By John Frierson
Staff Writer
The idea began with a spark during a small Zoom gathering last fall.
Georgia volleyball players Kaylah House and Phoebe Awoleye were having a video chat with Darrice Griffin, then Georgia’s Deputy Athletic Director for Administration and now the Senior Deputy Director of Athletics. The three African-American women were talking and sharing and connecting, and it felt good to do so.
“Darrice brought up a good idea, that if we ever wanted to talk to her, just opening up a space for other female student-athletes who look like us, we could,” said House, a senior from Atlanta.
Soon after, House worked with Dr. Courtney Gay, Georgia’s Assistant Athletic Director for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, to create Girl Talk.
“I ended up talking to Courtney about starting a monthly thing, or every other month, to kind of just talk in a safe space for a lot of people who maybe don’t have that safe space inside the circle that we’re in,” House said. “I wanted to have a safe space for a lot of people who look like me in the student-athlete world.”
Girl Talk is a gathering place where African-American women involved with UGA athletics — student-athletes, coaches and staff — can get together and have open and honest conversations about what’s happening in their lives and in the world. They can talk about their experiences, their dreams, and, Gay said, create “a sisterhood.”
“One of the main goals in creating the group was having that collegiality, that sisterhood, and being able to support and encourage one another,” Gay said.
The first Girl Talk meeting, conducted via Zoom, was in October. The deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and the subsequent rise of the social justice movement and Black Lives Matter were very much on everyone’s minds during the meeting.
“We just talked about everything going on, how we were feeling about it, and kind of getting to know each other,” House said.
Given how busy everyone within UGA athletics is, particularly this winter as nearly every sport is competing or preparing to do so, finding a time when enough women are available to get together isn’t easy. After that successful first meeting, the second Girl Talk didn’t happen until Tuesday night.
Since it was their first gathering in the new year, House and Gay opted to make the theme about visions and goal-setting. Some women created physical vision boards, others did virtual versions and others wrote their ideas down in journals.
“People really shared a lot with their vision boards. It was just an opportunity for people to be really vulnerable about their goals and where they are in life, and people shared some very personal stories and things as they talked through their goals,” Gay said. “I thought we definitely had more in-depth conversations with each other and had the opportunity to get to know each other on more of a personal level.”
House described the meeting as “very inspirational.”
“It definitely was a very personal meeting,” House said. “We got a lot closer and learned a lot of stuff about each other. I definitely took a lot away from the meeting, for sure.”
Growing up in Atlanta, House said she was a member of numerous clubs in high school but was never a leader in them. During her first two years of college, at Coastal Carolina, there was a group on campus called Women of Color that had a mission similar to Girl Talk, but House said it wasn’t something she participated in often because of the demands of school and volleyball.
“This is the first time I’ve ever done anything like this,” she said.
While House said she wouldn’t really describe herself as a vocal leader, Georgia volleyball coach Tom Black said she’s “definitely not quiet.”
“She’s always positive, she’s engaged, she’s really mindful of the energy she’s bringing on the court,” Black said. “She’s definitely an energy giver and not an energy taker.”
Along with creating Girl Talk, House was heavily involved, Black said, in the volleyball team’s response to the social justice issues and protests happening around the country last year. When the team began its season last October, it opted to have before each match a moment of reflection to call attention to everything that was happening.
“She’s taken the bull by the horns and done some really cool initiatives like Girl Talk, and she was a big voice in the moment of reflection that we do before our games,” Black said. “It’s been really cool to see that part of her come out.”
February is Black History Month and House said Girl Talk’s next meeting, which ideally will take place in a couple of weeks, will be a “celebration meeting.”
Girl Talk is still just getting started, but House hopes that it continues long after she graduates with a degree from the Grady College of Journalism in 2022.
“Once we get a monthly thing flowing with this, it could be something that can last,” she said. “I definitely want it to be something that keeps going at UGA.”
If Tuesday’s session was an indicator, Girl Talk is well on its way.
“I think we saw that vision that Kaylah had for the group come alive,” Gay said.
Looking back on herself as an 18-year-old that went off to college, House said she wouldn’t have imagined then that she’d one day have and use her voice like she’s doing now. House said she would probably have gone to a Girl Talk meeting, but she wouldn’t have been the one creating it.
“I definitely think I’ve grown to be a somewhat vocal leader in certain situations,” she said. “And then with everything going on, especially everything going on last year, you can post on social media but that’s not enough. I was like, ‘Take a little initiative.’
“Donating is great, posting on social media is great, helping people around you be aware is great, but when you help make your community stronger, I think that’s the biggest impact you can have. Word of mouth is so strong and it can reach out to so many people.”
