“The Tunnel as a Border: Disciplining "Bodies Out of Place" in Collegiate Spirit Labor”

• In Event: Schooling Race

Abstract

This project utilizes Barbara Harris Combs’ (2016, 2019, 2022) "Bodies Out of Place" (BOP) framework to analyze the institutional response to the "Kennesaw 5"—five Black cheerleaders at Kennesaw State University who knelt during the national anthem in 2017. Through a qualitative case study of the subsequent "tunnel ban," presidential resignation, and team cuts, we argue that in this context the Black cheerleaders occupy a precarious position of "spirit labor(ers)" where their bodies are welcomed only as performative symbols of institutional loyalty. When these bodies transitioned from "performer" to "protestor," they were perceived as transgressive threats to the racialized social order of the stadium. This paper explores how the university utilized spatial segregation (the tunnel) and institutional exclusion (team cuts) as tools of boundary maintenance to re-establish "place" in the wake of a racialized disruption.

Authors

• Barbara Harris Combs, Kennesaw State University

• Ben Vu Pham, University of Maryland-College Park