Memo: The Media Image of Female Athlete

Gender classification is a predominant topic within today’s sports and is most broadly understood through the portrayals of sports media. Through overt and covert ways, sports media has continued to promote a masculine representation of sports (Millington & Wilson, 2010; Messener, Duncan, & Jensen, 1993). By understanding the way in which sports media portrays sports, one can recognize how masculinity has dominated the world of sports. With the aid of two unique studies of sports media, this paper will critique the way in which media has effected the gendered depiction of sports.

Women in professional sports fits into the Sex and Power: Global Gender Inequality class because many female athletes have experienced the inequalities in a professional sports setting. Female athletes are being put down by gender inequalities, causing less females participating in athletic programs. Women athletes are being paid less than their male counterparts. Along with being paid less, female and males are receiving unequal benefits in the form of scholarship, media coverage, transportation, and stadium conditions. The professional sport’s world is filled with the obsession of body image and sexuality. Through this obsession, female athletes have been abused from the people they trust the most. There is an increasing inequality in women’s professional sports in the form of pay, sexuality, and abuse.

The creation of Title IX in 1972 banned gender discrimination in schools nationwide, particularly in sports (Huffman 4). Without it, superstar female athletes such as Lisa Leslie, Mia Hamm, or the Williams sisters would not be internationally famous. They also would not have the media exposure they get in sports without Title IX. In addition to the few that were just named, media is focusing more and more on female athletes such as Michelle Wie and this year's winter Olympic silver medalist in figure skating, Sasha Cowen. In conjunction with the popularity of female athletes, Title IX has pushed for equality over the past three decades. In Suzanna Huffman's article from "Mass Communication and Society," it states that "Title IX has encouraged school administrators to work toward gender equity in athletic spending, and now many more women participate in college sports and earn college athletic scholarships than in years past" (4). Although this statement is generalized, it is close to the truth in today's culture among men and women. The impact that Title IX has bestowed on women has created a positive outcome. It is astonishing to see what one document in 1972 can do to increase equality for women, yet create so many controversies with it.

This article talked about the daunting unequal media coverage in sports of male sports teams in comparison to females.They researched the true differentiations of coverage between men and women sports. The actual percentage difference of coverage of male vs female sports discovered in their research truly is unfathomable. Men’s sports receive 96.3% of the airtime, women’s sports 1.6% and gender neutral topics were 2.1%. When you think back about twenty years ago and the coverage of media people tend to think that America is generally trending positively forward, however that is not the case for the coverage of women's athletics. It has actually gone down since then. Although on the scarce occasion that they are feature in the news, more often than not they are conveyed in the stereotypical way: as wives, girlfriends, or mothers. When media is highlighting these aspects instead of their talent, hard work or success it takes away from their image as an athlete and it demonstrating that it is acceptable to do so in society. However if male athlete achieved equal success and he was a father, that

Society has largely ignored and discriminated against female athletes. For a long time society portrayed female athletes as masculine, butch, and homosexual which has influenced the amount of women that choose to participate and excel in athletics. After noticing these problems, feminists attempted to reverse these trends and produce better opportunities for female athletes. By advocating for equal rights as well as pushing for legislation, they enabled women to use sports to improve their health, create new identities, and venture into male-dominated areas (Prakash, 1990). Because of this, Title IX was introduced to the world of sport. Title IX states that no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program

Within sport, as throughout society, gender differences exist. The socially constructed phenomenon of gender dictates a dichotomous system whereby females are feminine and males are masculine. Focusing on females specifically, society determines the feminine traits and roles ascribed to this gender. Being domesticated, slender, passive and heterosexual are a part of the desirable appearance that society has formed surrounding femininity (Wolf, 1991). On the other side of the dichotomy is the masculine realm that sport plays into. Sport is fuelled by muscle, power and aggressiveness, which are behaviours and images associated to masculinity. Sport therefore, defies all existing female gender ideals. It would be assumed that females have no place within this institution due to the gender clash. However, female athletes do exist, and many are very successful. For this to work, sport has established and reinforced the social constructions of gender that exist in society. Female athletes are viewed as inferior and are pushed into gender appropriate sports. Furthermore, they are often labeled as masculine until they can prove otherwise, and so great attempts are made to reassert femininity. The stigma associated to being masculine or homosexual for female athletes is so great that many have become irrationally fearful of this label. The sexualisation of the female body and overt displays of heterosexuality are used in

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 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 Cup

Male sports receive more recognition than female sports. “Additionally, in a study of four major newspapers--USA Today, the Boston Globe, the Orange County Register and the Dallas Morning news--women-only sports stories totaled just 3.5 percent of all sports stories.” (Collins Live Strong). Has one ever heard of Lisa Leslie, Kerri Walsh, or Chris Evert? Lisa Leslie is a WNBA basketball player. Kerri Walsh is a famous volleyball player for Team USA. Chris Evert is a tennis player. Has anyone heard of David Beckham, Derek Jeter, Eli Manning, Michael Jordan or Lebron James? Those well known names do not need any explanation. However, those female athletes have worked just as hard and have achieved so much for their team that they should receive just as much recognition. Whenever an individual searches through the sports section of a newspaper they are bombarded with news about male sports, but what about female sports? Mckenna Peterson is a twelve year old athlete who plays basketball. While she was reading the Dicks Sporting Goods Magazine, she realized that there were no female athletes featured in the magazine. “McKenna added in her letter that the only women featured in the catalog are sitting in the stands, or dressed as cheerleaders in the coupons” (Murray ABC). Editors of sports magazines need to take a closer look at their content and not be so discriminatory and realize that they could draw in female readers by including female athletes. Currently, it is so hard to imagine that a sports magazine would not feature female athletes along with male athletes. More people would run up to famous male athletes in public than famous female athletes. For example, more people would take notice of Derek Jeter than Jennie Finch if someone saw them in public. People are glued to their TV screens while watching

Today, sports are one of the biggest parts of our lives. Sunday night football has 64% of American?s sitting on their couch, rooting for their team. If anyone misses that, they have Monday and Tuesday night football to make it up. Besides football, which is the prominent headlight in this culture; sports like soccer, tennis, and basketball, sits close behind. However, most of these sports are linked with men; women are rarely thought of here. Women play these sports too, and do not receive the recognition that they deserve. These women athletes grew up facing oppression for the simple fact that they were women playing sports, yet they

Women’s equality is an issue that has been around for awhile. While women have been given many rights to increase equality, including the right to vote and go to college, the problem hasn’t completely vanished. One area that still sees this is in sports. Women’s sports do not draw nearly as many fans and are not covered in the media as much as men’s sports, pay differences between male and female athletes are large, and female athletes have to wait longer to start their professional career than men, which risks their professional career before it even starts.

Before I conducted this media analysis about women in sports and sport broadcasting, I hypothesized the obvious - that more male sports would be in the media, and that there would be more male sports broadcasters as well. Through my observations I did find that the sports arena and sports broadcasting sphere are male dominated. However, I also found that although there are not many stories about women, there has been a steady progression and magazines like Sports Illustrated are becoming bold enough to highlight women athletes in a magazine that is targeted towards a male audience. Although women still have a long way to go, they are making some headway into the male-dominated sports arena.

In sports there is huge gender inequality in the media with women athletes often only receiving attention for having good looks or the best body, rather than their athletic abilities. Men, however, don’t receive this attention and people only focus on their athletic prowess. This report will review and analyse two examples of how the media portrays different genders in accordance with the following question: “How does the media portray men and women in sport?

From the three network affiliates they studied, they found that 96.3 percent of the coverage was for men’s sports and women only received 1.6 percent (Messner and Cooky 4). When analyzing the coverage of Sports Center, which is arguably the most popular sports show on television, they found that women still only received just 1.4 percent of their coverage (4). This study also found that 100 percent of the Sports Center programs had a lead story that was about men’s sports (4). Even the most renowned and credible sports show, which only shows sports all year long, does not even provide women’s sports with equal attention. Even more shocking than this was that the study also revealed that reporters devoted more coverage to men’s sports that were out of season than they did women’s sports that were actually in season (4). This can be extremely disrespectful to female athletes when their sport is pushed aside and ignored so that a men’s sport that is not even being played can be covered by the media. These women put all their effort into performing their sport at the highest level, but their media attention gets replaced by men who are in their off-season.

In the last one hundred years women have made tremendous inroads in many facets of life. Of that there can be little doubt. Women may now hold jobs, own property and participate in professional sports. Today women can compete in sports, once a vestige of male domination; there is now room for women in that arena. But even today women in sports are not portrayed in the same light as their male counterparts. To a large degree this is because of today's cultural ideal of women.

Similarly women are receiving less attention and media coverage than men. When someone puts on the television and turns on a sports game, it is most likely going to be a men’s sport. Even when females get their coverage, the commentators are usually talking about their body rather than their skill. In an article, “Examination of Gender Equality and Female Participation in Sport” by Joshua A. Senne, he talks about how women are referred by their appearance rather than their skill. During a study about the media, the commentators mostly talked about the women’s hair, make-up, and body figure, rather than their ability. This also occurred after the 1996 summer Olympics, where there was a lack of promotion for female athletes and the marketing of women’s sports. These athletes were also only recognized by their physical appearance instead of their ability. The tone of these broadcasters was proved in a study that men 's events were the standard in the society rather than the women’s. They would list the event as “other” rather than saying it is a women’s sport. In the study that was conducted, it states that the gender marketing showed that the woman sports were marked as “other” on an average of 27.5 times, but it 's never happened in the men’s sporting events (Senne). There is still coverage of women 's sports, but it rarely covered. The title IX project made a pie chart about the comparison of men’s and women’s sports media coverage on the show SportsCenter on