Women+in+sport+time+to+get+equal

Luis de Kretser  N8092303 Tutor: Sarah Jordan

The public health issue central to my analyses is women in sport; more specifically I will focus on the amount of television air time they receive compared to men. I will discuss the lack of media support that women’s sport receives, the reasons why men’s sports dominate television air time and make an informed prediction on the progress on this issue in the future. To conduct this analysis successfully I will also use the history of women’s sports. The main angle that I will take on this issue analyses is that men and women’s sports should be equal in every way.

Anne Keothavong and Ross Hutchins (Wimbledon 2009 day five)

Women in sport has been a controversial issue since it was first discussed and considered in the late 1800’s. (Drinkwater, 2000, p. 3) The first women, a Greek Spyros Louis, to try and enter the Olympics in a marathon was firmly rejected. However she was not to be deterred, so in the same year 1896 she ran the marathon a few days before the Olympics were held. (Drinkwater, 2000, p. 4) This act of commitment inspired another woman to follow, both of these women completed the marathon without fail. These women, in their country, sparked a gradual change in the Olympics which saw both women and men competing in the events. The change was frowned upon by many and was considered to be emasculating for men. (Cahn, 1995, p.1) However the changes continued and sports in general followed the Olympic trend, forming women’s teams. A significant moment in women’s sporting history was when Martina Navratilova a Czech immigrant to the United States took women’s tennis by storm. (Cahn, 1995, p.1) From 1982 to 1984 she lost only six games and by 1985 has accumulated 8.5 million dollars in winnings. (Cahn, 1995, p.1) Martina symbolized the advances women’s sport had made so far. As an outgoing critique of sexual inequality she represented the historic barriers women had over come to establish their position in sport. Even though these advances have been made in 1992 women represented only 30% of the competitors at the summer Olympic Games (Drinkwater, 2000, p. 3). This leads to the question, how far has women’s sport actually progressed. In terms of the Olympics, there has been significant progression in the participation and the rights to participate. Also every sport has a women’s team or option for women to play, but how equal is the playing field? As women’s sports has become more popular the inequalities compared to their counterparts has become easier to see. While participation numbers have increased media attention has decreased, so much so that in 2009 they were at a recorded low. According to Deggans (2010, para. 3) “Coverage of women’s sport was down to 1.6% of air time on local TV station and ESPN’s SportsCenter”. His research displays a list of disheartening numbers for women’s sports and the media attention it receives. According to Deggans (2010, para. 4) “100 percent of the shows surveyed started with a story on men’s sports; 72 percent of all coverage focused on just three sports, men’s basketball, football and baseball; the highest proportion of coverage occurred ten years ago, when local TV stations spent 8.7 percent of airtime on women’s sports (SportsCenter was still at 2.2 percent); reporting on the most popular women’s sport, basketball, was often shunted to the rolling “ticker” at the bottom of the TV screen.” These statistics highlight the inequalities between women’s and men’s sports. Another source showed that even in print women are underrepresented. According to Vincent Ph.D (2005, para. 6) “Despite the exponential growth in women’s sport in the last there decades, elite female athletes typically receive only about 10 percent of print media coverage.” After Deggans released his research article he was shocked when he found out how some of the media outlets reacted. According to Deggans (2010, para. 8) “This is what the sports audience wants. Broadcasters are focusing on the most interesting sports. Most female-centered sports are no good, anyway.” These reactions of apathy insinuate that no action will be taken to balance the scales. When will women’s sports be given as much media attention as men’s sports? Granted it won’t happen overnight but the statistics indicate that things are getting worse not better, so when will things at least start to improve? According to Deggans (2010, para. 20) “… the gap won’t really improve until sports journalists see the disparity as an essential journalism failure – a continuing and worsening inequality that is distorting how sports fans see female athletes and women in general, continuing a cycle that intensifies their marginalization in a vibrant marketplace.” Taking this into account infers a bleak future for women’s sport. However there is another side to the issue that gives a more positive insight to the future of women’s sport. As has been discussed earlier, although media coverage is declining, the number of sports women is still increasing. Throughout the course of the twentieth century and continuing into the twenty-first century numbers have been steadily increasing. According to NSW.gov (2004, para. 3) “The graph displays the steady increase of women in organized sport and physical activity from 1995 20% participation to 2000 24% participation”. Due to the constant growth in numbers of sports women, their conditions can only improve; as it becomes a larger industry they will receive more media attention and funding. As a result of the better funding and attention the sports women will benefit from more professional training facilities. According to NSW.gov (2004, para. 11) In 2000-01, 703 athletes will hold New South Wales Institute of Sport scholarships, of whom 336 (48%) will be female.” These positive improvements have already started so it is up to the sports and media influences to continue in the right direction. The western culture and society has a huge impact on how the women in sport issues are perceived. The western culture creates two vey distinct images for women and men. The women being house wives, cooking, cleaning, maintenance of the house and the men are the providers, work for money, ensure there’s food in the fridge and the family is comfortable. The roles have slightly changed in the modern era and women aren’t considered to be house wives anymore and are now considered to be a lot more independent. However in terms of sport, it is still very male dominated and orientated. Some female athletes are such as Samantha Stosur are considered to be too masculine. Why? Because females are meant to be slender and sexy? Her body is toned because she takes tennis seriously and has adapted so she can play to her maximum potential. A male body builder has so many muscles that you can’t see his neck, this is because he has adapted his body so he can operate to his maximum potential. Both of their bodies have been adapted to suit their sports but are perceived differently due to the influence of western couture and society. If women are to play sport they should still be petite and ladylike. Western culture even puts pressure on female sports people to be “sexy”. As if to prove my point there’s a sport in America called lingerie football. A seven on seven game of football where the players uniforms are knickers and bras with padding and helmets. I wonder what kind of crowd that draws. The media and the western culture in general are quite aware of the inequalities between men’s and women’s sports but have yet to make any real progress in closing the gap. Some small steps have been made but no significant difference has been made as yet. I feel that for the most progress to be made our focus and attention needs to be on the media. The media is extremely influential in the way sport is perceived and more importantly to this issue the way women’s sport is perceived. If the media was to get on board with closing the gap between women’s and men’s sport I feel that there would be substantial differences in the way women in sport are perceived. Currently if anything the media have a negative influence on the way women in sport are perceived. When sports news is on usually the whole segment on male sport, sometimes women’s sports news is run along the bottom of the screen in the “ticker” (the band of words moving from left to right). This already gives off the image that women’s sports are second to men’s. Furthermore when a women has performed an outstanding achievement and is included in the sports segment it always seems to be given less weight and the hype is insignificant compared to male sporting achievements. Samantha Stosur can be used as an example for this instance as well. Just recently she won the US open which was a huge mile stone for her as well as Australian tennis. This accomplishment received some media attention but I feel not enough considering the momentous occasion. In short as soon as the media start to have a positive influence on women’s sport progress will be made to close the gap.  My artifact is an image of Anne Keothavong and Ross Hutchins during the first round of mixed doubles at Wimbledon. I feel this image is a good representation of what I would like to see in the future for women’s and men’s sports. The main idea behind my analysis is closing the gap, creating an equal playing field so that both male and female sports people are treated with equal respect, are equally perceived in a positive way and have equal media attention. I feel this image captures the feeling of equality; both Anne Keothavong and Ross Hutchins are content and happy with each other as a team and as sportspeople. This feeling of mutual respect is what I hope the future of women’s sport will hold, between the athletes and their male counterparts, between the athletes and their fans and most importantly between the athletes and the media. Through the process of researching and writing this analysis I’ve come across information about the female sporting word that I hadn’t previously known. I had no idea that their media coverage so poor and how they are perceived so differently when compared to male sports people. It was shocking to me that media coverage was at its worst in 2009 when this issue had been brought up years before. It seemed to me that things were only getting worse for women’s sports, until I found out that the number of female athletes as steadily increasing. This meant to me that the future of women’s sport was only going to improve. The media can’t ignore something so large that keeps on growing, especially when so many people care about the inequalities in women’s sports. Soon enough the right people will care and the process of closing the gap will start.

Reference list: 1. NSW Sport and Recreation. (2004). Infosheet female participation in sport. Retrieved from []

2. Vincent, J. (2005). Equitable media coverage of female and male athletes: Is there a solution?. Retrieved from []

3. Lopiano, D.A. (2008). Media coverage of women’s sports is important. Retrieved from []

===4. Deggans, E. (2010). [|Continued apathy by sports media toward women’s sports a bigger problem than first meets the eye]. Retrieved from []===

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">5. Drinkwater, B. L. (2000). //Women in Sport// (Vol viii). London. Blackwell science Ltd.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">6.Cahn, S. H. (1995). //Coming on Strong//. USA. The Free Press, a division of Micmillan Inc.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">7. Wenner, L. A. (2000). //MediaSort//. London. Routledge.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">8. Scraton, S. Flintoff, A. (2002). //Gender and Sport: A Reader//. London. Routledge.