Football appears to be the sport that omits women the most. These days, we, as women, have our own sports leagues softball, baseball, and basketball. However football constantly focused on men and them being praised by cheerleaders, but this no longer holds true. The Legends Football League began in 2009 as a ladies’ tackle football league. The women are enthusiastic and passionate in regards to the sport and they play in NFL professional arenas and stadiums during the spring and summertime. In many ways the LFL appears to be a feminist triumph being that it gives women the chance to participate in a football league at an extraordinary level and seems to be a stride in the direction of egalitarianism. The coaches of the LFL are former NFL …show more content…
The Lingerie Football League name has been changed from to the Legends Football League and its slogan to “Women of the Gridiron” in 2013.The uniforms have also been changed and improved to performance wear. The uniform change, according to the league’s founder, was to empower the women and to shift additional attention to the sport rather than the objectification of the women. Even though the uniforms remain a little bit revealing, they seem to provide the athletes the chance to own their appeal, which does work to counter the typecast of women athletes as extra mannish and unappealing. Likewise, it is indubitable that the LFL has given women the chance to partake in football whatsoever and that should not be disregarded. Hopefully, the LFL will keep changing and facilitating more progressive and actual feminist change. When women began to become more involved in sports (like playing basketball, for example), they wore miniskirts, but now, there is the WNBA which the players are fully clothed basketball shorts and jerseys. Other sports like volleyball and track also have very revealing uniforms. Women’s sports are still somewhat young and though there are many enhancements to be made, the current league deserve some credit for initiating the determination to get women
For example, “I wanted to ask him why, when the NFL’s always talking about growing their audience and penetrating new markets, why would he not consider a larger suspension for Ray Rice to send the message to the untapped market of female fans that the NFL actually cares about them,” says Kate Nolan. Furthermore, in Lipsyte’s article it mentioned that women are one-hundred percent included in being part of a winning team. “The drive to feel that sense of belonging that comes with being part of a winning team- as athlete, coach, parent, cheerleader, booster, fan-is a reflection of Jock Culture’s grip on the male psyche and on more and more women,” says Lipsyte. In Nolan’s article, women can only be involved in certain things like reading headlines, assisting their male colleagues with sports-related issues, and guarding the sidelines.
Turn on ESPN, and there are many female sports reporters, and many reports on female athletes. Flip through Sports Illustrated, and female athletes are dotted throughout the magazine. Female athletes star in the commercials. Female athletes are on the cover of newspapers. Millions of books have been sold about hundreds of female athletes. However, this has not always been the case. The number of females playing sports nowadays compared to even twenty years ago is staggering, and the number just keeps rising. All the women athletes of today have people and events from past generations that inspired them, like Babe Didrikson Zaharias, the All-American Professional Girls Baseball League, Billie Jean King, and the 1999 United States Women’s World
The following commissioned report was compiled for the Health Studies Faculty of Brisbane Girls Grammar. The purpose of this report is to evaluate the nature of women’s sport, not only in society, but also at the Brisbane Girls Grammar School.
... As an organization born in the Progressive Era, this would not have been a concern for these women who gained their own power by emphasizing the elevated moral code and motherly qualities that are distinctly female. The Women’s Trade Union League was an important chapter in the Labor Movement that was run entirely by women and placed the needs of the working women of the United States above all else. A large percentage of the population of workingwomen was made up of young girls and immigrants who were exploited at the hands of rapid industrialization and endured cruel working conditions in order to survive. Their attempts to promote their needs through organization into unions enjoyed limited success but not enough to keep the League from shifting their focus after the World War to a more legislative process in order to try to have a larger effect and promote nationwide change.
To understand the significance of the league (which will further be referred to as the AAGPBL) you must first have an understanding of the role of women in society at this time. Post World War II, women had a very slight role in anything not concerning domestic issues. Public figures and decision-makers were male, and very few women were involved in anything having to with business or politics. Women were expected to be ladylike and well mannered at all times. Because of these factors it was rare to find a woman involved in any type of sport, especially those dominated by males.
Women don’t receive the spotlight in sports very often. Usually, the men in baseball, football, basketball, and soccer have higher salaries and are paid attention to more. This wasn’t the case with a special league of female baseball players. These ladies sparked a thought in peoples’ heads in the mid 20th-century. Could women really play a professional sport instead of staying home to do the housework? From 1943-1954, women in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League helped to change the rights women were believed to have in society and in the workplace as they began playing a professional sport as a form of entertainment. Men, who would usually fulfill this role, were drafted into the military with the responsibility to serve during the war. The AAGPBL quickly became a world-winning group of women athletes and kept baseball and peoples' hopes alive during a time of weakness in American history.
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.
Facts show thats football is one of the top ten sports females play and about 151,000 of them play football every week.
“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.
Throughout history, women have had to struggle for equality in all elements of our society, but no where have they had a more difficult time than in the area of athletics. Sports is a right of passage that has always been grafted to boys and men. The time has come for our society to accept women athletes and give them the attention they deserve.
Gender in sports has been a controversial issue ever since sports were invented. In the early years, sports were played only by the men, and the women were to sit on the sidelines and watch. This was another area of life exemplifying the sexism of people in which women were not allowed to do something that men could. However, over the last century in particular, things have begun to change.
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.
For most of human history, athletic competition has been regarded as an exclusively masculine affair. Women weren't aloud to watch most sporting events let alone participate in them. Not till late 19th century did women really begin participating in sporting events. Although women were permitted to participate in many sports, relatively few showed interest, for a variety of social and psychological reasons that are still poorly understood. Title IX declares: "No person in the U.S. shall, on the basis of sex be excluded from participation in, or denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving federal aid." Therefore sex should not deem females athletic ability as inferior in comparison to men. Women are physically, mentally, and emotionally capable of playing any sport just as men are.
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.
Gender equality in sports is still an issue that will be dealt with many years to come. Great advancement has been made through history and accomplishments did not go unnoticed. There is the fear that Title IX, with time will not be as strong or it might be ignored with time. But it is also a powerful weapon that can be used in the legal system to make sure women have their rights protected and saved. We can say that female athletes have enjoyed the fruits of this law to provide them with confidence and empowerment. Although, some women athletes will still face adversity because of racism and ignorance, but looking back at the past decades the fight for gender equality is well worth the fight and determination.