Pretty Versus Powerful in the Sports Pages

Abstract

To examine how descriptions of the performance of female athletes are likely to reflect dominant beliefs about gender in society, 769 passages from the print media describing gold medal winning contests for four U.S. women’s teams in the 1996 Olympics (basketball, gymnastics, soccer, and softball) and the U.S. women’s hockey team in the 1998 Olympics were subjected to content analysis. The sports analyzed fall under the categories of Matteo’s study classifying the gender appropriateness of sport (masculine, feminine, and neutral). Two dimensions were examined for each passage: task relevance and use of gender stereotypes. Consistent with our expectations, female athletes in male sports were described by the print media using frequent male-to-female comparisons and comments that had little to do with sports or the athlete’s performance. Print media coverage of female athletes in female sports focused on performance while reinforcing female stereotypes. Implications of the images of female athletes portrayed by the print media are discussed.

Half the Story? Olympic Women on ABC News Online

“…Such sexist notions have been challenged strongly since the late 1960s, but their impact on the entire character of sport is still evident today (Cashmore, 2000). Females' sport involvement is considered either socially acceptable or unacceptable, based on how each sport conforms to traditional/ historical and/or modern images of appropriate female behaviour (von der Lippe, 2002); and beliefs regarding the sex-typing of sports are likely to be reflected in the popular media's description of female athletes (Jones et al, 1999).…”

‘Legends’ in ‘Lingerie’: Sexuality and Athleticism in the 2013 Legends Football League US Season

“…Thus turning attention away from their embodiment of physical power, this reductive re-framing sees athletes' bodies made most visible when they emphasise a form of physicality broadly oppositional to the agentic power denoted by the supposedly 'masculine' attributes of tough, muscular athleticism (Carty, 2005;Jones et al, 1999;Kane et al, 2013; see also Dowling, 2000). The sexualisation of female athletes thereby neuters the subversive potential of women's sport by reaffirming images of heterosexual (and thus, supposedly 'normal') women as weaker than, and therefore vulnerable to, heterosexual/'normal' men.…”

Women’s Sports Coverage in Israel: Perception Versus Reality

“…In recent years many studies (e.g., Vincent, 2004;Von Der Lippe, 2002) on the field of women's sports have focused on major sports events, mainly the Olympics (e.g., Bishop, 2003;Daddario, 1997;Jones, Murrell, & Jackson, 1999;Weiller et al, 2004). Like other media research, studies have focused on two directives-the first, the amount of time and space the media dedicate to women's sports, and the second, the attitude toward women in sports.…”

“…As for coverage content, when broadcast contents are examined, several characteristics emerge that often undermine the importance of the increasing percentage of space and time in women's sports coverage. First, there is a tendency in the media to focus on sports that are traditionally considered female (the "softer," less physical sports branches; e.g., Jones et al, 1999). Moreover, a condescending tone is consistently taken by writers, who treat female athletes as if they were children (Sabo & Curry Jansen, 1992).…”

“…Moreover, a condescending tone is consistently taken by writers, who treat female athletes as if they were children (Sabo & Curry Jansen, 1992). Other familiar phenomena are related to the media's treatment of female athletes as sexual objects (Kane & Greendorfer, 1994) and the emphasis placed on physical appearance (Jones et al, 1999). It is clear that the attempt to evaluate sports coverage of major events creates a certain illusion in regard to the real attitude of society and the media establishment toward women who engage in sports, as it is expressed in today's everyday reality.…”