After Atalanta

This Olympics marked the first time the female figure skaters were allowed ot wear pants in competition. That actually surprised me. I guess I had always thought there were no such restrictions (at least in this the twenty-first century!) and that women chose not to don pants. (I suppose I could try to deconstruct why women would have wanted to to keep wearing those flitty little skirts but I am not in the mood.) So bronze medal winner Irina Slutskaya wore a very attractive pants outfit in the short program and I thought she looked great. She went back to a skirted outfit in the long program (perhaps the reason for her letdown???) But others came out in pants including Slutskaya's team member. (Hers was not as attractive, though.) And I found a little blurb about the other skaters who have embraced the skating federation's 2005 rule change: "Other women who have gone the pants route are Fumie Suguri, competing for Japan; Elena Sokolova of Russia; Tatiana Totmianina; ...

So apparently I was not the only one to think that maybe it was time for Ben Smith, USA Hockey's women's national team head coach. During the bronze medal game (which the US won 4-0 over Finland!) commentators discussed as interview Smith had given prior to the game. Apparently he was evasive about whether he would return but he hinted around that he was ready to leave (because he sees the writing on the boards perhaps?). But I give him considerable credit because he said that perhaps it was time for a female coach to lead the team. Canada was the only team with a female head coach, as I have mentioned previously, in the field of eight teams. Canada has a commitment to grooming female head coaches. It is time for USA Hockey to follow suit. Commentator A.J. Mzelcko said while it would be nice to have a female head coach, USA Hockey should find "the most qualified person for the job." This is the spiel I heard from many female hockey players when I did my master's t...

A little over a week ago my alma mater, University of New Hampshire, made headlines (mostly in New England) for taking off of the hockey playlist the song Black Betty . Black Betty is traditionally played when the team comes onto the ice and fans start clapping in sync. Apparently various constituencies at UNH have been protesting the song for years and trying to get it removed because of its racist overtones. I had never heard anything about it when I was there--maybe because coming out against a hockey tradition at UNH is like coming out against University of Iowa's pink visiting team locker room football tradition. You're going to draw a lot of fire. But for some reason Athletic Director Marty Scarano chose to finally take Black Betty off the playlist this year. He did not cite a particular group or person's complaint that caused the decision but apparently there was at least one made recently according to Scarano's statements to the press. The 1970s rock song has be...

...please for the US women's national team that lost in a shootout to Sweden today 3-2. Alas I did not get to see the game (these damn academic things like teaching and studying are truly getting in the way of my own Olympic experience). But, like any good blogger, I certainly have some things to say about the loss. First, I am truly sad and actually almost glad I was not able to watch because I would have been devastated. I had a firm plan to ditch all things school-related Monday and make it home (or to the nearest sports bar) to watch the gold medal game. I don't even know when the bronze medal game is being played. And I am very nervous about this game given that Finland was a tough opponent for the US a few short days ago. The team is going to have to very quickly go through all the stages of mourning in order to get psychologically ready to compete in the bronze medal game. Second, the numerous comments about the lack of depth in women's hockey should wane somewhat no...

OK I hate to be the Debbie Downer of the Grandma Luge celebration but I have some concerns over how she is portrayed and how she portrays herself . I am wholeheartedly in support of Anne Abernathy's representation of the power and ability of women over 50. She counters stereotypes of the aging woman. But she simultaneously reinforces stereotypes of the role of women over 50 by calling herself Grandma. (I don't even think she is really a grandmother--but I couldn't find any family bio information.) The nickname also reifies common connotations of older women as nurturing and kindly (often read as passive and only good for comforting others) when clearly Abernathy is quite different from the stereotypical grandmother. Viewing her website it is clear that nickname is an asset to Abernathy's career. Who wouldn't want to (economically) support Grandman Luge? And I do want to support her and I feel nbdly she couldn't race in Torino--I just want her to change her nickn...

Maybe that title is a bit scathing for what follows but what the heck. So, if I truly am an academic I will be able to turn my few observations/anecdotes into a theory about which I can write and publish a paper, which will lead to a job, which will lead to tenure, and so on and on... But for now here is something to ponder. Watching the two games the US hockey team played this weekend was pretty interesting. Of course the games--handily won by the US--were exciting (OK not so much exciting as fulfilling to someone who never gets to see women's hockey anymore living out here in the midwest.) But, as always, commentary is the topic that draws my attention. Cammi Granato is doing the studio coverage of the hockey tournaments with some dude (S.D.) I have never seen nor heard of. Another guy was interviewing players between periods. They were pretty good interviews actually, but S.D. seemed to be more interested in how the players looked without their helmets on. He commented on the wo...

Michelle Kwan withdrew from the Olympics today because of a groin injury--allegedly a different one from the injury that prevented her participation in the US Nationals that serve as the Olympic trials for figure skating. When Kwan received a bye from the powers-that-be I was almost entirely supportive of this move despite my sympathy for Emily Hughes, the third-place finisher at Nationals whom Kwan replaced essentially. I was a little suspect of the possible economic motivations for the bye (i.e. Kwan's appearance in Coca-Cola Olympic-themed commercials and Visa too I believe) but she is the reason the US could send 3 skaters this year and she is an icon--one who's ability has not, in my opinion, waned. But her withdrawal makes me a little uneasy. This was it for Kwan--her last chance. The competition is still a few days away. Kwan always seemed like the type to push through adversity. This situation reminds me of the one a few weeks ago in Australia when Justine Henin-Harden...

I meant to post this yesterday but the opening ceremonies were so riveting that I couldn't bear to look away. Yeah, not so much this time around. I am not sure what it was; maybe NBC's coverage, the modern industrial-themed dances, the somewhat hackneyed cirque-de-soleilesque acrobatics. I am sure it had something to do with Bob Costas and whatever news guy was co-commentating with him last night. How long has Costas been doing the Olympics? And he still isn't good at it? I think he just gets too enamoured of his own smooth voice and doesn't think about THE WORDS THAT ARE COMING OUT OF HIS MOUTH! Maybe I am just getting too old, have seen too many opening ceremonies but they all seem the same now. There is always a little kid component, some interpretative dance number, the acrobats, the diplomat speeches (thankfully short this year, I thought), and the lighting of the torch--the last does not seem less meaningful thankfully. I was disappointed that when the US team wal...

I stuck around my house for a few extra minutes this morning to catch the Today show's feature on the US Women's Hockey Team. It was a correspondent who conducted the interviews with four of the veteran players about their training but Matt Lauer is scheduled to get in goal when he heads to Turino later this month. It was a pretty standard segment: shots of practice spliced with interview comments. One of the segment's themes was the whole women play hockey too and this is how the game differs (and maybe is even better) than the male version. And somewhere along the line, when noting that just because the women are not allowed to check, the interviewer noted that these women are still dangerous (shots of players being held against boards and fighting for the puck along the boards) but wait, it's ok, because they're cute. Oh good. I was worried the women representing the US in hockey would be ugly. Who the hell cares if they're cute? Oh, that's right the peop...