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More handpicked essays just for you.
Problems with gender in sports
Effects of sport gender inequality
Discrimination in a society
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Women face discrimination in different spheres of society and the feminist movements across the globe have fought tooth and nail against this. Sports is one such sphere where women are slowly coming up and are aiming to be at par with men. Nicole Hoevertsz at the UN: “Sport can help break down barriers and challenge gender norms”1. Olympics, the biggest sports event has seen gradual increase in women participation which reached to 45% in Rio 2016 Olympics2. Such a positive change assisting women athletes to breakdown gender specific stereotypes and bringing confidence to showcase their skills and abilities without the fear of being judged by others in sports. But on the other hand, advertisements undermine the player’s achievement by sexualizing them, hyper feminizing them
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These Ads create gaps between the real image of athletes and what is being portrayed to the audience. A study shows, television network in U.S.A. give 1.6% of airtime to women’s sports4. Also, in Olympics some sports like rhythmic gymnastics and synchronized swimming which are specifically for women and demand lots of strength & hard work are unfortunately overpowered by beautiful decorative clothes and glitches5. The name used is pretty women in pretty sports. To challenge such stereotypes, an ad campaign was launched in January 2015 to create awareness about gender differences in participation of sports in U.K. & backed by Sport England, a non-departmental public body briefed to build and support grassroots sport, by working with national governing bodies of sport. “The research was done on 13 million women & data shows 75% of women want to do more sport, so the question was: why aren’t they doing so?” The major reason found out was “fear of judgment” -on their ability (or not). So the agency set out to create a campaign to give women the confidence to go out and do sport6. The ad gave a clear message, to get women & girls moving,
The Dick’s Sporting Goods commercial was ranked number 9 in the most effective commericals. The commercial shows the different struggles that athletes in training face for the USA Olympics. The audience for this commercial is intended for both genders. Although the stereotype is that sports are usually for males, this commercial has a fair representation of both male and female athletes. Many of the female athletes shown are training in hard sports such as boxing and lifting weights. This commercial also included disabled male and female athletes which can also serve to be another audience. This commercial was promoting Dick’s Sporting Good athletic attire. The advertiser did not include an unequal representation of genders, also the commercial didn’t use gender stereotypes to please the audience.
Common sense seems to dictate that commercials just advertise products. But in reality, advertising is a multi-headed beast that targets specific genders, races, ages, etc. In “Men’s Men & Women’s Women”, author Steve Craig focuses on one head of the beast: gender. Craig suggests that, “Advertisers . . . portray different images to men and women in order to exploit the different deep seated motivations and anxieties connected to gender identity.” In other words, advertisers manipulate consumers’ fantasies to sell their product. In this essay, I will be analyzing four different commercials that focuses on appealing to specific genders.
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. When the American people think of women in sports, they think of ice skating, field hockey and diving. People don’t recognize that women have the potential to play any sport that a Man can play, with equal skill, if not better.
To deepen our understanding of the cultural values embedded in sports and to explore current values and power structures regarding men and women, it is necessary to investigate the effect that the media may possibly have in influencing beliefs about gender-appropriate sport behavior. The media is a powerful factor which influences our beliefs, attitudes, and the values we have of ourselves and others, as well as the world surrounding us. It seems that the televised coverage of athletics continues to reinforce the ongoing division between males and females, and to reproduce traditional expectations regarding femininity and masculinity. One is able to witness the biased attitude directed toward the individual who attempts to participate in a sport that is non-traditional to his/her gender. Figure skating, for example, has been dominated for many years by women.
In recordings, percentages have shown that men’s sporting commercials have taken over with ninety-six percent of the overall sports commercials; this leaves women with two percent and neutral with the other two. Therefore, women are not being promoted as much as men. Gender equality has been proven to be a major setback to the promotion of women’s sports; this must be changed. Men and women’s sporting advertisements should both be set equal to each other. Not only does this help women advertise more and show what they are really made of, but it can also raise paychecks to media casters.
-The 2012 London Summer Olympics Games follow this modern trend in sports media, and had a tendency to project hegemonic gender and femininity standards onto society. Showing some major differences between female and male sports commentary.
“The past three decades have witnessed a steady growth in women's sports programs in America along with a remarkable increase in the number of women athletes (Daniel Frankl 2)” From an early age women were thought to be “Lady Like”; they are told not to get all sweaty and dirty. Over 200 years since Maud Watson stepped on the tennis courts of Wimbledon (Sports Media Digest 3); women now compete in all types and levels of sports from softball to National racing. Soccer fans saw Mia Hamm become the face of women’s soccer around the world, Venus and Serena Williams are two of the most popular figures in tennis, and Indy car racing had their first woman racer, Danika Patrick. With all the fame generated by these women in their respective sports, they still don’t receive the same compensation as the men in their respective sports fields.
In almost all the movies we have seen, the women go through a series of changes as they grow older. They might or might not choose to continue with their sport (although movies are usually shy of showing women who actually choose to abandon a blossoming sports career in favour of something more 'socially acceptable'). However, when we first meet the female heroine in almost all the movies, she is a young tomboy. The figures of Jess in 'Bend It Like Beckham' or Monica in 'Love and Basketball' are remarkably similar as children. They both wear boyish clothes, shun typically girly clothing, and prefer to spend their time with boys. Of course, the movies make it amply clear that these girls only want to play sports with the boys – they have no sexual interest in them. In 'Bend It Like Beckham', for example, Jess is clearly contrasted with the other Indian girls who watch the local boys playing football not because they like the game but because they want to see the boys with their shirts off. Even in 'Love and Basketball', Monica loves Quincy, but she never lets him see that until after prom night; before then, they are simply neighbours, friends and ballplayers. Even in a movie like 'Remember the Titans', which has no clear female protagonist, the little girl is shown hanging around boys all the time with her father, but she too has no interest in them except as sportsmen.
Female athletes, unlike males, are not always portrayed exclusively as performance athletes, instead attention is placed on sex appeal usually overshadowing their on-field accomplishments. Unfortunately female sports, like male sports, are directed primarily to a male audience, the media commonly use marketing techniques which involve sexualisation of the female bodies under a male gaze (Bremner, 2002). The idea that “sex sells” is used to generate viewers and followers of female sport.
History is a predominant influence on the sporting culture of Australia. Throughout history sport has been viewed mainly as a manly pursuit, it was believed that competing in physical activity displayed masculine qualities (Hede, C 2010). Despite it being a woman’s right to compete in these “masculine” sporting activities they were restricted, just like men are today with competing in the “female” sports due to the social construction that the Australian culture has built for our community. Since the introduction of synchronised swimming it was promoted as a more feminist sport and still continues to be the current perception today. The media encourages the concern of gender equality regarding this sport by promoting the sport with more feminine branding.
To sum up, it is often said that advertising is shaping women gender identity, and some have been argued that the statement is true, because of the higher amount of sexual references of women that advertisement show and the damages that occur on women’s personality and the public negative opinions of those women. As well, the negative effects that those kinds of advertisements cause to young generations and make them feel like they should simulate such things and are proud of what they are doing because famous actors are posting their pictures that way. Others deem this case as a personal freedom and absolutely unrelated to shaping women gender identity. On the contrast, they believe that, those sorts of advertisements are seriously teaching women how to stay healthy and be attractive, so they might have self-satisfaction after all.
In some ways, women today face more pressure to be perfect than ever before in history. The feminine ideal of the past has been replaced by a new face — stronger and more independent, but under no less pressure to conform to society's expectations than her predecessors. Today's woman must be all that she was in the past, and more. In addition to being beautiful, feminine, and demure, she must also be physically fit and academically and socially successful. It is no longer appropriate for a woman to depend on anyone, for that would imply subordinance and inferiority. Instead, woman must fill all of these roles on her own. Although achieving independence is an important step for women, it brings added pressure. This is especially visible in films about women in sport. These women experience these pressures at an intense level. They are expected to be phenomenal athletes, and are not held to a lower standard than men. However, they must also be beautiful — if they are not, they face the possibility of discrimination. Added to this is the pressure that they are representative of the entire gender. Films about women in sports show the intense pressure on female athletes to fulfill all aspects of the ideal woman.
National and local television networks stations usually broadcasts many hours of sport coverage each year to millions of viewer worldwide. However, it usually fails to cover women that have been engaged in the sports activities and this reflects the way women are treated in the society. Messner, (1992) asserts that women and girls are the majority of the population and most of them tend to love sports. Some scholars believe that because of the marginalization of women in the sport department the coverage of their sports is limited (Michael, Warren and Paul, 2003).
From January 1997 to December 2008, only 38 of 676 Sport’s Illustrated issues featured women on the front cover (Women’s Sports Foundation, 2009). Of those 38 covers, 6 of them had the women as part of a larger feature story and 12 of them were models for Sport’s Illustrated infamous swimsuit issue (see Figure 1.2). Though some argue that all exposure to women’ sports is good exposure, the media’s sexualisation of female athletes does not garner any more respect for the sport. When the Tucker Centre for Research on Girls & Women in Sport surveyed two different age groups of two different genders, majority of the people said that photos of competent female athletes draws their interest in the sport in comparison to sexualized athletes. Men from ages 14-33, the group that reported the highest response to soft porn images of female athletes, said that the photos only drew their attention to the woman, not the sport.
Although women have been accepted within the participation in sports and physical activity, there is still constant controversy surrounding the topic of whether or not female sports can be “considered a ‘real’ sport” (Hall, M. Ann, 2007, pg. 56) or if the female participants can be “viewed as ‘real’ women” (Hall, M. Ann, 2007, pg. 56). This is due to the fact that sports and physical activity has invariably been viewed as strictly for males, to aid in validating their masculinity. It is constantly vocalized that sports considered to be ‘feminine’ ones such as