Chapter 12 Women and Sport

1
Chapter 12 Women and Sport
C H A P T E R
12
Women and Sport
2
Chapter Outline

• Historical Role of Women
• Women and Sport Before Title IX
• Title IX
• Women and Sport After Title IX
• Social Issues in Womens Sport
• (continued)

3
Chapter Outline (continued)

• Global Status of Women in Sport
• Barriers for Women in Sport
• Golden Age of Sports Reborn
• Chapter Summary

4
History of Women and Sport

• Historically not allowed to be physically active
  outside of chores.
• Often excluded from participation or ridiculed
  for participation until mid-1800s.
• (continued)

5
History of Women and Sport (continued)

• Participation in physical activity, individual
  sports slowly increased.
• Prohibited from modern Olympics until 1920.
• Sport greats include Collett, Wills, Didrikson,
  Joyner-Kersee, and King.

6
Reasons or Myths for Not Participating

• Lack of interest
• Harmful to health
• Only ladylike sports appropriate
• (continued)

7
Reasons or Myths for Not Participating (continued)

• Undeserving quality inferior to men
• Lesbian stigma
• Gender verification practices
• Social attitudes

8
Discussion

• What is Title IX?
• How does it affect women and sport?

9
Title IX

• Passed in 1972 as part of Education Act.
• Prohibits discrimination in federally supported
  education programs.
• Before Title IX, participation rates and
  financial support lopsided.
• In sports, 3.7 million boys versus 295,000 girls
• For every U.S. dollar spent on programs, 0.99
  for boys, 0.01 for girls
• Confusion until lawsuits, clarifications.

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Title IX Prongs

1. Proportionality test
2. History of progress test
3. Accommodation of interest test

11
Women and Sport After Title IX

• Sport participation nearly equal to that of boys
  (see tables 12.1 and 12.2 on page 228).
• Make up significant percentage of sports fans.
• Buy 81 of all sport or fitness apparel.
• Increasingly, males watch female sports.
• Atlanta Olympics named Year of the Woman.

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Social Issues in Womens Sport (Physical Activity
Benefits)

• Benefits of physical activity and sport
  participation
• Increased self-esteem
• Decreased drug use
• Decreased chance of unwanted pregnancy
• Increased graduation rates
• Four out of five women executives played sports
• Note Need to be careful with higher incidence of
  eating disorders

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Social Issues in Womens Sport (Media and Images)

• Gender conflict over orientation labels
• Athletic apparel
• Advances with sports bras (Chastain in 1999)
• Shoes not updated
• Objectification of athletes
• Female athletic body now seen as sexy
• May be judged only on looks, not by talent

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Global Status of Women in Sport

• Not all countries progressive (Arab countries
  still prohibit participation).
• In 2000, 30 of countries did not send a female
  athlete to the Olympic Games.
• In 2008, only 5 countries sent all-male team.
• White, middle-class athletes are most supported
  in developed nations.

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Discussion

• Do you think Olympic Games organizers and
  sponsors judge male and female athletes when
  making a decision about whether to promote them?

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Barriers to Participation

• Title IX challenges
• Football dominance 85 scholarships for 22
  positions!
• Schools cutting mens teams unintended
  consequences.
• Physical activity participation Strides have
  been made. In 25 to 64 age group, women now
  actually exceed men. However, men are
  significantly higher in 18 to 24 category.

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Women as Leaders in Sport

• In 1980, 90 of womens teams coached by women
  in 2008 only 42.8, close to all-time low.
• Only 21 of college athletic directors are women.
• Only 27 of USOC are women.
• See University of Central Floridas annual Gender
  Report Card (Lapchick 2008-2009).

18
Discussion

• What suggestions do you have for increasing the
  number of women in leadership positions in sport?
• Think not only of coaching and athletic director
  spots, but also league officials, marketing
  leaders, media leaders, athletic department staff
  leadership positions. Dont think of just major
  college and professional ranks.

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Equal Pay for Equal Play

• Only recently have all four tennis Grand Slams
  offered same prize money.
• LPGA purses still lag far behind PGA purses (and
  tennis and golf are the success stories!).
• According to Forbes.com, in 2008 the top 50 paid
  athletes were all male.
• Women do same endorsements for less.

20
Spending in College Sport

• In 2004-2005 at Division I Football Bowl
  Subdivision schools, mens athletics accounted
  for 70 of overall expenses.
• These schools spent more money on football
  programs than on all womens teams combined.
• In 2005-2006, the average amount of money spent
  on recruiting for Division I womens teams was
  less than half that of men.

21
Media Coverage of Womens Sports

• Olympic coverage in prime time of womens sports
  is increasing, but total programming still mostly
  men.
• Womens coverage still lags behind mens in
  newsrooms (less than 10 of sports broadcast).
• Scarborough Sports Marketing study In 1998,
  percent of women over age 18 who identified
  themselves as very or somewhat avid sport fans
  was 28. Four years later, up to 58.

22
Discussion

• What vision do you have for a rebirth of the
  golden age of sports?
• Does it include more involvement of women in
  sport?