In 2022, transgender swimmer Lia Thomas reignited longstanding debates about fairness in sport, and by August 2023, 23 states had enacted legislation restricting transgender athletic participation. While trans-feminine athletes are often seen as a “threat” to women’s sports, the experiences of trans-masculine athletes are often overlooked. Based on interviews with 13 trans-masculine athletes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association, I explore how they navigate gender identity while participating in gendered, competitive sport. I find that their (trans)gender identities and identities as athletes became inseparable and were mutually constituted. Additionally, I argue that their experiences in sport are contingent on their trans-masculine identities. While not the primary targets of antitrans policy, their experiences were impacted by broader, antitrans rhetoric and legislative efforts to restrict transgender participation.
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“I’m the Kind of Trans They Don’t Care About”: Experiences of Trans-Masculine Athletes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association
Alexander Z. Perry
Transgender Athletes’ Testimonies of Existence and Resistance: Breaking Gender Binaries in Online Women’s Sports Media
Monica Crawford
Within an increasingly polarized media environment, transgender inclusion within sport has become a political wedge issue and, accordingly, a newsworthy topic. This study adds to the literature on media representation of transgender athletes by focusing on coverage within five women’s sports media outlets. Through a critical discourse analysis of 190 media artifacts, this study considers how the outlets discursively construct transgender and nonbinary athletes and engage in conversations around transgender inclusion within sport. Findings show that women’s sports media outlets foreground the legality of transgender athletic participation and the humanity of transgender athletes. Moreover, the outlets are understood here as a counterpublic where media organizations embrace an explicitly activist stance.
Weaponizing Sport: Exploring the Legal and Policy Implications of Menstrual Tracking for Transgender and Nonbinary Athletes
Lindsey Darvin, Tia Spagnuolo, and David Schultz
The intersection of gender identity, sports participation, and health care is increasingly under scrutiny within legal and policy spheres. Specifically, the practice of tracking U.S. high school athletes’ menstrual cycles sustains concerning implications for gender-based discrimination, particularly affecting transgender and nonbinary athletes. This paper examines the legal and policy implications of menstrual tracking in high school athletics, highlighting the potential violations of privacy rights and discrimination against athletes of diverse gender identities. By analyzing existing laws, regulations, and case law, the paper explores the complexities surrounding the practice of menstrual tracking and calls for more inclusive and equitable sports policies. Additionally, it addresses gaps in privacy protections under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, emphasizing the need for updated regulations to safeguard students’ health-related data in digital environments.
Nationalism and Anti-LGBTQ+: Exploring the Role of Nationalism in Soccer Fans’ Protests Against LGBTQ+ Equal Rights
Mateusz Grodecki, Dagmara Szczepańska, and Barbara Pasamonik
This paper examines the role of nationalism in Polish soccer fans’ protests in resistance to LGBTQ+ equal rights. Drawing on data from semistructured interviews with 22 nationalist activists, namely ideological leaders of hard-core soccer supporters’ community, who shape the ultras’ nationalist discourse, the study explores their rationalizations behind anti-LGBTQ+ demonstrations. By recognizing nationalism as an ideological background, our study goes beyond theories of masculinity, a dominating way of explaining discrimination against sexual minorities in sports (fandom) to date, and it identifies a wider set of rationalizations, conceptualized in two broader models: (1) naturalist rationalizations, and (2) the counter-counterhegemonic rationalizations, which include three more specific themes—(2a) anti-antihegemonic masculinity (2b) anti-Western and (2c) anti-leftist.
Sport and Transnational Indigenous Solidarity From Turtle Island to Palestine? Examining Iroquois Nationals’ 2018 Trip to Israel
Chen Chen
The Iroquois Nationals’ participation in the 2018 World Lacrosse Championship was welcomed by the hosting Israeli state despite the call for boycott from the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement and pro-Palestinian groups’ appeal for Indigenous solidarity. This paper discusses the historical/geopolitical contexts of this event and examines the responses from multiple parties, including the team representatives, pro-Israel groups, and Indigenous media/activists. By bringing together literature in Indigenous studies, settler colonial studies, Palestinian studies, and critical sport studies, it highlights the challenges for transnational solidarity in the sport industry as well as the urgency for deepening an internationalist anticolonial/anti-imperialist political consciousness among athletes and sport organizations, Indigenous or non-Indigenous alike.
Driving Change? Field Containment of Gender Equality Committees in International Sports Governance
Lucie Schoch and Madeleine Pape
This study investigates the ability of Gender Equality Committees (GECs) to drive change in the governance of International Federations, particularly in the overrepresentation of men in leadership roles. We situate GECs within the gendered fields of strategic action, whose change efforts must engage diverse actors beyond the immediate organizational context of a given International Federation. In examining the GECs of two gender-progressive International Federations through semistructure interviews, we develop the concept of “field containment” and show that the political and material conditions of the GEC constrain its ability to perform impactful work and particularly to achieve field-wide change, ultimately resulting in the containment of the GEC. The article concludes with practical implications.
Media Analysis of Lia Thomas Surrounding 2022 National Collegiate Athletic Association Championship Win
Jessica L. Hamdan and Adam Love
In March 2022, swimmer Lia Thomas became the first transgender athlete to win a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I individual title. The current study analyzed popular online media coverage of Thomas during the month of the NCAA championships. Conservative-oriented media set the agenda by publishing a disproportionate number of articles about Thomas, frequently framing her performance as (a) illegitimate and (b) enabled by activists who “silence” their opponents. All media outlets often framed Thomas’ performance as (a) unprecedented, (b) a question of fairness as it relates to (1) science and policy and (2) concern for women’s rights, and (c) complex, while nonconservative media more frequently framed her performance as (a) a matter of LGBTQI+ rights and (b) an inspiration.
Gender Critical Feminism and Trans Tolerance in Sports
C.J. Jones
Through a systematic review of gender critical feminist rhetoric in the realm of sports, this article excavates a rhetorical strategy of what the author calls “trans tolerance,” a strategy that is at once trans-affirming and trans-exclusionary. The author argues that three themes run across three gender critical feminist organizations: (a) nonpartisanship, (b) biofeminism, and (c) trans tolerance. In a sports world that desperately needs transformation, scholars and activists alike must sharpen analyses of violent transphobic rhetoric in a way that moves beyond a “pro-trans versus anti-trans framework.”
Pride Body: Racialized Gay and Queer Men’s Physique Preparation for Canadian Pride Events
Daniel Uy
This research explores why racialized queer and gay men work out prior to Pride events in Pride Toronto and Fierté Montréal. The findings show that muscular aesthetics are a type of gay social capital, and participants acknowledge that this may also increase undesired attention and limitations because of their racialized bodies. Participants voice the paradox of the “unspoken rule,” which derives from ideas of authenticity and superficiality. To be one’s most genuine self, racialized queer and gay men must achieve a high physical bodily aesthetic but may lose identity and agency. Yet, they transform their bodies as a daily dedication to their own well-being. Most seem to be aware of the contradictions and tensions in developing a muscled body, which is a personal journey each of them went through to find their own understanding and meaning.
“What Is Lost so That Other Things Can Be Sustained?”: The Climate Crisis, Loss, and the Afterlife of Golf
Brad Millington and Brian Wilson
This article introduces sociological conceptions of loss to literature on sport to assess the “life” and “death” of golf courses—as well as the “afterlife” of golf terrain once golf courses close. As indicated by the quotation from Rebecca Elliott’s writing (2018) in our title, a loss framing differs from the concept of sustainability by considering practices that might be discarded to serve better environmental futures. We consider loss vis-à-vis three golf industry “outlooks”: (1) strategic and gradual loss, where loss serves an industry-friendly view of sustainability; (2) permanent loss, where courses “die,” potentially toward greener “afterlives”; and (3) transformational loss, where golf courses remain but are substantially changed. We conclude with reflections on loss and the study of sport beyond golf.
