beyond the body as a
machine and the body as musclesBecause really the body is all
of that and the experiences wehave I don't have to tell you
this right and the impact wehave on other people and the
impact they have on us, and theideas we have about ability, who
can be included in certainspaces and who can't, and the
(05:59):
histories that go with that.
And so I get this opportunity totake students that are already
interested in sports, say, orthey're interested in the body,
and we just study all of thesedifferent things related to this
but that have, that areconnected to science, but that
aren't the science side of it.
In that work, I think thelearning happens more deeply
when we personally connect to it, and I have this opportunity
(06:21):
where everybody has a body solike and a lot of them if it's a
sport class they probably havesome experience with sport and
sport culture themselves ortheir families.
We do a lot of reading, theory,reading, academic work and then
thinking about how it relates toour lives and thinking about
how it informs, how this helpsus think through our own
(06:41):
experiences in sport and sportculture or with bodies or with
our own body and doing thisintegration so it becomes more
personal.
But also this is where the sortof the psych side of it right.
It also gives them a chance toself-reflect and think through
meanings they already makearound bodies and sport.
All of that before they go out.
(07:02):
And our personal trainersworking with other people or our
professors or our researchersright.
They have this differentengagement with their own
interests and their ownbackground and their own
assumptions and ideas that mightmake them ideally more open,
more inclusive, more thoughtfuland cognizant of the histories
and the context that they'reworking within.
Lisa Danylchuk (07:23):
Yes, there's so much in there and I was thinking
as you were talking and justhaving this memory of Saturday.
I was running a trail halfmarathon, so hiking and running,
and I had this memory of somememe I saw recently.
And in it there's an interviewwith a group of women going
(07:46):
jogging and I want to say it'sthe early seventies and it's
literally a news interview.
The anchor is like we've gotthis group of women, they like
to get together and they run twomiles every Tuesday.
Right, Wow, what do you do this?
And he puts the mic.
She's like I just really feellike it gives me space and I
(08:08):
love to be with other, with the,this group of women, and I just
feel better after.
Okay, you heard it straightfrom her.
You know like it's this wildthing that this group of women
are running and it made me thinkof you and knowing we were
talking this stuff isn't thatlong ago, right, and even
(08:29):
thinking about for myself andI've interviewed a few trail
runners on this podcast now howthat community has evolved in my
about a decade being involvedin it, how it's evolved along
gender lines.
I've had conversations here onthis podcast about body image
and the messages we get andfueling and your relationship to
your body and your relationshipto a sense of empowerment
(08:51):
internally and power andpresence being seen.
So there's just so many layersto your work.
When we fold trauma into that,it's another layer.
Hopefully any of us who have abody, anyone listening with a
body.
Hopefully we are curious aboutthese things so that we're not
(09:16):
just living based on, I'll justsay, unhealthy dynamics or
oppressive dynamics or historythat's exploitive and that can
go across so many differentlayers, right?
So I love the depth and breadthof this work.
It can apply to so manydifferent things.
I'm curious what you're seeingyour students come with.
(09:39):
I'm not so connected.
I used to teach more inacademic settings.
I'm not so connected thereanymore.
What are the questions, thethings that people are really
chewing on as they're goingthrough your classes, that you
see the gears start to shiftinternally?
Dr. Diane Williams (09:56):
Specifically thinking about the sport
classes I teach.
I teach sport in Americansociety, a coaching and sport
management class, and I alsoteach women in sport.
I've been teaching all thosefor a couple of years now.
There is a profound acceptanceof norms because we've only seen
one major athletic governanceorganization for intercollegiate
(10:18):
sport, for example, the NCAAright, and so merely the idea
that there one are more than oneat this moment and two
historically have been otherorganizations that organized and
had different philosophies ofsport and why we might play in
college or in high school or atlower levels.
(10:40):
That in itself is a part of whyI do the work I do is to simply
like there's an acceptance thatwhat it is is what it.
Why I do the work I do is tosimply like there's an
acceptance that what it is iswhat it always has been and will
be right, which we get.
That's how, that's how societyrolls, that's also how the folks
that have a lot of power andprivilege would really like it
to be, so that there is nothreat to that power and
privilege.
Right, and with that comes thisrhetoric of women in sport have
(11:03):
come so far, and isn't this sogreat?
And let's celebrate and, trustme, I'm all for celebrating when
things deserve celebration andI am all for being real about
how far and what are the caveatsthere?
We still talk about sport andwomen's sport.
So we haven't come that far.
The norm is still male, womenare still noted Right.
(11:24):
Until that's different, we'refar from equality, right, and
all of the things that followfrom that opportunity, resources
, support for students inathletics and broader
opportunities.
So one of the things that's thebiggest thing I do is get people
in the room and get them tostart thinking how do we even
study sport?
People study sport.
Yeah, let's start there Thengently starting to think about
(11:49):
what are things you've seen andexperienced in sport?
What did you like, what did younot like?
Then we start thinking abouthow we get socialized into
dominant sport culture.
What's fun, particularly in alot of these classes, is that
everybody in the room has astory, even if it's that they
don't like sport culture.
They have a story.
It's that dominant, and so Ican get folks talking pretty
(12:11):
quickly.
As long as we've got a kind ofa good space set up where they
feel like they can share andpeople will comment and they'll
have interesting conversations,we get going.
Lisa Danylchuk (12:20):
I would love to be in your class even just to
talk about my experiences intrail running.
What I love and that's liketrail running to me has become
like the most inclusivenon-performance or body shape
focused or yoga I mean that'sthat's its own thing too.
Like there's plenty of bodyshape focus there, there can be
(12:40):
competition there, and so for meit's been a process to try to
find something where I can bevery engaged in my body and
athletic and even exploring theends of my range of motion or my
speed or climbing something,but in a place that feels
psychologically healthy, liketrail running and yoga.
(13:02):
I've been able to find that,but it's not even like it's a
hundred percent in either ofthose communities.
And I think for me going intolike basketball like if I was on
a women's basketball team, Ithink some of the cultural
things around it just wouldn'tjive with me and it would make
it too hard for me to eat, likeI think that's why I didn't go
in those directions.
I was like Ooh, wow, that'sjust not.
It's just not going to behealthy for me to have some of
(13:25):
these dynamics.
So I would love to sign me up.
I will fly over and take yourclass at McDaniel and be a
student.
Let's talk about this andthey'll be like man.
She's really eager.
Dr. Diane Williams (13:37):
No, they'd love it.
The thing is also sport is sucha big part of their lives.
They do have questions, they dohave ideas, they do have things
.
Sometimes I ask them, like whatdo you know about sports?
And then, like, what do youthink you know?
Hopefully, eventually, the morewe get into this and the more
we think about all thesedifferent aspects of sport and
sport culture, the more youstart going oh wow, there's a
(13:58):
lot I don't know, and like, howfun, what an opportunity, and
why Do we have to do it this way?
No, of course not, but we'regonna, unless something major
happens.
We spend a fair amount of timetalking critically about sport
right, which, as I tell them, isnot like I'm being critical and
picky.
It's.
I'm thinking about power, I'mthinking about inclusion.
(14:19):
I do critical thinking about it, asking questions.
There's lots of negative thatcan come from that right and, at
the same time, part of what ishelpful about having a really
positive background in sportmyself and in coaching is that I
love it also.
I loved playing.
I'm no good as a fan because Ijust want to be out there
playing.
It's fun, and so they also haveoften real positive stories
(14:44):
that we can also build on.
We can talk about how sportoften particularly for men, but
also for women is perpetuatinglike this kind of distancing
from your body, overcoming orignoring pain signals and
glorifying that in ways that are, like, deeply disturbing when
you actually sit with it.
Lisa Danylchuk (15:01):
Oh yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (15:01):
We can talk about these kinds of things,
right, and then I can say like,tell me about a moment with
someone in sport, culture orcoach, athletic trainer that
challenged that.
And these awesome stories comeout all the time.
Of my high school footballcoach who, who sat with me, sat
down next to me when I was likein pain and let me know it was
OK and it was OK to have all thefeelings and it was OK, you
(15:21):
know, and and just, there'salways these really awesome
stories too.
We can learn from the crappyones, but we can learn from the
really awesome opportunities andsee those awesome opportunities
if we have a future in coaching, if we have a future working
with young people in athleticsor whatever.
Lisa Danylchuk (15:37):
What do you see as some of the dominant
narratives in sport culture?
What are some of the emergingnarratives you see that are not
problematic right, that aremaybe an evolution Less?
Dr. Diane Williams (15:52):
problematic or less problematic, one of the
things that keeps coming up inclasses.
Students of all genders anddifferent ethnic and racial
backgrounds are very interestedin and supportive of talking
much more about mental healthand sports.
Talking much more aboutathletes' health and well-being
themselves, their teammates, allof it.
(16:14):
And looking to some of the moreelite athletes for the last
couple years maybe a decade plusthat have been much more open
about their own challenges andhumanizing themselves in
different ways.
Simone Biles was dealing withthe twisties, or something that
sounded horrifyingly terribleand people.
Anyone saying you should pushthrough when, literally, your
(16:36):
body has lost a sense of up anddown and you're in the air
sounds like you need to take abreak right.
And so recognizing the studentsvery much overall, are excited
about that and see that as real,positive, and I think that is a
reflection of this moment andbecoming more aware of mental
(16:56):
health realities.
And that's not always like adiagnosable thing.
Sports have a different kind ofstress.
Sometimes that manifests inways that isn't necessarily
clinical at all, but we can workwith it and we can actually
train with it.
We train it giving peopleskills to develop their
abilities to work with their ownemotional regulation and in
(17:18):
performance moments, right when,like we give them the skills to
like perfect their free throw,and then we're like, just be
tough, how, tell me how and I'lldo it.
Lisa Danylchuk (17:28):
And you be a little more specific about that.
Dr. Diane Williams (17:31):
I'm crying and I want to cry.
Lisa Danylchuk (17:34):
How about let's learn how to focus, let's learn
when we need to take a momentand take a breath and collect
ourselves, and when some spaceor freedom would be helpful and
when some discipline or focuswould be helpful.
How?
Dr. Diane Williams (17:47):
to even do those things right, start small
right.
That is definitely an exciting,really important shift because
our sort of dominant sportculture is set up.
It's so male dominated, it's socapitalist influenced,
productivity focused,dehumanizing these things that
just like, oh, what getsglorified is so destructive,
(18:10):
often in the interest of winninggames.
Lisa Danylchuk (18:14):
Yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (18:15):
And there's so much money on the line.
Lisa Danylchuk (18:17):
Tell us about the AIAW, the Association for
Intercollegiate Athletics forWomen, and why it's important.
Dr. Diane Williams (18:23):
I'm going to come at this from a different
direction that connects to whatyou were talking about earlier.
You were talking about the factthat, like all that stuff about
dominant sport culture wasn'tvery appealing to you, and so
you like weren't like, yeah, I'mgoing to go out for the
basketball team, like I'll go domy own thing, and so, likewise,
in an interesting way, you knowthat I grew up dancing we both
did in a really supportive Parksand Rec program that was led by
(18:48):
a physical educator who wastrained and did dance programs
in the public schools in thearea.
Mary Joyce did all kinds ofamazing work and she had this
physical education backgroundthat was like had a belief in
the value of physical activityand bodily awareness for
lifelong health and wellness andalso as a part of your
educational experience there's awhole history of physical
(19:10):
education that really is aboutthat and so I grew up not really
playing sports but beingphysically active, loving
dancing, loving feeling my bodyand like the coordination and
doing a routine with people andyou're all in sync and it's like
very exciting and all of that.
Lisa Danylchuk (19:26):
I feel like you and I performed to C&C Music
Factory Janet Jackson in littlewhite t-shirts that got you cut
up the edge so there's fringeand seeds on the end so that
when you jump and turn it twirls.
I remember that.
I remember that routine, I gotit.
Dr. Diane Williams (19:43):
Right.
And so there was so much joy,there was so much community
focus in that program.
It wasn't about being the best,it was about being the best you
can be and learning.
I took that into sport as afirst year in high school.
I was like sports look like fun.
I don't know, Maybe I'll go tryout and I did and like it
worked, partly because I hadwhat we call in kinesiology
(20:04):
physical literacy, Like I had aan ability to move and pick up
routines and have balance, and Icould that translated into then
learning sports specific stuff,right, Volleyball, basketball,
track.
And so then I got into sportworld, which was not something
you know, you know my family.
That wasn't necessarily likewhere I was headed ever, and now
(20:25):
it's like what I doprofessionally.
So there's a bridge there whichis that I've.
As I was in sport world, I waslike I don't think I do this the
same way everybody else does,Like this is really fun.
It's like we're not here tohave fun.
Yeah, oh, we're not, we're herefor pain.
It doesn't sound fun, Like thisis, this is joyful, this is a
(20:49):
challenge and it's no-transcriptsport.
(21:13):
I'm coaching and stuff, and I'mstill just like I just don't, I
don't do this, this isn't themost important thing in all of
our lives.
Like this is an important thingin our lives and also like how
we care for each other is reallyimportant and care for our
bodies, and that we care aboutthings other than just sport.
You know, in college I wasrunning the rape and sexual
(21:33):
assault network, putting onevents there and also competing
on the national scene and astudent, like a pretty serious
student, really enjoyinglearning stuff, Learning stuff.
Lisa Danylchuk (21:45):
Learning stuff is fun.
I'm a big fan.
Dr. Diane Williams (21:47):
Right, right , I start hearing about this
organization as I am in thecoaching and in my master's
program for coaching.
So one thing I notice is peopletalk about oh yeah, there was
this other organization that ledwomen's sport, but like it
doesn't exist anymore and theyhad different ideas.
And I'm like huh, did they?
Oh, hold on, one cool storybefore that and then I'll get to
(22:08):
the AIW.
I promise the coolest story.
The first time I heard about theAIW was actually from my
collegiate throws coach,fletcher Brooks, who is amazing
and still coaching and justincredible, very silly and it's
(22:28):
wonderful.
And we're watching my teammatescool down and they are across
the track trying to get down oneof the NCAA posters to bring
home.
They're not sneaky, but nobodycares.
The NCAA sends this stuff.
You hang it up, it disappears,it's fine.
Yeah, so Fletcher looks acrossand it's like, yeah, like the
NCAA has been that great forwomen athletics, women's
athletics, and I was like whatnow?
(22:49):
What?
What do mean?
And I'm a burgeoning feministscholar and taking my women's
studies classes and I'm like huhand he's like the NCAA has not
treated women in sports verywell.
He had been educated atSpringfield in part by women who
had been a part of the AIW andhe had knowledge of this much
longer legacy of women'sphysical education and sports.
(23:10):
So he starts telling me alittle bit, just a tiny bit,
about this like well, there'sthis whole other organization
that used to exist and the AIW.
I don't know if he said thename, but the part of what's
significant is they had a wholedifferent philosophy of sport
and physical activity and it waseducationally rooted and it was
financially reasonable and itwas about something else that
you would do in college.
(23:30):
That's a part of youreducational experience and your
overall growth and developmentas a human.
We're going to have high levelcompetition and organized teams,
but we're not going to exploitathletes and we're not going to
oh my God, what.
Lisa Danylchuk (23:43):
And we're going to.
Dr. Diane Williams (23:44):
we're going to value their humanity and
we're going to have a differentapproach to doing this, and one
sport isn't going to knows aboutthis massive organization and
the work they did, and not likein a.
(24:17):
We deserve all this credit.
Necessarily they do, but morein like it's part of sport
history.
It's part of collegiate sporthistory, let alone US sport
history.
So, anyways, I get through acouple grad programs and have
gotten interested enough.
I read their purpose statement,I think from the first couple
(24:37):
of pages of the constitutionthat they wrote, and it's a
manifesto.
It's so gorgeous.
It is like sport sport for the.
We believe in cultivatingintercollegiate sport for women,
for the overall wellbeing ofthe student athlete.
All decisions should be madewith that in mind.
I'm like, well, that seemsdifferent.
(24:58):
Yeah, and to your point earlier.
Lisa Danylchuk (24:59):
It's not exploitive.
No, we're not making money offof you.
This is about enrichment, rightEmbodied enrichment, and
education and, from what I'veread that you've shared, it's
focusing on the academics,focusing on the whole experience
, focusing like it's not justthis hey, play for our team so
(25:20):
we win and make money.
Dr. Diane Williams (25:21):
Yes, yes, focusing on student athletes
well-being and educationalexperience doesn't preclude
working hard, challenging people.
Educational experience doesn'tpreclude working hard,
challenging people, excellingand competing at a high level
Like those things can all gotogether.
In so many cases they did.
I decided I didn't want tocoach under the NCAA.
I loved coaching.
I loved working with athletes.
(25:42):
I loved teaching young women inparticular how to throw a shot
put.
It wasn't about the shot putyou know, like it's about oh no,
you're powerful.
Let me let me show you how tothrow a shot put.
It wasn't about the shot putyou know, it's about oh no,
you're powerful.
Let me let me show you how toget into a ready position and
then, like, use those legs anduse your butt and take this tiny
little heavy metal object andchuck it out there and it's
really silly and it's reallyjoyful and it can be really
(26:04):
empowering in these delightfulways.
And I was like there'ssomething here I love, but like
I don't love the way that thisperformance ethic and it only
matters if you win, and like, ifyou're not on a team that makes
money but really that justmeans spends a lot of money that
then you have to recoup.
There's so much about the NCAA Ifound distasteful and so I was
like done, and then I decided togo to grad school and study
(26:27):
this.
So I ended up at Iowa, whichhad this amazing legacy of
leadership within thisorganization, and in fact, three
of the professors who werestill in the area two of them
had been presidents of the AIAWand one was one of the executive
directors for a short time, andthey were they all had their
papers there, so I was able tostart in the archives there and
(26:49):
also interview them, and thenthat also led to other
interviews and other archivalwork.
The AIAW was created by womenwho were trained physical
educators.
They all came with a commitmentto the value and power and joy
that physical activity can bringand not seeing it as something
that women can't do can bring,and not seeing it as something
(27:13):
that women can't do Right, andin fact, seeing it as like oh no
, it's great Everybody should doit however they want to.
And so there was lots ofmomentum Students in the late
60s, early 70s.
Women students were like wewould like to play, the guys
have had sports forever.
We had intramurals and therewas like other kinds of
competition going on, but noorganized teams and no organized
schedules and championshipsanything like that.
(27:34):
And so there were physicaleducators who decided, okay, we
don't want to recreate what theNCAA is doing and we think we
can do it better and we think wecan do it different and we're
going to do it for women.
The NCAA is not interestedanyway.
So like great, go do your thing, we'll be over here doing ours.
And so there was a couple ofyears of organizing and a pilot
(27:55):
organization that wasn't anofficial membership organization
.
They were putting out standardsand ideas for creating
intercollegiate women's sport.
And then by 1971, theAssociation for Intercollegiate
Athletics for Women made theirfirst call like we're starting
this, join in.
And we had like 273 schoolsjoin in right away as charter
members in that first year.
(28:16):
And from then it just grew andit was women-led and it was
women-run for women, which has asort of gender essentialist
notion that might be kind oflike.
Couldn't it be for everybody,yes, but also the men already
had something on the NCAA side.
They didn't want anything to dowith what the women were doing
anyways, and there was adifferent sensibility that
(28:39):
informed the work the AIW wasdoing.
That was from the experience ofhaving been told your whole life
you couldn't participate, andso there was a sense of we also
need to teach people about sport.
And so, like coaches for thelate in the late sixties, there
were workshops for women highschool, elementary school and
(28:59):
college professors and teachersto go learn how to play
volleyball so that then theycould go back and coach it.
And then they were under thelike each one teach one.
So you go to the nationalworkshop, you learn how to play
volleyball, you go home, you puton a conference locally so you
can teach people how to playvolleyball, and then we start
coaching kids and we get girlsinto volleyball or whatever it
is.
There was an embeddededucational mentality right
(29:22):
there, right these again, allphysical educators trying to
develop high level sport, but somany women had been told they
couldn't play.
There were some opportunitiesfor women to play in industrial
leagues throughout the earlierpart of the 1900s, but this was
a kind of all of a sudden apretty widespread thing that was
happening, like through schoolsand in a different way.
(29:42):
And so then, at the collegelevel, the AIW started.
They held their firstchampionships in 72.
Lisa Danylchuk (29:48):
They held their first championships in 72.
So what would be your hope formoving forward?
Right, the AIW doesn't existanymore.
There's something to be learnedfrom that, for sure.
There's lessons to take away.
What would be your hope, movingforward, of how athletics could
(30:09):
change?
That is a very, very bigquestion.
Let's just dream storm.
Dr. Diane Williams (30:19):
I always quote Dr Jennifer Gomez.
I heard that one.
That was good.
You have this almighty power tosay how it's going to go.
How's it going to go?
So one of the things that I runinto when this type of question
comes up is that there is asmall part of me that just
recoils at how exclusivecollegiate sport is, period.
(30:41):
And sport is period, and so myinterest now is I want more of
all of it.
We can have high levelcompetitive sport that's lovely,
but I want more of all the restof the kinds of ways we can
participate in sport, so thatmore people of different
abilities and differentinterests can find something
that would be fun for them to do.
It doesn't have to be aboutwinning, but it can be.
(31:03):
It doesn't have to be aboutpushing boundaries, but it can
be.
It might just be aboutcommunity and like giggling and
going for a walk together,climbing on a playground and
doing different stuff there, andthat's not sport per se.
But I guess this is where myinterest lies.
I want more of all of it, moreof a mentality that we can learn
and grow as we age.
We don't have to just seeourselves as increasingly
(31:25):
deficient.
Lisa Danylchuk (31:25):
Yeah, so what would be your hope for how we
think about bodies andgender-affirming athletics.
That's when I think of you.
I think of body-positive,gender-affirming athletics,
thanks.
So what does that look like?
(31:48):
What does it look like to havebody positive, gender affirming
athletics?
I mean, it starts with peoplenot telling you to tuck your
butt in when that's just yourbutt.
Dr. Diane Williams (31:58):
Like yeah, that's just, and that's just my
butt.
Booties are really important inathletics.
Lisa Danylchuk (32:04):
I use my gluteus to jump high.
Dr. Diane Williams (32:06):
It's super important.
Yeah, it comes from a differentset of values.
It comes from motivations thatare that are rooted in those
things.
Right, I can go at this fromtwo examples that offered ideas
of how this could look.
So one of them is in my latetwenties I was in this coaching
grad program but I decided Iwasn't going to coach.
(32:26):
I needed to like survive thenext year and a half of the
program and I started playingroller Derby in Western mass.
And so here I was, again thatphysical literacy thing kicked
in and I was like I don't knowwhat I'm doing, but I used to
like to roller skate a lot.
We also did that together.
So you know, sure I'm going togo learn how to play this thing.
(32:49):
And I was in WesternMassachusetts, which had at that
point one of the only co-edleagues, and we practiced
together.
We played separately becausethere was no structure to play
together.
It was led by folks who wantedto create a different kind of
sports space, and they might nothave used that language because
, like, not all of them weresports scholars, right, in fact,
none of them, which one of themwas she wrote a book on it, and
(33:10):
a couple of us were, you knowdorky academics, it's Western
mass.
But you know, we also hadeverybody else there, some of
who had played sports, some ofwho had never played sports but
thought this looked fun becauseit was kind of alternative and
it was kind of punk and it waskind of grungy.
And then we had to create outof that.
How do we?
How do we do this then?
This is a sport where, likeit's a full contact sport.
So if we're practicing in adrill, like your hand is on the
(33:35):
hip of your teammate and you'recreating a wall and you're
moving each other of yourteammate and you're creating a
wall and you're moving eachother, how do we do this?
In a way that our society is soweird about bodies and there are
so many reasons to be cognizantof boundaries and to be very
conscious of how you're engagingeach other.
And then there's a gendercomponent and there's power,
right.
And yet we somehow managed todo it and it wasn't flawless,
(33:57):
because nothing's going to be,but we had a pretty strict code
of conduct and we had, right upfront, we were like, don't make
this weird.
I don't remember quite how theysaid it, but that might've been
it.
We want to do this.
We have a no tolerance policyfor harassment, like you need to
be aware of yourself and howyou're treating others, and from
there we could do it and itworked.
(34:19):
And we had this again, notwithout its issues, but overall
really positive, very differentkind of sports space.
There were still moments wherethe ideas of society snuck in
and the women would hold back orassume the men were better or
the men might assume a sort ofrole, but we also undermined it
constantly and, if nothing else,you just had this experience of
(34:41):
like I developed into one ofthe stronger blockers not like
the strongest some folks, but awell-respected blocker on both
teams, right, and worked withpeople really well from both
teams in practice, and then wewould play separately, like I
said.
But so that was like thisbeautiful invitation to oh God,
thank you.
Just imagine what this couldlook like if we weren't so like
(35:03):
weirdly caught up in these normsand these assumptions.
I historically have beenstronger than plenty of guys I
know, and yet I still get toldwomen are weaker and I'm like,
seriously, really, come on.
Lisa Danylchuk (35:15):
I find myself thinking, too, about non-binary
folks, anyone who's doesn'tidentify as male or female, or
isn't right like yes, all of it,all of the in between it, and I
think about you mentionedearlier inclusion and exclusion
in sports and thinking about howwe bring people together, how
(35:35):
we exclude people in a harmfulway, and when you talk about
even gender inclusive practiceand I think gender inclusive
games could be interesting too.
It's so powerful to think aboutpeople playing sports instead
of, or people engaging inathletics, and in terms of
(35:59):
learning, in terms ofphysicality, there's a time and
a place.
In terms of therapy, there's atime and a place to make things
exclusive so that people feelsafe or protected or there's
some sense of a scope there.
But if we were to open upsports more, athletics more,
(36:21):
maybe we could be more inclusive.
Like, I just find myselfthinking of people I know who,
if certain information werefound out about them, wouldn't
be able to play on their team,you know, and why, yeah, I mean
yeah, exactly when we set it allup as a binary.
Dr. Diane Williams (36:43):
That's it.
That's so ridiculous, and noteven how people are period.
So like softening that,changing, like this is where,
like I don't know what to do onthe national, international
level and I don't really care tofix it.
Honestly, I think a lot of it'sreally broken.
I want to see moreopportunities for anybody to
play things that they'reinterested in playing, more
participation, not less.
Lisa Danylchuk (37:04):
Yeah, I feel like that's something really
generative.
There's how it is and there'sfighting how it is, which can be
exhausting, and trying tofigure out how to fix something
that feels inherently inadequateor unequal or harmful, and it's
worth it to think about that.
But we can also build somethingdifferent, and what I'm
(37:26):
gathering from everything you'resaying is let's be more aware
of the positive things inhistory.
Let's just be curious aboutthat and open to maybe digging a
little to find it.
From there Can we create places, especially for young people,
but for all people, I mean, weknow, for young people.
(37:46):
It impacts them across thewhole.
That impacts culture and thosepeople could end up owning teams
later.
Dr. Diane Williams (37:52):
Right.
Lisa Danylchuk (37:53):
Yeah, so can we start?
Can we create spaces for youngpeople, for all people, to
access their bodies and theirpower in unique and inclusive
ways together, right, Right,yeah, yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (38:10):
And whether that looks like a sport per se
or whether it looks like likeI'm just starting to be part of
a West Coast swing dancecommunity out here that years
ago did away with the sort ofgendering of swing and they have
leaders and followers andpeople of different genders do
whatever they want and wear alittle button to indicate if
(38:31):
they're a leader or a follow,and they have again a strict
code of conduct a really biginvestment in positive community
building and they practice it.
A really big investment inpositive community building and
they practice it.
And then, literally, you get togo be in a space where your
boundaries are going to berespected.
If you don't want to dance, youjust say no and like there's an
ethic of okay, then you move onand you ask someone else to
dance.
It's fine, that happens, right,you don't have to explain
(38:51):
yourself, but there's just thislike positive social interaction
that's happening and it's aphysical activity and it's with
people of all different gendersand like the world doesn't end
and in fact, you feel betterwhen you leave, right, and you
can't undo those kinds ofpositive experiences of being on
a team with just all yourfriends, and all your friends
are different genders andhopefully, depending on where
(39:13):
you live, different races andthey're from different parts of
the community or whatever, andyou get to have that experience
and you don't unhave thatexperience then after that and
you know that you can beteammates and work hard and play
hard with other people who looklike you and who don't look
like you.
Right, that's where thesereally beautiful opportunities
exist.
Part of what's so powerfulabout sport and physical
activity is, again, thatembodied experience of it, that
(39:35):
it's not just intellectual, it'snot just us thinking about
ideas Like we actually get to go, do a thing and be in a space
that is liberatory in some ways.
I was going to say to your pointof like, do we change the
system or create our own?
That's part of, of course.
What draws me to the AIAW'shistory is because I see it, I
really read it as that radicalidea of like no, the system's
(39:58):
broken, we're not going to tryand adapt into it, we're going
to do something new.
And in fact it's a verydifferent philosophy than what
undergirds, like Title IX, whichis the norm, is here and women
or the underrepresented groupsshould be brought up to the norm
, as opposed to saying actuallythe norm is ridiculous.
There's no reason that footballshould get the power and
(40:19):
resources that it has had since1900.
But it still does.
So what's fair and what'sreasonable?
And how do we create equitableopportunities for everybody?
That might involve scaling somethings back.
Instead we go.
How do we fit women into asystem that was not designed for
them?
Not necessarily because they'rewomen, just because it was not
designed for them?
It wasn't designed for most meneither Not that many men get to
(40:43):
play, and so that's part of whatI love about the AIW is it's a
reminder that we can do thingsdifferently.
Yeah, it takes time and energy,and sometimes your organization
ends.
After 10 years.
Does it still count?
Yeah, because it did exist.
It was the biggest athleticgovernance organization for a
time, and the only one offeringwomen's championships.
Was that threatening?
Yeah, but it happened.
Lisa Danylchuk (41:07):
I know you have a dissertation about this.
Why did it end?
Dr. Diane Williams (41:12):
It depends on who you ask.
I have definitely talked towomen who were presidents who
said well, we were too powerfuland we were doing too good of a
job, and so the NCAA put us outof business.
It's a combination of things,but one of them is that the AIW
started pre-Title IX, and TitleIX was actually never intended
to be for sports.
It was an educationally focusedamendment about admission into
(41:37):
different academic programs likedentistry and other things like
that.
It had some pay equity, otherthings related to education, but
not about sports.
Actually, I don't think itwould have passed, honestly, if
it was about sports, but that'sa side note.
So, right away, though, allthese women physical educators
who are looking to create moreresources because women's sport
came out of having thecreativity where you have no
(41:59):
resources and you're like well,I guess we'll use the same
uniforms for every single teambecause we don't have money to
buy more.
So they thought if we can getthis to apply to sports, we can
make a legal case for moreresources, and so they did, and
that's part of both the AIAW,and women's physical education
was a really big part of helpingto push that sports should be a
part of what is covered underTitle IX.
(42:22):
The NCAA was not on board atall and fought it tooth and nail
.
So the thing is, sport is areally messy thing to try and
figure out.
What does equity even look likewhen things cost different for
different teams?
There aren't really women'steams yet.
So what do we, what do you evenwant girls, right?
And so throughout the entireseventies, as the AIAW was
(42:45):
creating women's intercollegiatesport, all of these women
physical educators who were notpolitically savvy had to then
become politically savvy andthey were testifying in Congress
that they were doing all thiswork right and they were
connecting with other women'sgroups, legal groups and
educational groups to buildbroader networks and see the
connections.
Sport was not a part of theexplicitly feminist movement at
(43:05):
that point and these folks werelike no, this can be a part of
it, both in the educationalcontext and beyond it.
But let us explain how thisworks under the AIAW, not what
the NCAA is doing.
Congress interprets Title IXlike here are the criteria for
the athletic program followingTitle IX guidelines Passed in 72
(43:26):
, it's not interpreted until 79at the end of the year, that
January in 80, the NCAA veryquickly and breaking some of
their own rules to do it passDivision II and III women's
championships at their nationalconvention without engaging the
AIEW, which already hadextensive championships at that
(43:47):
point, just as a power move.
They were concerned that theirmembership the colleges and
universities that were part ofthe NCAA at that point could get
sued for not providingequitable opportunities.
And then they smartly leveragedthis notion of separate is not
equal, which is not intended tobe about gender.
(44:08):
It's a race-based historicalargument, but it gets applied
this way and we start sayingwell, if you have two different
governing organizations, thatcould be a problem for your
institution.
Don't you feel better goingwith the NCAA?
We've got money and power onour side.
It was chaotic.
I'm not sure what all theschools could do.
Aiw had only been around forlike 10 years, NCAA had been
(44:28):
around for 75.
And there's like this massivepolitical campaign going on both
directions and ultimately lotsof attempts made by the AIAW to
say can't we come together andpick the best of what we're both
doing and create somethingbetter?
And the NCAA had no individual.
(44:49):
People might have had respect,certainly, for people that were
involved, but they had norespect for the organization.
And this was the NCAA'sterritory with collegiate
athletics, and so it was a we'regoing to take over and destroy
as opposed to try andcollaborate, and that's what
happened.
So the following year, the NCAApassed division one
championships and actually a lotof football coaches were very
(45:09):
opposed to it at the high levelfootball coaches because they
were worried about losingresources, cause, of course, if
you have to add things, where'sthe money going to come from?
We always frame it as asum game, right?
Yeah, other ways of thinkingabout it, but that's how it was
set up.
And so it was a very narrowvote and the NCAA passed women's
championships, and then for thenext year, both organizations
offered championships and theNCAA matched theirs weekend to
(45:32):
weekend to the AIWs.
And so every school then had tomake a choice, and the NCAA
incentivized theirs.
They said if your men arealready a part of our
organization, you don't have topay for dues.
The AIAW ran on dues.
They had just gotten some mediacontracts, they were just
building some financialstability beyond that, and the
NCAA went right for the moneyand the ways that you could
(45:54):
undermine.
So philosophically, schoolsmight have wanted to stay with
the AIW, but financially it wasthe early 80s Again, sort of
time of recession and a scalingback of social programs for
equity and justice.
This fell into that prioritizingwomen and they got put out of
business, essentially, and womenlost their jobs.
(46:16):
Women quit.
They had poured their heart andsouls into this for years and
plenty of women would be put outof a job and a man would be
hired into that coachingposition or that athletic
departments merged and thewomen's athletics director would
become the assistant athleticdirector and the men's athletic
director would be the athleticdirector.
That happened almost at everyschool across the country.
And all of a sudden, this wholehistory that, like there was a
(46:39):
whole governance organizationled by women, there were
athletic departments almostexclusively led by women at
every institution, like 970institutions at its peak.
Those women, for lots ofreasons, had to go take care of
themselves or were asked toleave.
Some stuck around, but therewas this huge exodus and lot.
Lisa Danylchuk (46:59):
The history is lost and it is buried and we
don't talk about it yeah, well,I'm glad you're keeping it alive
and so much of it in my mindsounds like it's about power.
Right, it's about genderdynamics and power and, just
just like your work is sointerdisciplinary, this is so
intertwined in so many differentsocial systems and the ways
(47:22):
that we think, and it's thefederal government in the US and
it's universities and the NCAAthat operates somewhere in
between, all of those like, notsubject to anybody's power, but
involved in students' lives.
These are things that I don'tthink a lot of people think
(47:43):
about.
Like you go into, oh, I'm goingto play basketball, Okay, I'm
going to go from this level tothat level, I'm going to show up
at the competition, I'm goingto do my best.
Like we don't have a lot ofencouragement or space to think
about the dynamics or theculture or the power.
So that's where I think placeslike your classroom are so
important, because people havespace for that and encouragement
(48:08):
to reflect on the history andto see what's going on and to
ask themselves do I want to be apart of this and how?
How do I want to be a part ofthis and what choices am I going
to make within that to try tomake it healthy for me, to
advocate for it being healthyacross the board.
(48:30):
But especially when you'retalking about athletics, there's
so many other things for peopleto pay attention to.
Right, I mean, you could justget completely consumed with
what's the best training planand how should I fuel my body
and how do I optimize my sleepand what gadgets do I want to
use.
You could get so consumed inthat that you never even unless
(48:50):
it slaps you in the face, unlessthere's some big point of
conflict.
Never even think about some ofthe larger systems.
I'm so glad you're doing thiswork and encouraging other
people to do it as well.
You've written some amazingarticles.
I know you're working on a book.
Do a link to your professorpage McDaniel.
Dr. Diane Williams (49:11):
It has nothing on it but I will say it
does have your cat's name on it,which is an article.
Lisa Danylchuk (49:18):
There is an article I'm going to pull it up
right now, hobbies.
She played roller derby foreight years, skating as Lady
Hulk.
During her first semesterteaching at McDaniel, she
adopted an adorable kitten namedMargo.
She's a six time NCAA, divisionthree, all American in shot,
put four times and discus twice.
Nicely done, people of thepodcast, because I refuse to say
(49:42):
, ladies and gentlemen, at thisstage, hell, yes.
People of the podcast, dr DianeWilliams, you are the best.
Thank you so much for sharing.
I mean, I feel like this is tipof the iceberg.
There's so many more directionswe could go, but thank you for
the work that you do, forthinking and encouraging people
(50:04):
to reflect in a body positiveand inclusive and gender
affirming way.
I'm grateful that you're awonderful human out there, that
you're an educator and I justlove staying connected.
And we didn't even really talkabout how trauma folds into all
of this.
I mean, it fits in my mind soclearly when we start talking
about power and oppression.
Dr. Diane Williams (50:24):
And how it ended.
That's the part that I want totalk to.
We can talk another time.
I think that's a big part ofthe end and the legacy.
That is also like somethingthat still needs to be mended in
some way and reckoned with insome way.
There's a wound there withbeing shut down.
Lisa Danylchuk (50:42):
How do we attend to that wound?
And the impacts.
You mentioned people's jobs,right, the impacts and the
trickle down of that, and that'swhy I wanted to have this
conversation with you.
It's like, well, how do we pullfrom all the amazing wisdom and
effort?
and learning and carry thatforward, and we might be in a
time period where we're plantingseeds more than harvesting
(51:07):
flowers, but that's an importantstage, right?
None of us would eat if nobodyplanted seeds.
So I feel like we can take whatyou've studied, what you've
learned, and really plant thatin some rich soil and bring it
to light over time in a way that, hopefully, is just more
(51:28):
inclusive and body positive andhelpful for young people.
You know people in theirnineties who want to dance, yeah
, yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (51:36):
Yeah, and it fills in this gap.
That helps explain somethingthat just gets normalized right.
And so, yeah, there's.
There's much more to discussand I will be looking forward to
discussing it with you as we goforward, and I just appreciate
the chance to share about myfavorite topic in the whole wide
world.
Lisa Danylchuk (51:56):
I love it.
Thank you so much, Diane.
It's been so good to talk toyou.
Dr. Diane Williams (52:00):
So good to talk to you.
I love all the work you'redoing.
I'm so proud of you and excitedfor all your and your big award
for your podcast.
Lisa Danylchuk (52:08):
You're so awesome the award winning how we
can heal podcast.
It's official I know, I love.
I love doing this.
I love having theseconversations.
We were just saying the otherday we wouldn't sit down and
have this conversation if itweren't for this podcast, even
between us.
So thank you for listeningeveryone.
I really appreciate listenerschiming in, asking questions,
(52:29):
sharing comments, recommendingguests.
We have such a long list ofguests.
People reach out all the timehey, I'd love to come on and
talk about this, or I recommendthis person, and I have a long
list of people that I've wantedto interview.
So there's more to come,definitely.
Dr. Diane Williams (52:46):
Excellent.
Well, I'm so honored to get tobe a part of it, so thank you
for including me.
Thank you.
Lisa Danylchuk (52:56):
Thanks so much for listening.
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(53:18):
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Before we wrap up for today, Iwant to be clear that this
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It's not advice, nor is it anykind of mental health treatment
(53:39):
or diagnosis.
Your decisions are in yourhands and I encourage you to
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support you through your uniquepath of healing.
Also, everyone's opinion hereis their own and opinions can
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I'd like to thank our gueststoday, everyone who helped
(54:01):
support this podcast directlyand indirectly, especially Alex.
Thanks for taking care of thebabe and the fur babies while I
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Last but never least, I'd liketo give a special shout out to
my big brother, matt, who passedaway in 2002.
He wrote this music and itmakes my heart so happy to share
it with you here.
(54:25):
Thank you.
Welcome back to the how we Can Heal podcast.
Today, our guest is Dr DianeWilliams.
Diane holds a doctorate inAmerican Studies and Sports
Studies, in addition to acertificate in Gender, women's
and Sexuality Studies from theUniversity of Iowa.
She also has a master's insocial justice education from
UMass Amherst and a master's inexercise and sports studies from
(00:31):
Smith College.
She's currently a professor ofkinesiology at McDaniel College
in Maryland, where she teachessport in American society.
Women in sport, sport coachingand management and kinesiology.
Women in sport, sport coachingand management and kinesiology.
A six-time NCAA Division IIIAll-American in shot put and
(00:53):
discus, she's been a coach andan athlete herself, earning the
name Lady Hulk during hereight-year skating roller derby
as well.
She often writes and teachesabout the Association for
Intercollegiate Athletics forWomen, an organization that
existed in the 1970s and 80s andcentered the well-being of
women student-athletes in aunique way, which we'll talk
about today.
We'll also talk about theimportance of inclusivity and
(01:15):
mental health in sports cultureand the need for deep reflection
on dynamics and powerstructures in athletics.
I've been lucky to know Dianemy whole life and see her
brilliance up close and personal, so I'm excited to share it
with you today.
Please join me in welcomingDiane to the show.
(01:37):
Dr Diane Williams, welcome tothe how we Can Heal podcast.
How are you today?
Dr. Diane Williams (01:42):
I'm good.
Thank you, I'm so excited to behere and to talk to you.
Lisa Danylchuk (01:46):
For folks listening Diane and I met when
we were zero years old.
I used to live probably like ahundred yards from your house
when I was born.
We moved pretty quickly.
But then preschool,kindergarten, elementary, middle
school, high school, all of itright.
I have memories of doing showand tell in preschool and you
(02:10):
sitting in the little corner bythe door.
I remember it.
It wasn't that long, it was awhile ago.
It wasn't that long ago.
So thank you for being here.
You have such an extraordinarycareer yourself.
We've kept in touch over theyears, but I'm really curious to
learn from you today and toshare that with our audience.
So yay.
Dr. Diane Williams (02:30):
Yay, well, I mean, yes, all of that.
I was just telling my classesbecause we read part of the yoga
for trauma book you wrote, sothey're familiar with you.
I was telling them that I wasdoing this and telling them like
, again, I told you I go wayback with Lisa, but what we've,
what we've both talked about, isthat we took, you know, like
(02:52):
since calculus in high school,when we spent a lot of time
together.
We haven't necessarily spent aton of time together, but we
have had these interestingcareers that have have come back
together in different ways andthat echo each other in
different ways that aren'tnecessarily apparent on the
surface.
right, and that's part of what Ilove about just getting every
(03:13):
time I get to see you and talkto you.
Lisa Danylchuk (03:16):
I feel like our careers are so interrelated and
if I had extra life space Iwould want to study what you're
studying right, but it's likeyou pick and choose.
We all only have so much andyou have to choose a major in
college and I mean for you, youjust keep going back and getting
more degrees.
Maybe you're done with that.
For now I'm not going to sayforever.
(03:37):
Let's share with folkslistening.
What are some central themes inyour studies, your work, your
teaching?
Dr. Diane Williams (03:48):
So I currently am an assistant
professor of kinesiology, whichused to be called physical
education back in the day, andit's this interdisciplinary
study of the body and movement,and so a lot of my colleagues
are scientists and they doexercise, physiology and anatomy
and biomechanics.
(04:09):
And then there's the other sideof the discipline and of my
department, which is humanitiesbased and social science based,
and so we have a sportspsychology professor and we have
me, and I study the history andsociology of sport and physical
activity, focused mostly in theUnited States, and so I come
(04:29):
out of a reallyinterdisciplinary background.
I was an American Studies majoras an undergrad, did American
Studies as my doctoral work,with gender studies, women's and
gender studies in there, butalso looking at sport and
physical activity, and I wantedto coach all along and I have
coached on and off for 20 yearsnow.
I was an athlete in high schooland college, so that sport
(04:52):
thing has been a part of my lifefor a long time.
But at some point I decided Ididn't want to coach anymore
Well, maybe different levels Ikeep coming back to it but I
didn't want to be a collegiatecoach, but I wanted to do
something related to sport andphysical activity.
And so now I am in thisposition that I always wanted to
(05:13):
be in, which is that I get towork with students who are
kinesiology majors Sometimesthey're not, and they just came
to take women in sport becauseit sounded interesting, but
they're usually there becausethey're interested in the body
and movement.
I get to introduce them tothinking about the history and
how identities are a part ofthat history and how sports are
inclusive and exclusive and howall kinds of different aspects
(05:37):
of studying sport and the bodythat are beyond the body as a
machine and the body as musclesBecause really the body is all
of that and the experiences wehave I don't have to tell you
this right and the impact wehave on other people and the
impact they have on us, and theideas we have about ability, who
can be included in certainspaces and who can't, and the
(05:59):
histories that go with that.
And so I get this opportunity totake students that are already
interested in sports, say, orthey're interested in the body,
and we just study all of thesedifferent things related to this
but that have, that areconnected to science, but that
aren't the science side of it.
In that work, I think thelearning happens more deeply
when we personally connect to it, and I have this opportunity
(06:21):
where everybody has a body solike and a lot of them if it's a
sport class they probably havesome experience with sport and
sport culture themselves ortheir families.
We do a lot of reading, theory,reading, academic work and then
thinking about how it relates toour lives and thinking about
how it informs, how this helpsus think through our own
(06:41):
experiences in sport and sportculture or with bodies or with
our own body and doing thisintegration so it becomes more
personal.
But also this is where the sortof the psych side of it right.
It also gives them a chance toself-reflect and think through
meanings they already makearound bodies and sport.
All of that before they go out.
(07:02):
And our personal trainersworking with other people or our
professors or our researchersright.
They have this differentengagement with their own
interests and their ownbackground and their own
assumptions and ideas that mightmake them ideally more open,
more inclusive, more thoughtfuland cognizant of the histories
and the context that they'reworking within.
Lisa Danylchuk (07:23):
Yes, there's so much in there and I was thinking
as you were talking and justhaving this memory of Saturday.
I was running a trail halfmarathon, so hiking and running,
and I had this memory of somememe I saw recently.
And in it there's an interviewwith a group of women going
(07:46):
jogging and I want to say it'sthe early seventies and it's
literally a news interview.
The anchor is like we've gotthis group of women, they like
to get together and they run twomiles every Tuesday.
Right, Wow, what do you do this?
And he puts the mic.
She's like I just really feellike it gives me space and I
(08:08):
love to be with other, with the,this group of women, and I just
feel better after.
Okay, you heard it straightfrom her.
You know like it's this wildthing that this group of women
are running and it made me thinkof you and knowing we were
talking this stuff isn't thatlong ago, right, and even
(08:29):
thinking about for myself andI've interviewed a few trail
runners on this podcast now howthat community has evolved in my
about a decade being involvedin it, how it's evolved along
gender lines.
I've had conversations here onthis podcast about body image
and the messages we get andfueling and your relationship to
your body and your relationshipto a sense of empowerment
(08:51):
internally and power andpresence being seen.
So there's just so many layersto your work.
When we fold trauma into that,it's another layer.
Hopefully any of us who have abody, anyone listening with a
body.
Hopefully we are curious aboutthese things so that we're not
(09:16):
just living based on, I'll justsay, unhealthy dynamics or
oppressive dynamics or historythat's exploitive and that can
go across so many differentlayers, right?
So I love the depth and breadthof this work.
It can apply to so manydifferent things.
I'm curious what you're seeingyour students come with.
(09:39):
I'm not so connected.
I used to teach more inacademic settings.
I'm not so connected thereanymore.
What are the questions, thethings that people are really
chewing on as they're goingthrough your classes, that you
see the gears start to shiftinternally?
Dr. Diane Williams (09:56):
Specifically thinking about the sport
classes I teach.
I teach sport in Americansociety, a coaching and sport
management class, and I alsoteach women in sport.
I've been teaching all thosefor a couple of years now.
There is a profound acceptanceof norms because we've only seen
one major athletic governanceorganization for intercollegiate
(10:18):
sport, for example, the NCAAright, and so merely the idea
that there one are more than oneat this moment and two
historically have been otherorganizations that organized and
had different philosophies ofsport and why we might play in
college or in high school or atlower levels.
(10:40):
That in itself is a part of whyI do the work I do is to simply
like there's an acceptance thatwhat it is is what it.
Why I do the work I do is tosimply like there's an
acceptance that what it is iswhat it always has been and will
be right, which we get.
That's how, that's how societyrolls, that's also how the folks
that have a lot of power andprivilege would really like it
to be, so that there is nothreat to that power and
privilege.
Right, and with that comes thisrhetoric of women in sport have
(11:03):
come so far, and isn't this sogreat?
And let's celebrate and, trustme, I'm all for celebrating when
things deserve celebration andI am all for being real about
how far and what are the caveatsthere?
We still talk about sport andwomen's sport.
So we haven't come that far.
The norm is still male, womenare still noted Right.
(11:24):
Until that's different, we'refar from equality, right, and
all of the things that followfrom that opportunity, resources
, support for students inathletics and broader
opportunities.
So one of the things that's thebiggest thing I do is get people
in the room and get them tostart thinking how do we even
study sport?
People study sport.
Yeah, let's start there Thengently starting to think about
(11:49):
what are things you've seen andexperienced in sport?
What did you like, what did younot like?
Then we start thinking abouthow we get socialized into
dominant sport culture.
What's fun, particularly in alot of these classes, is that
everybody in the room has astory, even if it's that they
don't like sport culture.
They have a story.
It's that dominant, and so Ican get folks talking pretty
(12:11):
quickly.
As long as we've got a kind ofa good space set up where they
feel like they can share andpeople will comment and they'll
have interesting conversations,we get going.
Lisa Danylchuk (12:20):
I would love to be in your class even just to
talk about my experiences intrail running.
What I love and that's liketrail running to me has become
like the most inclusivenon-performance or body shape
focused or yoga I mean that'sthat's its own thing too.
Like there's plenty of bodyshape focus there, there can be
(12:40):
competition there, and so for meit's been a process to try to
find something where I can bevery engaged in my body and
athletic and even exploring theends of my range of motion or my
speed or climbing something,but in a place that feels
psychologically healthy, liketrail running and yoga.
(13:02):
I've been able to find that,but it's not even like it's a
hundred percent in either ofthose communities.
And I think for me going intolike basketball like if I was on
a women's basketball team, Ithink some of the cultural
things around it just wouldn'tjive with me and it would make
it too hard for me to eat, likeI think that's why I didn't go
in those directions.
I was like Ooh, wow, that'sjust not.
It's just not going to behealthy for me to have some of
(13:25):
these dynamics.
So I would love to sign me up.
I will fly over and take yourclass at McDaniel and be a
student.
Let's talk about this andthey'll be like man.
She's really eager.
Dr. Diane Williams (13:37):
No, they'd love it.
The thing is also sport is sucha big part of their lives.
They do have questions, they dohave ideas, they do have things
.
Sometimes I ask them, like whatdo you know about sports?
And then, like, what do youthink you know?
Hopefully, eventually, the morewe get into this and the more
we think about all thesedifferent aspects of sport and
sport culture, the more youstart going oh wow, there's a
(13:58):
lot I don't know, and like, howfun, what an opportunity, and
why Do we have to do it this way?
No, of course not, but we'regonna, unless something major
happens.
We spend a fair amount of timetalking critically about sport
right, which, as I tell them, isnot like I'm being critical and
picky.
It's.
I'm thinking about power, I'mthinking about inclusion.
(14:19):
I do critical thinking about it, asking questions.
There's lots of negative thatcan come from that right and, at
the same time, part of what ishelpful about having a really
positive background in sportmyself and in coaching is that I
love it also.
I loved playing.
I'm no good as a fan because Ijust want to be out there
playing.
It's fun, and so they also haveoften real positive stories
(14:44):
that we can also build on.
We can talk about how sportoften particularly for men, but
also for women is perpetuatinglike this kind of distancing
from your body, overcoming orignoring pain signals and
glorifying that in ways that are, like, deeply disturbing when
you actually sit with it.
Lisa Danylchuk (15:01):
Oh yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (15:01):
We can talk about these kinds of things,
right, and then I can say like,tell me about a moment with
someone in sport, culture orcoach, athletic trainer that
challenged that.
And these awesome stories comeout all the time.
Of my high school footballcoach who, who sat with me, sat
down next to me when I was likein pain and let me know it was
OK and it was OK to have all thefeelings and it was OK, you
(15:21):
know, and and just, there'salways these really awesome
stories too.
We can learn from the crappyones, but we can learn from the
really awesome opportunities andsee those awesome opportunities
if we have a future in coaching, if we have a future working
with young people in athleticsor whatever.
Lisa Danylchuk (15:37):
What do you see as some of the dominant
narratives in sport culture?
What are some of the emergingnarratives you see that are not
problematic right, that aremaybe an evolution Less?
Dr. Diane Williams (15:52):
problematic or less problematic, one of the
things that keeps coming up inclasses.
Students of all genders anddifferent ethnic and racial
backgrounds are very interestedin and supportive of talking
much more about mental healthand sports.
Talking much more aboutathletes' health and well-being
themselves, their teammates, allof it.
(16:14):
And looking to some of the moreelite athletes for the last
couple years maybe a decade plusthat have been much more open
about their own challenges andhumanizing themselves in
different ways.
Simone Biles was dealing withthe twisties, or something that
sounded horrifyingly terribleand people.
Anyone saying you should pushthrough when, literally, your
(16:36):
body has lost a sense of up anddown and you're in the air
sounds like you need to take abreak right.
And so recognizing the studentsvery much overall, are excited
about that and see that as real,positive, and I think that is a
reflection of this moment andbecoming more aware of mental
(16:56):
health realities.
And that's not always like adiagnosable thing.
Sports have a different kind ofstress.
Sometimes that manifests inways that isn't necessarily
clinical at all, but we can workwith it and we can actually
train with it.
We train it giving peopleskills to develop their
abilities to work with their ownemotional regulation and in
(17:18):
performance moments, right when,like we give them the skills to
like perfect their free throw,and then we're like, just be
tough, how, tell me how and I'lldo it.
Lisa Danylchuk (17:28):
And you be a little more specific about that.
Dr. Diane Williams (17:31):
I'm crying and I want to cry.
Lisa Danylchuk (17:34):
How about let's learn how to focus, let's learn
when we need to take a momentand take a breath and collect
ourselves, and when some spaceor freedom would be helpful and
when some discipline or focuswould be helpful.
How?
Dr. Diane Williams (17:47):
to even do those things right, start small
right.
That is definitely an exciting,really important shift because
our sort of dominant sportculture is set up.
It's so male dominated, it's socapitalist influenced,
productivity focused,dehumanizing these things that
just like, oh, what getsglorified is so destructive,
(18:10):
often in the interest of winninggames.
Lisa Danylchuk (18:14):
Yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (18:15):
And there's so much money on the line.
Lisa Danylchuk (18:17):
Tell us about the AIAW, the Association for
Intercollegiate Athletics forWomen, and why it's important.
Dr. Diane Williams (18:23):
I'm going to come at this from a different
direction that connects to whatyou were talking about earlier.
You were talking about the factthat, like all that stuff about
dominant sport culture wasn'tvery appealing to you, and so
you like weren't like, yeah, I'mgoing to go out for the
basketball team, like I'll go domy own thing, and so, likewise,
in an interesting way, you knowthat I grew up dancing we both
did in a really supportive Parksand Rec program that was led by
(18:48):
a physical educator who wastrained and did dance programs
in the public schools in thearea.
Mary Joyce did all kinds ofamazing work and she had this
physical education backgroundthat was like had a belief in
the value of physical activityand bodily awareness for
lifelong health and wellness andalso as a part of your
educational experience there's awhole history of physical
(19:10):
education that really is aboutthat and so I grew up not really
playing sports but beingphysically active, loving
dancing, loving feeling my bodyand like the coordination and
doing a routine with people andyou're all in sync and it's like
very exciting and all of that.
Lisa Danylchuk (19:26):
I feel like you and I performed to C&C Music
Factory Janet Jackson in littlewhite t-shirts that got you cut
up the edge so there's fringeand seeds on the end so that
when you jump and turn it twirls.
I remember that.
I remember that routine, I gotit.
Dr. Diane Williams (19:43):
Right.
And so there was so much joy,there was so much community
focus in that program.
It wasn't about being the best,it was about being the best you
can be and learning.
I took that into sport as afirst year in high school.
I was like sports look like fun.
I don't know, Maybe I'll go tryout and I did and like it
worked, partly because I hadwhat we call in kinesiology
(20:04):
physical literacy, Like I had aan ability to move and pick up
routines and have balance, and Icould that translated into then
learning sports specific stuff,right, Volleyball, basketball,
track.
And so then I got into sportworld, which was not something
you know, you know my family.
That wasn't necessarily likewhere I was headed ever, and now
(20:25):
it's like what I doprofessionally.
So there's a bridge there whichis that I've.
As I was in sport world, I waslike I don't think I do this the
same way everybody else does,Like this is really fun.
It's like we're not here tohave fun.
Yeah, oh, we're not, we're herefor pain.
It doesn't sound fun, Like thisis, this is joyful, this is a
(20:49):
challenge and it's no-transcriptsport.
(21:13):
I'm coaching and stuff, and I'mstill just like I just don't, I
don't do this, this isn't themost important thing in all of
our lives.
Like this is an important thingin our lives and also like how
we care for each other is reallyimportant and care for our
bodies, and that we care aboutthings other than just sport.
You know, in college I wasrunning the rape and sexual
(21:33):
assault network, putting onevents there and also competing
on the national scene and astudent, like a pretty serious
student, really enjoyinglearning stuff, Learning stuff.
Lisa Danylchuk (21:45):
Learning stuff is fun.
I'm a big fan.
Dr. Diane Williams (21:47):
Right, right , I start hearing about this
organization as I am in thecoaching and in my master's
program for coaching.
So one thing I notice is peopletalk about oh yeah, there was
this other organization that ledwomen's sport, but like it
doesn't exist anymore and theyhad different ideas.
And I'm like huh, did they?
Oh, hold on, one cool storybefore that and then I'll get to
(22:08):
the AIW.
I promise the coolest story.
The first time I heard about theAIW was actually from my
collegiate throws coach,fletcher Brooks, who is amazing
and still coaching and justincredible, very silly and it's
(22:28):
wonderful.
And we're watching my teammatescool down and they are across
the track trying to get down oneof the NCAA posters to bring
home.
They're not sneaky, but nobodycares.
The NCAA sends this stuff.
You hang it up, it disappears,it's fine.
Yeah, so Fletcher looks acrossand it's like, yeah, like the
NCAA has been that great forwomen athletics, women's
athletics, and I was like whatnow?
(22:49):
What?
What do mean?
And I'm a burgeoning feministscholar and taking my women's
studies classes and I'm like huhand he's like the NCAA has not
treated women in sports verywell.
He had been educated atSpringfield in part by women who
had been a part of the AIW andhe had knowledge of this much
longer legacy of women'sphysical education and sports.
(23:10):
So he starts telling me alittle bit, just a tiny bit,
about this like well, there'sthis whole other organization
that used to exist and the AIW.
I don't know if he said thename, but the part of what's
significant is they had a wholedifferent philosophy of sport
and physical activity and it waseducationally rooted and it was
financially reasonable and itwas about something else that
you would do in college.
(23:30):
That's a part of youreducational experience and your
overall growth and developmentas a human.
We're going to have high levelcompetition and organized teams,
but we're not going to exploitathletes and we're not going to
oh my God, what.
Lisa Danylchuk (23:43):
And we're going to.
Dr. Diane Williams (23:44):
we're going to value their humanity and
we're going to have a differentapproach to doing this, and one
sport isn't going to knows aboutthis massive organization and
the work they did, and not likein a.
(24:17):
We deserve all this credit.
Necessarily they do, but morein like it's part of sport
history.
It's part of collegiate sporthistory, let alone US sport
history.
So, anyways, I get through acouple grad programs and have
gotten interested enough.
I read their purpose statement,I think from the first couple
(24:37):
of pages of the constitutionthat they wrote, and it's a
manifesto.
It's so gorgeous.
It is like sport sport for the.
We believe in cultivatingintercollegiate sport for women,
for the overall wellbeing ofthe student athlete.
All decisions should be madewith that in mind.
I'm like, well, that seemsdifferent.
(24:58):
Yeah, and to your point earlier.
Lisa Danylchuk (24:59):
It's not exploitive.
No, we're not making money offof you.
This is about enrichment, rightEmbodied enrichment, and
education and, from what I'veread that you've shared, it's
focusing on the academics,focusing on the whole experience
, focusing like it's not justthis hey, play for our team so
(25:20):
we win and make money.
Dr. Diane Williams (25:21):
Yes, yes, focusing on student athletes
well-being and educationalexperience doesn't preclude
working hard, challenging people.
Educational experience doesn'tpreclude working hard,
challenging people, excellingand competing at a high level
Like those things can all gotogether.
In so many cases they did.
I decided I didn't want tocoach under the NCAA.
I loved coaching.
I loved working with athletes.
(25:42):
I loved teaching young women inparticular how to throw a shot
put.
It wasn't about the shot putyou know, like it's about oh no,
you're powerful.
Let me let me show you how tothrow a shot put.
It wasn't about the shot putyou know, it's about oh no,
you're powerful.
Let me let me show you how toget into a ready position and
then, like, use those legs anduse your butt and take this tiny
little heavy metal object andchuck it out there and it's
really silly and it's reallyjoyful and it can be really
(26:04):
empowering in these delightfulways.
And I was like there'ssomething here I love, but like
I don't love the way that thisperformance ethic and it only
matters if you win, and like, ifyou're not on a team that makes
money but really that justmeans spends a lot of money that
then you have to recoup.
There's so much about the NCAA Ifound distasteful and so I was
like done, and then I decided togo to grad school and study
(26:27):
this.
So I ended up at Iowa, whichhad this amazing legacy of
leadership within thisorganization, and in fact, three
of the professors who werestill in the area two of them
had been presidents of the AIAWand one was one of the executive
directors for a short time, andthey were they all had their
papers there, so I was able tostart in the archives there and
(26:49):
also interview them, and thenthat also led to other
interviews and other archivalwork.
The AIAW was created by womenwho were trained physical
educators.
They all came with a commitmentto the value and power and joy
that physical activity can bringand not seeing it as something
that women can't do can bring,and not seeing it as something
(27:13):
that women can't do Right, andin fact, seeing it as like oh no
, it's great Everybody should doit however they want to.
And so there was lots ofmomentum Students in the late
60s, early 70s.
Women students were like wewould like to play, the guys
have had sports forever.
We had intramurals and therewas like other kinds of
competition going on, but noorganized teams and no organized
schedules and championshipsanything like that.
(27:34):
And so there were physicaleducators who decided, okay, we
don't want to recreate what theNCAA is doing and we think we
can do it better and we think wecan do it different and we're
going to do it for women.
The NCAA is not interestedanyway.
So like great, go do your thing, we'll be over here doing ours.
And so there was a couple ofyears of organizing and a pilot
(27:55):
organization that wasn't anofficial membership organization
.
They were putting out standardsand ideas for creating
intercollegiate women's sport.
And then by 1971, theAssociation for Intercollegiate
Athletics for Women made theirfirst call like we're starting
this, join in.
And we had like 273 schoolsjoin in right away as charter
members in that first year.
(28:16):
And from then it just grew andit was women-led and it was
women-run for women, which has asort of gender essentialist
notion that might be kind oflike.
Couldn't it be for everybody,yes, but also the men already
had something on the NCAA side.
They didn't want anything to dowith what the women were doing
anyways, and there was adifferent sensibility that
(28:39):
informed the work the AIW wasdoing.
That was from the experience ofhaving been told your whole life
you couldn't participate, andso there was a sense of we also
need to teach people about sport.
And so, like coaches for thelate in the late sixties, there
were workshops for women highschool, elementary school and
(28:59):
college professors and teachersto go learn how to play
volleyball so that then theycould go back and coach it.
And then they were under thelike each one teach one.
So you go to the nationalworkshop, you learn how to play
volleyball, you go home, you puton a conference locally so you
can teach people how to playvolleyball, and then we start
coaching kids and we get girlsinto volleyball or whatever it
is.
There was an embeddededucational mentality right
(29:22):
there, right these again, allphysical educators trying to
develop high level sport, but somany women had been told they
couldn't play.
There were some opportunitiesfor women to play in industrial
leagues throughout the earlierpart of the 1900s, but this was
a kind of all of a sudden apretty widespread thing that was
happening, like through schoolsand in a different way.
(29:42):
And so then, at the collegelevel, the AIW started.
They held their firstchampionships in 72.
Lisa Danylchuk (29:48):
They held their first championships in 72.
So what would be your hope formoving forward?
Right, the AIW doesn't existanymore.
There's something to be learnedfrom that, for sure.
There's lessons to take away.
What would be your hope, movingforward, of how athletics could
(30:09):
change?
That is a very, very bigquestion.
Let's just dream storm.
Dr. Diane Williams (30:19):
I always quote Dr Jennifer Gomez.
I heard that one.
That was good.
You have this almighty power tosay how it's going to go.
How's it going to go?
So one of the things that I runinto when this type of question
comes up is that there is asmall part of me that just
recoils at how exclusivecollegiate sport is, period.
(30:41):
And sport is period, and so myinterest now is I want more of
all of it.
We can have high levelcompetitive sport that's lovely,
but I want more of all the restof the kinds of ways we can
participate in sport, so thatmore people of different
abilities and differentinterests can find something
that would be fun for them to do.
It doesn't have to be aboutwinning, but it can be.
(31:03):
It doesn't have to be aboutpushing boundaries, but it can
be.
It might just be aboutcommunity and like giggling and
going for a walk together,climbing on a playground and
doing different stuff there, andthat's not sport per se.
But I guess this is where myinterest lies.
I want more of all of it, moreof a mentality that we can learn
and grow as we age.
We don't have to just seeourselves as increasingly
(31:25):
deficient.
Lisa Danylchuk (31:25):
Yeah, so what would be your hope for how we
think about bodies andgender-affirming athletics.
That's when I think of you.
I think of body-positive,gender-affirming athletics,
thanks.
So what does that look like?
(31:48):
What does it look like to havebody positive, gender affirming
athletics?
I mean, it starts with peoplenot telling you to tuck your
butt in when that's just yourbutt.
Dr. Diane Williams (31:58):
Like yeah, that's just, and that's just my
butt.
Booties are really important inathletics.
Lisa Danylchuk (32:04):
I use my gluteus to jump high.
Dr. Diane Williams (32:06):
It's super important.
Yeah, it comes from a differentset of values.
It comes from motivations thatare that are rooted in those
things.
Right, I can go at this fromtwo examples that offered ideas
of how this could look.
So one of them is in my latetwenties I was in this coaching
grad program but I decided Iwasn't going to coach.
(32:26):
I needed to like survive thenext year and a half of the
program and I started playingroller Derby in Western mass.
And so here I was, again thatphysical literacy thing kicked
in and I was like I don't knowwhat I'm doing, but I used to
like to roller skate a lot.
We also did that together.
So you know, sure I'm going togo learn how to play this thing.
(32:49):
And I was in WesternMassachusetts, which had at that
point one of the only co-edleagues, and we practiced
together.
We played separately becausethere was no structure to play
together.
It was led by folks who wantedto create a different kind of
sports space, and they might nothave used that language because
, like, not all of them weresports scholars, right, in fact,
none of them, which one of themwas she wrote a book on it, and
(33:10):
a couple of us were, you knowdorky academics, it's Western
mass.
But you know, we also hadeverybody else there, some of
who had played sports, some ofwho had never played sports but
thought this looked fun becauseit was kind of alternative and
it was kind of punk and it waskind of grungy.
And then we had to create outof that.
How do we?
How do we do this then?
This is a sport where, likeit's a full contact sport.
So if we're practicing in adrill, like your hand is on the
(33:35):
hip of your teammate and you'recreating a wall and you're
moving each other of yourteammate and you're creating a
wall and you're moving eachother, how do we do this?
In a way that our society is soweird about bodies and there are
so many reasons to be cognizantof boundaries and to be very
conscious of how you're engagingeach other.
And then there's a gendercomponent and there's power,
right.
And yet we somehow managed todo it and it wasn't flawless,
(33:57):
because nothing's going to be,but we had a pretty strict code
of conduct and we had, right upfront, we were like, don't make
this weird.
I don't remember quite how theysaid it, but that might've been
it.
We want to do this.
We have a no tolerance policyfor harassment, like you need to
be aware of yourself and howyou're treating others, and from
there we could do it and itworked.
(34:19):
And we had this again, notwithout its issues, but overall
really positive, very differentkind of sports space.
There were still moments wherethe ideas of society snuck in
and the women would hold back orassume the men were better or
the men might assume a sort ofrole, but we also undermined it
constantly and, if nothing else,you just had this experience of
(34:41):
like I developed into one ofthe stronger blockers not like
the strongest some folks, but awell-respected blocker on both
teams, right, and worked withpeople really well from both
teams in practice, and then wewould play separately, like I
said.
But so that was like thisbeautiful invitation to oh God,
thank you.
Just imagine what this couldlook like if we weren't so like
(35:03):
weirdly caught up in these normsand these assumptions.
I historically have beenstronger than plenty of guys I
know, and yet I still get toldwomen are weaker and I'm like,
seriously, really, come on.
Lisa Danylchuk (35:15):
I find myself thinking, too, about non-binary
folks, anyone who's doesn'tidentify as male or female, or
isn't right like yes, all of it,all of the in between it, and I
think about you mentionedearlier inclusion and exclusion
in sports and thinking about howwe bring people together, how
(35:35):
we exclude people in a harmfulway, and when you talk about
even gender inclusive practiceand I think gender inclusive
games could be interesting too.
It's so powerful to think aboutpeople playing sports instead
of, or people engaging inathletics, and in terms of
(35:59):
learning, in terms ofphysicality, there's a time and
a place.
In terms of therapy, there's atime and a place to make things
exclusive so that people feelsafe or protected or there's
some sense of a scope there.
But if we were to open upsports more, athletics more,
(36:21):
maybe we could be more inclusive.
Like, I just find myselfthinking of people I know who,
if certain information werefound out about them, wouldn't
be able to play on their team,you know, and why, yeah, I mean
yeah, exactly when we set it allup as a binary.
Dr. Diane Williams (36:43):
That's it.
That's so ridiculous, and noteven how people are period.
So like softening that,changing, like this is where,
like I don't know what to do onthe national, international
level and I don't really care tofix it.
Honestly, I think a lot of it'sreally broken.
I want to see moreopportunities for anybody to
play things that they'reinterested in playing, more
participation, not less.
Lisa Danylchuk (37:04):
Yeah, I feel like that's something really
generative.
There's how it is and there'sfighting how it is, which can be
exhausting, and trying tofigure out how to fix something
that feels inherently inadequateor unequal or harmful, and it's
worth it to think about that.
But we can also build somethingdifferent, and what I'm
(37:26):
gathering from everything you'resaying is let's be more aware
of the positive things inhistory.
Let's just be curious aboutthat and open to maybe digging a
little to find it.
From there Can we create places, especially for young people,
but for all people, I mean, weknow, for young people.
(37:46):
It impacts them across thewhole.
That impacts culture and thosepeople could end up owning teams
later.
Dr. Diane Williams (37:52):
Right.
Lisa Danylchuk (37:53):
Yeah, so can we start?
Can we create spaces for youngpeople, for all people, to
access their bodies and theirpower in unique and inclusive
ways together, right, Right,yeah, yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (38:10):
And whether that looks like a sport per se
or whether it looks like likeI'm just starting to be part of
a West Coast swing dancecommunity out here that years
ago did away with the sort ofgendering of swing and they have
leaders and followers andpeople of different genders do
whatever they want and wear alittle button to indicate if
(38:31):
they're a leader or a follow,and they have again a strict
code of conduct a really biginvestment in positive community
building and they practice it.
A really big investment inpositive community building and
they practice it.
And then, literally, you get togo be in a space where your
boundaries are going to berespected.
If you don't want to dance, youjust say no and like there's an
ethic of okay, then you move onand you ask someone else to
dance.
It's fine, that happens, right,you don't have to explain
(38:51):
yourself, but there's just thislike positive social interaction
that's happening and it's aphysical activity and it's with
people of all different gendersand like the world doesn't end
and in fact, you feel betterwhen you leave, right, and you
can't undo those kinds ofpositive experiences of being on
a team with just all yourfriends, and all your friends
are different genders andhopefully, depending on where
(39:13):
you live, different races andthey're from different parts of
the community or whatever, andyou get to have that experience
and you don't unhave thatexperience then after that and
you know that you can beteammates and work hard and play
hard with other people who looklike you and who don't look
like you.
Right, that's where thesereally beautiful opportunities
exist.
Part of what's so powerfulabout sport and physical
activity is, again, thatembodied experience of it, that
(39:35):
it's not just intellectual, it'snot just us thinking about
ideas Like we actually get to go, do a thing and be in a space
that is liberatory in some ways.
I was going to say to your pointof like, do we change the
system or create our own?
That's part of, of course.
What draws me to the AIAW'shistory is because I see it, I
really read it as that radicalidea of like no, the system's
(39:58):
broken, we're not going to tryand adapt into it, we're going
to do something new.
And in fact it's a verydifferent philosophy than what
undergirds, like Title IX, whichis the norm, is here and women
or the underrepresented groupsshould be brought up to the norm
, as opposed to saying actuallythe norm is ridiculous.
There's no reason that footballshould get the power and
(40:19):
resources that it has had since1900.
But it still does.
So what's fair and what'sreasonable?
And how do we create equitableopportunities for everybody?
That might involve scaling somethings back.
Instead we go.
How do we fit women into asystem that was not designed for
them?
Not necessarily because they'rewomen, just because it was not
designed for them?
It wasn't designed for most meneither Not that many men get to
(40:43):
play, and so that's part of whatI love about the AIW is it's a
reminder that we can do thingsdifferently.
Yeah, it takes time and energy,and sometimes your organization
ends.
After 10 years.
Does it still count?
Yeah, because it did exist.
It was the biggest athleticgovernance organization for a
time, and the only one offeringwomen's championships.
Was that threatening?
Yeah, but it happened.
Lisa Danylchuk (41:07):
I know you have a dissertation about this.
Why did it end?
Dr. Diane Williams (41:12):
It depends on who you ask.
I have definitely talked towomen who were presidents who
said well, we were too powerfuland we were doing too good of a
job, and so the NCAA put us outof business.
It's a combination of things,but one of them is that the AIW
started pre-Title IX, and TitleIX was actually never intended
to be for sports.
It was an educationally focusedamendment about admission into
(41:37):
different academic programs likedentistry and other things like
that.
It had some pay equity, otherthings related to education, but
not about sports.
Actually, I don't think itwould have passed, honestly, if
it was about sports, but that'sa side note.
So, right away, though, allthese women physical educators
who are looking to create moreresources because women's sport
came out of having thecreativity where you have no
(41:59):
resources and you're like well,I guess we'll use the same
uniforms for every single teambecause we don't have money to
buy more.
So they thought if we can getthis to apply to sports, we can
make a legal case for moreresources, and so they did, and
that's part of both the AIAW,and women's physical education
was a really big part of helpingto push that sports should be a
part of what is covered underTitle IX.
(42:22):
The NCAA was not on board atall and fought it tooth and nail
.
So the thing is, sport is areally messy thing to try and
figure out.
What does equity even look likewhen things cost different for
different teams?
There aren't really women'steams yet.
So what do we, what do you evenwant girls, right?
And so throughout the entireseventies, as the AIAW was
(42:45):
creating women's intercollegiatesport, all of these women
physical educators who were notpolitically savvy had to then
become politically savvy andthey were testifying in Congress
that they were doing all thiswork right and they were
connecting with other women'sgroups, legal groups and
educational groups to buildbroader networks and see the
connections.
Sport was not a part of theexplicitly feminist movement at
(43:05):
that point and these folks werelike no, this can be a part of
it, both in the educationalcontext and beyond it.
But let us explain how thisworks under the AIAW, not what
the NCAA is doing.
Congress interprets Title IXlike here are the criteria for
the athletic program followingTitle IX guidelines Passed in 72
(43:26):
, it's not interpreted until 79at the end of the year, that
January in 80, the NCAA veryquickly and breaking some of
their own rules to do it passDivision II and III women's
championships at their nationalconvention without engaging the
AIEW, which already hadextensive championships at that
(43:47):
point, just as a power move.
They were concerned that theirmembership the colleges and
universities that were part ofthe NCAA at that point could get
sued for not providingequitable opportunities.
And then they smartly leveragedthis notion of separate is not
equal, which is not intended tobe about gender.
(44:08):
It's a race-based historicalargument, but it gets applied
this way and we start sayingwell, if you have two different
governing organizations, thatcould be a problem for your
institution.
Don't you feel better goingwith the NCAA?
We've got money and power onour side.
It was chaotic.
I'm not sure what all theschools could do.
Aiw had only been around forlike 10 years, NCAA had been
(44:28):
around for 75.
And there's like this massivepolitical campaign going on both
directions and ultimately lotsof attempts made by the AIAW to
say can't we come together andpick the best of what we're both
doing and create somethingbetter?
And the NCAA had no individual.
(44:49):
People might have had respect,certainly, for people that were
involved, but they had norespect for the organization.
And this was the NCAA'sterritory with collegiate
athletics, and so it was a we'regoing to take over and destroy
as opposed to try andcollaborate, and that's what
happened.
So the following year, the NCAApassed division one
championships and actually a lotof football coaches were very
(45:09):
opposed to it at the high levelfootball coaches because they
were worried about losingresources, cause, of course, if
you have to add things, where'sthe money going to come from?
We always frame it as asum game, right?
Yeah, other ways of thinkingabout it, but that's how it was
set up.
And so it was a very narrowvote and the NCAA passed women's
championships, and then for thenext year, both organizations
offered championships and theNCAA matched theirs weekend to
(45:32):
weekend to the AIWs.
And so every school then had tomake a choice, and the NCAA
incentivized theirs.
They said if your men arealready a part of our
organization, you don't have topay for dues.
The AIAW ran on dues.
They had just gotten some mediacontracts, they were just
building some financialstability beyond that, and the
NCAA went right for the moneyand the ways that you could
(45:54):
undermine.
So philosophically, schoolsmight have wanted to stay with
the AIW, but financially it wasthe early 80s Again, sort of
time of recession and a scalingback of social programs for
equity and justice.
This fell into that prioritizingwomen and they got put out of
business, essentially, and womenlost their jobs.
(46:16):
Women quit.
They had poured their heart andsouls into this for years and
plenty of women would be put outof a job and a man would be
hired into that coachingposition or that athletic
departments merged and thewomen's athletics director would
become the assistant athleticdirector and the men's athletic
director would be the athleticdirector.
That happened almost at everyschool across the country.
And all of a sudden, this wholehistory that, like there was a
(46:39):
whole governance organizationled by women, there were
athletic departments almostexclusively led by women at
every institution, like 970institutions at its peak.
Those women, for lots ofreasons, had to go take care of
themselves or were asked toleave.
Some stuck around, but therewas this huge exodus and lot.
Lisa Danylchuk (46:59):
The history is lost and it is buried and we
don't talk about it yeah, well,I'm glad you're keeping it alive
and so much of it in my mindsounds like it's about power.
Right, it's about genderdynamics and power and, just
just like your work is sointerdisciplinary, this is so
intertwined in so many differentsocial systems and the ways
(47:22):
that we think, and it's thefederal government in the US and
it's universities and the NCAAthat operates somewhere in
between, all of those like, notsubject to anybody's power, but
involved in students' lives.
These are things that I don'tthink a lot of people think
(47:43):
about.
Like you go into, oh, I'm goingto play basketball, Okay, I'm
going to go from this level tothat level, I'm going to show up
at the competition, I'm goingto do my best.
Like we don't have a lot ofencouragement or space to think
about the dynamics or theculture or the power.
So that's where I think placeslike your classroom are so
important, because people havespace for that and encouragement
(48:08):
to reflect on the history andto see what's going on and to
ask themselves do I want to be apart of this and how?
How do I want to be a part ofthis and what choices am I going
to make within that to try tomake it healthy for me, to
advocate for it being healthyacross the board.
(48:30):
But especially when you'retalking about athletics, there's
so many other things for peopleto pay attention to.
Right, I mean, you could justget completely consumed with
what's the best training planand how should I fuel my body
and how do I optimize my sleepand what gadgets do I want to
use.
You could get so consumed inthat that you never even unless
(48:50):
it slaps you in the face, unlessthere's some big point of
conflict.
Never even think about some ofthe larger systems.
I'm so glad you're doing thiswork and encouraging other
people to do it as well.
You've written some amazingarticles.
I know you're working on a book.
Do a link to your professorpage McDaniel.
Dr. Diane Williams (49:11):
It has nothing on it but I will say it
does have your cat's name on it,which is an article.
Lisa Danylchuk (49:18):
There is an article I'm going to pull it up
right now, hobbies.
She played roller derby foreight years, skating as Lady
Hulk.
During her first semesterteaching at McDaniel, she
adopted an adorable kitten namedMargo.
She's a six time NCAA, divisionthree, all American in shot,
put four times and discus twice.
Nicely done, people of thepodcast, because I refuse to say
(49:42):
, ladies and gentlemen, at thisstage, hell, yes.
People of the podcast, dr DianeWilliams, you are the best.
Thank you so much for sharing.
I mean, I feel like this is tipof the iceberg.
There's so many more directionswe could go, but thank you for
the work that you do, forthinking and encouraging people
(50:04):
to reflect in a body positiveand inclusive and gender
affirming way.
I'm grateful that you're awonderful human out there, that
you're an educator and I justlove staying connected.
And we didn't even really talkabout how trauma folds into all
of this.
I mean, it fits in my mind soclearly when we start talking
about power and oppression.
Dr. Diane Williams (50:24):
And how it ended.
That's the part that I want totalk to.
We can talk another time.
I think that's a big part ofthe end and the legacy.
That is also like somethingthat still needs to be mended in
some way and reckoned with insome way.
There's a wound there withbeing shut down.
Lisa Danylchuk (50:42):
How do we attend to that wound?
And the impacts.
You mentioned people's jobs,right, the impacts and the
trickle down of that, and that'swhy I wanted to have this
conversation with you.
It's like, well, how do we pullfrom all the amazing wisdom and
effort?
and learning and carry thatforward, and we might be in a
time period where we're plantingseeds more than harvesting
(51:07):
flowers, but that's an importantstage, right?
None of us would eat if nobodyplanted seeds.
So I feel like we can take whatyou've studied, what you've
learned, and really plant thatin some rich soil and bring it
to light over time in a way that, hopefully, is just more
(51:28):
inclusive and body positive andhelpful for young people.
You know people in theirnineties who want to dance, yeah
, yeah.
Dr. Diane Williams (51:36):
Yeah, and it fills in this gap.
That helps explain somethingthat just gets normalized right.
And so, yeah, there's.
There's much more to discussand I will be looking forward to
discussing it with you as we goforward, and I just appreciate
the chance to share about myfavorite topic in the whole wide
world.
Lisa Danylchuk (51:56):
I love it.
Thank you so much, Diane.
It's been so good to talk toyou.
Dr. Diane Williams (52:00):
So good to talk to you.
I love all the work you'redoing.
I'm so proud of you and excitedfor all your and your big award
for your podcast.
Lisa Danylchuk (52:08):
You're so awesome the award winning how we
can heal podcast.
It's official I know, I love.
I love doing this.
I love having theseconversations.
We were just saying the otherday we wouldn't sit down and
have this conversation if itweren't for this podcast, even
between us.
So thank you for listeningeveryone.
I really appreciate listenerschiming in, asking questions,
(52:29):
sharing comments, recommendingguests.
We have such a long list ofguests.
People reach out all the timehey, I'd love to come on and
talk about this, or I recommendthis person, and I have a long
list of people that I've wantedto interview.
So there's more to come,definitely.
Dr. Diane Williams (52:46):
Excellent.
Well, I'm so honored to get tobe a part of it, so thank you
for including me.
Thank you.
Lisa Danylchuk (52:56):
Thanks so much for listening.
Don't forget to go tohowwecanhealcom to sign up for
email updates.
You'll also find additionaltrainings, tons of helpful
resources and the fulltranscript of each and every
show.
If you love the show, pleaseleave us a review on Apple,
spotify, audible or wherever youget your podcasts.
If you're watching on YouTube,be sure to like and subscribe
(53:18):
and keep sharing the shows youlove the most with all your
friends.
Visit howwecanhealcom backslashpodcast to share your thoughts
and ideas for the show.
I always love hearing from you.
Before we wrap up for today, Iwant to be clear that this
podcast isn't offeringprescriptions.
It's not advice, nor is it anykind of mental health treatment
(53:39):
or diagnosis.
Your decisions are in yourhands and I encourage you to
consult with any health careprofessionals you may need to
support you through your uniquepath of healing.
Also, everyone's opinion hereis their own and opinions can
change.
Guests share their thoughts,not that of the hosts or
sponsors.
I'd like to thank our gueststoday, everyone who helped
(54:01):
support this podcast directlyand indirectly, especially Alex.
Thanks for taking care of thebabe and the fur babies while I
record.
Last but never least, I'd liketo give a special shout out to
my big brother, matt, who passedaway in 2002.
He wrote this music and itmakes my heart so happy to share
it with you here.
(54:25):
Thank you.
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