The Importance Of Women's Sports

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Recommended: Women’s media coverage in sports

Have you ever watched a Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) or even attended a women’s sporting event? What if you were an achieved athlete and you never received the media attention you deserve? Today’s sports media is clearly dominated by male athletes, consequently female athletes get minimal recognition in the media for their athletic achievements. The media plays a significant role in influencing our ideas, values, and attitudes toward specific subjects. In today’s media, female athletes are continually sexualized and objectified, whereas male athletes are shown to have strength and power; to correct this problem society can take many steps including empowering young girls to play sports and encouraging media to cover women’s sports more often.
Title IX was a federal civil rights legislation passed in 1972 that leveled the playing field for females seeking to participate in organized sports. The law forced educational institutions to allow girls and women equal access to school sports and facilities (Kane 99). Before Title IX society had questioned if it was okay for women to participate in organized sports in educational institutions. Title IX was a groundbreaking law to all women because it gave them hope that they can participate in sports without being questioned if it was culturally appropriate to participate in athletics. Mary Jo Kane, a researcher and advocate for women’s sports, states in defense of Title IX “In one generation we’ve gone from girls hoping that there is a team, to hoping they make the team” (103). Though Title IX did not completely level the playing for female athletes, but it did make a significant impact over a course of four decades. According to the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) i...

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...ooky. "Gender in Televised Sports: News and Highlights Shows, 1989-2000." Sociology of Sport Journal 27.2 (2010): 139-59. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 16 July 2014.
O'Reilly, Jean. "The Women's Sports Film as the New Melodrama." Women and Sports in the United States: A Documentary Reader. Boston: Northeastern UP, 2007. 283-97. EBook Collection. Web. 14 July 2014.
Weber, Jonetta D., and Robert M. Carini. "Where are the Female Athletes in Sports Illustrated? A Content Analysis of Covers (2000-2011)." International Review for the Sociology of Sport 48.2 (2013): 196-203. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 9 July 2014.
Whiteside, Erin, and Marie Hardin. "Women (Not) Watching Women: Leisure Time, Television and Implications for Televised Coverage of Women's Sports." Communication, Culture & Critique 4.2 (2011): 122-43. Communication and Mass Media Complete. Web. 15 July 2014.

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