Athletic or Sexy - Can Professional Women Athletes Be Both?

All professional athletes are experienced in endurance, strengthening, and mobility, yet there is a different attitude when discussing gender.  When it comes to athletic bodies, perceptions of strength and ability changes when considering the representations that society provides for us.  There is this need to maintain the ideals of women as feminine and males as masculine in the athletic world so that gender norms are not disrupted, which can be seen through photography and advertisement campaign comparisons. 

Ad campaigns play into sexuality by introducing athletic women into a sphere that is not even sport related that shows more of their bodies rather than their skills in their career.  The space that women athletes are presented in sexually would be Sports Illustrated, ESPN website, and many others. The media represents women athletes in a sexual way compared to men, especially when considering the covers of Sports Illustrated. Although women are more likely to be represented as an object, men are portrayed in that way as well.

The cover above shows Brett Favre in his uniform, which easily indicates his career in football, whereas on the right, Elle Macpherson is posing for the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition. When Google searching images of Sports Illustrated, most of the images are from the swimsuit editions rather than action shots of men and women in their sports, that is if the women are professional athletes.  When it comes down to women athletes presented on Sports Illustrated covers, many times the woman is wearing little clothes and it is not intuitive of what sport the woman has made a career of.  For example, Anna Kournikova posed on Sports Illustrated and the picture had nothing to do with the fact that she is an amazing tennis athlete. Instead, she is staring directly at the camera with a pout while hugging a pillow while lying on her stomach.  Where is the tennis racket?  What about action shots of her swinging full force at the ball to show she can beat her opponent? Although athletic men have been represented in a sexual lens, it is much less than athletic women (Heywood and Dworkin, 2003).  Not only are there less male sexualization, but athletic men do not pose in vulnerable positions.  Most times, men are flexing, positioned in powerful ways and they are allowed to take up space.  As you can see below, Kournikova is in curling into herself, not taking up a lot of space.

Comportment is known as the way or manner in which one conducts oneself, which ties into athleticism and gender/sexuality.  Leslie Heywood and Shari L. Dworkin jump into what motivates women athletes to pose for magazines in a sexual way in Built to Win (2003), chapter “Bodies, Babes, and the WNBA.” Heywood and Dworkin discuss male femininity and female masculinity and the implications that these terms have in regards to the gender binary system that is still in place. Heteronormativity in society is then threatened if gender was put on continuum, rather than polarized as female/femininity and male/masculinity.  If a woman has masculine characteristics, she may be considered as queer by societal “norms.”  So if athletic female bodies are seen as heroic and self-determined, these bodies can be read as being lesbian.  This can be explained as well for men – male femininity is not accepted, not only in society but especially in sports. 

In order to maintain the gender binary and to be represented as a feminine but athletic woman, perhaps athletic women are more apt to sexualize and soften their look in order to be seen in a particular way.  According to Heywood and Dworkin (2003), women who pose “pornographically” feel as though they have that right to their body and that they choose how they want their bodies to be represented.  Although it is their body and they should have that right to choose how they want to be represented, by posing in “pornographic” realms creates exploitation.  Athletic women are strong and self-determined, but they are not immune to exploitation and seen as an object. 

Unfortunately, this is one way an athletic woman can get recognition, not just by her achievements as a professional athlete, but by being beautiful and sexy.  This may draw more people to follow, although intentions might not be specific towards the athlete’s career but rather their body and what that represents (sexually or as an object).  Media has provided that being “hot” and (hetero) sexual is extremely valuable before athletic achievement.  This keeps the consumer culture thriving and allows the gender binary to polarize. 

Heywood, L. and Dworkin, S. (2003). “Bodies, babes, and the WNBA.” Sports and Culture Series, 5. 76-99.