Sports Media Research Articles

Alvin Dark and the Chipmunks: Racism, Baseball, and the Press in 1964

ABSTRACT In 1964, Newsday columnist Stan Isaacs quoted San Francisco Giants manager Alvin Dark making disparaging comments about his team’s Black and Latino players. This article analyzes the controversy over the Newsday column, with a focus on the interpretations of sports journalists. Most baseball writers excused Dark and attacked Isaacs, who was one of the “Chipmunks”—a cohort of young, socially conscious columnists for East Coast afternoon newspapers. The San Francisco press protected Dark out of regional identification, while New York’s veteran writers resented the style of the upstarts. The mainstream press muffled the genuine grievances of Black and Latino players, and it manipulated the statements and actions of superstars Jackie Robinson and Willie Mays. Although Black columnists saw Dark’s comments as indicative of racism in sports, most sportswriters downplayed the conflict, reflecting baseball’s prevalent biases in this era.

Fall of Newspapers’ Sports Coverage during Corona Pandemic in Bangladesh: An Empirical Study

In this study, we have tried to analyse how the newspapers dealt with the pandemic situation. Due to COVID-19, sports events (both international and national levels) were stopped for a long time. In those days, it was a challenge for the daily newspapers to continue sports pages with regular trends. The policies and new trends that have been taken by the national dailies to cope with this situation have been analysed here. To conduct the research, we used the content analysis method. In this research, we have observed a significant decline in the number of news items and news areas on the sports pages. Cricket and football were the main sources of news, and most of the news items were male-centred. During the pandemic, using colours in headlines decreased. The Prothom Alo experienced a scarcity of advertisements though The Daily Observer did not experience it. The trend of using photos (with news) increased a little during the pandemic. Overall, many challenges were faced during this period by the newspaper industry, especially by the sports desk. Social Science Review, Vol. 40(2), December 2023 Page: 23-38

Strategic Branding Approaches for Women Professional Athletes via Self-Presentation Theory and Social Role Theory

The rise of social media has provided many opportunities for athletes to develop outside of traditional media, and the use of social media platforms by female athletes can overcome the limitations of traditional sports media and promote the development of their personal brands. The aim of this study is to analyse and discuss how female athletes use social media to develop their branding strategies based on self-presentation theory and social role theory using Serena Williams as the subject of the study. By analysing the links between self-presentation theory, social role theory and athlete branding, research done by researcher on athlete branding strategies based on the two theories is analysed and discussed. Based on the analysis of the study population, the article makes recommendations on how female athletes can use social media to develop branding strategies. In terms of athlete branding, the article argues that branding strategies for female athletes can be used to gain consumer trust and seek business development opportunities outside of the sports arena by marketing their athleticism, respectable appearance, and marketable lifestyles on social media. On the issue of athlete brand image representation, the article encourages female athletes to focus on social justice issues and suggests that athletes use a combination of public service and commercial marketing to strategically build and manage their athlete brands.

Lexical, Grammatical and Stylistic Features of the Sports News Journalism (Based on the Material of the English Language).

The article presents an analysis of English-language sports news journalism from the point of view of the implementation of lexical-grammatical and stylistic means of speech expressiveness in the texts. The research is conducted on the material of modern American journalism presented in the Internet and is focused on the search for the most frequent and active stylistic means that allow to reveal the mechanisms of influence of information material on the consumer, whose impression of the provided information is formed depending on the degree of accuracy of transmission and emotional presentation of the material. The article includes a theoretical section, which is devoted to the specifics of sports discourse in general, its functions, the main means of conveying the expressiveness of the text, as well as the research part, which includes the analysis of the main lexical-grammatical and stylistic means, statistics of their use and linguistic features, supported by many examples. The main result of the research has been the conclusion that stylistic means of expressiveness account for about 50% of all existing techniques. The most active are metonymy and epithets. Grammatical means are represented to a much lesser extent.

Girl Power and Brand Power: Postfeminist Sensibility in News Coverage of Tokyo’s Girl “Prodigy” Skateboarders

This paper analyses news media coverage of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic skateboarding competition, which paid significant and celebratory attention to the extraordinary youth of the medallists in the women’s disciplines. The coverage was marked by a postfeminist sensibility that constituted the girl-child skater via a ubiquitous and enduring girl power discourse, and idealised them as sites of extraordinary feminine capacity. These narratives located girls’ success in their exceptional youth, market potential, and personal agency, reinforcing neoliberal norms which privilege individualism, entrepreneurialism and choice. However, while offering the girl athletes as testaments to feminist progress in a historically male sport and culture, news narratives tended to render girls’ athletic labour virtually invisible and to elide larger issues that may impact women skaters and girl-aged elite athletes. This paper addresses a call for further attention to postfeminist sensibility as it manifests in contemporary media coverage of women’s sport in order to understand the kind of contradictions that can manifest in media narratives that simultaneously celebrate women’s achievements while denying the existence of larger structural issues affecting them. Additionally, it addresses a gap in feminist sport media research that has largely overlooked the girl-child elite athlete.

Mud, sweat and cameras – Irish trail and mountain running vlogging

This article investigates the rise in participant-based running video blogs (vlogs), where audiences are brought on runs from the point-of-view of the runner. Examining Irish YouTube channels that create content around trail and mountain running, it focuses on a number of themes, including emotionality, place, and sociability in storytelling. In doing so, it questions the ways in which the activity of filming encapsulates the act of off-road running and the quest for vertiginous experiences. It explores the motivations of content creators, potential tensions with the ethos of alternative sports, and interactivity between producers and viewers. It positions this coverage as unique within the sports media space, providing first-hand, dizzying accounts of a niche sporting activity.

The In-House Balance: Negotiating Professional Identity, Boundaries, and Ethical Quandaries as an In-House Sports Reporter

ABSTRACT The sports media landscape has shifted to favor outlets with inside access to sports organizations, teams, and athletes. This study interviews 21 NFL in-house reporters working at 19 official team websites to determine how they view their roles as sports journalists, including ethical standards and shifts in media boundaries. Qualitative interviews uncovered that cultivating a positive team image and protecting the interests of stakeholders supersede the production of objective news stories, even from those who started their careers as external sports reporters. Internal reporters are often conflicted with their roles in the sports media ecosystem. Additionally, interviews reveal their efforts to maintain a balancing act between the established ideals of journalism with the positive spin that accompanies public relations. The present study illuminates how such positions both mirror and diverge from the expectations typically placed within sports journalism, while offering fruitful avenues for subsequent scholarly investigation.

The first press release about the meetings of football teams in Mykolaіv

Local periodicals of the late 19th and early 20th centuries were studied. and local history literature from the funds of the State Archive of the Mykolaiv Region, the National Library of Ukraine named after V. I. Vernadskyi, the Odesa National Scientific Library, and the Mykolaiv Regional Universal Scientific Library to find out the history of the beginning of the game of football in Mykolaiv. In the shipbuilding city of Mykolaiv, which was previously closed to foreigners, where the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Empire was located, the possibility of commercial ships entering began in 1862, when the Commercial Port was opened with permission for the entry of foreign ships to visit and stay in the city of foreigners. Mykolaiv became one of the important ports for grain trade, where many foreign representative offices and banks were opened, commercial shipbuilding began to develop, and the cultural life of the city intensified. According to later local studies, it was established that, based on the memories of contemporaries, the first football meetings in Mykolaiv were started at the end of the 19th century. foreign sailors of merchant ships. Having adopted football traditions from foreigners, in 1901–1902 the teams of the city gymnasium and real school played football, and from 1906, the teams of the mechanical and technical school. At this time, street and district city football teams are created. Despite the fact that the first friendly meetings of football teams took place at the end of the 19th century, reports about the matches appeared in the local press only at the beginning of the 20th century. In 1908, Charles Bate, an employee of the bread office, organized the "Zebra" team, which played with foreigners and teams from educational institutions and sports clubs both in Mykolaiv and Odesa. Football matches took place on adapted sites, first near the Commercial Port, and later in different areas of the city. The referees of the matches were elected collegially from representatives of both opposing teams. Football matches were played according to English rules. The game of football at the time of its coverage in the local press was popular among the townspeople, especially among the youth of educational institutions, intelligentsia, and port workers. Newspaper articles cite examples of the presence of a significant number of spectators and fans, in connection with which the police had to be called in to maintain order. Local periodicals published not only announcements about scheduled meetings of football teams, notes with analysis of matches and their results, but also training schedules and sportsmen's runs around the city. Press publications announcing scheduled meetings, emotions from matches, the opportunity to observe and participate in joint training with popular athletes in the city contributed to the spread of football in the city. Most often, notes about football matches were printed by the "Nikolaevskaya newspaper", popular among the townspeople, with which a sports journalist probably cooperated, who did not indicate his surname or sign his authorship with the cryptonym Z-a.

‘Is she married, single or available?’ Standing out and blending in as a woman working in sports media

Women working in sports media contend with unwanted attention during their careers, extending beyond evaluations of their knowledge to encompass judgements of their appearances and emotional management. Using Banet-Weiser’s framework of popular feminism, within the ‘economies of visibility’, this research explores the experiences and strategies of women in sports media as they navigate increased ­visibility. Working as a researcher-insider, the first author conducted semi-­structured interviews with seven women working in sports media (early career to 35 years’ experience), working in the UK and/or Ireland, across TV, radio, print and/or online formats. Collaborative reflexive thematic analysis by both authors resulted in the construction of two themes around ‘heightened visibility’ (including a subtheme of standing out) and ‘blending in’. The findings indicate that while women are increasingly visible in the industry, the gender dynamics and conditions of the sports media workplace have not progressed to the same extent.

Introduction to the special issue—sport, the media and Ireland: intersections of gender, class and geography

The seven articles in this special issue of Sport in Society explore constructions and intersections of gender, class and geography in Irish sport media. Drawing on theoretical and methodological approaches from a variety of disciplines, ranging from sport sociology to film and cultural studies, the articles encompass both established ‘mainstream’ print and broadcast media, and alternative media platforms. They examine the cultural politics of sport media institutions, forms of representation, and media production and sharing, tracing how hegemonic intersections and hierarchies are both reproduced and negotiated in this national context. Although focused principally on the Republic of Ireland, the issue will be of interest to international readers as the articles variously identify the role of media and cultural contexts in the shaping of popular understandings and experiences of transnational sports; or have an internationally comparative dimension; or deal with transnationally circulating ‘Irish’ sport media texts within international networks.

Sports Journalism at the height of Portugal’s Dictatorship: Bureaucracy and Censorship (1935-1960)

During Portugal’s dictatorship (1926-1974) there were said to be three pillars to appease its population: Fado (the music connected to culture and tradition), Fátima (symbolizing the Catholic religion) and Football (the most popular sport). Because of the importance of these three F’s, news outlets that specialized in these subjects were, in theory, given a bigger freedom. And yet, all periodical publications were targeted by the Portuguese censorship and were regularly constrained by it.
 With this in mind this study will centre on the relationship between the censorship services and the journalistic publications of the third F, newspapers and news bulletins that were mainly concerned with covering sports and sporting events. We will analyse the censorship records and public archives during the height of the dictatorial regime, 1935-1960, in an effort to perceive how these journalistic publications were controlled through bureaucracy and surveillance.

A Proposal for an “Environmental Sports Journalism” (ESJ) Approach: Principles and Illustrative Examples From Coverage of the Rio 2016 and PyeongChang 2018 Olympic and Paralympic Games

This article introduces/rationalizes an attempt to conceptualize “environmental sports journalism (ESJ).” ESJ refers to a set of principles for analyzing and/or reporting on media coverage of sport-related environmental issues—principles intended to support/promote dialogue and nuanced thinking about these issues and about how sports journalism might contribute to environmentally friendly and just outcomes. To clarify features of ESJ and explore benefits/challenges of ESJ, we include illustrative examples of ESJ from media coverage of: (a) polluted harbor water used for the 2016 Rio Olympic and Paralympic Summer Games and (b) the razing of an ancient forest for a ski facility for the 2018 PyeongChang Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. We conclude with reflections on the potential/limits of ESJ and suggestions for work on sport, journalism, and environmental issues.

Fan Labor Shapes Visibility for Women's Sports in Networked Sports Media

ABSTRACT: This article examines how networked sports media actively facilitates a hierarchical system of visibility dependent on social media engagement and data analytics. I argue that in the case of women's sports, as well as other less prominently mediated sports, the industry logics that structure hierarchies of visibility deflect responsibility for representation away from networks, brands, and leagues and onto fans, who are left to promote women's sports through their engagement online. This strategy shields the business of sports from the risk of investing in women athletes and instead places promotional responsibility on fan labor.

Developing Nuance in Gendered Sports Media Mental Health Narratives

Developing Nuance in Gendered Sports Media Mental Health Narratives

Examining school nutrition policies and their effect on the promotion of low-nutrient foods in the context of sports advertising

ObjectivesDespite recommendations to implement nutrition standards in schools, low-nutrient foods and high-energy drinks are still some of the most important challenges for school management and students' purchasing and consumption behavior. In this regard, the aim of the present study is to examine school nutrition policies and their effect on the promotion of low-nutrient foods in the context of sports advertising. MethodsA partial least square technique with SmartPLS 3.0 and bootstrapping with 500 resamples was used to examine the effect of food marketing on school nutrition policies and students' nutritional involvement. Online surveys were done through The Iranian Educational Network of students and measured on a 5-point Likert scale. The survey questionnaire consisted of 3 scales to measure the following: school nutrition policies, advertising of low-nutrient foods, and student nutritional involvement. ResultsResults from a sample of 382 Iranian high school students revealed that low-nutrient food advertising has a significant effect on student consumption, and the greatest overall effect on students' nutritional involvement. School nutrition policies were affected by media, endorsement, and the environmental advertising, whereas school financial capabilities had the greatest direct effect on students' nutritional involvement. ConclusionsThese findings suggest that advertising through sports media plays a mediating role in school nutrition policies and student nutritional involvement. Policy changes to restrict food marketing for young people must include both television and non-broadcast media.

Swag, Social Media, and the Rhetoric of Style in College Athletic-Recruitment Discourse

Style—or the aesthetic dimensions of public presentation—is a dominant mode of symbolic expression. However, no one has explored how style functions as a coherent and generalizable symbol system influencing public conversations about athletic recruitment. The purpose of this essay is to fill this gap by developing a critical framework for theorizing the rhetoric of style in athletic recruitment discourse and significantly, how this is done through social media. We analyze sports journalism, recruiting websites, and the public messaging of athletic departments and athletes on social media according to five structural components: stylistic homologies, aesthetic rationales, primacy of text, imaginary communities, and market contexts. Our analysis offers practical lessons for athletes, journalists, and college athletic departments, but we also highlight several conceptual, methodological, and theoretical implications for scholars of communication and sport and social media interested in better understanding social influence in a dynamic and hyper-competitive context.

On-Air, Off-Balance: Detecting and Examining Media Biases in Filipino Sportscasting

With sports gaining global acclaim and recognition, media outlets have extensively covered a myriad of sporting events with a particular emphasis on international tournaments. In the digital age, media is crucial for disseminating news and shaping audience perspectives especially in sportscasting where local sportscasters tend to show affection and allegiance to their home nation by providing more airtime and positive commentaries to athletes representing their country. Such an approach shortchanges the viewers’ right to unbiased and diverse perspectives. Hence, it is imperative for media outlets, particularly during live sports broadcasts, to adeptly navigate and manage biases, given the significant impact of nationalistic positioning on sports media. In this study, the researchers analyzed the language employed by sportscasters in the local media coverage of the games of the Philippines Men’s Basketball Team, also known as Gilas Pilipinas, during the FIBA World Cup 2023. Following a mixed-method approach, the study sought to understand how sportscasters detect and manage media biases through corpus analysis. The investigation involved identifying prevalent forms of media biases within the study corpus, focusing on lexico-semantic, discourse, and pragmatic constructions that serve as indicators of these biases. The study findings indicated that all the analyzed sports broadcasts contained evident manifestations of media biases. Moreover, it was revealed that Filipino sportscasters exhibited a range of media biases favoring Gilas Pilipinas, and that the media biases in their utterances were affected by the phenomenon of nationalistic positioning that raises concerns about fairness and impartiality. Consequently, the frequency of these biased expressions in sportscasters' utterances was found to be contingent upon the specific context, varying with the situation. Furthermore, these biases can be identified through specific linguistic cues and features. This paper underscores the importance of fostering a more equitable sportscasting environment while simultaneously fortifying language and media education initiatives.

From studio to screen: The production processes of Polish televised football and discursive (re)constructions of race/ethnicity

In this study, we shed light on the relationship between the production processes in televised football in Poland and representations of race/ethnicity. Previous research has extensively explored representations of race/ethnicity in mediated sports texts, but there remains a gap in understanding the production processes and their connection to these representations, particularly in contexts beyond the Anglosphere. In order to address this gap, in this study we conducted interviews with football media professionals and conducted field visits at football media organizations in Poland. Our findings reveal that football media professionals employ various discursive strategies when giving meaning to racial/ethnic diversity in televised football and within the football media workplace, which occasionally incorporate stereotypes. Generally, football media professionals took a color-evasive stance, and argued that they do not speak through racial/ethnic stereotypes in their work. Critical reflections on the production process are also hindered by the everyday practices and dominant working cultures in the football media office, which is constructed and maintained by media professionals as a predominantly White and masculine space. We contextualize these findings in light of previous studies on race/ethnicity in sport media, and the complex discourses surrounding Whiteness in the Polish context.

“Part of the Team”: In-House Sports Reporters Navigating the Journalistic Periphery

In recent years, the sports communication landscape has seen changes in terms of who occupies the role of sports reporter. In-house reporters, or sports communicators employed by specific clubs, teams, or leagues, now contribute content to the sports media landscape. This study explores the complicated relationship between in-house reporters’ self-perceived professional identities and in-houses reporters’ perceptions of their audiences through the lens of Bourdieusian field theory. As such, it sees in-house reporters as peripheral actors negotiating the boundaries of the sports journalism field. Through semi-structured interviews with 28 in-house sports reporters from the United States and Austria, our findings suggest that in-house reporters conceive of themselves both in relation to professional journalism and as members of the sports establishment. Furthermore, they note an ambiguous relationship to their audience, which is both reliant upon the reporters’ work, and, at times, highly critical of it.

Effect of Resistance Training Programme on Selected Physical and Physiological Variables among under 18-19 Basketball Women Players

A sport is an activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged competitively. Sports commonly refers to activities where, the physical capability of the competitor are the sole or primary determinant of the outcome (winning or losing), but the term is also used to include activities such as mind sports (a common name for some card games and board games with little to no element of chance) and motor sports where mental acuity or equipment quality are major factors. Sports are commonly defined as an organized, competitive and skillfull physical activity requiring commitment fair play. Some view sports as differing from games based on the fact that there are usually higher levels of organization and profit (not always monetary) involved in sports. Accurate records are kept and update for most sports at the highest levels, while failures and accomplishments are widely announced in sport news. The term sports are sometimes extended to encompass all competitive activities in which offense and defence are played, regardless of the level of physical activity. Both games of skill and motor sport exhibit many of the characteristics of physical sports, such as skill, sportsmanship, and at the highest levels, even professional sponsorship associated with physical sports.