After Atalanta

Last week several people told me I must listen to Frank Deford's weekly piece on NPR's Morning Edition. I finally listened to it this morning. I have not read any other opinions about it--or even looked to see if they exist. I have seen many opinions, however, on the hot new non-fiction book, Lean In , by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg. I have not read the book yet. I am on the Kindle wait list at my library. I don't really want to read it. I am a little irked by the whole thing. Sandberg is pretty darned privileged. She owns $1 billion of FB stock . She is white, married to a man, and a mother of two. Who is she appealing to? I have heard the thoughts about the book and its message from non-white, non-middle-class, non-married women and they all offer legitimate criticisms. But I shall wait until I actually read it before launching into a full-scale critique. But since I have heard Deford's piece, I won't hold back. I have heard this rant before. It came from Nanc...

...show your fandom in your feet, females! Fan gear that limits your activity level. This is something to put in my female fandom file for that not-yet-written article. Previous commentary on this issue has been about 1) pink apparel or 2) heteronormative marketing. My last post on the heteronormative marketing of sports gear, trinkets, mementos brought a comment from Sean at sportsBabel about why I would want to be included in the grand capitalist scheme. True, true. And when I saw this little piece of news about how the NBA will be making $250 stilettos, I was mighty glad to not be in the target audience.These things don't seem very practical. I mean, high tripping/slipping hazard when walking around the arena and up and down stairs to your seat. And you definitely don't want some drunk fan to spill beer on these!

I know I'm a slacker blogger whenever Dr. Pants sends me a link to a blogworthy story/article/column. Sorry. This one is especially good because it's about female fandom, soccer, and sex objects--and people who say dumb things.  This time is was an employee of Major League Soccer (MLS) who disparaged avid female soccer fans basically by calling them unsexy. A few issues about this statement: First, as the author of this opinion piece on Bust Magazine's blog notes, women do not exist for the sole purpose of being sexy for men. Second, can soccer in the US really afford to be disparaging fans? Haven't we heard over and over how unpopular soccer is in this country? Third, a question: so what's this all about? I haven't seen or heard of similar critiques of female fans in other sports. And there are some pretty avid fans out there of, for example, various NFL teams. Is it because these avid soccer fans are wearing team or country colors and not pink, deep V-...

I, as the perceived target audience (women), received a brief questionnaire about my thoughts on sports memorabilia from a representative of a company that sells such memorabilia. OK. Fine. I understand a company's need to better understand its target demographic. I generally appreciate efforts to include and understand women as consumers of sports-related products and services. But then I realized rather quickly that the survey wasn't meant for me. Question one was fine: Would you purchase sports memorabilia (autographed jerseys, sporting goods, photos etc.) for yourself? If so, what type(s) would you purchase? Probably not. Not my kind of thing. Though I am currently carrying a vanilla chapstick with Gretchen Bleiler's name on it. Would you want to receive sports memorabilia as a gift from the man/men in your life? Wait, what man? My dad? Because I'm a dyke so he's pretty much "the man" in my life. Oh, this survey is for straight wome...

...who has some reservations about how this WWC is going to dramatically change the women's sports landscape in the US. WaPo columnist Petula Dvorak talks to some of my favorite people, Mike Messner and Nancy Hogshead-Makar, about how and why the surge in fan interest in women's soccer post '99 and for women's professional sports generall kind of petered out. The difference, for soccer, is that the WUSA started 2 years after that world cup ended. Too much lag time. The WPS is already in place this time. Hopefully, this will make a difference. But I too have been skeptical about all the rah-rahing. Some of us have been following women's soccer all along, in the so-called down time--you know when the US won the Olympic gold medal. I worry about fair weather fans. But I worry about no fans at all, too. Boston Breakers 2009

I don't have time for this shit, people. It's the last day of spring break and I have classes to prep and a dissertation to write and a yoga class in 45 minutes. And yet here I sit writing about more ridiculousness around March Madness--courtesy of The Huffington Post of all places*. HuffPo actually reprinted it. The originator of the Girls' Guide to March Madness is Seven Daughters, a wine company marketing to women. Obviously this "lesson" is not directed at me, since I am not a GIRL! Regardless, the not-so-handy chart, which clearly was not meant to be handy, is just another example of how women (aka girls) are clueless about sports. And that of course our choices are based on the relative cuteness of the 1) coach 2) point guard 3) mascot. (Well at least they seem to be familiar with the power structures in sport.) And there's a picture of a high heel on it as well for some reason. In case you weren't quite sure this was for women and not to be taken s...

I appreciate a thoughtful piece of student sport journalism once in while; something that doesn't say "Title IX is reverse discrimination and men are now the underrepresented sex." The latter sentiment was actually one I read in response to the news the University of Delaware was cutting its men's track program. Anyway, this piece is out of Boston University, which is currently the home of the number one hockey team in Hockey East. And it's not the men's team. The BU women's team is doing quite well this season. (Far better than my own UNH Wildcats. Sigh.) What's more impressive is that the women's team is new to the Hockey East scene. Not brand new. But less than 5-years old I believe. And they have zipped to the top of the contender list quite quickly. One might argue about depth in the women's game and it's true that other conferences have, in recent history, been stronger than Hockey East for the women, but the DI women are producing so...

Having lived in Red Sox Nation* for the greater portion of my life and never having an interest in professional baseball, I have to say, I'm not quite sure of the way this manifestation of fandom works. Now I don't live in dark cave nor am I visually impaired; I've seen the anti-Yankees stuff. The Yankees Suck t-shirts. The Calvin peeing on a Yankees cap car decal. I'm aware of the rivalry. I'm also aware of the generally high level of fanaticism among Boston/New England fans. But I was pretty shocked to see a guy wearing a t-shirt that said "A-Rod slaps balls". I wonder how he explained that to his young son who was shopping with him. "You see, son, slaps balls is a double entendre meant to convey the Alex Rodriguez likes playing with men's genitals which means he is gay, which makes him less of a man and thus less of a ball player even though he just set that record. Because all the people we don't like are gay. Even if they aren't, we c...

Maybe, according to this article out of an Atlanta paper, a city which will host three women's professional teams in 2010 (soccer, softball, and basketball). Chicago has just as many. [Not sure if they are counting football at all, though. I know there are at least two leagues for women's football but I do not know if they qualify as professional or how that designation is made.] Anyway, some are hopeful that it's a good time (recession notwithstanding) for professional women's sports. That perhaps people are getting a little sick of male professional athletes behaving badly. That fans don't always like to see their favorite athletes getting arrested (guess we better not look too hard at Diana Taurasi then!) and that female athletes are generally seen as more accessible and more willing to do promotion and hang out with kids, etc. While I would love 2010 to be a great year for women's professional sports that have no historically been so successful, or even thos...

A study out of Canada about the gendered nature of fandom reveals that women are not huge fans of professional sports. Not a shocker despite the plethora of popular media accounts of women forming fan clubs and becoming the latest target demographic for fan apparel. Some women just don't like professional sports, some go just for the social aspect, and some like sports other than professional sports. In other words, it's not that women don't like sports. Studies like these--or rather the way they are reported on--always worry me because of the generalizations that often manifest. Otherwise I don't find the results startling in the least bit. I mean did anyone see the Cardinals game a few nights ago when that women got a beer spilled all over her? Who wants to pay (a lot) for that privilege? I personally used to like professional hockey. But I stopped going to games and watching on television (for the most part) because it was just getting too violent. Too gratuitously v...

We all have teams/schools that we do not like. That we like, in fact, to dislike. I, for example, as a loyal UNH alum and hockey fan dislike Maine. And Boston College. Oh, and Boston University (sorry, Dad!). It's just my duty. And I enjoy such school-specific cheers as "U-R-I, U-R-I, U-R-I-N-E--flush!" when University of Rhode Island comes to town. (Clever, eh?) But I was never on board with saying, at men's hockey games, "you suck" (or at least not after my naive undergraduate mind was enlightened a little) and its derivatives like "Hey goalie, your boyfriend called and he says..." You get the idea. But what's happening at Duke (another school I am not fond of but for different reasons--recall that whole lacrosse fiasco a couple of years ago) is getting extreme. Haters of Duke men's basketball are launching all sorts of homophobic words, chants, videos and even Wikipedia entries at players. Seriously, people go into players' Wikipedia...

If you're the ACC (or any other conference) you probably aren't so keen on acknowledging your lesbian fan base at this, the most exciting time of the year for intercollegiate basketball--despite the many benefits of lesbian fandom. This isn't a new issue certainly. There has been a lot of reporting on various WNBA teams and the level of attention (or inattention) they pay to their lesbian fans--of which there are many. But this article addresses the lack of marketing to lesbians by basketball conferences. This is despite that fact that there are marketing strategies in place that target other fan groups like youth and families. At this point, such a denial of a lesbian fan base is just bad business. Especially given the money lesbians spend when they travel to sporting events, including the conference tourneys and the NCAA games. Other entities recognize this: bars and restaurants hold lesbian-friendly events when tournaments are in town. Unfortunately, the basketball confe...

Baking and knitting and wrapping and shopping... ...oh, and shovelling and scraping. Those are my excuses for my lack of posts this week. I saw an interesting story about a transwoman in a long drive (golf) competition that I plan on saying more about later. For now, just a couple things from the news. First, current South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley (formerly of Temple and of course a US National team member/gold medal winner) has accumulated a few violations in her brief tenure. Doesn't look like anything major , but these things have a way of coming back to haunt coaches--especially the female ones. A British-based website, Sky Sports, has done a year in review of professional women's tennis . I'm not sure I would agree that Venus Williams is the comeback player of the year because she didn't seem to ever really fall that far. The piece overall was a good reminder of the diverse array of talent that showed itself this year: four different slam winners and the mos...

The title makes it seem like I am going to say something truly profound about these issues. But not really. 'Cause I've said a lot of it before. But it's Monday; I just got back from Denver, and I'm feeling blog-lazy. So I'll just repeat my basic rant that is always engendered by articles such as this one that report--always with a hint of surprise--that female fans of men's professional sports comprise a pretty significant portion of the consumer base for apparel and other fan gear/accessories. Yes, sales of women's NFL jerseys are up and appear to be equal to those of men's and youth. I get the different fit for women--though I'm not so sure some men wouldn't benefit from different fits either. Women are not the only ones with prominent breasts these days. Ideally I would like, at the very least, a gender-neutral sizing system. Why I am a men's small but a women's large kind of confounds me. Anyway, cut is one thing--color is another: A...

I imagine this post could have future follow-ups: Female fandom II, III, etc. (All with a catchy post-colon phrase, of course.) This post is about an article I came across earlier this month and nearly forgot about. It's all about female NFL fans. And it kind of reads like an older anthropological piece. You know the one in which the white guy goes looking for something unusual amongst the primitive. Because the whole angle is basically "women like football, and they really get into it. How 'interesting.'" And you know the tone "interesting" has here. It details the rituals female fans engage in from organizing parties to donning their favorite team's gear. The article makes minor mention of the pinkification of fandom with lots of shirts, hats, etc. that resembles Pepto Bismal and produces the kind of effect that makes you want some--Pepto Bismal--not pink gear. Luckily a hardcore Steelers fan pipes up that pink has no place in her version of fandom...

Back in Boston. Well Cambridge which I know technically is not Boston though such thinking caused me a little trouble yesterday as I drove in to town. Because yesterday was the celebratory parade for the new NBA champions, the Boston Celtics. "But that's on the other side of the river," I thought to myself. And yet as I pulled up to the parking garage and found it full and then found myself in the midst of a green-clad throng of fans I realized it didn't matter that my destination was Cambridge and theirs was downtown. I am not sure if it helped that I too was wearing green yesterday--more grass than kelly. The fans were loud and represented a pretty diverse demographic: men and women of many races, parents, kids, older (no one past middle age that I observed though) and younger; preppy people and those sporting a more hip-hop style. This is what I like about Boston fans--they're diverse. But generally Boston fans scare me with their fervent fandom. And despite th...

Not too long ago I mentioned Yahoo's new women-focused website and claimed that the lack of sports coverage on the site indicated a lack of insight on Yahoo's part. But I certainly hope they don't go listening to this woman who claims to be a sports fan. Brenda Scisson, a former sports reporter, has a column describing what she believes all women sports fans want. While this assessment represents only one woman's view, I feel confident that fellow female sports fans will agree at least in part, if not in whole, with my list. I wholly disagree with her whole list. It's a ridiculous accumulation of what women allegedly get out of sports that are uniquely feminine. Because sports themselves aren't gendered enough apparently. Because society has not gone to the greatest lengths possible to perpetuate the differences between men's and women's sports (and in the process inferiorize women's sports) already. Now we are gendered fandom. Okay, sure, fandom wa...

A local Utah paper has a nice feature on a man, Grant Cottam, who has supported girls' sports since the 1960s. Back then he attended a high school basketball game with his wife who had pressured him to go with her. While he went reluctantly, he was impressed immediately and became a lifelong fan of not only basketball but volleyball, track, and soccer. He travels to find good games and follow strong teams--though does not have a favorite. I am pleased there is such a devoted supporter in Utah, but is this really newsworthy? I was actually more interested in how his wife became a fan herself in a pre-Title IX era. Or what exactly it was that Cottam saw in the girls' game that he found so compelling. Why is it so interesting that a now 80-year old man is a fan of girls' sports? The writer didn't do a good enough job framing the story to convince me that this man was remarkable in any way besides the fact that she chose to write about his fandom. But a man's following ...

...for all this football madness. I don't know how I missed hearing about this story when it happened in June but it's being retold now, perhaps because college football season has begun. It's obvious to even the casual observer that superiority in football is equivalent to superior masculinity. And this extends to fans. Masculinity is proved in the stands by the guy who can yell the loudest or stand the longest bare-chested in 20 degree weather. But Oklahoma fan Allen Beckett proved his masculinity by emasculating--literally--a Texas Longhorns fan, Brian Thomas, in an Oklahoma bar. Well almost literally. Beckett did not quite succeed in castrating Thomas but pulled hard enough at his crotch to leave Thomas's testicles hanging outside of his body. Sixty stitches were required to put them back. The events leading up to the near-castration are in dispute but there was trash talking going on. Some interesting points to note: 1. Neither man actually attended the school he s...

Sam Donnellon, columnist for the Philadelphia Daily News, seems to start his piece about the new football league for former college players who don't have NFL stuff complaining about the oversaturation of football on television between the aforementioned NFL, Arena Football, Canadian Football League, and NFL Europa. But really he uses the fact that all these are on television to suggest that men make up the viewership of sports, and despite 35 years of Title IX (not noting of course issues such as lack of enforcement and the fact that there is no requirement for equity on the part of media outlets) women's sports just are not that popular--even with women. Donnellon tries to play it safe by using phrases such as "reverse injustice"--rather than reverse discrimination. And does not come out himself and say that Title IX is hurting men's sports but that the discontent is a sign of the times: "It comes in an age - as we say in pro football - of further review, t...