Silence, sports bras, and wrestling porn: Women in televised sports news and highlights shows

MA Messner, MC Duncan… - Journal of sport and …, 2003 - journals.sagepub.com
MA Messner, MC Duncan, C Cooky
Journal of sport and social issues, 2003journals.sagepub.com
This study of televised sports news on three network affiliates and ESPN's SportsCenter
extends and expands on earlier studies in 1990 and 1994 to examine the quality and
quantity of televised coverage of women's sports. The dominant finding over the decade
spanned by the three studies is the lack of change. Women's sports are still “missing in
action” on the nightly news, and are even less visible on SportsCenter. Textual analysis
revealed some change over the decade, but mostly showed continued gender asymmetries …
This study of televised sports news on three network affiliates and ESPN’s SportsCenter extends and expands on earlier studies in 1990 and 1994 to examine the quality and quantity of televised coverage of women’s sports.The dominant finding over the decade spanned by the three studies is the lack of change. Women’s sports are still “missing in action” on the nightly news, and are even less visible on SportsCenter. Textual analysis revealed some change over the decade, but mostly showed continued gender asymmetries in televised sports news and highlight shows: (a) the choice to devote a considerable proportion of the already-thin coverage of women’s sports to humorous feature stories on nonserious women’s sports, and (b) the (often humorous) sexual objectification of athlete women and nonathlete women. The authors conclude with a discussion of how and why television has continued to cautiously follow, rather than lead or promote, the growth in girls’ and women’s sports.
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