Sports and Gender

In ihrem Beitrag „Zwischenräume – die Sportumkleide als Raum praktischer Geschlechterpolitik im Sport“ rahmt Corinna Schmechel beobachtbare Praktiken in geschlechtersegregierten Sport-Umkleideräumen raum-, emotions- wie auch geschlechtertheoretisch. Indem die Autor*in Umkleide-Strukturpraktiken queerer Sportkontexte anhand von Interviewmaterial und Feldbeobachtungen auf deren Potentiale sowie auf deren Grenzen für In- und Exklusionsprozesse hin analysiert, verdeutlicht sie die Relevanz sozialer Prozesse in Sport-Umkleideräumen für die Partizipation von LGBTI*-Personen im Sport.

In this study we explored the experience of competing in the Senior Games and the resultant contributions to the successful aging of older adults. We used in-depth interviews with older adults who participated in the National Senior Games. Analysis of the data produced five central themes: (a) perseverance, (b) career development and significant effort, (c) personal and social benefits, (d) unique ethos, and (e) identification as a senior athlete. We found that participating in the Senior Games as a form of serious leisure enhanced the well-being of older adults and could be utilized as a means by which to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Resumo: A Educação Física adentrou as escolas, no século XIX, propagando ideais de eugenia e militarismo, voltada, inicialmente, apenas aos meninos. Um padrão hegemônico de masculinidade, com vistas a torná-los fortes e robustos, era imposto nas aulas, ao mesmo tempo em que discursos se contrapunham à sua prática nas escolas. Apresentando relatos historiográficos, tendo como base as noções de masculinidade hegemônica, de Connell, e gênero performativo, em Butler, busco compreender e discutir diferentes performances de masculinidades na História da Educação Física.
Palavras-chave: Masculinidades; Educação Física; Performatividade

This paper investigates whether male soccer tradition can predict the success of female soccer. Different from the existing literature, this paper utilizes panel data covering
175 countries during the 1991-2011 period, capturing country heterogeneity effects and time trends. An instrumental variable approach is further employed in order to identify causal relation. My findings do not support the widespread perception that male tradition determines female soccer attainments. On the other hand, my results indicate that women’s empowerment can be a driving force for the success of female soccer.

U tekstu se predlaže teza da je bavljenje konjičkim sportom u razvijenim zemljama Zapada postalo novom frontom rodnog (feminističkog) dokazivanja. Unatoč maskulinosti obilježava sferu rada (i zarađivanja) s konjima, nekoliko povijesnih fenomena ilustrira da su žene u istoj domeni pokušavale konkurirati muškarcima. Jesu li prve emancipirane žene (preteča feministkinjama) bile upravo - konjarke i jahačice?

Obwohl sich Männer im Allgemeinen stärker für Fußball interessieren als Frauen, verfolgen Frauen die Spiele bei Fußballgroßereignissen wie Welt- oder Europameisterschaften mittlerweile genauso begeistert wie Männer. Was aber sind die Gründe für die Fußballrezeption bei Frauen und Männern? Diese explorative Studie untersucht die Intensität und den Verlauf von Rezeptionsmotiven während der Fußballeuropameisterschaft 2012 anhand von 904 Teilnehmerinnen einer Online-Befragung und analysiert dabei Unterschiede zwischen Männern und Frauen. Es lassen sich die vier Rezeptionsmotivfaktoren Mitfiebern, Information, Neugier auf Fußballteams und Erwartetes Konfliktpotenzial ermitteln. Im Turnierverlauf bleiben die Intensität dieser Motive konstant, jedoch zeigen sich bedeutsame Unterschiede zwischen Männern und Frauen, selbst bei gleich starkem Fußballinteresse.

This essay is based on ongoing ethnographic research on southern Brazilian equestrian cultures.  With certain characteristics that enable us to refer to it as 'multi-sited ethnography'  - its interconnected research sites include rodeos and organized rides, as well as the spaces of daily work and leisure in the cabanha -  most of what we discuss here is the result of participant observation that over a four year period has been carried out in the rural and semi-rural region of Paraná outlying the state's capital city, Curitiba. The issues we highlight here include issues of gender relations as they change and develop within the milieu, as well as our own notions of equestrian culture and 'capital', built in the interface between rural and urban and the movement between popular and professional forms of activity.

The original text was written in Portuguese and translated into Spanish by Nashyelli Salazar Flores.

There is agreement that transwomen, like everyone else, have a right to participate in sports. But there is controversy about the following question: Do they have a right to compete in the female category? 

In a forthcoming paper, the philosopher and transwoman athlete, Veronica Ivy (previously: Rachel McKinnon), claims that she has no choice but to compete in the female category in cycling: ‘the rules of elite sport require athletes to compete in the sex category on their race license. If your license says ‘F,’ then you must compete in the female category.’ Here, Ivy aims to counter the charge that she is ‘identifying into the sex category of her choice’.

This justification brings up interesting questions about the purpose of sport and competition. My view is that sport aims to give us a ‘fair measure of performance’ (on the day). If transwomen, on average, have a considerable advantage over women, due to their male physiology,  then, I could just ignore this and say: ‘My racing license...says ‘F’, so I have no choice but to compete in the female category.’
https://idrottsforum.org/feature-imbrisevic210119/

This paper considers the phenomenon of sex-integrated martial arts training, adopting an auto-ethnographic perspective to outline the transformative potential of physical cultural practices. By foregrounding the concept of habitus, the paper discusses how gendered dispositions are formed, reinforced, and at times challenged, throughout one’s life course. Through a discussion of the author’s own experiences of mixed-sex martial arts training, along with data drawn from observations and interviews with other martial artists, the suggestion is made that (men’s) deeply-held, embodied dispositions and values might be challenged and transformed following experiences at the level of the body, such as ‘being hit by girls’, and indeed ‘hitting girls’, in the context of mixed-sex martial arts practice. The paper suggests that for scholars interested in the potential of sport and related physical activities for ‘subverting’ inequitable formations of gender, such phenomena as the transformative...

Beitrag zur Veranstaltung »‚Total angespannt / überspannt /
entspannt‘: Körper und Sport als Medien gesellschaftlicher Spannung« der Sektion Soziologie des Körpers und des Sports

https://publikationen.soziologie.de/index.php/kongressband_2020/article/view/1297/1567

https://www.tu-chemnitz.de/zlb/professuren/gsd_sport_bewegungserz/index.php#sportforeverybody


Feminist and queer sport clubs focus especially on minority groups of sport participation as women and LGBTIQ people. They claim to work primarily not on sportive success, on medals and trophies, but on fun and social inclusion, on the improvement of people’s self-esteem and body-self-connection (see Elling/de Knop/Knopper 2003, Carter/Baliko 2017). But this has never been easy, as of course also in these contexts people are highly influenced by hegemonial concepts of beauty and attractivity, of fitness and sportive performance, of competition and comparison.
In my sociological dissertation project (2015-2021, LMU Munich, publication date: Feb. 2022), I ethnographically observed how contemporary queer-feminist fitness groups negotiate the ambivalent potential of sport for (dis)empowerment. I did participant observations in three training groups and 14 interviews with participants.
I want to present some of the results to show the complex and ambivalent relation towards body and beauty norms in sportive empowerment politics. I use an analytical perspective which is informed by emotion- resp. affect theory. This showed a set of feeling rules (Hochschild 1979), which structure the field and create certain affect aliens and killjoys (Ahmed 2010).
It showed that next broader inclusive aspects of queer sports clubs, as e.g., the locker room policy (see Schmechel 2019), there are also specific implicit exclusions being produced in this field, amongst others based on physical ability.
This presentation therefore offers an empirically grounded basis for the discussion of explicit and implicit exclusions in the field of sport, especially in such sport organizations that claim and foster to be extraordinary inclusive.

The attention paid to women’s bodies and the way they ‘look’ while performing feats of endurance, strength and beauty is disproportional. Men simply play sports; women must play sports while looking amazing. It is these double standards that have once again come into the glaring spotlight in these Olympics

Este  artigo  tem  por  objetivo  discutir  como  treinadores  de  voleibol,  das  categorias  profissional e amadora do estado do Rio de Janeiro, performatizam enunciações sobre a presença de mulheres transexuais atletas em equipes do naipe feminino. Buscamos diálogo com os estudos pós-estruturalistas, sobretudo nas teorizações de Jacques Derrida e Judith Butler, pelas noções de performatividade da linguagem e performatividade de gênero. Além disso, realizamos a produção de narrativas com os treinadores pelos princípios de Leonor Arfuch e Jorge Larrosa, na operacionalização de entrevistas dialógicas por meio de conversas. Os treinadores enunciaram sentidos diversos, que remetiam ao preconceito e não aceitação das jogadoras nas equipes de voleibol, em particular os que atuavam na categoria profissional, como da inclusão das mesmas, ainda que dentro de determinados parâmetros. Acreditamos que novas pesquisas sobre a participação de atletas transexuais no esporte podem tensionar e constituir novas performatizações discursivas sobre o tema.

Este ensayo versa sobre una investigación etnográfica en curso, sobre culturas ecuestres del sur de Brasil.  Con ciertas características que nos permitan considerarla como "multi-situada" (abordando diversos momentos y espacios, desde los rodeos y cabalgatas, hasta el cotidiano de participantes y practicantes del mundo ecuestre en sus casas o en lugares denominados 'cabanhas'  donde se  hospedan caballos), la mayor parte de lo que aquí se relata es resultado de la observación participante en municipios próximos a Curitiba, capital del estado del Paraná.  Cuestiones aquí subrayadas incluyen las relaciones de género que emergen en el medio, así como el propio concepto de cultura y capital ecuestres, que se construyen entre lo rural y lo urbano y en los tránsitos entre lo popular y el mundo de las profesiones y de la ciencia, este último universo arraigado en instituciones  urbanas históricamente vinculadas a las clases medias urbanas.
Palabras claves
Cultura ecuestre, relaciones de género, saber popular, rodeo, caballos.
Abstract
This essay is based on ongoing ethnographic research on southern Brazilian equestrian cultures.  With certain characteristics that enable us to refer to it as 'multi-sited ethnography'  - its interconnected research sites include rodeos and organized rides, as well as the spaces of daily work and leisure in the cabanha -  most of what we discuss here is the result of participant observation that over a four year period has been carried out in the rural and semi-rural region of Paraná outlying the state's capital city, Curitiba. The issues we highlight here include issues of gender relations as they change and develop within the milieu, as well as our own notions of equestrian culture and 'capital', built in the interface between rural and urban and the movement between popular and professional forms of activity.

"Valeria Napolitano, Calcio e TV. Stereotipi di genere e
prospettive educative, Franco Angeli, Milano 2014.
Football and TV. Gender stereotypes and educational prospects"

In questo volume, l’autrice esamina gli stereotipi di genere presenti nelle trasmissioni
televisive calcistiche, riflettendo sulla spettacolarizzazione dei corpi maschili e sulla
svalutazione dei corpi femminili nel calcio che la narrazione televisiva tende ad
amplificare, elemento che pone un problema alquanto rilevante. Una differenza di
genere raffigurata sino all’inverosimile, la riduzione della donna ad oggetto sessuato e il
suo svilimento come immagine pubblica, nel calcio e nei programmi televisivi ad esso
rivolti, cosa produce a livello dell’interiorizzazione educativa nei giovani?
Parole chiave: stereotipi di genere; sessismo; virilità nel calcio; corpo estetico.

Baril, A. (2016). « Les athlètes transgenres aux Jeux olympiques : Entrevue avec Alexandre Baril », Émission « Le 6 à 9 », Interviewé par Martine Bordeleau, Ici Radio-Canada Manitoba, 16 août, (12 minutes). Link:
http://ici.radio-canada.ca/emissions/le_6_a_9/2015-2016/archives.asp?date=2016/08/16&indTime=271&idmedia=7580058

The advances by women in football signify that the gender paradigm in Caribbean society is being redefined. Football acts as a unifying thread in constructing Commonwealth Caribbean Identities and teams like the Jamaica Reggae Boyz, the Trinidad and Tobago Soca Warriors, and the Samba Boys of Brazil continue to use football to contest Western identity/identities. Still, women demand equality, earning the right to decide on policy. Caribbean “popular sports” press masculinist themes while women’s participation and success intensifies; contest notions that it is a male birthright; and refine gender inequalities that persist as constructions of Caribbean identity continue to manifest.

The study investigates linguistic sexism in communication in sports within a sociolinguistic context. The starting point of the research is a recent debate in Turkish society about the appropriate word to refer to females in sport. Specifically, the manuscript focuses on the preference between the near-synonymous Turkish words kadın and bayan (the corresponding English words are ‘woman’ and ‘lady’) in the case of describing females in sport. We present a theoretical background for gender in language and linguistic sources that explains the multilayered meanings of the Turkish words. We also present the findings of a supportive text-mining study that covers articles published in national newspapers in four consecutive years. The study aims to reveal the change in the recent usage in favour of both words as well as investigate long-term trends by using the 50-year archive of a mainstream national newspaper.

Este artigo tem como objetivo discutir como treinadores de voleibol, das categorias profissional e amadora do estado do Rio de Janeiro, performatizam enunciações sobre a presença de mulheres atletas transgêneros em equipes do naipe feminino. Buscamos diálogo com os estudos pós-estruturalistas, sobretudo nas teorizações de Jacques Derrida e Judith Butler, pelas noções de performatividade da linguagem e performatividade de gênero. Além disso, propomos a construção de dados pela produção de narrativas com os treinadores, pelos princípios de Leonor Arfuch e Jorge Larrosa, na operacionalização de entrevistas dialógicas por meio de conversas. Os treinadores enunciaram sentidos diversos, que remetiam ao preconceito e não aceitação das jogadoras nas equipes de voleibol, em particular os que atuavam na categoria profissional, como da inclusão das mesmas, ainda que dentro de determinados parâmetros. Acreditamos que novas pesquisas sobre a participação de transgêneros no esporte podem tensiona...

In this episode, Nathan has the privilege of speaking with Elizabeth Williams, a center-forward for the Atlanta Dream of the WNBA and, until as recently as one unattended game during the beginning of the pandemic, Fenerbahçe in Turkey. She is sixth in WNBA history averaging 1.8 blocks per game and was the league's 2016 Most Improved Player. She is also a former Duke University Blue Devil. Most importantly, she is Secretary of the WNBPA.

Nathan and Elizabeth discuss the WNBA's new collective agreement and how it improves compensation and working conditions for players. They also deep-dive into the day-to-day life of women's professional basketball players both in the United States and overseas, and the physical and emotional impact of being in-season for nearly 350 days per year. They also touch on the differences between college and pro women's basketball, fandom in the WNBA and abroad, and the future of the game.

This paper explores the sociological issues of high school girls' basketball, and boys' basketball comparatively, over the past 3 years at Sullivan High School in Sullivan, Illinois.  In many instances, high school basketball has been labeled as a community event, especially in the post season and as a family event for many players' relatives in a small town.  Over the years, many relationships have been established between players and their coaches, along with their community.  For some players, the sport has allowed them to further their education with scholarships to college.

INTRODUCTION: Differences in anthropological characteristics of men and women could influence the success of ski learning if different methods of teaching are applied (Lesnik&Zvan, 2010). The aim of this study is to determine the difference between achieved knowledge in skiing for women and man applying parallel and snowplow (combination method-CM) or only parallel ski technique (direct method-DM).
METHOD: Alpine skiing novices were taught during seven days ski school (30 women and 96 men, average age 23.3±1.66). Within the male and female group one subgroup learned by applying CM and one by applying DM. The examinees of both programs had the same conditions during learning, considering: the size of the group, hours of learning and training, equipment, terrains, quality and education of teachers. After the program end, examinees were joined into one group and had to demonstrate seven elements of ski technique. On the basis of grades, the level of ski knowledge was determined. To determine statistically significant difference between two groups of examinees concerning the method of learning ANOVA was used. Eventual existence of difference was determined by Fisher test. Factor analysis was used with the aim of isolating components that represent skiing knowledge. In order to determine statistical significance of differences between the two learning programs, considering the obtained main components of skiing knowledge, Student t-test was used.
RESULTS: There was no significant difference in achieving skiing knowledge through CM or DM for women. Males showed significant difference in the knowledge of traversing to the right (p=0.03), short (p=0.00) and parallel turn (p=0.01). Therefore CM proved more efficient. Through factor analysis seven main components were extracted, and first defined as total skiing knowledge was compared on two programs. Significant difference was determined in the level of total skiing knowledge for men learning to ski through CM (p=0.01). No difference in total skiing knowledge related to the learning program was determined for women.
DISCUSSION: To teach beginners skiing, teachers are trying to find the best way of transferring knowledge (LeMaster, 2009). The problem is not only in recognizing the efficient program, but also in recruiting participants who would benefit most. One of the factors that can affect learning is sex. Because of the differences between men and women in motor abilities and psychological characteristics, it is possible that male compared to female beginners, are reacting differently to the same learning program. In this research two programs were tested. The results showed that women did not learn ski technique significantly different by neither CM nor DM. However, men in the absence of the snowplow ski technique progressed less.
CONCLUSION: This study showed that through CM men achieved better results. It means that while forming ski groups for beginner skiers it isn't necessary to separate men and women, since women will advance regardless of the two applied learning methods.
KEY WORDS: women, men, beginner skiers, learning methods

T HE Olympic Games are relevant, not as a platform for the display of shallow 'national pride' in the State's achievements, but because the beauty of sport continues to mesmerize us in spite of and not because of the media spectacle; because of the little people who now and then, triumph in the face of capitalism, imperialism, racism, and sexism that dominate sports globally. Women have notched many firsts this year, and there are heartwarming, yet disturbing stories about the odds faced by women in the context of the imbalances along gender lines, especially in the respective sporting cultures of their home countries and in the sporting world in general. Sara Ahmed, the first woman medalist ever from Egypt, a country which has competed in the Olympics for over a century, is also the first Arab Muslim woman at the Olympics who has a medal in weightlifting. Simone Manuels became the first black woman from a country where acid was poured into swimming pools to keep black people out, to win an individual medal in swimming. Our own Sakshi Malik has challenged the perception of what is not 'women's sport', namely wrestling. Women have competed in the hijab against a background of overt and covert Islamophobic comment-one woman commentator writing about the hijab at

In this episode, Derek and Nathan conduct their first *athlete interview.* They chat with Liz Knox, a retired professional hockey goaltender, CWHL Clarkson Cup champion, CIS Brodrick Trophy winner, CWHL all-star captain, and former co-chair of the CWHLPA, and, currently, one of nine players on the board of the PWHPA. The interview breaks down the complex world of women's hockey and frankly examines the harsh conditions therein. It also explores how Liz and her colleagues are reconceptualizing labour action in high-performance spectator sport.

Viele Lesben haben keinen Bock auf schräge Blicke in der Turnhalle. Seit 30 Jahren gibt es deshalb den Verein "Seitenwechsel".

Rebekka Gottl | Der Freitag, Ausgabe 38/2018
https://www.freitag.de/autoren/der-freitag/kick-gegen-das-patriarchat

Resumo: Este artigo busca problematizar, através de entrevistas narrativas, como jovens adolescentes atletas de voleibol, que se identificam como gays e bissexuais, narram suas performances de masculinidades no contexto do esporte. Tomo como base a noção de gênero performativo, desenvolvida pela teórica feminista Judith Butler, que diz respeito à repetição discursiva de atos, gestos, atuações e encenações, inscritos nos corpos dos sujeitos, a partir de padrões normativos, mas que é um processo contingente que abarca possibilidades de repetições/deslocamentos de sentidos. As entrevistas narrativas, operacionalizadas pela proposta dialógica de Leonor Arfuch, apontam pelas falas dos jovens adolescentes atletas que o espaço do vôlei não nega a existência de diferentes orientações sexuais e performances de masculinidades, porém seu reconhecimento repete normatizações estabelecidas quando se busca mantê-las sob padrões regulatórios. Palavras-chave: Masculinidades. Performatividade. Narrativas. Voleibol. Esporte. Abstract: This article seeks to discuss through narrative interviews as young teenager volleyball athletes, who identify themselves as gays and bisexuals, narrate their performances of masculinities in the sport. Based on the notion of performative genre developed by feminist theorist Judith Butler, which concerns the discursive repetition of acts, gestures, actions and performances recorded on the bodies of the subjects, from regulatory standards, but that is an uncertain process that includes possibilities of repetition/dislocation of directions. The narrative interviews applied by dialogic proposal of Eleanor Arfuch point, through the comments of young teenager athletes that the volleyball space does not deny the existence of different sexual orientations and performances of masculinities, however its recognition repeats established regulations that seek to keep them under regulatory standards.