Towards the “Undoing” of Gender in Mixed-Sex Martial Arts and Combat Sports

Abstract

This paper addresses sex integration in martial arts and combat sports, discussing the implications of mixed-sex training for challenging orthodox Western constructions of gender. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 37 long-term martial arts practitioners from around the English East Midlands between 2007-2011, the paper argues that restrictive, essentialist and hierarchal conceptions of sex difference can be challenged through integrated training practices. The paper advocates the "undoing" of gender in this regard as helping to build a more progressive, inclusive and liberal form of physical culture, seen as a key potential of sex-integrated training. To that end, the paper makes a number of proposals for instructors and practitioners interested in developing such inclusive environments in their own clubs and training settings.

Mixed-sex in sport for development: a pragmatic and symbolic device. The case of touch rugby for forced migrants in Rome

“…So yes, it is not important however … it has its effects, let's say (…) These comments suggest that mixed-gender touch rugby can generate opposite dynamics compared to other practices already studied in the literature, notably mixedsex combat sports. In fact, the latter can enable the 'undoing' of gender through participants' experiences that disconfirm sexist stereotypes within a practice which is intrinsically based on physical confrontation/collision, strength and aggression (Channon 2014). In our case, on the other hand, while touch rugby (or at least the way it is intended by Liberi Nantes' volunteers) is based on an inclusive and anti-sexist rhetoric that downplays or even denies the importance of differences in physical strength and condition, this can be disconfirmed by the actual experience of the female participants when playing against an all-male team composed of massive athletes used to physical collision.…”

“…So far, the benefits to women of involvement in mixed-sex sports have been explored only by a few studies that have investigated the 'undoing' of gender stereotypes (Channon 2014) either directly by focusing on women's empowerment or indirectly by concentrating on men's experience and the challenge to hegemonic masculinities (Channon 2013a(Channon , 2013bTagg 2008). The fact that several sport-for-development programmes provide mixed-sex activities despite the paucity of research and lack of evidence about their benefits suggests that such initiatives are often based on optimistic assumptions and pre-conceptions.…”

“…This sounds particularly limiting in the light of recent studies that have shown how mixed-sex sports can challenge the discourse of male dominance embedded in contemporary sport culture (Pringle 2005) by providing opportunities for unique and transformative experiences of embodied equality between male and female participants (Channon 2014).…”

The @UFC and third wave feminism? Who woulda thought? Gender, fighters, and framing on Twitter

“…However, the inclusion of women in the UFC does not come without issues, such as over-sexualisation and exploitation of female bodies. My research builds on the sports research of Channon [2014], Roth [2004], Basow [2004], and Jennings [2014], all of whom focus on the role of women's sport, specifically combat sports, in promoting social change. I add to their analysis by locating my research on the Twitter coverage of two hashtags, #Feminism and #UFC.…”

The promises and pitfalls of sex integration in sport and physical culture

“…Moreover, when women demonstrate an ability to compete with, or even defeat male opposition in sports which are typically not integrated, they stimulate reflection on otherwise entrenched beliefs about bodily capabilities, potentially inviting challenges to the sexist assumptions that all women are always athletically inferior to all men (McDonagh and Pappano 2008;Wachs 2005). Further still, when men and women face each other in traditionally male-dominated and deeply masculinized contexts, such as combat sports (Channon 2014;Fields 2005;Maclean 2015, in this volume;McNaughton 2012), ideas that all women are 'weak' and in need of protection from men's inevitably superior strength and power can be radically debunked. And if, as outlined above, we accept that notions of male athletic superiority often help underpin wider social constructions of male hegemony, then such challenges to these assumptions take on a clear symbolic importance (McDonagh and Pappano 2008).…”