After Atalanta

Donna Lopiano and historian Susan Ware are co-presenting a talk on Billie Jean King and second-wave feminism tomorrow night at Harvard, 6pm. Sounds interesting.

Women's Sports Foundation CEO Donna Lopiano, who has held the position for fifteen years, announced she was stepping down at the end of last week. No word on her replacement or definite future plans. She said she may return to the academy (she was director of women's athletics at University of Texas). She is definitely eager to undertake a new project. WSF has begin searching for a new CEO and Lopiano has agreed to serve as a consultant for another 3 years. So her amazing influence will not be entirely lost. And I, for one, am eager to see where she directs her energies next and the change she will surely bring about wherever she goes.

I have previously blogged about the problems I have with Nancy Lieberman. And when I saw that the Women's Sports Foundation newsletter this month was running a feature on her , I was a little disappointed. It is nothing especially new. She hasn't done something notable of late. The WSF wants to keep lauding women's sports advocates like Lieberman who is a former WSF president. During the feature Lieberman re-states her complaint (that I initially heard at the Title IX conference at Harvard in April) that women are spending their money on Coach and Prada purses and not on season tickets to local women's intercollegiate or professional sports. Apparently this is a line she uses at most of her public speaking gigs. She also seeks to mention her teenage son whenever possible. My diagnosis: Lieberman has an acute case of apologetic behavior. Apologetic behavior is when female athletes essentially compensate for their presence in sports, a traditionally masculine endeavor, th...