i have assignment and quiz based on readings and short videos

Temple University - Fox School | STHM_0857_-_Women_in_American_Sport-SD

[MUSIC PLAYING]

AUBREY KENT: Hi. I'm Aubrey Kent. And in this brief video, we're going to talk about women in American

Sport. We're going to talking about some key eras for women in American Sport and also

some key issues that have and continue to impact their participation and involvement in the

business of the sport industry.

Sadly, when we talk about the history of American Sport, it's typically absent the female

perspective. Most of what we know has come through the perspective of the white male.

Historically, research on sport has been the same. It's always been assumed that there's an

inherent conflict between participation in sport and the female gender.

There are many debunked myths that now we can laugh at. But not so long ago in American

history, especially through the mid 19th century, persisted that were barriers for women

participating in sport-- things like sport being harmful to female reproductive organs, sport

creating masculine-looking females, participation in sport turning women into lesbians, females

being incapable of participating at the same level as men-- so why would they bother--

psychological variables like women not valuing traits that are valuable in sport, like

aggressiveness and competition, or just the basic societal role that women were perceived to

play in the home being inconsistent with participation in sport.

We can laugh at many of these now. And we know they are certainly untrue. But in developing

nations, many of these persistent and are significant barriers for girls and women participating

in sport.

More serious and persistent in today's society is discrimination, which really limits opportunities

for sport. And it certainly did so to a greater extent before 1972. In 1972, landmark legislation

was passed known as Title IX. And this was education-based reform which prohibited any

imbalance in opportunities by any entity that received federal funding.

So for example, if a university which receives federal funds in the form of direct grants, but

also grants and aids to students, has a proportion of 52% to 48%, female to male, then 52% of

opportunities, sport and otherwise, have to go towards females.

So this has over the last 40 or so years been very important in increasing the participation for

women in sport in America. But it certainly hasn't translated to participation around the world.

Even as participation has grown due to Title IX, access to administrative and coaching

positions has declined.

Paradoxically, as the investment of universities, for example, has increased in women sport,

what it's actually done is driven the coaching ranks to become more male. As more male

coaches are perceived to be qualified and there's more pay for coaches of female teams, so

we've seen a decline, in fact, of coaching and administrative opportunities for female.

In many ways, women have had history against them. They have less formal connections and

training development programs in the coaching ranks. And these are persistent discriminatory

barriers that need to be overcome.

Finally, one of the big areas of study in the academics of sport has to do with media depictions

of females versus males. You'll often see in a sport magazine the male athlete in a suit and tie,

whereas you will see a female athlete depicted in less formal wear, either participating in her

sport or in some sort of attractive outfit as they become objectified, and to a far greater extent

than male athletes do.

There are far fewer opportunities for women to be professionals in their given sport. As we

know, in America, there are only two professional leagues-- the WNBA and various iterations

of women's professional soccer, neither of which are funded even close to the degree of male

professional sports in terms of the athletes' opportunity to make a living.

The Olympic Games were all-male until 1924. And even in 1960, which is not so long ago,

relatively, it was only 20% female.

The more recent games-- in London 2012, the Olympic Games hit an all-time high for

representation, and yet still only 44% of the events and athletes participating were women.

So we've identified quickly some key eras and landmark milestones for women in sport. But

the key issues still remain-- access and barriers to access and discrimination still remain in

terms of certain positions, not so much athletes themselves, but coaching and administrators

and in terms of media and societal acceptance as athletes, as peer athletes within the sport

industry to their male counterparts.