How Is Wayne Rooney Constructed Within Sports Culture and the Media
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HOW IS WAYNE ROONEY CONSTRUCTED WITHIN SPORTS CULTURE AND THE MEDIA SAM CHALONER This dissertation is presented in part fulfilment of the BA (Hons) Film and Media With Practice, 2011. ABSTRACT How Wayne Rooney is Constructed Within Sports Culture and The Media. This thesis will aim to examine the process of construction of sports stats in modern day football and celebrity culture. To do this, close examination of tabloid press material and coverage of four football matches featuring current British football star Wayne Rooney will be used. Wayne Rooney will be examined in four key areas: Celebrity, Class, Nationalism and Gender, and will be compared to other football stars, both past and present to highlight how the construction of the modern day football star works and has changed over time. i Contents Page Number Acknowledgements iii List of illustrations iv Introduction 1 Literary Review 3 Methodology 9 Chapter One – An Introduction to 13 British Football and Wayne Rooney Chapter Two – Celebrity 26 Chapter Three – The Working Class Hero 43 and Nationalism Chapter Four – Gender 58 Conclusion 73 Bibliography 78 Appendix Appendix A 91 ii Acknowledgments I would like to thank Helen List for sharing her knowledge base with me and giving me guidance wherever it was needed. I would also like to thank my parents and family for the support they have given me over the last three years. Finally I would like to thank Keith Chaloner for introducing me to the wonderful sport that is football. iii List of Illustrations Page Number Figure 1: Premier League Advert 16 Figure 2: Rooney signs for Manchester 24 United Figure 3: Coke Zero Advert 32 Figure 4: Sunday Mirror Scandal Headline 39 Figure 5: Stanley Matthews 45 Figure 6: Goal against Manchester City 47 Figure 7: Rooney and The World Cup 53 Figure 8: Rooney and Family 70 Figure 9: David Beckham Armani Advert 72 iv Introduction. British football and its image has drastically changed over time, from its humble beginnings as a working class leisure activity, to its growing relationship with media broadcast platforms and its transformation into the multi-billion pound industry it is today. The increased exposure given to football and injection of cash from the formation and the Premier League has also given rise to a new breed of celebrity, the football star. Wayne Rooney is one of, if not the, biggest football star playing in Britain today. He currently plays for Manchester United Football Club and also represents the England National team. By studying the representation of Wayne Rooney, I aim to examine the process of construction within football culture and the media. Football coverage exists on two main platforms of popular media, Television and the Tabloid Press. Both forms comment on the same game, yet use very different forms of address and representation and I will examine how different forms of construction and representation exist through these mediums. 1 There are four key contributing areas to Rooney's overall persona construction. Firstly, is celebrity culture, a concept that has evolved over time and has only recently been attracted to include a figure like Rooney, with the relatively new phenomenon that is the sports star. Secondly, is his place within the British class system, which due to his upbringing and background would see him classed as working class, and has led to him being built up as a working class hero, something that has become commonplace for talented footballers. Also, the idea of Nationalism within sport contributes to Rooney's persona, as national ideologies are both naturalised and constructed through sport and its coverage. Lastly, is the way in which gender is constructed and naturalised within the media, with Rooney's own construction and performance working towards a notion of hegemonic masculinity. By examining newspaper articles and football coverage the process of how Rooney's persona is constructed in terms of these four key areas and applying it to theoretical work and comparison to past cases of football stars I aim address the question; How is Wayne Rooney Constructed within Sports Culture and the Media. 2 Literature Review The area I will explore in this dissertation will be: How is Wayne Rooney Constructed within Sports Culture and the Media. Whilst there has not been a great amount of academic literature on Rooney himself, there is a vast amount written on the concept of celebrity and the "sports star" which I can use to my advantage and apply to both my own theories and other authors looking at similar modes of construction that are found in Rooney's image. When looking at the concept of celebrity, a brief introduction to the area and its history is needed. Turner (2004), Holmes and Redmond (2006) and Rojek (2001) provide a good background to this, recounting early examples of fame and celebrity status creation, recollecting early methods such as the "pseudo event", the Hollywood Star systems persona creations and early use of gossip columns. Rojeks book Celebrity (2001) is particularly interesting and useful for the way in which he attempts to classify the different type of celebrity and their path to fame. He categorises them into the following – ascribed, which is though blood, such as royalty, achieved which is through things such as sport and 3 attributed, which would count for created personas such as television and film stars. There are however, limitations when using this model, Rojek recognises this and coins the category celetoid, which is a celebrity that has hyper visibility, yet has a short and unpredictable lifespan. The problem in my research with this would be that Rooney, and other sports stars would be I feel a hybrid of parts of these as they need to fit into the achieved category at first, but would also need to be attributed to maintain their status and some sports starts could be seen as a celetoid. To study how celebrities are formed and created Turner (2004) is an excellent starting point. He argues that celebrities are constructed and their main function is to promote and sell products. He also looks at the role of celebrity within sport. He argues that sport is differ from other ways of gaining celebrity status as you have to earn your way to a certain level by having a certain amount of talent and can continually prove that you are the best at what you do and deserve your celebrity status. However, the celebrity still needs to create a persona outside their sporting agenda and this persona can transcend their sporting career, he uses people such as footballer David Beckham and tennis player Anna Kournikova to demonstrate this. Another key text in how and why celebrities are created in 4 society is Marshalls Celebrity and Power (1997), in particular his work on how celebrities are used in regard to capitalist society. Turner (2004) also looks at the role of agents, PR managers, publicists and the relationship with the press in relation to the creation and maintaining of celebrity status. He concludes that the press, the public and celebrities all need one another, something that I will be looking at when studying the case of Wayne Rooney. Whilst providing a look at celebrities over various media platforms, Turner (2004: 39-40) also applies his studies to sports, which is useful to my research. He looks at the rise of the sports celebrity in relation to televised sport and convergence of sportswear and fashion. The world of sport is another area that will have to be closely studied. Rowe's (2004) Sport, Culture and the Media, gives a good introduction to sport including a history of sport and its rise to being a major player within the media, the cultural aspects of sport and how sport is consumed. This book serves as both an introduction to the relationship between sport and the media as well as beginning to look at how construction works within sport by looking at the role of commentators and photography. 5 The work of Boyle and Haynes will take prominence specifically when looking at the role of football. Power Play (2nd Edition 2009) is very useful as it addresses many themes I wish to look at such as Nationalism, Masculinity and Consumption, which I will analyse in relation to Rooney and construction. Whilst not always focusing on football they provide many theories that can be applied to my own work. Football in the New Media Age (2004) provides a look at football from an industry point of view, particularly focusing on the way in which technological and financial interventions have changed the face of football and in turn given rise to the football celebrity. This is particularly useful in my research as the changing face of football, the formation of the Premier League, the injection of money in the industry and players "image rights" will be important when studying Wayne Rooney. They also discuss Rooney himself, and how his first professional contract was disputed over the value of his potential as a "brand" and less over his football ability. The sports star itself is explored in two texts The Sports Star, Smart (2005) and Sports Stars, Andrews and Jackson (2001), which whilst mainly focused on American sports stars such as Jordan and Woods also looks at football stars creations in relation to Beckham and his celebrity construction, image rights 6 and downfall, which will be useful as it is similar to Rooney's career to date. Andrews and Jackson (2001: 124-137), look at Paul Gascoigne, whose rags to riches story is an interesting comparison to Rooney's, bearing many similarities. The issue of nationalism is also examined within these texts, whilst Turner (2004) examines the connection of sports stars to national identity and suggests sports stars are more vulnerable to the cycle of celebration, transgression, punishment and redemption, something Rooney has recently experienced and is visible in the coverage I will study.