The Role Of Gender In Sports

Social class is another aspect of their lives that people use to identify themselves and others. Social class is determined by "wealth, education, occupation, income, family and social connections" (notes page). Social and class relations not only add to the identity of an individual, but also what access they will have to supports and services such as medical care, education, sport and recreation and housing. Those higher up in social class will have greater access to supports and services when compared to those individuals who fall into the lower end of class.

Another aspect of identity that can limit or increase the exposure to supports and services in society is gender relations. An individual 's gender plays a large part in their accessibility to sports and recreation. This is due to gender logic, which is

Although this is an issue that is slowly being faded out of society, gender discrimination is still present. Gender is defined as the "socio-cultural construction of masculine and feminine characteristics" (NOTES). Those who are marginalized by society tend to be excluded from the community and are expected to follow society 's norms. Gender ideology plays a large role in society 's views of gender. Generally, in sports society has its own certain norms and expectations of its population, one major example in sport is the media coverage of sports games and events. The majority of sporting events shown in the media are of male-dominated sport such as hockey, football, and basketball. Yet there isn 't much media attention on women in sport. A prime example of the lack of support for women in sport is the Olympic Games, in the 1908 London games, there was only 2% of female athletes. Although this number has increased drastically over the last century, there is still a disproportionate number of male to female athletes competing in today 's sporting