Before and Beyond Title IX

Photo 3 for Meg Conkey BeLOnG Blog — Springfield (Pa.) Township High School's
Best Athletes, Wes Frith and Meg Conkey, in 1961.

I am of the age that went to high school and college before Title IX, long before Title IX! I played high school sports in a Philadelphia suburb- both field hockey and lacrosse. I even attended a well-known summer field hockey camp in the Pennsylvania Poconos, run by a tenacious woman who is the one to have brought field hockey from Britain to the US: Constance Applebee. Wikipedia has this summary:

"She was a co-founder of the American Field Hockey Association and served as its head for 20 years. She also founded Sportswoman magazine and was the athletic director at Bryn Mawr College for 24 years."

Constance Applebee (whom we all called "the Apple") was, as I recall, a veritable soft tyrant- shouting out to us from the sidelines even as she was in her mid '80s at the time. She was born in 1873; that is, some 150 years ago or 99 years before the passage of Title IX (1972), as we today celebrate that passage of 50 years ago. She took women in organized sports, especially field hockey, very seriously and we all took that in. There was to be no "dilly-dallying" (as she would urge in her distinctly British accent), no loss of focus on the field, and above all, one should be fit and prepared to run, to be assertive, to score, to defend and to win! And, fortunately for young women such as my high school self and my teammates and coaches, her approach and influence were held by many. It was only in the past few years, here at Cal in my capacity as the Faculty Fellow to the women's lacrosse team, that I came to realize that my very own high school lacrosse and field hockey coach, Jane Vaché, was also not one to shun or minimize the benefits of organized and supportive athletic teams for and of women, having been a player, coach of both high school and the US International team as well as a key leader in the early years of the International Federation of Women's Lacrosse Associations (see https://www.usalacrosse.com/player-profile/jane-l-vache). And, in hopefully sharing these histories with current players, one will not forget that the very game of Lacrosse comes from Native Americans of the Haudenosaunee tribes on the eastern Woodlands and some Plains tribes as a ceremonial, spiritual and physical enterprise.

Photo 2 for Meg Conkey BeLOnG Blog — "The Apple," at age 86, coaching at the '59
Poconos field hockey camp. (Meg Conkey, back
center with pixie haircut.)

Now, I do know well that having had this kind of supportive context for playing the team sports of field hockey and lacrosse at that time-more than 60 years ago- was not all that common and was what seems to have been a more localized possibility. I have heard stories of women today who had unfortunate experiences and were not given such opportunities. For them, the passage of Title IX was long overdue and indeed to be celebrated, even if as somewhat bittersweet. The Philadelphia area, where I grew up, was certainly an island of opportunity although we were really not aware of it. There were many other high schools with teams in both sports (and other sports for girls/women as well; as I look over my high school yearbook, I see tennis and basketball). Many of our high school identities were formed around our being on such teams and especially, in my case, being on successful (and undefeated!) ones.

As I look back on my life and career, as an anthropological archaeologist, professor, teacher and researcher, and as I look at what kinds of topics and issues have been an ongoing thread in these roles and activities- one main thread has been the inclusion of women in our understandings of human life (archaeologically, and over the long term), in our everyday worlds, in our communities and in our practices. I have only accomplished much of what I have thanks to the teamwork with others, thanks to collaborators, especially, with other women. To be an archaeologist (and many other things) requires teamwork, which can be traced back to team sports in high school. While I have not really played any of those formative sports in many years, the benefits and lessons have stayed with me. It is still a sad testimony that in order that every young girl or person has a chance at being involved, included and supported, a federal law had to be passed. And although that law has to be revisited regularly for its compliance, much has been accomplished toward the goals of full inclusion and full cultural value. But much remains to be done. The peak of equality is still a goal to be reached. But for those who today not only benefit from Title IX but also take it for granted, it is important to realize that the foundations for women's and girls' athletics- at the college/University level, at a professional level, have been a long and often challenging development, going way back before Title IX was even an idea or concept. Who ever imagined that it would be a federal mandate? Our debts are too many, past and present. But making the world of University-level athletics more equitable will take several generations more, even if some of us had opportunities we did not fully appreciate nor understand.

Meg Conkey is the Class of 1960 Emerita Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, and is a Co-Chair of the Gender, Equity and Diversity Subcommittee of the University Athletic Board.

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