Sports, Media & Society

Wimbledon coverage perpetuates sexism

Wed, 10 Jul 2013 08:05:00 +0000

This year's Wimbledon brought much excitement. Additionally to the close, grueling matches, the first few days built up surprises one after the other as the superstars such as Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Maria Sharapova and Serena Williams unexpectedly followed each other out of the tournament.

Wimbledon will most likely be remembered, once again, for these thrilling moments, and not the blatant sexism that appeared in media coverage upon the closure of the tournament.

The coverage of the men's and women's singles finals tells us two things about women: 1) they don't count, and 2) they are only allowed to succeed if they are attractive.

To Andy Murray's win in the men's singles finals over Novak Djokovic, the media in a number of countries, and multiple languages suggested that Murray ended Britain's 77 years of pain without a Wimbledon winner. Some of these headlines proclaimed "British champion ends 77 years of tennis hurt" (The Mirror), "Andy Murray credits home crowd after ending 77-year wait" (The Telegraph), and "Andy Murray wins Wimbledon, ends 77-year British drought" (USA Today).

These headlines make me wonder: What exactly are British women? Next door neighbors?

The articles fail to account for four British women who won singles titles in that 77-year period. An article on Buzzfeed credits Dorothy Round Little (1937), Angela Mortimer Barrett (1961), Ann Haydon-Jones (1969), and Virginia Wade (1977) for the wins. Thus, The Atlantic points out "Britain's last Wimbledon champ won 36 years ago, not 77."

One must give credit to outlets that at least specified in the article that Murray was the first "men's" champion after 77 years, but even in that case information about female players is missing.

Once again, we see a normalized pattern in sports media coverage that positions male athletes and men's sports as the only ones that really matter while failing to account for women's accomplishments. The women are, thus, rendered invisible.

But, considering the somewhat exceptional level of equality in men's and women's tennis, the women's Wimbledon champion, Marion Bartoli, also received some coverage. Except, according to some fans and even one media outlet, she was too ugly to win.

The Daily Mail reported that Bartoli received extensive criticism over her looks on Twitter.

Perhaps the most disturbing comment came from BBC radio commentator John Inverdale, who said:

"I just wonder if her dad, because he has obviously been the most influential person in her life...did say to her when she was 12, 13, 14 maybe 'listen you are never going to be, you know, a looker. You are never going to be somebody like a Sharapova, you're never going to be 5-foot-11, you're never going to be somebody with long legs, so you have to compensate for that."

BBC apologized after hundreds of complaints. Of course, they should.

Still, we are left with blatant sexism perpetuated by some of the most respectable media outlets.

But beyond sexism, the above give examples also contain misleading and even inaccurate information. And that is simply poor journalism.

-- Dunja Antunovic

New documentary looks at locker-room access for women covering sports

Tue, 02 Jul 2013 11:17:00 +0000

Although ESPN has made dozens of documentaries for its acclaimed "30 for 30" film series, the number of those films that focused on women could be counted on one hand.
But a new film series, "Nine for IX," will turn the network's lens to women over the next two months. The documentaries, all produced by women, will start tonight with "Venus VS," the story of Venus Williams' successful campaign for gender equity at Wimbledon.
All of the documentaries promise to be "must-see TV" for any sports fan. Last night, the Center for American Progress in Washington was host to a premiere screening of two of the films, "VenusVS" and "Let Them Wear Towels," which takes a look at the struggles of female journalists for locker-room access during the first few decades after Title IX became law in 1972.
The documentary features pioneers such as Melissa Ludtke, Claire Smith, Lesley Visser and Christine Brennan, telling the compelling story of the struggle by these women to break through the legal and then social barriers to cover sports.
After the screening, Brennan and Ludtke, part of a post-screening panel, talked about trying to get equal access to athletes at a time when women were sometimes shoved or carried (literally) out of locker rooms. Ludtke described herself as a "quiet negotiator" who wouldn't call her editor after getting kicked out of a locker room but would instead steel herself to get the story. "We were just determined that no one was going to stop us," she said, adding, "Each of us was working out there on our own."
Brennan said that as an undergraduate at Northwestern, she had been inspired by Ludtke's story. The famous Bobby Riggs-Billie Jean King "Battle of the Sexes" in 1973 also influenced her to see sports as place where women belonged.
Brennan added that although problems still arise with access, "this is resolved....There are tens of thousands of locker-room entries by women."
"We're there. It's done," she added.
Ludtke said there is still a "cultural lag" around television, where relatively few women have made it into to booth for play-by-play and commentating for men's marquee sports. "We're in a position today that we were in the 1970s," she observed.
Almost as if on cue -- to underscore her point -- a 9-year-old girl in the audience raised her hand and told the panelists about the "wide gender gap" in her elementary school.
"I'm the only girl playing with the boys at recess," she said.
Laura Gentile, espnW vice president, asked whether the girl felt she was "accepted" by the boys.
"Not really," the girl replied.
"I get upset at times at how much hasn't changed," Ludtke said. "Let's keep telling the stories."
Brennan agreed that women have barriers to address. But she said the progress already has been notable. "We're just at the beginning," she said. She added, "Where will we be in 40 years? That's a fun thought."
--Marie Hardin

Highest paid female athletes play individual sports

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 18:08:00 +0000

ESPNW reported that the highest paid female athletes out of 57 countries are predominantly tennis players, followed by golfers, a few long-distance runners, two skiers and a squash athlete. The article focused on the WTA's business model and illustrated how the LPGA tries to promote women's sports.

Quoting Carol Oglesby, the vice president of WomenSport International and a past principal contributor with the United Nations Division of Advancement for Women, the article also points out that tennis and golf are two sports that demand serious financial investment in terms of coaching and equipment. Thus, these two sports may not be universally accessible for girls and women.

I was glad to see that the article highlighted the issue of access, as particularly in tennis, because participating in tournaments with lower prize money amount, such as $10,000, $25,000 or even some categories above that, do not even come close to covering the expenses a professional tennis player encounters. It may take years on the tour until a female athlete (and male athlete) turns a career into a profitable job.

However, a really important element of analysis is missing from the article. All these sports--tennis, golf, skiing, long-distance running, squash--are individual sports. Whatever happened to female athletes who play team sports? Why aren't any on this list? Of course, it is possible that the revenue is distributed more evenly among female team sport athletes: that rather than one female athlete, such as Victoria Azarenka, standing out with millions, a number of female athletes who play team sports "share" an amount of a similar total value.

But I doubt that's the case. In the U.S., it is common knowledge that women's professional leagues struggle. The women's professional soccer league is taking its fifth (?) attempt at surviving financially, women's basketball players often travel oversees to Europe or China for better opportunities rather than staying in the WNBA, and the league continues to try to find away to attract audiences (recently the Phoenix Mercury gave out free tickets to men to their games to increase attendance).

Perhaps these individual sports on the list generate revenue because of the deeply engrained ideas we hold about gender norms.

After all, there is no contact in tennis or golf or squash or skiing, let alone distance running. There is no over-powering the other, which would certainly trigger some resemblance of masculine values our society associates with men's team sports. Women in tennis and golf also tend to be able to conform to ideals of elite, white femininity--and if they don't, they receive criticism (see coverage of Serena Williams or Amelie Mauresmo for examples).

So perhaps what generates revenue for women's sports is when the sport is able to "absorb gender performance," as Marie Hardin, associate director of the Curley Center for Sports Journalism said. Women who play team sports, thus, continue to have low marketing potential.

For this to change, certain cultural norms we hold about gendered bodies and sport also need to change. And that has to be addressed before we celebrate that women are, at least, making money in tennis and golf.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Women fans not solely responsible for success/failure of women's sports leagues

Thu, 09 May 2013 12:19:00 +0000

The failure or success of female sports leagues in the United States rests primarily with female sports fans, Frank Deford said in a piece for National Public Radio titled “Ladies, Want Women's Sports To Get More Attention? Pony Up.”

Unfortunately, Deford missed the point entirely. Women’s sports should not appeal to uniquely to females because women are playing. Women’s sports should appeal to all sports fans because elite athletes are competing. Men do not feel mandated to watch LeBron James because he is a man. Men and women watch LeBron James because he is the best men’s basketball player in the world.

Note that I said James is the best men’s basketball player. This distinction is critical to understanding the problems facing women’s sports leagues. There is a tendency in mainstream media to deem male athletes or male sports as the unquestioned best or standard. For example, Deford mentions a new women’s soccer league is forming. Just saying women’s soccer league delegitimizes the athletes in that league because there is a qualifier to their prowess—their gender. Why can’t Major League Soccer be called Men’s Major League Soccer? By having their sports leagues gender marked, women athletes are already placed at a disadvantage because there is a latent implication that their leagues are inferior to men.

The second issue I have with Deford comes from the written summary of his piece. An excerpt states: “Still, I think the sisterhood has to look more into the mirror. In the post-Title IX era, as girls have flooded into athletics, there has been no comparable explosion by female spectators. It's all very comforting to blame media men for a lack of coverage, but if more women buy tickets to watch female athletes play, then more coverage will follow.

“This may be only anecdotal, but I have noticed that in small-town newspapers and on community websites, female high school and college sports seem to get a commensurate amount of attention with their male jocks. The imbalance of coverage is so much more at the top, where commerce matters.”

This argument is misguided. Women make up about 40 percent of fans in major North American sports leagues, according to 2009 research by Scarborough Sports Marketing published in Sports Business Daily. Male sports leagues need female fans to help fuel their billion-dollar industries. By extension, female sports leagues need male fans for their leagues to thrive.

And since the “sisterhood” of sports fans is markedly smaller than the “brotherhood”, it would be most appropriate to question why male fans are exempt from Deford’s critique of the struggles of women’s sports leagues.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Coverage of rape needs context

Fri, 29 Mar 2013 01:34:00 +0000

In light of the the cases that connect sports to rape culture, progressive sportswriter Dave Zirin proposed in his recent article that professional leagues such as the NFL, MLB, NHL and NBA should address the prevailing violence against women. Zirin proposed that the leagues should educate athletes in order to "reshape a jock culture that treats women like they are the spoils of athletic supremacy."

Considering the recent media coverage around the Steubenville case that focused on how the young men's careers would be ruined as a result of the ruling rather than pointing to the issue of how violence against women is normalized in our culture, Zirin is right to call for education.

Education, indeed, needs to happen in multiple spheres. Professional male sports is certainly one, an important one as Zirin contends, because "no other institution reaches more men and no other institution plays a greater role in teaching boys how to define their own manhood and masculinity."

In a culture that teaches women how not to be raped rather than teaching men not to rape, it is essential to turn the conversation around.

But cultural ideologies around rape need some context to be effectively disputed.

A chart provided by RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network) indicates that less than 10% of rapes get prosecuted. RAINN also reported that on college campuses less then 5% of rapes or attempted rapes get reported.

Universities, especially larger universities, tend to have resource centers students can turn to for support. Institutions also implement policies and regulations that enable students to report crimes while remaining confidential. But the policies and resource centers can only do so much when women continue to be blamed for a) being sexually assaulted, b) reporting the crime, c) the implications on the rapists' lives. We have seen that from the media coverage of Steubenville and we have seen that from the media coverage of the UNC student who stated that her reporting of an alleged sexual assault was mishandled by the university.

I agree with Zirin that we need to be attentive to how sports and rape culture intersect. And I agree with Zirin when he writes that "it's time for sports to pick a side and take their share of accountability for the toxicity in our culture that normalizes rape." But, normalization of rape occurs outside of the athletic context as well and, thus, it should be addressed as a larger social issue.

So while Zirin's idea to educate professional athletes, and thereby also raise awareness about rape culture, would be beneficial, it cannot occur in isolation from other layers of society. Reversing the discourse through the education of boys is essential, but it takes time.

There are things that can be done now. And I believe the media can play an important role in making things better now by providing the "big picture" statistics, by recognizing the patterns we see over and over again when it comes to coverage of rape cases.

What the media can do is to situate these incidents within a larger context to explain that these cases are not about one boy's or two boys' lives--and their "promising careers" as CNN put it. These incidents are about a huge problem that affects thousands of people who become victims of sexual assault.

Sexual assault receives coverage when it becomes an issue tied to athletes, but sexual assault is not a sports issue. We need to work on reversing the blaming the victim rhetoric and on demystifying the male athlete, but we also need to recognize that the stories we hear about in the media are only a small small percentage of the sexual assaults that actually occur.

The media can help here: To report what continues to be unreported.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Criticism of Silberman's NFL combine efforts misplaced

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 16:09:00 +0000

Lauren Silberman’s pitiful effort during a recent NFL regional scouting combine tryout sparked strong criticism about how Silberman hurt women’s attempts to be taken seriously in football and reignited conversations about how women cannot compete with men in athletics.

I will tackle each point separately.

Katie Hnida, the first woman to score a point in a Division I football game, told USA Today: “Her performance does not have to do with her gender, it has to do with her experience and her preparation. Unfortunately, what's going to happen now is she's going to be looked at (as inferior) because she was female.”

Aditi Kinkhabwala of NFL.com called Silberman’s effort “A delusional, haughty, heartbreaking sideshow.”

Silberman did not know how to properly set a football on a kicking tee or how to approach an NFL-style kickoff.

Why would Silberman be allowed to participate in such an event?

When she did kick, her two attempts traveled a combined 30 yards. Silberman did later withdraw from the combine citing injury.

Kinkhabwala wrote Silberman “disrespected the 37 other kickers in New Jersey on Sunday who've spent lifetimes honing their craft.”

This is a strong criticism, but the fault does not lie with Silberman, but with the NFL.

Mike Garafolo’s article in USA Today said, “Though the league reserves the right to deny a registration, it apparently made no attempt to determine whether Silberman had a chance to put forth a good effort. Now, other young women likely will have an even tougher path to gender equality on the football field.”

These sentences appeared about 14 paragraphs in to his article. This should have been placed much higher. The fault lies totally with the NFL, not Silberman.

From all accounts, Silberman showed no skills that would have justified her inclusion into the combine; therefore there is no mystery as to why her tryout was a debacle.

The league allowed an unqualified individual attempt a difficult task, and lo and behold, the unqualified person failed miserably. The only reason Silberman’s terrible showing made national news is because of her gender. Kinkhabwala wrote, “… to be wholly fair, Silberman isn't the only applicant to be outclassed at one of these combines.”

Why have we not heard about the other failures?

Moving to the second part of this post, recall the claim that women cannot compete with men athletically.

This is claim is almost always true if we look at the sports that are touted in the United States – basketball, baseball, hockey and football. Yes, we can extend this to myriad other sports. However, this critique is incomplete.

We have to examine the political factors surrounding sports in general. For brevity’s sake, I will examine the pathway of control.

First, some simple questions: Who created many of today’s visible sports? Men.

Second, if one group creates a system, is it logical to presume that this group would build a system that accentuates the things it does well? Yes.

Building on these premises, it is not fair to place women into men’s ideas of sports. How could they ever succeed when the games are essentially rigged against them?

Why doesn’t anybody ask could men outshine women in sports created by and designed for women? Perhaps this question needs to be asked the next time there are discussions about the athletic abilities of men and women.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Student-athletes and privacy laws

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 20:21:00 +0000

Most sports reporters likely will never be confused for seasoned lawyers, but a new research paper suggests journalists might have to become better acquainted with the law.

Sada Reed, a doctoral student at the University of North Carolina, examined legal cases and law review articles regarding the privacy of collegiate student-athletes. This past weekend Reed told a gathering of scholars at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication’s Southeast Colloquium that a paucity of cases and articles exist on this issue.

Why is this a cause for concern? While state and federal governments are creating laws to protect the privacy of students, some schools might attempt to use the laws to deny information requests.

One of these tricky laws is the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), which restricts the information colleges can share about students. If a school is found to run afoul of the act, it can lose its federal funding.

Interpretations of the act have led to legal challenges. For example, a University of Maryland basketball player violated NCAA rules regarding the payment of parking tickets in the 1990s. The university’s student newspaper, The Diamondback, requested access to the parking tickets; the university denied the request citing FERPA. After a court battle, The Diamondback won the case because parking tickets were not considered part of students’ educational records.

Reed, who worked as a sports editor and reporter before beginning her doctoral studies, also discussed the rights of student-athletes, especially when it comes to surveillance of their activities. She told the audience that courts have ruled “student-athletes have a diminished expectation of privacy.” This is likely because of their quasi-celebrity nature of student-athletes.

The diminished expectation decision has big implications for things such as drug testing and potentially down the line allowing states to make compelling cases for “preventing specific online activities” for student-athletes.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Representation of women's sports in blogs needs improvement

Mon, 25 Feb 2013 00:18:00 +0000

Women's sports advocates might have hoped that the blogosphere would offer greater visibility and better coverage of women's sports than traditional media outlets do, but a recent study shatters this utopian ideal.

John Lisec, doctoral student at the University of Minnesota and Mary McDonald, professor of Sports Studies at Miami University (Ohio), published an article that compares the coverage of the WNBA in two blog networks: Deadspin and Women Talk Sports.

Considering the severe underrepresentation and sexualization of female athletes (see earlier posts on this topic), scholars have begun looking at the blogosphere to examine if content outside of the mainstream replicates ideas about gender and sports. Researchers from Penn State's Curley Center for Sports Journalism engaged in this scholarship as well. (See excerpts from a book chapter by Marie Hardin and Erin Whiteside, and excerpts from another chapter by Marie Hardin.)

Lisec and McDonald's article titled "Gender Inequality in the New Millenium: An Analysis of WNBA Representations in Sports Blogs," raises important issues about the ways in which women's sports are represented in the two blog networks. The authors found that Deadspin's coverage of the WNBA is limited and when existent, it disrespects female athletes' athletic abilities.

"Not only does the WNBA receive little coverage, but evidence of trivialization and mockery of the blatantly suggests women athletes as inferior," the authors wrote (p. 161). Sexist comments and comments that reflect a fear of lesbian athletes were often unfiltered. As such, Deadspin's coverage is actually a backlash rather than progress.

Contributors from the other blog network, Women Talk Sports, were often much more critical both of the representation of female athletes and of the WNBA's marketing strategies that continue to position women in the context of their heterosexual relationships. Thus, these bloggers were found to challenge the ways in which female athletes appear in mainstream media, counter the idea that female athletes are inferior and contribute to the advocacy of women's sports.

Additionally to blog posts that further the women's sports agenda, Lisec and McDonald would like to see a closer interrogation on how issues of race and class intersect with gender and sexuality. The authors pointed out that athletes' race is often completely ignored. The authors are also worried that the proliferation of content results in an isolation of fans, who then go to the sites that they are familiar with rather than looking for alternative perspectives--such as Women Talk Sports--that disrupt gender norms.

It's not quite time yet to celebrate. Although critical views on power relations in sports are out there in the blogosphere, sexist and homophobic ideas that continue to undermine female athletes' accomplishments are also present.

Concerning also is the lack of analysis on racial relations, particularly when it comes to the coverage of the WNBA. As Lisec and McDonald write, "given that the WNBA’s playing force is primarily African American and silence about the articulation of racial, classed and gender politics within representations of the league serve to legitimate the power of whiteness" (p. 175).

Lisec and McDonald's insightful analysis reminds us that even though new media outlets offer opportunities to bring visibility to women's sports, that visibility might not manifest in ways that challenge dominant cultural ideas.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Wake up, wake up: The reality of amateurism

Wed, 13 Feb 2013 00:52:00 +0000

The debate around amateurism in college athletics is not new, but a recently published article by Warren K. Zola, Associate Dean for Graduate Programs at Boston College, offers some great insights that are worthy of attention.

Zola, just as others have done, points out the flaw in the NCAA's argument which maintains that college athletes are amateurs and should remain just that: unpaid.

"The argument is stale, the facts don't support reality, and the public is recognizing the absurdity of the NCAA's position," Zola asserted "They insatiably embrace commercialism in all facets of intercollegiate athletics except on a single issue -- athlete compensation."

The "NCAA empire," as Zola refers to the governing organization of intercollegiate athletics, has seen an "utter loss of perspective in implementing rules, policies and enforcement" in the last few decades.

The commercial endeavors deter institutions from focusing on the educational aspect and what should be the primary focus of student-athletes' experience: academic advancement.

Taylor Branch's article in the Atlantic, published in October of 2011, makes the case that college athletes, particularly football and basketball---and particularly minority---student-athletes, are exploited by the NCAA and their institutions. Branch called this a total moral and legal failure on the NCAA's part.

Zola takes upon Branch's critique and calls for a reform of intercollegiate athletics.

"The claim by the NCAA that they are protecting amateurism is but an illusion," Zola wrote. "It is time to wake up."

Perhaps the NCAA would set up a fund for student-athletes whose televised performances generate revenue for the schools or perhaps the NCAA could implement a compensation system. Or perhaps there is a different solution.

Either way, Zola's call for change should be noted.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Nine-year-old female football player becomes an inspiration

Mon, 04 Feb 2013 03:42:00 +0000

This year’s Super Bowl will probably not be remembered for the Sam Gordon’s appearance, but NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell hopes that the 9-year-old girl will serve as an inspiration for many—including other young girls.

Gordon became an internet sensation with a YouTube video her father posted that shows her outrunning the boys in a football game. Since November, when the video was posted, Gordon has been receiving a plethora of media attention, including a feature on Good Morning America’s “Play of the Day.” She also became the first female football player to appear Wheaties box.

Sam Gordon’s story is fascinating for a number of reasons. For one, there is the Justin Bieber-ish resemblance: young talent, YouTube video leading to commercial success… Minus the perfume line, she’s got it all.

On a more serious note, the celebration of Sam Gordon is remarkable, but should be consumed with caution. Let’s go over the positives first. She is a girl playing in a sport that is notorious for excluding women. The coverage focuses on her athletic accomplishments. The media cite her stats (1,911 Rush yds, 35 TD, 65 tackles), highlight her pace and agility and even offer a commentary of her plays. In a perfect world, all female athletes would be covered the way Sam Gordon is.

Her confidence also provides a positive example for young girls who strive to succeed on boys’ teams and/or in sports that do not provide equitable opportunities for girls. In fact, Abby Wambach from the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team, who invited Gordon to training and a game, considered meeting the young double-sport athlete an honor.

Jane McManus, from espnW, quoted Wambach saying, "Sam is the bi-product of a powerful movement in women's sports. Her family provided her the opportunity to play whatever sport she loved and her story [is] one that I hope will influence many girls to follow their dreams in all sports. I was honored to treat her to a game as she inspires me to do more and be better. All I can say is, thank you Sam Gordon for your impact on all of us."

McManus also reported that Gordon preferred soccer over football and plans on playing football for only a couple more years. Her travels across the country will also presumably end with the Super Bowl attendance and, as McManus said, Gordon will return to her normal life.

Goodell invited Gordon to attend the Super Bowl as a spectator. Currently, that’s about the closest women can get to the field unless they are, of course, cheerleaders. Or unless the NFL has a referee lockout and a female ref just so happens to be available.

Although Gordon receives kind questions about her future plans with football, I have yet to see an article that actually acknowledges the systemic exclusion of women from football by the leagues, schools and by courts. Title IX does not help much here either because of the contact sport provision—football does not “count.” Despite the occasional participation of girls and women on football teams on different levels, they remain in a token status.

Considering the alarming findings about injuries in football, particularly concussions—even in pee-wee—perhaps Gordon is also smart to plan on a soccer career. (On a concussion note, rising rates for girls in soccer has also received some attention.) But before we get carried away by Gordon’s potential to become a superstar athlete, let us remember that she is only 9 years old.

Gordon's media exposure, however, is worthy of mention because provides an interesting glimpse into the U.S. sporting culture. On the one hand, the celebratory coverage communicates that girls and women in sport “can” do it. On the other hand, the she can do whatever she wants to rhetoric in a sport like football is close to an illusion.

I am not sure if advocating for increased opportunities for women in football is be the best idea in light of the rising justified panic about head injuries. But when it comes to contact sports, girls and women are far from inclusion. So, if the strategy is to celebrate girls and women in football, the prevailing structural barriers need more attention.

--- Dunja Antunovic

Office of Civil Rights issues new guidelines to include students with disabilities in sports

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 17:31:00 +0000

The U.S. Department of Education declared today that schools must provide students with disabilities a fair opportunity to participate in athletic activities.

Although the Department of Education does not foresee immediate dramatic changes, the new guidelines should probe schools to make adjustments and open doors for the students who have been—despite the previously existing ant-discrimination laws—precluded from participation.

The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (Section 504) already prohibits the exclusion of persons with disability from programs and activities at federally funded institutions. But the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) took a step further today and provided specific examples on how institutions should ensure that they accommodate students with disabilities.

The OCR stated that the letter does not “add requirements to applicable law, but provides information and examples to inform recipients [school officials] about how OCR evaluates whether covered entities are complying with their legal obligations” (See full letter here.)

Arne Duncan, U.S. Secretary of Education, wrote on his blog that students with disabilities are often excluded from sports based on incorrect judgments, generalizations and stereotypes. “This is simply wrong,” Duncan wrote.

The letter requires school officials to make “reasonable modifications” to ensure that students with disabilities have equal opportunity to participate in sports.

According to Gregg Toppo’s article for USA Today, the letter was long overdue—particularly because a report from 2010 indicated that students with disabilities participated in athletics at substantially lower rates than students without disabilities. The clarification on how to enforce positive change was, thus, in order.

Some activist compared the enforcement initiatives to Title IX, an education amendment that prohibits discrimination based on sex. Title IX is credited with the tremendous increase of athletic opportunities for women and a cultural shift about women’s place in sports.

“This is a landmark moment for students with disabilities. This will do for students with disabilities what Title IX did for women. This is a huge victory,” Terri Lakowski, who has been heavily involved with coalition building and education around civil rights issues, told the Associated Press.

The Women’s Sports Foundation announced that this letter is actually a “direct result of Title IX.”

It might take some time to enforce the structural changes. But a legislative boost might eventually result in a more inclusive sporting environment and increased participation for the students who are relegated to the margins in our society.

Perhaps increased opportunities will also eventually challenge the way we think about sport in our culture. Perhaps, such change will also encourage us to re-think the values we associate with sport—the values that contributed to the subjugation of many.

-- Dunja Antunovic

NCAA cuts funding for Scholarly Colloquium

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 00:21:00 +0000

A few days ago, the NCAA announced that it would withdraw funding to the Scholarly Colloquium, which has been in existence for six years and "provided a space for (often critical) academic discourse at the association's annual convention," according to an article on Inside Higher Ed.

The NCAA officials said that the colloquium did not attract sufficient attendance and that the Journal of Intercollegiate Sport (JIS), also sponsored by the NCAA and affiliated with the colloquium, was not profitable.

Some scholars who attended the colloquiums and submitted research for the JIS said that the NCAA's main problem was not financial, but the fact that the NCAA was reluctant to hear criticism embedded in the scholarly articles and discussions. (Read more on scholars' responses in the article by the Chronicle of Higher Education here.)

It is unclear at this point if the JIS will be able to stay alive.

Dr. Scott Kretchmar, professor of Kinesiology, who also served as the founding president of the Scholarly Colloquium and the founding editor of the Journal of Intercollegiate Sport, expressed his disappointment with the NCAA's decision.

"How interesting that, at a time when most agree that all is not well in Division I athletics, the NCAA has taken steps to avoid thoughtful criticism," Kretchmar wrote in an article for the Curley Center for Sport Journalism's site.

The former NCAA Faculty Athletic Representative of Penn State, Kretchmar teaches classes in sport ethics, among others.

I concur with Kretchmar. It is, indeed, "interesting" timing by the NCAA. One might wonder what happened to the NCAA's commitment to academics. Even beyond that, whatever happened to reason?

Wouldn't you, the NCAA, as an organization, want the input of people who can provide empirical evidence that might actually help you solve at least some of the problems?

The timing is particularly interesting considering that a study recently published by the Delta Cost Project at American Institutes for Research pointed to the wide gap between spending on student-athletes and students.

Here is a paragraph from the study:

"Athletic departments spend far more per athlete than institutions spend to educate the average
student—typically three to six times as much; among Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) institutions,
median athletic spending was nearly $92,000 per athlete in 2010, while median academic spending
per full-time equivalent (FTE) student was less than $14,000 in these same universities" (p. 2).

This should raise some question. An NPR article provides some good evaluation for the study. It's worth a read.

Anyways, perhaps a continued conversation at the Scholarly Colloquium and in the Journal of Intercollegiate Sport would allow for a deeper investigation of how the NCAA can better negotiate the "academic" component in intercollegiate athletics, whether that means examining the psychological impact of sporting events on campus, economic sustainability, hiring issues related to race, gender, and/or sexual orientation, and, broadly, academic reform.

It is understandable that the NCAA looks to cut costs. But do the cuts really need to result in the exclusion of scholars who see intercollegiate athletics both on a micro-level through teaching the student-athletes and on a macro-level through their research that often asks questions that are different from the NCAA's primary concerns (feel free to fill in the blank here)?

Dear NCAA, please reconsider.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Serena Williams impersonation triggers stereotypical ideals about black women's bodies

Sun, 16 Dec 2012 18:09:00 +0000

Caroline Wozniacki, former No. 1 tennis player in the world, decided to make fun of her friend, Serena Williams. Wozniacki stuffed towels into her top and skirt during an exhibition match in Sao Paulo, Brazil in attempt to illustrate Williams' bodily construction. It was supposed to be a well-meaning joke.

But the instance spurred a heated discussion in the U.S.-based media outlets. The question it raised was: Funny or racist?

Here is some context: Tennis players habitually poke fun at each other through imitation. I remember how much my friends and I imitated each other and other players at practice, making fun of our friends' shots, grunts, mannerisms. The pros do it too. Novak Djokovic became the joker of the circuit thanks to his famous impersonation of Maria Sharapova. Shortly thereafter, Andy Roddick took upon himself to make fun of Djokovic. It's all good. They are all friends.

But most of the imitations do not rely upon discriminatory cultural imagery about the bodies of one social group.

Wozniacki's imitation is problematic because it evokes the image of Saartjie Baartman, the Hottentot Venus, whose body was hypersexualized and objected to the gaze of white Europeans. Baartman was displayed as an oddity, as a freak due to her supposedly disproportionate buttocks and breasts. The exoticization of black women lives on.

That, right there, is the problem of the way in which Wozniacki chose to make fun of Williams.

Anita Little, who wrote a blog post for Ms. Magazine highlighted the issue:

"Our [black women's] bodies are not caricatures. This incident did not happen in a societal vacuum where black women’s bodies haven’t been historically degraded as exotic objects."

But some prefer to see the incident in a vacuum and take the "get over it" approach: It's all just a joke between friends and, really, why can't we just laugh at ourselves and others?

Certainly, Wozniacki did not mean to be malicious, and --- not to make assumptions about her cultural awareness, but--- she probably had no idea how offensive her imitation might be.

"Many people don’t have the cultural awareness to be sensitive of the centuries-old portrayals of black women, so we continue to see bad gestures like this one," Anita Little added. "It’s easy to tell black people to just lighten up when you are never the butt of the joke."

Greg Couch from FoxSports acknowledged that the act evoked caricatures of black women, yet concluded said that proclaiming Wozniacki a "worldwide racist" is "just too much talk." Couch also recommended Wozniacki ask her friend, Williams to determine how racist her actions were.

Jemele Hill from ESPNW wants to "chuckle" at Wozniacki. Hill emphasized that Serena Williams saw her body as a source of empowerment, that surely Wozniacki knew that. And besides, "black women love their curves," Hill wrote.

Williams is certainly proud of her body, as she should be. In 2009, she appeared in the ESPN Body Issue; her cover sold the highest number of copies. Despite Williams' efforts to embrace "beauty inside and out," she has also been a target of discussion for her behavior, her clothing (see catsuit), and her hair.

(On a related note: My colleague, Steve Bien-Aimé recently wrote a post wondering why Olympic gold medalist Gabby Douglas got more attention for her hair than for her athletic accomplishments.)

Herein lies the other problem: In the United States, female athletes overall receive less coverage than male athletes. Black female athletes receive even less coverage than white female athletes. So it is that much more important to examine how the U.S. media engage in instances such as this one.

Precisely because of the lack of visibility of black female athletes, I was glad to see that the Huffington Post invited Swin Cash, a professional women's basketball player, to participate in an online conversation on the issue. The experts on this panel address the cultural and historical implications of such imagery. One panelist pointed out that critics are viewing Wozniacki's action through a U.S.-centric lens and emphasized that the imitation is likely to carry different cultural meanings based upon the context. The conversation is worth a look.

Wozniacki's imitation was plain insensitive. Evaluating her actions by saying "she didn't know" or "she just meant to be funny" reflects a total lack of awareness of the history behind such representations---a lack of awareness of the representations of black women's bodies.

It is important to have this conversation. The instance might take upon different cultural meanings in other countries, but in the U.S. it certainly triggered historically rooted racist ideas. And I'm glad that there is a conversation about this in U.S.-based media. If for no other reason, but to raise awareness of the portrayals that have for so long contributed to the subjugation of black women.

--- Dunja Antunovic

Radio hosts' rude comments about transgender athlete highlights need for more diversity training

Thu, 13 Dec 2012 21:41:00 +0000

The recent suspension of two hosts of an ESPN Radio affiliate for insensitive comments about a transgender basketball player highlights that the lexicon journalists have needs to be burnished.

It is unknown whether the radio hosts consider themselves journalists, and I will not castigate all sports journalists for the actions of two individuals. However, the column by ESPN’s Christina Kahrl prompted me to tackle this from a different angle.

This post is a request for broadening the diversity training journalists receive. Being a former journalist and a member of different minority advocacy journalism groups, I believe that diversity is often thought of in terms of gender, race and now sexual orientation. While the categories appear varied, the groups in these categories are far from static.

People do not easily fit into the labels society provides. The article USA Today’s Eric Prisbell wrote about Gabrielle Ludwig explains this well. I also freely acknowledge that if I were copy editing Prisbell’s article, I would feel extremely underqualified to edit it without reading additional literature on transgender individuals.

Journalists are not sheltered people. They interact with various members of society, especially in sports where a huge cross-section of society sits. That cross-section is only going to become more diverse in the years to come.

The news media cannot ignore a group of people or act as if they do not exist. If work to broaden diversity training to include transgender athletes is not done soon, journalists will quickly find themselves ill-equipped in an ever-growing sports landscape.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

How do female athletes want to be portrayed?

Sun, 11 Nov 2012 05:35:00 +0000

More than 350 scholars gathered from all over the world for the annual meeting of the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport (NASSS) in New Orleans, which concluded on Saturday. The conference offered valuable research for those concerned about the relationship between sports media and society. Steve Bien-Aime, my colleague from the The John Curley Center for Sports Journalism, extensively documented some of these discussions on this blog (see earlier posts here).

One main area of interest at NASSS is gender in mediated sport. While much research has been done on representation of female athletes, scholars have recognized the need to examine perceptions of female athletes about the ways in which they are portrayed in the media. Researchers from the Tucker Center for Research on Girls and Women in Sport took upon the task to explore how female athletes would prefer to be shown in the media.

In the study titled "Exploring Elite Female Athletes' Interpretations of Sport Media Photographs: A Window into the Construction of Social Identity and 'Selling Sex' in Women's Sports,” Dr. Mary Jo Kane, Dr. Nicole LaVoi and Dr. Janet Fink (University of Massachusetts-Amherst) identified four ways in which female athletes typically appear in the media and asked female athletes to pick which representation they would prefer. The four representations were:

(1) A woman in an action shot, participating in her sport (competency frame),

(2) A woman with some symbol of her sport (such as holding a ball in her hand), but outside of playing field (mixed message frame)

(3) A woman completely outside of her playing field with no indication of athletic participation (“sexy/classy lady” frame),

(4) A soft pornographic image of a nearly or completely naked woman

The researchers found through focus groups with Division I female athletes that most of them would prefer to be portrayed as the woman in the (1) frame – playing their sport. Some of them wanted to pick two representations as they identified with both the (1) frame and the (2) frame.

However, when the female athletes were asked which photo would bring most attention to their sport, one-third of them said that it would be the soft pornographic image. They picked this based upon the belief that hypersexualized images were more marketable to a male audience.

Consistently with the Tucker Center’s previous research, Dr. Kane and her colleagues contested the “sex sells women’s sports” assumption, arguing that these hypersexualized, soft pornographic images are counter-productive as they do not foster respect for female athletes and women’s sports.

According to the study presented at NASSS, female athletes prefer to see themselves portrayed in an athletically competent pose. Ultimately, Dr. Kane and her colleagues argued, only these types of portrayals will lead to change in cultural perceptions about women’s sports.

For a summary of the “sex sells sex, not women’s sports” argument, see our earlier blog post. To see twitter updates from the conference, go to #NASSS12 @CurleyCenter.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Studies challenge ideas of sport fandom

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 19:40:00 +0000

Two recent studies presented Friday at the annual conference for the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport in New Orleans challenged the concept of sport fandom.

Antunovic presents during the "Sport and Gender" panel.

Bloggers on women’s sports blogs appear to view fandom differently than common perceptions of fan behavior, said Dunja Antunovic, a researcher with The John Curley Center for Sports Journalism at Penn State. Bloggers on Women Talk Sports and BlogHer perceive sport often through a participatory perspective rather than an observatory lens, Antunovic said. In other words, instead of following teams many of the bloggers on these websites enjoy sport in terms of well-being and as a livelihood.

Antunovic and her research colleague Marie Hardin analyzed the bloggers’ profiles to gauge their views on sport and fandom. Many of the bloggers were not rabid fans of teams and did not focus on the more aggressive actions of fandom. They were more fans of the sports themselves and in terms of women’s sports, they worked on “bringing visibility” to them, Antunovic said.

Overall, the bloggers saw sport's purpose to be positive, inclusive and build relationships, she said.

But why do women need a separate space to discuss sports? Preliminary research by the University of Tennessee’s Traci Yates can perhaps help to answer this question.

Yates interviewed four women NFL fans to gauge their experiences as fans. A common theme among these women was the fact they had to verify their sports credentials, Yates said. Male sports fans often “tested” the women’s sports knowledge and acted as if they are the gatekeepers on determining genuine levels of fandom. One of Yates’ interview participants expressed embarrassment at this type of questioning and the overall challenge to her quality as a fan.

To that end, another one of Yates’ participants talked about how she had to change her language style to fit in when she watched sports among men. She never talked that way except in that sporting context among men, indicating that perhaps sports fandom is defined by aggressive men.

Both studies also more broadly discussed working to change the definition of fandom; that there should not be “fandom” and then a women’s style of fandom. Rather, the definition needs to encompass a wider segment of the population – one that likely includes the majority of male sports fans, who are people who like sports but are not the intense, face-painting, tribalistic individuals commonly portrayed as the typical sports fan.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Is the regulation of celebrations in sports part of a larger battle?

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 00:15:00 +0000

"Control of the body is a political issue."

San Jose State's Vernon Andrews made that statement during presentations on the "African-American Experience" Thursday at the annual conference for the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport in New Orleans.

Andrews’ statement was part of a broader discussion regarding his research on how black expression is regulated in sports.

Thursday he focused mainly on the discourse surrounding end-zone dances in football. Why are these dances considered undignified, uncouth or unbecoming of an athlete? Andrews argues that white elites dictate the rules for behavior in social spaces.

During his specific presentation, Andrews introduced statements from media members questioning the celebrations of expressive athletes, with some even criticizing the now famous Tiger Woods fist pump.

Andrews said that there should not be a blind following to the notion: This is the way it’s always been done. Rather, it should be asked: Who did it “that way” first, and why should everybody else adhere to that? Perhaps there is a cultural significance to the behaviors performed by the small percentage of athletes who are expressive, Andrews said.

He also said the power to make the rules for social spaces should not rest with the owners, but with the players and fans instead.

“It’s not the owners’ sport. … It’s all of our sport,” he said.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Analysis of Sports Illustrated yields interesting data on portrayals of women athletes

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 23:50:00 +0000

A new study indicates that representation of women athletes is improving, but there’s a caveat to that point.

The University of Buffalo’s Kiera Duckworth analyzed Sports Illustrated issues during Olympic years and found that the majority of articles portrayed women athletes as “strong, competent athletes.” Her research was presented Thursday at the annual conference for the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport in New Orleans.

This is a positive signal for women’s sports because it is imperative that women athletes are recognized for their athletic prowess and not being sexualized.

However in her analysis of advertisements in the same issues, Duckworth found that there were differences in representation based on race. White women were portrayed as “the girl next door”, black females were shown predominately in a sporting context and Asian women were sexualized.

Taken together, Duckworth’s research indicates that the focus needs to be placed not just on journalists, but on advertising companies who also create societal representations of women athletes.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Study examines sports journalism, sexual orientation in sport

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 20:28:00 +0000

Sport is often linked to heterosexual masculinity, creating an uncomfortable atmosphere for those who do not fit in sport’s perceived mold, especially homosexual athletes. Much research has been done examining sport and sexual orientation in terms of athletes. Ted Kian of Oklahoma State University and the University of Alabama’s John Vincent decided to analyze sport and sexual orientation focusing on the content producers or more specifically sports journalists.

Presenting their preliminary findings Thursday at the annual conference for the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport in New Orleans, Kian and Vincent found that sports journalism appears to be an area lacking in people who are declared homosexuals.

Kian and Vincent interviewed seven veteran sports reporters, and all seven said they have never worked with other sports journalists whom they know are homosexual. This is not to say these reporters, who have more than 140 years of reporting experience among them, have not worked with homosexuals. They said they just have not worked with sports journalists whom they know are homosexual.

The findings of Kian and Vincent, though not definitive, raise interesting questions about the atmosphere in sports departments and the departments’ inclusiveness.

The journalists Kian and Vincent interviewed also said they believe society is ready for a major star in one the four dominant male team sports to identify as a homosexual. The reporters also said teammates’ acceptance of that individual could take some time.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Does the government need to protect NFL players?

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 19:56:00 +0000

Perhaps the U.S. government can play a role in protecting NFL players.

This idea was posited Thursday by York University’s Tracy Supruniuk during a session at the annual conference for the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport in New Orleans. The federal government regulates workplace safety through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

The rate of injury among football players should potentially put the NFL in OSHA’s sights, Supruniuk said. He cited data that said the NFL players suffer injuries about 15 times more than the average worker.

The concern for players go beyond concussions, Supruniuk said.

“Head injuries are part of a larger problem in football,” he said. Injuries players suffer during their playing careers often have debilitating effects later in their lives, he said.

Whether OSHA has jurisdiction over the NFL is a murky issue, Supruniuk said. One of the questions is whether NFL players are employees or independent contractors, complicating who is responsible for player injuries, he said.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

Is more required of black male superstar athletes?

Thu, 18 Oct 2012 15:29:00 +0000

Yahoo! NFL blogger Doug Farrar summarized an interesting article Out.com did on Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe, who is an outspoken supporter of same-sex couples having the right to be married. Kluwe definitely adopted a clear position on what is a contentious issue in American society today.

Many athletes refuse to wade into political battles for fear of losing endorsements, popularity, etc. (Farrar did mention the Baltimore Ravens’ Brendon Ayanbadejo as a supporter of same-sex marriage, while Kluwe’s former Vikings teammate and Ayanbadejo's current teammate center Matt Birk opposes same-sex couples having the right to be married.)

Toward the end of the article, Farrar touched on the backlash that Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan receive for staying apolitical.

This raises an interesting question: Why should prominent black male athletes be the ones who have to speak out? I have heard scant calls for Peyton or Eli Manning to take social stands. Nil for Aaron Rodgers. Same goes for last year’s National League MVP Ryan Braun.

There is a romanticization in mainstream media with Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, John Carlos and Tommie Smith? These men, along with many women, have gone against the grain to say what’s in their hearts and change the social landscape.

But why do LeBron James and other black male stars have to carry this legacy and not prominent athletes in general?

I write this warning of a little buyers’ remorse: Perhaps if more athletes do speak out, those “social activists” may not like what they hear.

-- Steve Bien-Aimé

"Remember the little moments" - John Amaechi talks to a PSU audience

Tue, 16 Oct 2012 03:36:00 +0000

Former Nittany Lion and NBA player John Amaechi visited the Penn State campus on Monday night to discuss the role of sports in the society.

"People have a hard time believing that I'm a psychologist because of the way I look," Amaechi said, signaling at his body. As a 6-foot-10 black man, people often have a hard time believing that currently his professional life is not being an athlete.

His opening stories subtly pointed to the stereotypes people hold about black men.

Amaechi, who is originally from Great Britain, talked about his upbringing and the influence his mother had on his values and his career aspirations. He also fondly recalled the importance of Star Wars, a movie that came out when he was 7 and inspired him.

Once Amaechi gave up on his dream to become a Jedi, he quickly turned to another, perhaps a slightly more realistic one: to play for the NBA.

The first step in this process was coming to the United States to play at a high school level.

"I didn't realize sport was quite serious in America," Amaechi recalled as he expressed his confusion over terminology such as "preseason," "wights," and "individual practices."

He soon learned from his coach how serious sport actually was. Amaechi remembered his coach saying, "I hope you are enjoying this year, because this is the last time you are playing for fun."

In fact, as a varsity athlete at Penn State, Amaechi was very much aware that his performance had a much larger implication than just his own success. He knew that his coaches' jobs were on the line -- and that people's careers depended upon his play on the basketball court.

But, he had another issue to consider when playing for Penn State and that was whether to come out to his teammates and be openly gay. He names two reasons as to why he chose to remain silent about his sexuality.

One was that he felt that being gay on the Penn State campus at the time "didn't feel like a good idea." He recalled talking to Rene Portland, a former women's basketball coach, and feeling uncomfortable about people who she considered to be "different," as Amaechi put it.

The other reason he decided not to come out was that he was worried about his future career in the NBA. Amaechi said he wasn't "that good" and that he was convinced, at the time, that as a "not that good" player, he would not be offered an opportunity in the NBA as a gay man.

"I regret that I didn't come out while I was at Penn State," Amaechi said. "I knew there was a choice."

He choose the NBA.

As a former professional basketball player, Amaechi is concerned that athletes are not prepared to deal with the responsibility put upon them to serve as role models for kids.

"Sports doesn't teach people how to be good giants," Amaechi said.

He said athletes pick and choose when they want to be treated like "giants." An example would be when athletes are around people who don't ask for their autograph and adopt this "Don't you know who I am?" attitude demanding preferential treatment. When it comes to being socially responsible and answering questions about social issues, athletes, however, opt out.

The solution, Amaechi suggests, is to re-shift our focus upon the "little moments of interaction."

"Sport when it's great, attends to details," he said.

These details can be as small as giving a hi-five to a child, or making eye-contact with a player when coaching them, or reaching out to a family.

"In those little moments, we make people feel better," Amaechi said. And that, he suggested, make sports and psychology interact.

Most importantly, it is being consistent in the decisions you are making.

"You can't be a part-time person of principle," Amaechi said.

Amaechi seems to have found his way of being as close to a childhood dream of being a Jedi as he possibly could. But, as a retired NBA player, he emphasized that the success tied to performance on the basketball court and the fame passes quickly.

"One day nobody will care about these great sweeping moments," he said. But what people will remember are the "little moments."

He told a story of playing in a gym during his basketball career and seeing two kids -- brothers -- there. He came up to them, talked to them a number of times and a few months later brought them to his camp in England. To his surprise, one of the children asked Amaechi to adopt them.

Years later, one of the children asked him: "Do you know why we picked you to adopt us?" Amaechi thought they chose him because he was a famous basketball player. The kid responded: "Nah, you weren't that good," and added, "We picked you because you remembered our names."

Amaechi cherishes these little moments and strives to bring many of these into life through his work as a psychologist and activist in different organizations. He believes that the development of young athletes to become attentive and responsible human beings lies in early education and, particularly, the NCAA's power to prepare the athletes for success beyond their athletic careers.

Amaechi strongly believes in the power of sports to teach principles and values that make life better. He acknowledges so by recongizing the positive influence his coaches have had on him.

Yet, when asked about who taught him the values he holds so dearly now, he names a person who had nothing to do with sports and who barely saw him play.

"Most of my values come from my mom," Amaechi said. "I mean, I used to think she was a Jedi. That tells you something about her."

John Amaechi is an author of a memoir titled "Man in the Mirror," which was published in 2007.

-- Dunja Antunovic

PSU hosts workshop on national pastimes

Fri, 12 Oct 2012 13:08:00 +0000

What is a national pastime? Can a nation have more than one national pastime? Is a "pastime" national based upon spectatorship or participation, or both?

These are some of the questions that the acclaimed scholars will be addressing during a two-day workshop hosted by the Pennsylvania State University.

This morning, Mark Dyreson, Professor of Kinesiology, open the "The Lives (and Deaths) of American National Pastimes" workshop addressing the early tensions in the development of the function and cultural significance of national pastimes in the United States.

Additionally to the faculty from Penn State, the workshop welcomes scholars from the University of Maryland, Ohio State University, Purdue University and George Mason University, among others.

On Friday, the workshop will encompass lectures on how basketball, baseball, and football became constructed as "national pastimes." The scholars will also address the role of the media in this process of construction, as well as the relationship between law and the emergence of these activities.

To close the first day of the conference, John Nichols, Professor Emeritus at the College of Communications, will offer a commentary. He will be addressing a talk titled "Intercollegiate Sports as National Pastimes -- Why American Football Became the Dominant College Sport" by Ronald Smith, Professor Emeritus of Sport and Exercise Studies, at 4pm.

The workshop continues on Saturday at 9am with sessions on horse racing and prize fighting. In closing, the scholars will address how social identity -- based on gender and race -- allowed for/limited access to "national pastimes."

Marie Hardin, Associate Director for Research at the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism will be commenting on Jaime Schultz's and Andrew Linden's talk "Women and National Pastimes," which begins at 11am.

The workshop is held at 110 Henderson Building. On Friday, the sessions end at 5pm, while on Saturday, they conclude at 1pm.

For updates, go to @CurleyCenter on Twitter and check back to our blog.

-- Dunja Antunovic

Recap: Past presidents disagree with sanctions

Sun, 07 Oct 2012 15:53:00 +0000

A panel including past presidents unanimously disagreed with NCAA sanctions placed upon Penn State late this summer, levying $60 million in fines, drastically cutting scholarships and keeping the team out of bowl contention for the next several years.

But they also agreed on this: Nothing can be done, and Penn State needs to move on.

“My heart goes out to you. This was a very unique situation and I hope it never happens again. No one has ever fired a president or athletic director over a football issue,” said Gene Corrigan, NCAA president from 1995 to 1997. “No one has certainly literally killed a football coach over one either.”

Corrigan and others spoke on the future of the NCAA to a crowd of about 500 on Thursday night in the State Theatre.

Penn State R. Scott Kretchmar, former NCAA faculty representative, drew applause when he expressed his disagreement with the level of the punishment by the NCAA and the level of evidence to support the punishment.

“Draconian penalties need to be supported by a high burden of proof. The evidence is not all in. Trials didn’t even happen yet. What happened to due process?” Kretchmar said.

Thomas O’Toole, assistant managing editor/ sports of USA Today, expressed his shock when the NCAA sent a letter to Penn State asking questions about the scandal.

“When I heard about the story, I thought there was no way the NCAA would or should get involved. When I heard the NCAA sent Penn State a letter, I was stunned,” O’Toole said.

After the panel had expressed its scrutiny of the NCAA’s involvement, university Board of Trustees member Anthony Lubrano addressed the panel.

“What can we do?” to address the sanctions, Lubrano asked.

Cedric Dempsey, NCAA president from 1994 to 2003, was the first to speak. He was blunt.

“There’s nothing you can do. You gave up your rights and therefore, your options,” Dempsey said.

According to the panel, Penn State would have had a case against the NCAA on procedural grounds, but since Penn State forfeited its right to appeal, there is nothing that can be done to overturn that decision.

Corrigan was even more blunt: “Bury it and move on,” he said.

Amanda Hommer is a student in the College of Communications. She can be reached at ACH5228@psu.edu.

What should the discussion be on performance-enhancing drugs?

Fri, 21 Sep 2012 12:15:00 +0000

After reading about how the Twitter-verse was all abuzz Thursday regarding the rumors surrounding New York Yankees star Robinson Cano and performance-enhancing drugs, it would seem appropriate to discuss doping in sport. (USA Today reported that Cano has not failed any drug test. A discussion about Twitter and journalistic ethics will be saved for a future blog post.)

While the Cano rumors are false, the impact of performance-enhancing drugs on sport cannot be ignored. Within the past 30 days, Major League Baseball suspended two prominent players for doping, and the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency moved to strip Lance Armstrong of his Tour de France victories.

The use of performance-enhancing drugs at one level can be traced to sport’s place in the global society. It is extremely capitalist in nature – extreme competition where there can be at most a few winners and plenty of losers. The resources (read money) go to the winners. There is a constant push for innovation. Innovation is a positive thing, but it can easily become warped as can be seen with doping in athletics.

The reward for doping seemingly outweighs the substantial health risks for some athletes. Opportunities for scholarships or multi-million dollar contracts provide big temptations that overwhelm a few competitors.

The genie is not going back in the bottle. For those who decry the win-at-all-costs nature of sport, there is too much money behind it to eliminate it from its prominence. The billions of dollars in ticket and merchandise sales, the billions spent on TV commercials, and the media industry created on the backs of the athletes are strong indicators that the capitalist nature of athletics is here to stay.

FOXSports.com ran a strong series of articles analyzing doping from a variety of perspectives: whether testing should even be done, the dangers to youth and society’s hypocrisy when it comes to cheating.

Jen Floyd Engel’s piece on hypocrisy is truly thought-provoking. Why does society place different levels on cheating? Some rule-breaking is OK, but others are not. This sliding scale indicates a society that encourages the bending or breaking of rules or norms to get ahead.

Maybe the discussion needs to shift away from improving PED testing to an honest discussion about why people permit violating some rules and not others.

But are capitalist societies destined to have cheaters because of the potential rewards? Are there any societies that do not have cheaters?

-- Steve Bien-Aime