Attitudes Towards Women's Football in Scottish Society

Abstract

Women's football in Scotland has developed in the context of a society which has celebrated football as a predominantly working-class male preserve. Although it is now claimed to be the fastest growing sector of Scottish football, women's football has been somewhat at odds with the male dominance that 'has.surrounded football in Scotland for so long' (Bairner 2000, p. 102). Reid (2004, p.58) argues that in Scotland 'sport is a sphere of popular culture through which women have .. . encountered the gender apartheid that is still characteristic of the economic, social and political life of the nation' . 2 The gendered nature of sport, particularly football, in Scotland has had a significant impact on the development of the women's game, and on historical and contemporary attitudes towards women's participation in football, and has resulted in women footballers being marginalised within this popular cultural sphere.