The United State’s Women’s Soccer Team lawsuit case has been in the media for the past few months. Five players from the national soccer team has filed an equal pay lawsuit against the federation of soccer. The five players were Hope Solo, Carli Lloyd, Becky Sauerbrunn, Megan Rapinoe, and Alex Morgan. The national women’s team makes significantly less money than the men’s team. This story has been covered on many different media outlets in many different ways. To analyze the media coverage of this story, I am going to use the reading ‘sport’ method that is highlighted in Susan Birrell’s and Mary G. McDonald’s article, Reading Sport Critically: A Methodology for Interrogating Power. I am going to identify ideologies presented in the series …show more content…
Kian, Michael Mondello, and John Vincent. This was a study done to examine print-media portrayals of men and women’s basketball teams as well as their players and coaches in the 2006 NCAA Division I tournaments. I used this in my research to look for the deeper meanings for the media involved in the lawsuit. My results found six dominant themes that emerged from this study. First, the men’s tournament was frequently referenced during the women’s coverage. Female players were being compared to male players as if the perception was that male players were physically superior. This theme is something that I noticed when reading some of the soccer articles. Most of the women’s skills were compared to those of a male. They were compared to show their strength. Next was the idea that female players gain their toughness and work ethic from playing with boys and getting coached by older men. This looks at the ways that players develop from youth level to college. When doing background research on the five players involved in the lawsuit, I found that at least in one point of their lives they were in fact, coached by men. The third theme based on the classic notion of “First football, then men’s basketball, and then everything else,” (Kian, Mondello, & Vincent, 2008). These ideas have been conditioning American society to associate masculinity to these two sports. I found this contradicting to most of the media I found. Most of the articles, I read saw soccer as masculine rather than feminine. It’s not just football and basketball. Another theme is athletic or supportive fathers who become newsworthy in their guidance. I didn’t find articles about any of the five women’s fathers. Fifth is the lack of attention received by African American women compared to men. The last theme was the lack of explicit reference to the gay and lesbian community.
Therefore, the women participating in such arduous sports breaks the normative ideas of what it means to be a women and what activities she can participate in. In contrast, for those women who do carry on tasks that are typically seen as masculine, are valued less, have less recognition, and their prestige and income tend to decline compared to their male counterparts (Johnson, 1997). Interestingly, when one types “soccer team” on google, the first thing to show up is the Unites States Men’s National Soccer Team. One has to explicitly type “women” in front of soccer. This shows the lack of acknowledgement of the women’s soccer team compared to their male counterparts. If the men’s soccer team is credited significantly more than the women’s soccer team, then the male representation is made more palpable in media with a greater screen time, thus bolstering their reputation and popularity and resulting in increase in pay from the soccer
In 1991 there was so little media interest in the event, almost no one even knew the United States had a team, and even less people knew that the United States won. Eight years later, “tickets sales reached 388,000,” more than triple the amount of sales in the 1995 Women’s World Cup (Longman). FIFA was depending on this World Cup to gain popularity, they needed more interest to spark people to play. If the United States had not won, it was predicted that not many in the suburban would not have much interest in soccer. Millions of young girls across the United States came to this event. After the World Cup it “will celebrate the explosive growth of soccer for women in the United States, where 7.5 million female players are registered, according to a recent survey by the Soccer Industry Council of America, a trade group. In suburbia, where the game flourishes, girls' soccer has become as popular as sport utility vehicles” (Longman). This World Cup team changed the perspective that soccer was only for males. “‘ We're fighting the myths and prejudices that women's soccer felt in the U.S. in the 70's,'' said Andrea Rodebaugh… 'That there are sports for boys and sports for girls and that soccer is not for girls, not feminine’” (Longman). This team changed the lives for many girls. The team gave little girls hope and faith they could make it in soccer. This team made them believe they could follow their passions.
In any movement by a marginalized social group to gain equal rights and recognition, there are always several factions with differing opinions of the best way to achieve the common goal. There are those who choose to work within the rules of the system as is it is already structured by the dominant social group, and there are those who choose to create their own branch, rewriting the rules to represent their own philosophies. Historically, women's athletics have been led by the second camp; by women who demanded a philosophy of sport with a vision unique from that of men?s athletics. Women's athletics remained, much like women as a social group, in its own separate sphere, leading its own organizational structure. But as the women's sphere was de-mystified (Spears, 1978) in the mid twentieth century, autonomous organizational structures were absorbed under the umbrella of formerly exclusively male athletics. This is the case as illustrated by the merger of the AIAW and the NCAA.
In the first article “Distributive Justice in Intercollegiate Athletics: Perceptions of Athletic Directors and Athletic Board Chairs”, Harold Reimer, Daniel Mahony and Mary Hums, discusses how people think of an athletic director. The second article “Systemic
Traditionally men have dominated the world of sports however in recent year’s women’s sports have become popular and with their new found popularity, women’s sports have evolved into marketable leagues of their own. Although women’s sports took a huge leap forward, women players still don’t receive the same financial compensation for playing the same sports in the same arenas as their male counterparts. In Purse Snatching by Donna Lopiano, she points out sexism may have a huge effect on this financial discrepancy between women and men athletes. Analyzing sports economics may point to a different reason why women are receiving such a compensation disparity. Women sports have come a long way, since the days when women were only allowed to watch.
In 1970 only 1 in 27 girls participated in high school sports, today that ratio is 1 in 3. Sports are a very important part of the American society. Within sports, heroes are made, goals are set and dreams are lived. The media makes all these things possible by creating publicity for the rising stars of today. Within society today, the media has downplayed the role of the woman within sports.
...ennis, basketball, soccer, and martial arts—have come from the days of cheerleading and synchronized swimming when she was growing up in the ’70s.” Disparities in media coverage and over-sexualized female athletes on magazine covers is something that needs to come to an end because of its effects on both male and female viewers, young and old, athletes and non-athletes. Both female and male athletics influence young people and shape their personality and morals as they mature. Retired WNBA player, Lisa Leslie credits her participation in basketball with shaping her character, as well as her career. “Sports can also help teenagers during an awkward time in their development.” (“Women’s Athletics: A Battle For Respect”). The solution is to come together as a society and identify how to balance the respect for female and male athletes in the media.
Unintentionally, a lot of us have been boxed into institutions that promote gender inequality. Even though this was more prominent decades ago, we still see how prevalent it is in today’s world. According to the authors of the book, Gender: Ideas, Interactions, Institutions, Lisa Wade and Myra Marx Ferree define gendered institutions as “the one in which gender is used as an organizing principle” (Wade and Ferree, 167). A great example of such a gendered institution is the sports industry. Specifically in this industry, we see how men and women are separated and often differently valued into social spaces or activities and in return often unequal consequences. This paper will discuss the stigma of sports, how gender is used to separate athletes, and also what we can learn from sports at Iowa State.
Gender discrimination is prominent in every industry, but it is as though the sport industry is one of the worst. Women in the work force currently receive only 80 cents to every man’s dollar (Holmes, 2016). However, female athletes both in America and internationally receive a far lesser compensation for their attributes. The only difference of the sports being played is who plays them. There should be no reason why a male athlete receives better pay simply because he had a 50% chance of being born a man. At birth, no one controls the gender, but as they grow and mature, they control their personality and development. Payment should be on personal skills and not gender. As a female STHM student focusing on sport management and a former athlete,
It has taken many years for women to gain a semblance of equality in sports. Throughout history, women have been both excluded from playing sports and discriminated against in sports. Men’s sports have always dominated the college athletic field, but women were finally given a fighting chance after Title IX was passed. Title IX, among other things, requires scholarships to be equally proportioned between men and women’s sports. Although this was a huge gain for women, gender inequality still exists in sports today. An example of this persisting inequality can be seen when looking at men’s baseball and women’s softball. In college, baseball and softball are both major NCAA sports. It is widely accepted throughout today’s society that baseball is a man’s sport, and softball is a woman’s sport. Very few people question why the two sexes are separated into two different sports, or wonder why women play softball instead of baseball. Fewer people know that women have been essentially excluded from playing baseball for a long time. This paper will focus on why softball has not changed the way women’s basketball has, why women continue to play softball, the possibilities and dynamics of women playing baseball with and without men, and the most discriminating aspect of women being banned from playing professional baseball.
The discrepancies in media coverage in coverage of female and children athletics have large gaps, but are gaining momentum in sharing equality. Major athletic leagues such as the NBA and FIFA World Cup have wide gaps in marketing and ratings for their male and female athletes. Children are future athletes and superstars, but as funding and coverage in athletics caters to the males, women are breaking the barriers to being in the spotlight of sport. Both genders contribute equally to athletics, and challenge the each other to accept new ideas and change. The sports world that has a single gender dominating the media is unjust.
Media plays a large role in affecting peoples thinking, opinions, ideas, etc. In essence media can shape our thinking into negative views and perspectives that are typically not true. Sometimes the media plays as a puppet master to society. Specifically, the inequity of the gender roles within sports causes for a stir in commotion that calls for some attention. In doing so the inadequate misuse of media towards women in sports causes low exposure, amongst many other things. On the other hand their male counterparts are on the other end of the success spectrum. Because of this noticeable difference, it is vital that action is taken place to level out equality within sports. Due to the power of media, it is believed that a change in media coverage
Sports, in general, are a male dominated activity; every “real” male is suppose to be interested and/or involved in sports in the American society. However, it is not expected of a female to be interested in sports and there is less pressure on them to participate in physically enduring activities. These roles reflect the traditional gender roles imposed on our society that men are supposed to be stronger and dominant and females are expected to be submissive. As Michael Kimmel further analyzes these gender roles by relating that, “feminism also observes that men, as a group, are in power. Thus with the same symmetry, feminism has tended to assume that individually men must feel powerful” (106).
The sport of soccer has overcome many changes through the years. In particular, women’s soccer compared to men’s soccer has gained much notoriety. The widespread knowledge of soccer has spread throughout numerous countries. Soccer began as primarily a men’s sport, but today soccer is considered a sport that both genders participate in. Women’s soccer has changed dramatically over the years with the increase in popularity as well as new style and rules of the game.
Whether its baseball, basketball, soccer, hockey, or tennis, sports is seen all over the world as a representation of one’s pride for their city, country, and even continent. Sports is something that is valued world-wide which has the ability to bring communities together and create different meanings, beliefs and practices between individuals. Although many people may perceive sports to have a significant meaning within our lives, it can also have the ability to separate people through gender inequalities which can also be represented negatively throughout the media. This essay will attempt to prove how gender is constructed in the sports culture while focusing on female athletes and their acceptance in today’s society.