Female Athletes and the Media

Spotlight Topic- Why Don't Female Athletes Receive the same amount of Media Coverage as Male Athletes?

Introduction

Gender differences are present in sports media coverage. Many sports fans argue that women’s sports are being compared to men’s sports. Simultaneously, women’s sports are very rarely broadcasted in the media. Women have been fighting for equality all throughout history. Coakley 2009, stated that women were once not even permitted to watch the Olympic games. The harsh reality is that sport is a male-dominated society and for a number of years, well-known male athletes have always been in the spotlight. Such as Christiano Ronaldo, Tiger Woods, Connor McGreggor and Kobe Bryant.

In comparison, women athletes and sports don’t even cut it close with the general public.
There is noticeably less interest in female sports and unequal media coverage and this is also the justification as to why this topic is so important within today’s society. This is a new age and media coverage needs to change. The purpose of this research report is to analyse why female athletes don’t receive as much media coverage as male athletes. This paper will also give a complete background about this topic and justification, mass participation, a discussion of key findings and also recommendations to sport development stakeholders on how to improve the future media coverage for female athletes.

Background and justification of the topic

Despite the improvements towards gender equality in sports, female athletes are still facing numerous obstacles daily, media coverage of women’s sports. Looking closer at participation of women and female athletes in sport, participation rates do have impact on media coverage of female athletes, however the mark is still being missed when it comes to the media. This text will give background knowledge about participation and the key findings about female athletes and the media.

Background and participation

The very first Summer Olympic Games were held in 1896, where only many athletes competed. The women then went on to make their debut in the Summer Olympics in 1900 of 22 women for two events, golf and tennis. In the next few games, other sports were slowly added but the gap did not begin to close until the 1980’s. From 1980 to 2012, the number of female participants in the Olympic Games skyrocketed to 5000, a total of 45% female athlete’s participants.

In 1966, a quote was written by the United States of America female athletes saying, “As never before, women are making their presence felt in the world of sport, and there is a wealth of opportunities for the media to influence society’s acceptance of all female athletes.” (Fink 2013). This quote reads that female athletes finally felt recognised as female athletes, that their presence felt known and ready for this change and greater media attention. However, years on from that famous quote, very little has changed. Research has been conducted for quite some time and is said that media don’t care about female athletes and what they can achieve for their athleticism instead the media’s focus is around their physical appearance and femininity

The 2012 London Olympic Games were announced as the ‘Year of the Woman’, according to Fink 2013, nearly 45% of all athletes were women. Sport Participation for women is currently at an all-time high, female athlete still receive next to none media attention when comparing to the male athletes.

When looking closer at participation of women sports and female athletes, participation rates have increased over the years. The 2012 Olympic games consisted of 44% female athletes. According to Fink 2013, after the London won the Olympic bid in 2005, participation of women in sport increased by one million. The United States of America Olympic team had a total of 529 athletes: 261 were men and 268 were women.

The Australian Football League saw that there was a 43% increase in female participation in soccer from 2011-2013. According to Women in sport 2015 and a recent study conducted in England 2015, Male participation is of 8,649,507 where females are only 6,868,450.

Discussion of Key Findings from the literature review

In a recent study conducted about female athletes and media coverage, more people than ever before are watching the women’s FIFA World Cup on TV, according to FIFA.COM, more than 3.3 million viewers between United States of America and Australia tuned in to watch the international sport. According to Petty and Pope 2018, The English media coverage had a total of 124 articles published, 70 of those were broadsheets and 54 were from tabloids. The key findings found that the coverage peaked for all newspaper once the tournament had started. However, after the FIFA world cup, very few articles were published from then on. This is from the typical lack of coverage of women’s team sport in the United Kingdom on a daily basis.

Another study conducted in America by Michael A. Messner, Michela Musto and Cheryl Cooky of Purdue University, have found that female athletes are actually covered less in media now than in 1989. During 2014, only 3,2% of network television coverage was of women sports. Sports Centre gave women 2% of coverage.

The study has suggested that this is because women’s sport is pushed aside to the margins of a TV screen whereas in comparison male sports are the main coverage. The researchers also suggest that all media coverage of women and female athletes is sexists. Female athletes are being framed as sexual objects rather than for their athleticism. Scheadler & Wagstaff suggest that the media present sport as masculine sports and separating the sports into feminine, gymnastics and figure skating and masculine, Rugby League and soccer sports. This automatically makes it more difficult to break gender barriers- allowing women to participate in masculine sports or males participating in feminine sports. If this happens, their sexuality is automatically and immediately assumed without any question. The media tends to ignore a women’s athletes and accomplishments by focussing on their physical appearance.

It is reported that the media does portray male athletes are represented as strong and powerful men and young men who are engaged in events of historical importance. (Duncan, Messner, Williams & Jensen 1994). According to Jennifer, Hardin & Horman 2009, the 2004 Sydney Olympics track and field coverage was presented as more exciting than the women’s- using more shot types, camera angles and special effects per minute. This then naturally symbolises male athletes as more powerful as perceived to the media.

Another issue women are facing in media coverage is the focus of femininity, and sexism. As briefly touched above in text, the most common theme is the sexualisation in sport for women is in references to their appearance. According to Trolan 2013, the most references was make-up, hair and body shape. The study that took place by Messner found that when female athletes were having some sort of media coverage, even if it was 5%, it was commonly either in role of a sexual object. The study reports that the decline of media coverage is because sports announcers are no longer allowed to use female athletes as a sexual object.

Stakeholders

In the key findings of the literature review, it is evident that media coverage of female athletes is still missing the mark. Even though some improvement has been recognised, it is important for stakeholders to improve media coverage for female athletes. This is because of the future generation of female sports.

According to Linton 2019, A stakeholder in sport is an individual or organization whose attitudes and actions influence the success of a sports team, sports participant or an entire sport. Stakeholder analysis is the process of identifying stakeholders and assessing their relative importance and influence.

1.1 Participants

Participants are the fundamental stakeholders in sports because coaches and teams help them to achieve their goals. Participants have the power to influence, aim and attract more players to a game.

1.2 Spectators

Spectators influence financial success throughout a sports team, for example, when a spectator attends a game they then increase the likelihood of more spectators- increasing attraction. This as a result increases ticket sales, team merchandise and memberships.

1.3 Governing Bodies

Sports governing bodies, such as the Australia’s women’s national soccer team, the Matildas or Australians women’s national field hockey team, the Hockeyroos, have responsibilities for participants and other stakeholders like coaches and or administrators. The governing bodies set rules for competitions and for the way teams manage their sport organisations. Governing bodies also negotiate broadcasting rights and sponsorship deals.

1.4 Financial Stakeholders

Sports teams, governing bodies and participants build relationships with financial stakeholders to attract revenue and other forms of funding. Financial stakeholders also seek sponsorship deals with broadcasters to increase revenue.

Recommendations

1.1

The first recommendations to stakeholders and the first step is to commit to consistent coverage of female sports. This is the first step because if there was consistent coverage, a number of things would improve- such as social media following, fans would know where to watch the game and when to watch the game. Knowing who was playing in the team that day or who is out injured, who was at the top of the ladder of the championship league- all of this takes consistent day-in and day-out coverage. If the financial stakeholders seek more coverage to not only increase revenue, but to also increase media coverage for female athletes, they would receive equal media coverage in comparison to male athletes.

1.2

The second recommendation is for more female journalists, athletes and coaches to launch more sporting podcasts and websites. By doing so, they will not only advocate for better sports coverage, but they will be introducing new voices and show women’s perspective about their love for the sport that they play.

1.3

The third recommendation is to increase the likes of female sports journalists. While it has been a difficult space for females to enter. For example, in the late 1970’s female sport journalists we not allowed to enter the football locker room to interview male athletes before and or after a game- leaving male sport journalists with a complete advantage. As well as female sport journalists can also be critiqued for their lack of knowledge around sports. Erin Molan who is a sports journalist for channel nine, better known as coverage for the NRL, she had encountered plenty of backlash for being in the position she is in now. In an interview with news.com.au she faced a lot of sexism comments. However, if the stakeholders increased female sports journalists, all of this wouldn’t matter anymore and it would just become the norm.

1.4

The fourth recommendation to stakeholders is to give female athletes a voice. If sports journalists both female and male wrote more background, light hearted stories about female athletes, this would make them feel empowered, make them feel like they do have a voice in the industry. Publishing great stories about women will give the future of female athletes a platform to then go from.

1.5

The fifth and final recommendation is to create an actual, dedicated timeslot for television networks. Coverage of women’s sport and female athletes will then feel like they have a voice is this male dominated industry. Even if it is just a 15minute timeslot, it is so much more than what it once was.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it is evident from this research report why female athlete don’t receive as much coverage as male athletes. A lot of things come into play. Participation, if the increase of participation levels rises with women’s sports, it is likely that there will then be an increase to media coverage. While mass participation has increased, there is indeed still a long way to go. The key findings found that only 3.2% of women’s sport is covered by the media. Recent research has also found that female athletes are generally being framed as a sexual object rather than for their athletes. If stakeholders looked at the five recommendations given, there would be more media coverage for female athletes than ever. It is important do take these recommendations on board now for the future generation of sport. While some improvement has been made, there is indeed still a long way to go.

References

Brennan, C. (2012, July 15). Finally. It’s all about the women at London Olympics. USA TODAY Retrieved from: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/sports/story/2012- 07-25/London-Olympics-Brennan-women/56488526/1

Coakley, J. J. (2009). Sports in society: Issues and controversies (2nd Canadian ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.

Driscoll, V. (2015). The differences in media coverage between male and female athletes (Order No. 1600996). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (1718550983). Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.libraryproxy.griffith.edu.au/docview/1718550983?accountid=14543

Duncan, M. C., Messner, M.A., Williams, L., & Jensen, K. (1994). Gender stereotyping in televised sports. In S. Birrell & C.L. Cole (Eds.). Women, sport, and culture (pp. 249-272). Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics Publishers.

Dunn, C, Welford, J (2015) Football and the FA Women’s Super League. Basingstoke: Palgrave.

Fink, J.S. (2013) ‘Female athletes, women’s sport, and the sport media commercial complex: have we really “come a long way, baby”?’, Sport Management Review, vol. 18, no. 3, pp. 331–42.

https://niemanreports.org/articles/covering-womens-sports/

Jennifer D. Greer Ph.D., Marie Hardin Ph.D. & Casey Homan M.A. (2009) “Naturally” Less Exciting? Visual Production of Men's and Women's Track and Field Coverage During the 2004 Olympics, Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 53:2, 173-189, DOI: 10.1080/08838150902907595

Petty, K., & Pope, S. (2019). A New Age for Media Coverage of Women’s Sport? An Analysis of English Media Coverage of the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup. Sociology, 53(3), 486–502. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038518797505

Williams, J (2003) A Game for Rough Girls? London: Routledge.