Women have come a long way in America; from them being expected to be housewives and caretakers confined to a house. Those days are long over and now women can pursue their dreams and aspirations however they want. The opportunities for women to pursue a career in any industry are extensive and mostly uninhibited. Now the pursuit of a career in the male dominated sports industry is an attainable goal. Although scholars examine the negative effects and obstacles women face in sports; (such as sexism and inequality) they fail to address the positive changes women in sports have made to social norms, sexism, and inequality.
Therefore, the positive changes women in sports have made need to be addressed. It is true that women do face sexism, inequality and other obstacles in sports, but these problems overlook the effect that women in sports will have for the future. When women first started entering the workforce they faced sexism, and inequality the same as women in sports face now. Women in the workforce have now nearly reached equality to men and face significantly less sexism. This parallel makes it safe to assume that women in sports will reach a higher level of equality and face less sexism overtime. Unfortunately the negative aspects of women in sports overpower the positive aspects mitigating their importance.
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Women in sports have broken social expectations for women to be nothing more than skinny, delicate, and submissive (which also curbs unhealthy body image). Female athletes also fight sexism by showing strong, confident, and skilled women competing alongside males. Now although female athletes don’t have equality to men in sports yet, they will overtime reach it as societal norms are reshaped and their participation in sports is accepted by society.
The social expectations and norms for women have been set for a long time, and these norms change overtime from one generation to the next. The most recent changes to these social norms have been made by women competing in sports. This group of women has begun to reshape the old expectations for women to be nothing more than skinny, proper, and delicate flowers that need to be protected and attained. Women in sports are inspiring other women and society to look at women in a new light; as beautiful, strong, and confident leaders that can get down and dirty like the men. Women in sports are inspiring society to change their expectations about women; this is evidenced in The Journal of Sport and Social Issues by Dorie Geissler who discusses girl power.
“Girl power is an empowerment that comes from within, the power of women and girls to break traditional molds and become whom they want to be, feminine but strong, free yet in control. Given the mutually contingent emergence of the women’s sports movement and the girl revolution during the mid-1990s, sport is at the center of girl culture. The acceptable focus on the physically strong and self-determined female body associated with the rise in women’s sports gives sport a unique and prominent place within girl culture. Mature, muscular, and confident women’s sports stars are said to portray a healthier female embodiment. Their success is seen as authoring a desirable brand of girl power that provides inspiration and encouragement for women and girls to participate in sport and helps build self-esteem and a healthy body image.” (Geissler).
Essentially girls participating in sports are reshaping how our younger and older generations view women. Men and women that grew up with these old social norms are now seeing those social norms broken and reshaped and must adjust to this new idea (which results in sexism). The younger men and women are now growing up with these new social norms and are learning to view women in a new way. Now a younger generation of girls are growing up seeing women as powerful, confident, and inspiring figures. Women in sports are empowering this younger generation of girls to pursue whatever they want and face far less sexism in the future as they do. In addition to women in sports empowering a younger generation of girls, they are also teaching a younger generation of guys. This younger generation of guys is being taught to embrace their female counterparts in the workplace, sports and life with far less sexism. Women in sports is just another step towards them reaching equality to men.
The effects of Title IX have been tremendous. A study commissioned in 2006 showed that when compared to the pre-Title IX era, high school girls had nine times more opportunities to participate in sports. Likewise, that same study found a 450-percent increase in the opportunities for women at the college level. A 2008 study on the matter confirmed those findings, discovering that the number of female sports teams per university has grown to just more than eight, a huge marker of equality progress from the pre-Title IX era.
There are still many issues that female athletes face at all levels. At the college level, female coaches are paid much less than their male counterparts (Gavora). Some argue that this tends to attract less talented coaches, thus causing negative effects for athletes. In addition, female professional sports suffer from a significant salary gap when compared to men’s sports. The Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) has grown by leaps and bounds in the more than fifteen years that it has spent in existence. It is moderately popular, but the women there lag behind men in many measures of equality. There are differences in viewership and attendance for these sports, of course, but that does not detract from the fact that female athletes still struggle to get the notoriety in men. The highest paid female athlete of 2012 was Maria Sharapova, but the highest paid male athlete that year – Tiger Woods – outearned her by more than $50 million.
While much progress has been made, these facts remain the unfortunate truth around women’s sports. As more colleges and more high schools allow opportunities for women to participate, there is some hope that the inequality will continue to shrink. After all, women’s sports have made significant progress over the last four decades. There is much work to be done, however, especially when it comes to women being given the opportunities to pursue sponsorship deals and other forms of compensation that are enjoyed by the men who also play their sports.
- Gavora, Jessica. Tilting the Playing Field: Schools, Sports, Sex, and. Encounter Books, 2002.
- Lopiano, Donna A. “Modern history of women in sports: Twenty-five years of Title IX.” Clinics in sports medicine 19.2 (2000): 163-173.
