One Of The Girls Heywood Summary

“One of the Girls” by Leslie Heywood
There are many “first frontiers” for women. There has been the first female doctor, mathematician, astronaut, scientist, and nobel prize winner. The first female novelist, CEO, Senator, Supreme Court Justice, and PhD. Each of these women have changed the way females are perceived around the world, and have paved the way for women in each of their fields. In her essay “One of the Girls” Leslie Heywood explores the idea that the first female athletes are just as important as these other “first” women.
In 1826 Gertrude Ederle swam the English channel two hours faster than all the men who preceded her. In 1967 Kathrine Switzer ran the Boston Marathon disguised as a man, because females were not allowed to run.

In 1972 Title IX of the Education Act of 1972 made gender discrimination illegal, and allowed millions of girls to play sports and be athletes. These three events mean nothing to a majority of the world, but for American female athletes, they make all the difference. They give girls a chance to be athletes, not just ‘pretty girls’. They give girls a chance to discover parts of themselves they never would have at home or in a classroom. They give girls a chance to throw off the labels society has given them, and enable them to make their own definitions. As Heywood put it, “No more female incompetence and physical weakness, you throw like a girl, no girls allowed, why don’t you just go home. Not now, excuse me. Stepping out.”
Moreover, Heywood is perfectly willing to discuss the problems female athletes still have.

There is finesse to her arguments, but they are not subtle. They do not need to be. They have the benefit of being right, the history of countless female athletes backing them, and the self assuredness from this to know that sometimes, you cannot simply press a point. You must hit it with a hammer. And that's what Heywood, her essay, and Title IX all do. In A world where the “female athlete triad” (eating disorders, exercise compulsion, and amenorrhea) are alive and well, female athletes need to know that they do not need to compete against themselves and their friends. It is enough to compete against the rest of the world. Heywood, as an athlete who experienced the female athlete triad, feels that she missed out on the true benefits of sports. Friendship, teamwork, and most importantly, “what the books call self esteem: feeling the warm sun on your face, walking across the field like a giant, feeling that just for a moment, the world belongs to you.” The fight to allow females to compete in sports has been won. Now, there is a new fight. To teach females in sports that they do not have to crush everyone else, to knock everyone else to the ground so they can be the one left standing. The new frontier for females will be an athlete who loves her sport, wants to win, and gives it her all, but doesn’t have to destroy herself or anyone else to do

so.