Serving Equality: Feminism, Media, and Women’s Sports(7 Communication, Sport, and Society)

Serving Equality: Feminism, Media, and Women’s Sports offers a much-needed methodological innovation to sports media research by expanding the focus beyond traditional sports media outlets to examine the diversity of media outlets writing about sports. In doing so, Serving Equality draws analytical attention to the ways in which feminism and feminist principles such as equality, progress, empowerment, and intersectionality shape media narratives of women’s sports. With a focus on networked sports media spaces, including news coverage, promotional cultures, and sports films, chapters examine narratives of Title IX, the Olympics, the treatment of women sports journalists, the activism of women athletes, the routine coverage of the sports world, as well as the COVID-19 global pandemic. Serving Equality illustrates how feminism informs not only the media narratives of women’s sports, but how women’s sports contribute to and mobilize feminism in networked media spaces. Serving Equality ultimately encourages students, instructors, researchers, athletes, sport media content producers, and those in the sports industry to consider the ways we can tell stories differently about sportswomen and women’s sports.

Table of Contents:
Preface – Acknowledgments – List of Abbreviations – Introduction – "Despite Title IX … " and "No one is watching": Articulations of feminism in sports media and sports media research – "Ceiling- breaker" and "Sexist backlash": Articulations of feminism in narratives of women in sports broadcasting – "The Year of the Woman" and "The Olympics are chock full of sexist bullshit … ": Articulations of feminism in narratives of the Olympics – "This isn’t just about us": Articulations of feminism in media narratives of athlete activism – "Take a Stand" and "Kick Inequality": Articulations of feminism in promotional cultures of women’s sports – "Feminist blockbuster" and "Feminist revisionism": Articulations of feminism in narratives of women’s sports films – "A disaster for women’s sport" and "A master class in resilience": Articulations of feminism in narratives of COVID- 19’s impact on women’s sport – Conclusion – Index.

About the Author :
Cheryl Cooky is Professor in American Studies and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Purdue University. She is co-author of No Slam Dunk: Gender, Sport and the Unevenness of Social Change and serves as the editor of the Sociology of Sport Journal. Dunja Antunovic is Assistant Professor of Sport Sociology in the School of Kinesiology at the University of Minnesota. She has published over 30 journal articles and book chapters on gender, sport, and media and serves on the editorial board of Communication & Sport.

Review :
“Cooky and Antunovic offer an innovative theoretical and methodological demonstration of how, and which, feminisms influence academic and media narratives of women’s sport. The detailed analysis identifies the asymmetrical visibilities of different feminisms—the most popular being ‘media-friendly’ versions that do not challenge existing structures—and a significant narrative shift from ‘sex sells’ to ‘feminism sells’. The book is a valuable tool for thinking differently and triggering new conversations for media, student and academic audiences.”—Toni Bruce, Professor of Sociology of Sport and Sports Media, University of Auckland, New Zealand "Serving Equality is a timely and engaging assessment of the inter-relationships among and between women and sports media. Cooky and Antunovic balance empirical observations with critical insights across a range of topics, including the impact of Title IX, inequities in sports media industries, the role of women in athlete activism, and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on women in sports. At the heart of the book is the authors’ challenge to the liberal feminist notions of equality and progress which, as they argue, are undermined by good intentions that are unable to disrupt structural forms of discrimination. Cooky and Antunovic especially direct their attention to the mediated stories told about women’s experiences in sports and demonstrate why those stories fail to advance robust forms of inclusion. Academically rigorous yet accessibly written, Serving Equality will be an essential resource for anyone who seeks to understand the history of gender-based exclusions in sports, contemporary struggles for equity, and the future prospects for an inclusive and safe culture for women in sports media." —Michael L. Butterworth, Director of the Center for Sports Communication & Media, The University of Texas at Austin