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Making Space for Those Unruly Women of Color

When I first walked into the classroom without the luxury of sitting in the back of the room, I was extremely self-conscious. As a brand new teacher, I was terrified that my body would betray me. I was afraid that I would trip or, worse yet, need to use the bathroom. I was apprehensive that freshmen would recognize my inexperience and know that I had never taught a day in my life. My concerns about competence and failure manifested themselves in a focus on the body. Ironically, it was not the body I should have focused on. While my fears corresponded to the situation, given that I would be subject to the specific and often intense gaze of young people, the far more complicated reality was that my concerns should have been directed at the circumscribed parameters of the raced, gendered body. The initial, superficial body concerns have long since passed. The substantial issues remain. I should have known, I suppose. I have a dim memory—a reference point—of a French teacher. Before I am able to call up her name, I remember the student who saw her sunbathing—in a two-piece swimsuit on top of her car, not at the beach but on a city street. She felt compelled to explain herself despite the fact that the incident had occurred during the summer, with no connection to her teaching and professional life. It was 1967. Teachers do not, however, have to wear a bathing suit to draw the attention of students to the body.