Women in Sports: The Struggle for Equality
Shattering StereotypesTry and imagine the scene. It's 1892. The game of basketball has been in existence for less than a year. Female students at Smith College in Massachusetts have just been introduced to the game. Their gymnastics instructor, Senda Berenson Abbott, has adapted the rules to make the sport less physically taxing for women. To ensure that her students maintain proper decorum, she has forbidden snatching the ball and dribbling it more than three times in row.
Females will not be considered strong enough to play a full-court basketball game until 1971. American women have struggled to be taken seriously as athletes for more than two centuries. How would you rate their progress?
How do you think people from earlier times would react to watching this video clip from the Women's National Basketball Association? (Requires QuickTime or MediaPlayer.)
Over the years, females have competed against the stereotype of being too fragile to play strenuous sports. During the 1920s, many people believed that girls couldn't handle the stress of interscholastic competition. In the 1930s, some doctors warned that high-stress sports might harm a woman's reproductive system. If you watched the movie "A League of Their Own," you know that players in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League of 1943 to 1954 had to attend charm school. There, they studied etiquette and beauty routines, including how to arrange their hair in a manner that would "best retain its natural style despite vigorous play."
The Olympics did not admit women
athletes until 1912. Women could not compete in the
marathon competition until 1984, partially because
some medical experts thought that women could injure
their organs by participating. Joan Benoit Samuelson
won the first Olympic marathon for women in 1984
—
helping to shatter the myth
that women couldn't run 26 miles (42 km) in a competitive
time.
A turning point for women's sports
occurred when President Richard Nixon signed Title
IX of the Educational Amendment of 1972, which states
that any educational program receiving Federal assistance
can lose its funding if it discriminates on the basis
of sex. This legislation was a great opportunity for
women because it gave female athletes access to better
equipment, coaches, playing fields, and travel budgets.
Before Title IX, Interscholastic competition for females
had been declining over the years. In 1970, only one
out of 27 girls played high school varsity sports.
Now, due in part to Title IX, that number is one in
three.
Playing
the Percentages
Joan Benoit Samuelson won the 1984
Olympic marathon with a time of two hours, 24 minutes,
and 52 seconds (2:24:52). Fatuma Roba won the women's
division of the 1999 Boston Marathon with a time of
2:23:25.
Smile
for the Camera To take advantage of its time in
the limelight, the team launched a 12-city tour against
a team of world all-stars in the months following
its win. They wanted to demonstrate to the U.S. Soccer
Federation that a woman's professional league would
attract crowds and be financially viable. Players
say a league is needed to maintain the growth of women's
soccer.
Show Me
the Money! Tennis player Billie Jean King
was one of the trailblazers for women receiving equal
prize money. Appalled at the disparity between men's
and women's prizes at major tournaments, this frequent
Wimbledon winner helped establish the Virginia Slims
professional tennis tour for women in 1970. She would
become the first woman athlete to earn more than $100,000
in annual prize money. Her belief that women were
not yet accepted as athletes also led her to compete
in a "Battle of the Sexes" tennis match. She played
against former Wimbledon winner, Bobby Riggs, who
had been making constant belittling remarks about
women's tennis. The 29-year-old King beat the 55-year-old
Riggs soundly during a match that attracted nearly
50 million television viewers.
By 1933, Babe turned to golf. She
became obsessed, hitting more than 1,000 balls a day
until her hands bled. Her standard 250-yard drives
were proof of her dedication. The Associated Press
named her Women Athlete of the Year six times. Despite
her success, Zaharias was regularly criticized by
those who felt she should convey a more ladylike image.
Wilma Rudolph (1940-1994) was another
sports heroine. Ironically, the future Olympic gold
medallist was born with polio and could barely use
her left leg in early childhood. She became the first
woman to win three gold medals at the 1960 Olympics
for her performance in the 100- and 200-meter events
and in the 4x100-meter relay.
Media coverage of women's sports
is considered important because it increases the level
of participation among girls
—
some of America's future athletes.
More than 658,000 fans and 1 billion worldwide television
viewers watched the 1999 FIFA Women's World Cup soccer
championships, the most successful women's sporting event
ever. This incredible publicity is expected to cause an
explosion of female interest in soccer--already the most
popular sport among college-age females, according to
a recent study by the National College Athletic Association.
Members of the U.S. women's soccer team say they are relying
on future generations to keep their team supplied with
talent.
Female athletes also want to earn
more equitable salaries. Currently, a considerable
gulf exists between the sexes. According to a recent
survey by Forbes magazine, Tiger Woods earned
$47 million in 1999. The highest-paid female athlete,
Swiss tennis player Martina Hingis, earned $12 million.
Only $3.3 million was prize money; she made the rest
through product endorsements.
History's
Heroines
Many people have heard of Babe Ruth;
fewer know about Babe Didrikson Zaharias (1914-1956),
even though she was one of the greatest female athletes
of all time. In high school, this tomboy wore masculine
clothes and kept her hair short. She believed it was more
important to work on her basketball game than to fuss
over her femininity. From 1930 to 1932, Zaharias was a
member of the women's All-America basketball team and
held American, Olympic, or world records in five different
track-and-field events. During a national amateur track
meet in 1932, she broke four world records in one afternoon.
At the 1932 Olympics, she won two gold medals (the javelin
event and the 80-meter hurdles) and a silver medal (high
jump), set a world's record, and became the co-holder
of two others.
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