1

Abstract

The aim of this article is the presentation and interpretation of the coverage of

female football players in the largest German Boulevard Paper during the 2011

FIFA Women’s World Cup. Main issues are the ways in which the players are

portrayed and women’s football is “framed”. In addition, there will be a focus on

the self-presentations of the players and on their reactions to the mediated

messages and images.

Drawing on constructivist approaches to gender, playing football is considered as

a gender performance, staged by the players and presented as well as interpreted

by the media. A content analysis of BILD showed that the game and the players

were “gendered”, meaning that their femininity was emphasized. In addition, the

paper published texts and images with a focus on erotic and sexuality. Some of

the footballers complied with these strategies; others rejected any sexualisation

with the argument: “We want to market our sport, not our looks”.

PUBLISHED IN SOCCER & SOCIETY

GERTRUD PFISTER

SPORTSWOMEN IN THE GERMAN POPULAR PRESS – A STUDY CARRIED OUT IN

THE CONTEXT OF THE 2011 WOMEN’S FOOTBALL WORLD CUP

Introduction

Whoever opens a German newspaper on a Monday morning and turns to the

sports pages finds almost exclusively football reports; and whoever is looking

for women in these pages, searches (mostly) in vain. All over the world media

sports play an important part in people’s everyday lives, but it is men’s sport

2

that is at the centre of public interest. Newspaper sports pages, television sports

programmes and information on sport on the internet seem to be produced by

men, for men and about men. Women play only a minor role – at least with

regard to media production and media contents. This changes, however,

particularly in the popular press on occasions when sportswomen can be

presented in a tantalising or provocative way. A number of women athletes

bring eroticism into play as a ‘selling point’, knowing full well that sporting

performance involves not only achievement but also presentation – and that

success in sport only has an effect when the media set it ‘on the agenda’. The

media, moreover, present competitions and athletes in a certain context, and

‘frame’ events and performances to create patterns of meaning in which the

gender of the athletes as well as the gendered ideals, norms and rules are re-

constructed and displayed.

The aim of this article is the presentation, interpretation and discussion of the

coverage of female football players in a German Boulevard paper, the BILD

Zeitung. The focus is on the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup held in Germany.

Among the main issues are the ways in which the game and the players are

portrayed and women’s football is “framed”. In addition, I will explore the self-

presentations of the players and discuss their reactions to media exposure and

mediated messages and images.

Sport, women’s sport and women’s football – backgrounds

There is a long history of marginalisation or even exclusion of women in sport

and in sports reporting.1 At the beginning of the 19

th century gymnastics and

sport were developed by men and for men; they were put into practice in the

education of boys and the training of soldiers, and used as a sign of social

distinction and to demonstrate masculinity. Women were regarded as the

“weaker sex”; restricted by their long skirts and tight corsets, they were

excluded not only from sporting activities but also from an academic education

3

and numerous occupations. They were also denied political rights. As a bastion

of heterosexual masculinity, football was initially used in English public schools

to discipline unruly boys and then in the second half of the 19th century it spread

first of all to the whole of England before going abroad and conquering the

world.2

In the wake of industrialisation and urbanising processes in the (second) German

Empire (from 1871) people’s lives changed dramatically, and so too did the

roles of women. They were now allowed to take part in gymnastics as well as in

a small number of sports as long as they did not offend against moral principles

and the rules of decorum. 3 In a number of European countries, especially in

England and France, girls and women took part in football from the turn of the

century right up to the 1930s. In Germany, by contrast, only a single initiative is

known in which women attempted to found a football club. In the face of great

opposition, the women had to abandon their plans.4 It was not until recent

decades that women ‘conquered’ one ‘men’s sport’ after another, from the

marathon to boxing and to ski jumping. In 2012 women were able to take part in

all (summer) sports at the Olympic Games for the first time.

In the 1996 Games in Atlanta women’s football was added to the canon of

Olympic disciplines. Since ‘soccer’ was regarded as a women’s sport in the

USA, the US team was financially supported by the country’s Olympic

Committee and cheered on by the spectators. This support “helped them live up

to their role as favourites. The team earned its success with excellent

performances in every game.”5

In the following years the female football players demonstrated throughout the

world that perseverance, aggressiveness and technical as well as tactical skills

were not purely a men’s preserve. Women’s football proved to be an attractive

game as well as a physical contact sport. However, it must be asked whether its

increasing popularity is reflected by the media’s coverage of it. In providing an

4

answer to this question, one must take into consideration the development,

requirements and conditions of media sport.

Women, the invisible sex? Developments of sport and media sport

The first sports reports in Germany at the end of the 19th century were about

horse racing, where the readers were above all interested in the results of the

bets they had placed. Later, cycle and motor races, aviation competitions,

boxing matches and especially football filled the sports pages of daily

newspapers. Since the 1920s fans have been able to listen to sports broadcasts

on the radio and since the 1960s follow football on the television screens at

home.6 In spite of the radical transformations that have taken place in the media

landscape, nothing has changed the focus on men’s sports and on football as the

number one media sport. Women were only to be found at the periphery of

sports coverage, in particular when they infringed the prevailing ideals of

femininity.7

An analysis of the contents of the sports reports in the Frankfurter Zeitung

between 1936 and 1968 revealed that the reports were brief, informing readers

essentially about competition results.8 Just as sober as sports reporting was the

attire of players and fans: the players wore mostly black or white trousers and

single-coloured or striped shirts, the fans wore their everyday clothes.9 It was

not until the 1970s that this kind of reporting, as well as the (self)-presentation

of both sportsmen and sportswomen, began to change. In order to compete with

the radio, and later television, newspapers provided background information and

“human interest stories” in order to gratify the desire of their “clients” for

entertainment and identification with their heroes. In sports coverage, however,

women were still a small minority. This was shown, for example, in a content

analysis of the German tabloid, BILD Zeitung, undertaken for the year 1980: in

that year only 7% of the reports were concerned with sportswomen, and even the

5

(female) companions of male footballers were given more space than women

athletes. The texts about Goldmädel, Rennmiezen and Turnküken [literally:

golden girls, racing pussycats and gymnastic chicks]10

were marked by

trivialisation and sexualisation and not only gave information about the private

lives and the appearance of the sportswomen concerned but also contained many

sexual insinuations. As a rule, however, not only the female athletes appeared

on photos in a sexualised manner, but mostly other women, e.g. the wives of

football players, who frequently had no direct connection with the text of the

sports reports.11

How, then, are sportswomen portrayed in the popular press

today, more than 30 years after the above mentioned study about “Goldmädel,

Rennmiezen and Turnküken” was published?

Recent studies have affirmed that in fact very little may have changed with

regard to the marginalisation of sportswomen in the media. The available

quantitative studies which have been conducted in many countries indicate that

less than 10% of either newspaper space or broadcasting time is devoted to

women’s sport. 12

On the basis of the data gathered as part of the Global Media Monitoring Project

since 1995 it can be concluded that women continue to be underrepresented in

all sectors of the media. In 2010 the proportion of women among the persons

heard, seen or read about in German mainstream broadcasting and print news

amounted to 21%, rising to 27% in the “Celebrity, Arts and Sports” sector, but

less than 20% of the featured women played prominent roles. 13

According to

the main findings of another project, the “European Observatory on Gender

Representation”, initiated in 2011, 14

of the 186 “most popular” sportspersons

appearing in the news only 14% are women. A special report in 2013

commented on the data as follows: “If women are underrepresented in the mass

media, they are undervalued in society.”15

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Sports reporting in daily newspapers and on television, as well as on the

numerous websites focusing on sport (e.g. sport.de) convey the same massage:

sport is a man’s domain. Today there is a concentration in the media on a small

number of men’s sports – in Europe mostly on football. (And it does not need to

be mentioned here at all that what is meant is “naturally”, and exclusively,

men’s football.)

However, recent studies on sport coverage revealed new trends. Some research

confirms that mainstream sport media perpetuate and reinforce hegemonic

masculinity,16

Other studies come up with a differentiated picture. Biscomb and

Griggs investigating the coverage of the 2009 Cricket World Cup, concluded

that “similar to the trends reported in previous studies there was some

continuation of themes which aimed to marginalize women’s sport”.17

The

media still use discursive strategies such as “gender marking”, e.g. by

emphasizing gender stereotypes and comparing women’s performances with

those of men. Results of other studies indicate a “degendering” of sport reports.

MacKay and Dallaire analyzed campus newspapers and found that the female

students were treated as athletes just as their male fellows.18

Godoy-Pressland

investigating British Sunday newspapers acknowledged “that trends have

changed in terms of what is reported but not in terms of how much is

reported.”19

In many countries, including Germany, the comparatively few reports on and

broadcasts of women’s sporting events and sportswomen deal predominantly

with individual sports such as tennis and skiing. Exceptions here are reports on

major events like European or World championships and the Olympic Games. In

addition, ‘national’ sports, for instance handball in Denmark, receive a certain

amount of attention, and women’s handball games are even shown on “prime

time” television.20

Women’s football, on the other hand, does not belong to the

media’s favourite sports anywhere in the world.

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That women’s sport is only of secondary interest is also manifest in the

concentration of private television stations on men’s sport. A good example of

this is the German Sports Television channel (today Sport 1), which – in order to

be able to offer advertising firms audiences with lots of purchasing power –

decided to focus on men and men’s interests. According to a press release 75 %

of its audiences are boys and men (between 14 and 49 years of age). They are

attracted not only by men’s sport, but also by female athletes and other

“beauties” in sexy outfits.21

More “women-friendly” are programmes and

reports about popular sporting events, in particular the Olympic Games, not least

because people are interested in the success and the medals won by ‘their’

fellow countrymen and women. However, the results of a comparative study of

coverage of the Olympic Games in 2004 in 18 countries revealed that

sportswomen received less media attention than sportsmen, even when they

were just as successful as their male team mates.22

Theoretical approaches and questions

In the second part of this article I would like to present messages and meanings

of women’s football in Germany based on newspaper reports about the most

important event of women’s football in recent years, the 2011 World Cup. I will

focus on one tabloid newspaper, the BILD Zeitung, which has the largest

circulation of all German daily papers and which devotes a great deal of space to

sport. BILD claims that it reaches 11.6m people (18% of the population). Sixty

three percent of its readership is male, roughly half of which is predominantly

interested in the sport pages. BILD takes up common stereotypes, and it

services the emotions of the masses and their interest in sensations.

Trivialisation and sexualisation are important sales strategies of this paper.23

BILD is one of the largest newspapers in the world, and holds second place in

Europe. In Germany, it dominates the market of half a dozen Boulevard papers

8

with a relatively small circulation. Therefore the paper and its reports can be

understood as representative of the yellow press in the country.

Readings of randomly selected articles covering the World Championships in

“serious newspapers” such as the Spiegel and the Zeit showed that there were

large differences between the reports in serious press compared to those in

BILD.24

The Zeit provided the readers with excellent insights and in-depth

information, whereas the Spiegel often presented stereotypes, e.g. about the lack

of competence of female footballers. But such statements were not presented as

the opinion of the magazine, but as wide spread prejudice among the population.

Inspired by the theoretical approaches to agenda setting and framing, I have

placed a focus on two key questions in analysing the reports: firstly, to what

extent was the Women’s World Cup covered by the media, and, more

importantly, did the coverage influence the salience of women’s football on the

public agenda.25

In addition, it will be asked how women’s football in general

and women players in particular were “framed”, i.e. described and

contextualised, considering the fact that football is still a man’s domain.

Scholars adhering to the framing theory contend that the contextualization

influences the ways in which the audiences think about and approach issues. 26

A third issue concerns the players’ perspectives, i.e. their gender constructions,

negotiations and “doing gender.27

Drawing on concepts of Judith Lorber and Raewyn Connell, 28

gender is

understood as a social construction which permeates the social order as well as

the individual’s identities and interactions. From this perspective, gender is not

something we are but something we do, i.e. it is created by and in social

interactions and it is an issue of negotiations, i.e. about practices which

reinforce, challenge or refute gender ideals and norms in a specific environment,

such as, for example, football. 29

9

In keeping with constructivist theories, Bourdieu (2012) interprets gender as a

naturalised social construction, a product of socialisation, a process and a social

relation, as well as an embodiment of habitus, i.e. the system of dispositions

which include the individual’s capacities for perceiving, thinking and acting.

The position of individuals in the various social fields depends on the prevailing

gender arrangements, as well as on their economic, cultural and social capitals.

From this perspective, the football field can be interpreted as an arena where

men can acquire capital fighting “serious battles” for hegemony and power.30

In

contrast, women are seen as “flattering mirrors”; they have to stage and

negotiate femininities in an environment dominated by men. Playing football is

a “gender performance” where the term ‘performance’, in the sense given to it

by Goffman, accounts for the specific, dramaturgical environment of the

stadium.31

The question under examination will be how the media portray

women performing gender in a field which has been traditionally been occupied

by men. According to Judith Butler’s concept of the “heterosexual matrix”32

,

societies enforce a naturalisation of bodies, genders and sexualities, as well as

the coherence between the biological sex, gender identities and sexual desires.

Using this concept for an interpretation of performances on the football field and

their representations in the media, I will explore whether and, if so, how the

mass media feminise and “heterosexualise” the female players.

Based on these approaches, the key questions of this article are if BILD sets the

women’s football World Cup on the agenda and how the paper presents and

frames the players. Was the World Cup treated as major sport event? Were the

footballers displayed as athletes and sport stars?

Further questions are whether and, if so, how the media (i.e. the BILD Zeitung in

this case) reinforce gender stereotypes; and, furthermore, how they react to the

“doing gender” of the players, keeping in mind the female athletes are

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confronted with heterosexual gender norms and the society’s ideals of

femininity which may contradict their own gender concepts and constructions.

Women’s football as a media event – the 2011 World Cup in Germany

After the Olympic Games the events that attract the most attention in the media

of many countries are football World Cups. In recent years this has also applied

– albeit to a limited extent – to women’s World Cups, which were held for the

first time in 1991, eleven years after the German Football Federation officially

recognised women’s football. Prior to this, unofficial tournaments had taken

place in Italy in 1971 and in Taiwan in1990, in both of which German teams

took part. A first milestone was the third World Cup in the USA in 1999, in

which all matches were broadcast live; almost 40 million people followed the

tournament on television. The two following World Cups, in the USA in 2003

and China in 2007 were won by the German team. In both these tournaments all

the matches in which the German team took part were televised live.

On account of their success to that point, there were high expectations of the

German women’s football team for the 2011 World Cup hosted by Germany 33

However, the team lost in the quarter finals to Japan, the winner of the

tournament. Perfect organisation, huge interest among the German population

and a very positive climate in and around the football stadiums characterised the

event.

The tournament was met with a hitherto unattained resonance in the media: “The

in-home TV coverage of this event reached a television audience of around 408

million people, and of around 250 million viewers who watched 20 minutes or

more.” In Germany the four matches played by the German team were watched

by 13 million viewers and the Germany vs. Japan match by as many as 17

million.34

In the print media the 2011 World Cup also made the headlines.35

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By and large, the German press reported on the event in a well-informed and

positive way, as was revealed, for example, by both quantitative and qualitative

analyses of reporting in the serious press, for instance in the ZEIT (a weekly

news magazine) and the FAZ (a broadsheet daily with a national circulation).36

As already stated, the focus of the reporting of these papers was placed on the

games and the sporting performances of the players.

Besides enthusiastic and dedicated reporting in the popular press, however, there

were also tendencies towards marginalising, feminising and sexualising the

players, as well as towards constructing a discourse that emphasised the

differences between men’s and women’s football, pointing in particular to the

deficits of the women footballers.

The Women’s World Cup in BILD

Methods and procedures

The contributions in BILD were submitted to a qualitative content analysis in

which the deciding factor was not the frequency of statements but their value

and significance. We chose a “directed approach” to qualitative research, using

the theoretical concepts and the questions raised above for initial codes (see

Hsieh and Shannon. 2005, 1277; see also Huberman and Miles 2002).

In a first step, we collected all 163 articles about the women’s World Cup in

BILD, published between June 26 to July 17, 2011.37

Many of them informed

just about facts e.g. about the line-up of the teams, techniques and tactics of the

players or results. Sixty nine articles contained additional information and

qualified for a closer inspection and interpretation. Based on our theoretical

approaches we had derived questions and assumptions, now we identified and

compiled relevant texts and statements. In addition, we included topics which

Formatted: Font: Italic

12

emerged from the material. The main questions and issues referred to the

following categories: presentations and evaluations referring to skills and

competencies of female players, appearance and behaviour, femininity and

masculinity as well as “doing gender” on and off the field. The articles are

available on the internet, and we “collected” the statements and grouped them

into relevant clusters. Depending on the content, the same text could be stored in

different compilations.

Qualitative research is based on interpretation and aims at understanding, in this

case at understanding the texts of the media and their underlying, open or

concealed messages about gendered images and practices of female football

players.

Results : Feminisation, beautification and sexualisation of the players

The motto selected for the tournament by the German Football Federation

“20eleven from its most beautiful side” already conveyed the impression that

“beauty” played an important role in women’s football. And this impression was

substantiated by the reports in the BILD Zeitung, which devoted its first page to

the World Cup four times. Even before the kick-off the World Cup made the

front page headlines of the Sunday edition, BILD am Sonntag. The centrepiece

was a close-up of the (attractively rouged) face of Kim Kulig, who was

apparently supposed to symbolise the “beautiful side” of the World Cup (BILD

am Sonntag, 26 June 2011). Ten times a short text on the first page referred to

the women’s football event. As a rule, however, the World Cup reports appeared

at the end of the sports news, i.e. after the more important articles on men’s

sport.

The coverage frequently followed the difference paradigm, especially when it

was not just a question of simply reporting on the game. The frequent

comparisons with men, along with the deficit perspective arising from these,

resulted in interpretations and judgments which at least suggested that women,

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“by nature”, were not made for “real” football and that “women’s football is a

different game entirely”. Mario Basler, a former football player with a “Macho

Column” in the BILD Zeitung, put this in a nutshell with his comment: “The

girls are successful, pretty and nice, of course. But I simply can’t watch this sort

of thing for long. I’m used to speed and muscle power on the field. But the

female body is just not good enough for football” (BILD 1.7.2011). Basler,

whose column was obviously supposed to be amusing and provocative, was

asked if he could explain why there was such great public interest in the

tournament. He replied, “Because it’s summer and there’s no Bundesliga. And –

at least from the point of view of the rules – women’s football is identical …”

(BILD, 2. 7. 2011).

BILD reporters found differences everywhere, ranging from bodily attributes

and performance to mental dispositions and from technical and tactical skills to

everyday behaviour. Frequently, moreover, deficits were diagnosed which

legitimised, more or less openly, the view that women football players were

inferior. Unfavourable judgments were to be found in all kinds of contexts and

were often taken from others and used as quotations. A racing driver was

reported to have said that, yes, he watched the Women’s World Cup on

television, adding, “After all, you watch the Paralympics as well, don’t you”

(BILD 24. 6. 2011). After the defeat of the German team in the match against

Japan, BILD quoted the left leaning Tageszeitung: “Shame on you, you bitches,

in such way the taz treats our girls” (BILD, 11.7.2011).

One article, though, was devoted to “chauvinist fouls” in which “macho jokes”

made by politicians and sportsmen were criticised (BILD 27.6. 2011). BILD

reporters would easily have been able to compete in this discipline. They

presented women’s football as an unknown sport and, as a service for their

readers, published, for example, 25 “piquant” questions and answers, several of

which related to how and why women’s football deviated from the standard, i.e.

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the men’s game (BILD 22. 6. 2011). It was asked, for instance: “Would our

women’s eleven win against a men’s team?” The answer was “no” and it was

reported that the women’s national team occasionally played against a male

youth team – in games from which the public was barred. A further question

was: “How do women’s teams exchange jerseys at the end of a match?” And

besides many ‘neutral’ questions it was asked what women wear under their

jerseys.

What is striking about this perspective is that, in the reporting of other sports

such as basketball and skiing, comparisons between the sexes are not at all

common. It may be assumed that the intrusion of women into one of the last

male domains and into a space in which hegemonic masculinities are

constructed and staged brings forth particularly strong opposition. Moreover,

accepting women’s football would pose a threat to the dichotomous gender

order and to the myth of masculine superiority both in sport and elsewhere.38

The “macho on duty”, Mario Basler, phrases his appraisal of women’s football

in the following terms: “Defeat against Japan. There won’t ever be another

boom in women’s football in Germany – and that’s fine. Soon the girls will be

playing in the Bundesliga again in front of a few hundred fans. Without any live

broadcasts on TV. Without any headlines in the papers. From now on, the field

will belong to men again. Wonderful!” ( BILD 11.7.2011). Such remarks are

supposed to be ironic, but one wonders whether a defeat of the men’s national

team would be commented on with the same flippancy.

Much crasser, blunter and more negative than the edited articles in newspapers

were the comments posted in blogs, which I did not analyse systematically, not

the least as they mirror random opinions of anonymous individuals.

However, I scanned through some of the blogs which followed articles in BILD.

Besides being predominantly negative, they were frequently degrading and filled

15

with animosity. Good examples are also provided by the contributors to a forum

of Werder Bremen fans (http://forum.werder.de/showthread.php?10255-Frauen-

Nationalmannschaft/page15, access 23. 6. 2011). Examples of denigrating

comments are: Female football players are like male stripper: boring! Or. I

hope for a miracle; that our team is eliminated soon. The World Cup goes on my

nerves“. Or: “The media should focus on real sport, and not on this spectacle

which the women perform.”

The BILD Zeitung tried to contribute to the positive image of the World Cup and

the German team by feminising and ‘cutifying’ the players, a process in which

their (attractive) appearance played a fairly important part. According to Achatzi

13% of the World Cup articles in BILD referred to appearance.39

In addition, the

(adult) players were frequently addressed as “girls”, “our girls”, “gorgeous girls”

or “prima ballerinas” (BILD 26.6.2011) and often also as “national elves” (a

play on words with the German word for ‘eleven’) (e.g. BILD 26.6. 2011;

30.6.2011). There was “grinning and giggling among our girls”, but also

“crying” (e.g. BILD 10.7.2011). The fans in the stadiums or watching television

“are falling in love with our national elves”. They are “gorgeous girls. The

Women’s World Cup is getting pretty hot” (BILD 26.6.2011).

As stated earlier, ‘beautiful’ was an often used attribute, not only for the players

but also for the game, the weather, the arena – all of them were beautiful, and

“Football Lady Baijramaj” was considered “the most beautiful in the national

squad” (BILD, 25.6.2011). ‘Beautiful’ also appears in the official slogan.40

Attention was also paid to the looks of the players on the other teams, for

example the “pretty Scandinavians”, who caused a “stir … with their victory

dances” (BILD, 7.7. 2012), or in such comments as: “In the match France vs.

USA playmaker Louisa Necib and Hope Solo are competing for the title of

Beauty Queen” (BILD, 30 7.2011). Beautiful, too, was “Canada’s midfielder

16

Kaylyn Kyle (22), whose nickname was “Barbie”. In private photos she looks

like a lady. Long blonde mane, elegant dress. On the field she’s not quite so

genteel. … Successful AND sexy!” (BILD, 22, 6. 2011).

These kinds of phrases were also used for a number of German players, in

particular Célia Okoyino da Mbabi, Lena Gößling, Inka Grings, Simone

Laudehr, Kim Kulig and Lira Bajramaj. These were the “glamour girls” who

were invited by BILD Zeitung to a cosmetic “make-over” session and who then

posed for a top British photographer – commissioned by the Henkel home and

beauty care company (BILD, 2.1.2011). Numerous human interest stories were

woven around these players, for example that Lira Bajramaj wanted to marry,

have children and open a beauty salon (BILD 6.7.2014); that Célia da Mbabi

was in love with Marco Sasic (BILD, 6.7.20119; and that Lira Bajramaj and

Lena Goeßling “went shopping … dressed sexily” (BILD 29.6.2011).

In 2011 the cliché of mannish or lesbian women that is often connected with

women’s football 41

was replaced – at least partly – by the image of attractive

femininity that Bajramaj, Mbabi and Kulig (among others) presented. For

instance, BILD published a series of photos of the “most beautiful players” on

the internet in which numerous Women’s Cup participants, such as Marta und

Birgit Prinz, appeared, albeit without ‘doing’ themselves ‘up’ for the camera

(BILD, 6.7.2014) . Furthermore, BILD printed a close-up of a football-playing

Barbie doll which had been designed in the run-up to the tournament. With its

long thin legs, however, the doll demonstrated clearly the incongruence of

emphasised femininity and playing football (BILD 6.7.2011).

During the World Cup sexual innuendo was rife, with players being described as

“sexy” along with speculation about their underwear (e.g. BILD 29. 6. 2011) . In

seven reports there were clear allusions to sexuality: for example, information

was given about a football calendar for 2011 containing pictures of naked

17

women, and a piece of advice from a former women football player: ”Sex sells”

(BILD 8. 6.2011). Another article featuring a group of half -naked women had

the title: Who will be Miss WM 2011?” (BILD 16.7.2011).

Homophobia might not have been an issue during the World Cup; however,

there was increased pressure to display femininity, with the argument that it

would not be wise to upset sponsors. “The branch wants women who behave

and look like ‘real women’. Just as men imagine them to be – the men who

believe that football is no sport for women,” commented the left-liberal TAZ

daily (23.1.2014).

After the elimination of the German team the BILD drew its conclusions about

the significance of women’s football and summed up: “An unbelievable 16.95

million […] viewers watched the match against Japan – a record TV audience

for our women. … Their natural behaviour and their hard work convinced us all.

We were moved by their tears after their bitter defeat. Well done, girls! You

have won your most important fight – the fight against the men’s world. … So

the elimination in the quarter finals is not as dramatic as it would have been in

the case of coach Jogi Löw’s men. … Germany now has new darlings (BILD,

6.7.2011). In other words, in women’s football it isn’t success that counts but

being “darlings”.

The BILD set the Women’s World Cup on the agenda as an important sporting

event with a regular and comprehensive coverage.42

Especially the activities of

the German players and the matches of the German team were described and

commented in detail. Great importance was attached to the success of the

national squad, although the comment on the elimination of the team suggested

that women’s football did not possess the same status and significance as the

men’s game.

18

The event was situated in a gender discourse in which the players’ individual

acts of “doing gender” were not only encouraged and staged but also taken up

and reinforced by the newspaper. With an emphasis on their attractive looks and

their feminine qualities it was intended to present the players as attractive

women. By frequently drawing the readers’ attention to female attributes and

behaviour, such as using make-up and shopping, as well as to their male friends

and partners, the newspaper took up and reinforced the notion of women’s

adaptation to traditional gender norms and ideals in compliance with Judith

Butler´s concept of the “heterosexual matrix”.

In this way the participation of women in the male domain (and lesbian sport) of

football is offset by their gender-typical behaviour off the football pitch. The

lesbian cliché is countered by staging the players as feminine and sexy.43

BILD

reporters seem to consider that this “make over” of the sport – and the women

who play it – is necessary in order to be able to present women’s football to its

predominantly conservative readership.

Bavaria’s (female) minister for social affairs criticised the reporting of the

Women’s World Cup as “in many cases misogynist”: “The Women’s World

Cup provided the opportunity of showing women beyond the classic images of

gender roles. … In many media, however, the football players were once again

reduced to high heels, lip gloss and handbags.”44

So far in this paper we have examined media representations, but the question

remains how women footballers themselves want to be presented playing the

game and doing gender?

Bikinis, naked photos and sporting performance –the player’s perspectives

Presentations and doing gender

19

In the first part of this paper, the media representations of female football players

have been presented and analyzed, bit it is also an important question if and how

they react to and comply with the media and their production of gendered

messages and images.

The entertainment value of sports and sports stars as well as the

professionalization processes taking place in women’s sports has led to an

increasing importance of the media and the media coverage of events and

athletes. More and more sportswomen, including participants in the Women’s

Football World Cup, want to make a living through sport and attempt to find their

way into the public limelight not only as a result of their sporting performance but

also through image, personality, charisma, looks or sex appeal. In doing so,

sportswomen cooperate with the media and not infrequently bring femininity and

eroticism into play in order to capitalise on their popularity during their career but

also when it has ended.

The marketing strategies of athletes resemble those of stars and starlets in the

entertainment business. They like to ‘party’, make the headlines as companions or

friends of celebrities or pose naked or half-naked in the media. Anna Kournikova,

the tennis player, and Magadalena Brzeska, the gymnast, or the boxer Regina

Halmich are excellent examples of the Kournikova “syndrome”: the abilities of

sports women to generate income via self-marketing.45

However, women

footballers form a minority among sportswomen who capitalise on their looks and

appearance - in spite of the comprehensive media coverage of the 2011 Women’s

World Cup.46

One can only make assumptions about the reasons for this. For one

thing, the presentation of emphasised femininity might well not fit in with the

self-concepts of football players. For another, the image of football-playing

women may not be compatible with the messages of many advertisements. A

survey of various companies revealed that the (still very common) cliché of

women footballers as lesbians is an obstacle to the marketing of the game. 47

It is

20

also possible that marketing women’s football would not be economically viable

since the players are not well known enough. According to BILD, 52% of the

German population cannot name a single woman football player. 48

This does not mean to say, however, that there are no attempts to turn success on

the football field into financial success by bringing eroticism into play. During

the Women’s World Cup, for instance, young talented German players had

photos of themselves taken for Playboy magazine,49

and after the Women’s

World Cup several German players tried to make the most of their popularity.

Anja Mittag and “glamour girl” Fatmire Bajramaj, for example, visited the BILD

Zeitung’s editorial offices, and, as the photographs were meant to show, both of

them ‘cut a good figure’. Bajramaj also took the opportunity to advertise her

autobiography “Mein Tor ins Leben” [My Gateway into Life].50

Motives of the players and backgrounds

There are a wide variety of motives for which, in their ‘public relations work’,

sportswomen pin their hopes on good looks, eroticism and perhaps also sex

appeal. The main aim is to attract attention, to present a pleasing image and to

increase their “market value”. In doing so, women football players are confronted

with the problem, or rather task, of regaining and emphasising the femininity

which is denied to them on the field, The trend towards a ‘market-oriented’

presentation is particularly important for women playing football because they

are active in a sport which brings no (or no high) earnings. In the German

Bundesliga the men earn an average of €1m per year while the figure for women

players is €10,000.51

Regina Halmich, a relatively famous former women’s

boxing world champion, remarked that “the gap between what men and women

earn is far too wide. It’s not just a matter of one nought – it’s a matter of several

noughts. And that can’t be right. Girls, too, should be able to make a decent living

from their sport”. 52

21

The earning chances of athletes – off the field – are influenced by their way of

“doing gender” which ranges from staging traditional femininity in the style of

synchronised swimming right up to the androgynous signals of many women

footballers or to Muslim sportswomen who, following their faith, appear in the

arena with more or less covered bodies. However, sportswomen who wish to

conform to ‘mainstream’ tastes must find a balance e.g. between athletic prowess,

androgyny and feminine allure. The limits of public acceptance are reached when

a female athlete presents a masculine image or when her heterosexual orientation

is called into question. Women football players are frequently confronted with the

‘lesbian image’ of the game. It may be assumed that, in their staging of

femininity, the media take up this issue and try to retain the interest of the

mainstream readership by feminising the players.53

The journalist Nadine Lange sums up the gender, or even identity, conflict of

women footballers as follows: “If they wish to enter into the sphere of popular

mass culture, there is a very clear guiding principle: they must conform to the

stereotypical conceptions of femininity which prevail in the world of western

media. They must be slim; they must preferably have long hair; and they must be

sexy.”54

Lange also assumes that especially the heterosexual women players in

the man’s game of football are faced with conflicts in this respect and thus

attempt to demonstrate their femininity by means of gender conforming

behaviour outside the stadium. In this way, the cliché that women footballers are

lesbians is replaced by the cliché that women footballers are “sexy girls” – a

cliché that suits the prevailing gender order better, but may not comply with the

player’s identities.55

Despite the presentation of femininity of the players, the high quality of the

games and the various marketing strategies, the World Cup did not achieve a

“breakthrough” of women’s football with regard to professionalization or

popularity. Pfister, Klein and Tiesler (2014) explored the impact of the World

22

Cup 2011 on women’s football in Germany and found out, that neither the

number of players nor the interest of fans or the media coverage increased

decisively since 2011. Women’s football is accepted and appreciated in the

country, but it does not attract a mass interest and a large media attention as does

the men’s Bundesliga.

There are various reasons for the still widespread disinterest in women’s football

which may be considered as a “hybrid sport”. The feminist journal “Emma”

explained this as follows: “...for some fans women’s football is too masculine, for

others too womanish. […] For sponsors who are interested in the women part, the

football gets in the way; for those interested in the football part, the women get in

the way”56

The fact that many players are lesbians may be an additional

“problem”. Journalists and sponsors prefer definitely heterosexual athletes.57

In addition, it can be argued that women, as a rule, do not play the sports

preferred by the media and those who do play ‘men’s sports’, like women

footballers, often fail to conform to the prevailing ideals of femininity. Huge

muscles and distorted features during a contest are only acceptable as long as the

sportswoman presents herself at the same time as an attractive woman. This

explains why many women boxers decide to compete in short skirts and why

footballers such as Bajramaj wear make up on the playing field.

Among the reasons for the marginalisation of women’s sport in general and

football in particular is the large majority of men among sports journalists, whose

knowledge and ‘taste’ find their way into their reporting. They strive to adapt to

the expectations and anticipations of their predominately male readership, without

taking any account of the fact that the media not only take up the interests of

consumers but also amplify and inflate them. Maintaining a critical distance to

media sport, moreover, is difficult on account of the mutual dependence of

23

journalists and sportspeople and on account of the great pressure on everyone

concerned to increase his or her market values.

Implications and perspectives

Media presence is an important factor in modern sport. Sports clubs and

federations, as well as sportsmen and women, need sponsors in order to

participate in elite sports, for example first-class football, and also to provide for

the future. However, sponsors are only willing to commit themselves financially

if they can benefit from their engagement in their advertising, i.e. if sportsmen or

women are idols or stars and do convey a positive and attractive image.

Several sport federations have discovered the appeal of erotic athleticism and

attempt to increase the popularity of their sport by changing the dress codes. In

beach volleyball the players compete in bikinis which makes them a favourite

target of photographers. Other sport federations, too, wanted to make use of the

“sex appeal” of their athletes, e.g. the boxing federation, but they did not succeed.

When the world governing body for amateur boxing discussed, if women should

wear short skirts at the London 2012 Olympics, not only sports officials but also

many athletes took to the barricades, and the organisation had to revoke this rule.

However, some professional boxers compete in short skirts in order to increase

their “market value”.

How do sportswomen cope with the demand to strive for sporting success and

present an attractive and feminine appearance at the same time?

Their activities, as well as statements made in interviews, show that there are

different reactions to the new marketing strategies. Some comply with the new

demands and emphasise femininity; others downplay their looks; and yet others

are unsure about how to react. Asked whether she used make-up, Simone

Laudehr, a participant in the World Cup 2011, for example, replied: “I want to

look good, of course... . There are games when I put on make-up, but only

24

mascara around the eyes. It’s important for me to look athletic. I want to fight, go

off the pitch with a filthy jersey – and not win a beauty contest” (BILD, 3.7.2011).

Another player, Babette Peter, rejected any marketing of her looks outright. When

a TV presenter remarked that she would cause a sensation on a catwalk with

make-up and a smart slit dress, Peter said: “High heels and that sort of thing –

that’s not my thing. I don’t like to be the centre of attention.”58

Birgit Prinz, for years the best female player in the Germany, reacted to the

“feminisation” of female players with great scepticism. She rejected any staging

of herself and as far as possible avoided promotional appearances or photo

sessions. On the subject of the dress code for beach volleyball, she commented:

“We don’t want to play in sack-shirts – but we don’t want any rules about what to

wear. We want to market our sport, not our behinds.” The Spiegel news magazine

wrote about her: “The 33-year-old never had any really great charisma – because

that’s the way she wanted it.”59

In an internet discussion about Anna Kournikova and the presentation of erotic

athletes the questions raised were not so much concerned with moral issues as

with image – and thus perspectives of women’s sports – as well as power and

influence. A statement of the Women´s Sport Foundation ended with the

following remark: "For the female, who has been the victim of portrayal as a

nude or semi-nude sex object for many years, one would think that the decision to

appear naked should be carefully considered, especially when her male

counterpart is not similarly displayed. Why is this important? In the end she can't

ignore the fact that she is most likely a role model for thousands perhaps millions

of young girls."60

Some of the female players in the World Cup 2011 would have

agreed with this statement.

Conclusion

25

The women’s Football World Cup 2011 was on the public agenda and the games

were presented by the press as important events. Besides an interest in the sport,

BILD had a focus on the appearance and femininity of the players and the

journalists used various strategies to entertain the readers by “playing” with the

alleged contradiction between women and football.

Here, the question arises of whether and, if so, how the role of women can be

improved in media sport. There are no simple remedies since many different

interests are involved and also because a great number of existing conditions and

circumstances are difficult, or even impossible, to change. Interest in and

identification with a sport and with athletes cannot simply be ordered from above:

Bundesliga fans will not be interested in gymnastics on apparatus, even if it is

staged differently. Sportswomen can and ought to defend themselves against

sexualisation; but it is not certain that, in doing so, they will gain respect and

recognition for themselves and the sports they play. The advances in women’s

sports, and in particular the evident acceptance of women in men’s sports such as

football, give cause for hope, however, that sportswomen and their achievements

have to be given more public attention in the future. Providing attractive sport

coverage of women is the task of the journalists and there is a need for more

female journalists and female editors who could bring women’s sport in general

and women’s football in particular in the lime light. In addition, it should not be

forgotten that there are numerous media which take women’s sport seriously and

present the athletes in a positive light. It is to hope that these are trendsetters,

influencing the sport coverage of the future.

1 See e.g. Klein and Pfister, Goldmadel; Bruce, Hovden and Markula, Sportswomen..

2 See e.g. Goldblatt, The Ball Is Round; Pfister, “Wem gehört der Fußball”.

3 E.g. Pfister, Frau und Sport.

4 Pfister et al., Women and Football; Pfister, “Auf den Spuren”; Magee 2007, for the histories of women’s football

in Europe.

26

5 http://www.fifa.com/tournaments/archive/tournament=509/edition=4715/overview.html

6 See Pfister, “Watching Sport - A Universal Phenomenon?”.

7 See e.g. the chapters in Bruce, Hovden and Markula, Sportswomen; see also Rulofs, Konstruktion von

Geschlechterdifferenzen. 8 Pfister, “Women in the Olympics”.

9 See the clothes of players and fans searching google with the term “Fußballspieler 1950“.

10 Klein and Pfister, Goldmadel.

11 See Klein and Pfister, Goldmadel.

12 E.g. Bruce, Hovden and Markula, Sportswomen; Schultz Jørgensen, “Sports journalism”; Achatzi.

Geschlechterstereotype. 13

Who Makes the News, 2010, X, XI; http://whomakesthenews.org/; see in particular http://cdn.agilitycms.com/who-makes-the-news/Imported/images/reports_2010/highlights/highlights_en.pdf 14

http://www.iscap.ipp.pt/cei/ECREA%20-%20website/EuropeanObservatoryOnGender.pdf.

15 See Diana Swift Special report: Gender in the media; http://whomakesthenews.org/articles/special-report-

gender-in-the-media. This webpage contains more information about the world wide representation of women in the media.

16 See Miloch, Pedersen, Smucker and Whisenant, "The Current State”; Crossman, Vincent and Gee, “Dorothy”; Cooky, Messner and Hextrum, “Women Play Sport”. 17 Biscomb and Griggs, “A Splendid Effort!”. 18 MacKay and Dallaire, "Campus Newspaper Coverage”. 19 Godoy-Pressland, "The Weekend as a Male Entity”, 148. 20

See about the audience rates in German TV http://www.dwdl.de/zahlenzentrale/. On the audiences and their taste in Denmark, Kulturministeriet (2012) Danskernes Kulturvaner 2012. http://kum.dk/Documents/Publikationer/2012/Bogen%20danskernes_kulturvanerpdfa.pdf. 21

See e.g. http://www.constantin-medien.de/dasat/index.php?cid=100469&conid=101577&forcetemplate=100102; e.g. the coverage of Wimbledon 2014, see http://www.sport1.de/de/tennis/tennis_grand_slams/ June 31, 2014. 22

This is true for all the 16 countries covered in Bruce, Hovden and Markula, Sportswomen. 23

Dulinski, Sensationsjournalismus. 24

See also Achatzi, Geschlechterstereotype. 25

McCombs and Reynolds, "News influence on our pictures of the world"; McCombs, “A look at agenda-setting”.

26 See e.g. Fairhurst and Sarr, Art of Framing.

27 See West and Zimmerman, „Doing Gender“.

28 Lorber, Paradoxes of Gender; Connell, Gender; Connell, “Supremacy and subversion”; Lorber, Breaking the

Bowls; Lorber, Gender inequality.

29

See in particular Lorber, Paradoxes of Gender. 30

Bourdieu,. “Die männliche Herrschaft“; see also Bourdieu, Distinction. 31

Goffman, Presentation; see also Brickell, "Performativity”. 32

Butler, Gender Trouble, 24. 33

Nieland, „ Anerkennung mit Hindernissen“. 34

FIFA Women’s World Cup Germany 2011. Television Audience Report http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/tournament/competition/01/54/91/10/fwwcgermany2011televisionaudiencereport%28interactive%29.pdf

27

35

http://www.bmi.bund.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Broschueren/2012/fifa_wm.html;jsessionid=D309D8AC7CE94DBB3A379882E2C1493A.2_cid287?nn=1816228 (assessed 24 November 2013). 36

Achatzi „Mediale Geschlechterstereotype“. This is also my impression after systematically reading the football reports. 37

This time period includes beside the period of the World Cup one week before and one week after the event. 38

Kreisky, Arena der Mannlichkeit, 21.

39 Achatzi, Mediale Geschlechterstereotype.

40 http://www.dfb.de/?id=507752&tx_dfbnews_pi1%5BshowUid%5D=28145&tx_dfbnews_pi4%5Bcat%5D=167

41 Schaaf, Lieber Barbie als Lesbe.

42 See also the quantitative analysis in Achatzi, Mediale Geschlechterstereotype.

43 See also the contributions in Schaaf, Die Sexualisierung.

44 Augsburger Allgemeine, 3. June 2011, http://www.augsburger-allgemeine.de/bayern/Frauen-WM-Haderthauer-

kritisiert-frauenfeindliche-Medien-Berichte-id15718546.html 45

E.g. Pfister, „Kournikova-Syndrom”. 46

See e.g. Pfister, Klein and Tiesler „Momentous Spark“. 47

Schaaf , „Lieber Barbie“. 48

http://www.BILD.de/sport/fussball/birgit-prinz/maenner-frauen-fussball-vergleich-18551622.BILD.html 49

http://www.bundesliga-livestream.net/2011/06/alle-playboy-BILDer-der-deutschen.html 50

http://www.BILD.de/sport/fussball/fussball/und-anja-mittag-europameisterinnen-besuchen-BILD-

10319176.BILD.html 51

http://www.BILD.de/sport/fussball/birgit-prinz/maenner-frauen-fussball-vergleich-18551622.BILD.html 52

http://www.stern.de/sport/sportwelt/3-interview-mit-birgit-prinzregina-halmich-der-kampf-der-starken-frauen-

518842.html; see also http://www.news.de/karriere/855196411/gleiche-leistung-fuer-weniger-geld/1/ 53

Schaaf, „Lieber Barbie als Lesbe“. 54

http://www.tagesspiegel.de/kultur/vor-der-wm-fussballerinnen-in-der-nachschminkzeit/4278166.html 55

Schaaf, „Lieber Barbie als Lesbe“. 56

Emma, März/April 1998, http://www.emma.de/artikel/fussball-kampagne-2-die-haelfte-des-balls-fuer-die-frauen-263454. The lack of sponsors is still a major problem in women’s football. 57

http://www.emma.de/artikel/wie-darfs-denn-sein-kernig-burschikos-ungeschminkt-265464 58

sylvie-van-der-vaart/welche-frau-sie-am-besten-findet 59

http://onyxgedankensalat.wordpress.com/2011/11/17/mal-wieder-sexismus-im-sport/ 60

WOSPORT WEEKLY 13.9.2000, the Women's Sports Foundation newsletter.