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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.

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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.”

Open access

“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.

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Black Hair Is a Safe Sport Issue!: Black Aesthetics, Access, Inclusion, and Resistance

Janelle Joseph, Kaleigh Pennock, and Shalom Brown

This paper examines the intersection of Black hair aesthetics and three dimensions of safe sport: environmental and physical safety, relational safety, and optimizing sport experiences. Black hair, a fundamental aspect of cultural identity for people of African descent, has been historically stigmatized; an issue that extends into sports yet remains unexplored. Through a predominantly Canadian perspective, we define Black hair aesthetics as encompassing various textures and styles related to real and potential risks of injury, inattention, and disregard in sport contexts. We contend that Black hair is a safe sport issue as it intertwines with risk, safety, and human rights. By exploring Black hair stylization, we uncover its political dimensions and its ability to challenge colonial norms that impact sporting access and success.

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Prologue: Have You Heard About the Cotillion?

Maria J. Veri and Diane L. Williams

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(Un)Doing Gender Inequalities in Sport Organizations

Annelies Knoppers, Corina van Doodewaard, and Ramón Spaaij

Gender can be seen not only as a binary category but also as a performance or doing that is shaped by, and shapes organizational processes and structures that are deeply embedded in (sport) organizations in multiple and complex ways. The purpose of this paper is to explore strategies for addressing the undoing of gender in sport organizations with the use of an overarching or meta-approach. Strategies that aim to undo gender require a recognition of the complexity of regimes of inequality and the need to use incremental steps in the form of small wins while acknowledging change is not linear. The complexity and multiplicity of the gendering of sport organizations should, therefore, be considered a wicked problem. The naming of heterotopias can provide directions or goals for small wins and for addressing the wicked problem of the doing of gender in sport organizations.

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The Carceral Logic of Female Eligibility Policies: Gender as a Civilizing Narrative, the Science of Sex Testing, and Anti-Trans Legislation 1

Travers

Female eligibility policies punish people for gender nonconformity and normalize patriarchal rule. These policies were used first to exclude women deemed “too masculine” from competing against women who more closely conform to gender stereotypes. In recent years, this form of discipline has dovetailed with efforts to determine the circumstances, if any, under which transgender women may compete against cisgender women. Modern sport, as a set of institutions, does not stand apart from capitalism, colonialism, white supremacy, and heteropatriarchy. In this article, I use a prison abolitionist lens to connect anti-trans campaigns and female eligibility policies that police sporting identity to the carceral logics of racial capitalism to make the argument that sex surveillance is related to race, social control, and capital accumulation.

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Mentioned, Quoted, and Promoted: How Sports Journalists Constructed a Narrative of Athletes’ Value in the “Name, Image, and Likeness” Era

Shannon Scovel

Using theories of framing and agenda setting, this study explores how journalists covered women athletes during the first week of the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s new “name, image, and likeness” (NIL) policy. Athlete representation during this first week was critical, as it established precedent for which athletes, according to media members, held value and were worthy of publicity. The findings from this study show that journalists focused their reporting of NIL on U.S. male athletes, although women athletes such as Olivia Dunne, Haley Cavinder, and Hanna Cavinder were also frequently mentioned in relation to their large social media following, lifestyle, or appearance. Overall, reporters generally promoted a male-dominated NIL agenda, one that undervalued women athletes and minimized their potential role as sporting celebrities in the college sports space.

Open access

Team Identity and Environmentalism: The Case of Forest Green Rovers

Elizabeth B. Delia, Brian P. McCullough, and Keegan Dalal

Despite consumer concern over climate change, research on environmental issues and sport fandom has focused more on organizational outcomes than on fans themselves. Recognizing fandom can be representative of social movements, and social identity and collective action are utilized in an intrinsic case study of Forest Green Rovers football club supporters (who also identify with environmentalism) to understand the extent to which the club represents a social movement, and whether Forest Green Rovers’ sustainability efforts encourage pro-environment actions. Through interview research, we found supporters’ team and environmental identities cooperate synergistically. Forest Green Rovers is not just representative of environmentalism but has become a politicized identity itself—a means to act for change on environmental issues. We discuss implications concerning identity synergy, team identity as a politicized identity, perceptions of success, collective action, and cognitive alternatives to the status quo. We conclude by noting the unavoidable inseparability of environmental issues and sport consumption.

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From Frozen Ponds to Organized Competitions: The Growth of Skating and Ice Hockey in Korea, 1886–1938

Kyoungho Park and Karam Lee

The encounter of American Protestant evangelicalism and Japanese imperialism formed in Korean society in the late 19th and early 20th centuries became a steppingstone for the acceptance of modern winter sports in Korea. In particular, skates introduced by American Protestant missionaries and the Young Men’s Christian Association formed an imaginary space to counter Japanese imperialism in Korea during Japanese colonial era. Ice hockey introduced along with skating is a representative product that evolved in this process. The history of the introduction of American ice hockey to Korea also had a dual imperial influence between the United States and Japan, and in another direction, there was a voluntary acceptance process by Koreans who recognized ice hockey as a modern product.