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Imperialism and the 1999 Women's World Cup

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Imperialism and the 1999 Women's World Cup IMPERIALISM AND THE 1999 WOMEN’S WORLD CUP: REPRESENTATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES AND NIGERIAN NATIONAL TEAMS IN THE U.S. MEDIA by Michele Canning A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of The Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts Florida Atlantic University Boca Raton, Florida April 2009 Copyright by Michele Canning 2009 ii ABSTRACT Author: Michele Canning Title: Imperialism and the 1999 Women’s World Cup: Representations of the United States and Nigerian National Teams in the U.S. Media Institution: Florida Atlantic University Thesis Advisor: Dr. Josephine-Beoku-Betts Degree: Master of Arts Year: 2009 This research examines the U.S. media during the 1999 Women’s World Cup from a feminist postcolonial standpoint. This research adds to current feminist scholarship on women and sports by de-centering the global North in its discourse. It reveals the bias of the media through the representation of the United States National Team as a universal “woman” athlete and the standard for international women’s soccer. It further argues that, as a result, the Nigerian National Team was cast in simplistic stereotypes of race, class, ethnicity, and nation, which were often also appropriated and commodified. I emphasize that the Nigerian National Team resisted this construction and fought to secure their position in the global soccer landscape. I conclude that these biased representations, which did not fairly depict or value the contributions of diverse competing teams, were primarily employed to promote and sell the event to a predominantly white middle-class American audience. iv IMPERIALISM AND THE 1999 WOMEN’S WORLD CUP: REPRESENTATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES AND NIGERIAN NATIONAL TEAMS IN THE U.S. MEDIA List of Figures .................................................................................................................. viii Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 1 Organization ............................................................................................................ 8 Review of Literature ......................................................................................................... 11 Women’s Sport- Development, Participation and Feminist Agendas .................. 11 Sport and the Global North- A Vehicle of Empowerment ........................ 12 Sport and the Global South- Development Agendas and “Feminisms” ... 17 The Role of International Governing Bodies ........................................................ 22 Women’s Soccer- Status Symbol in a Global Landscape ..................................... 25 Thwarting “Feminist” Agendas- The Media, Identity, and Representation .......... 29 Marketing Women’s Sports-Capitalism, Commercialization, and Consumption . 32 Representation of Athletes from the Global South ............................................... 34 The Media and the 1999 Women’s World Cup .................................................... 35 Feminist Conceptual Frameworks......................................................................... 38 Feminist Postcolonial Theory ................................................................... 38 Cultural Imperialism, Commodification, Appropriation .......................... 42 Summary ............................................................................................................... 44 v Methodology and Data ...................................................................................................... 46 Qualitative Research ............................................................................................. 46 Content Analysis ................................................................................................... 47 Reflexivity ............................................................................................................. 49 Difficulties and Limitations .................................................................................. 51 The Nigerian Soccer Player: A Local Context .................................................................. 53 Overview .............................................................................................................. 53 Colonialism ........................................................................................................... 55 Politics ................................................................................................................... 57 Marriage and Family Life ..................................................................................... 59 Economics and Labor ............................................................................................ 60 Education .............................................................................................................. 62 Religion ................................................................................................................. 64 Health .................................................................................................................... 66 Beauty ................................................................................................................... 67 Indigenous Sports .................................................................................................. 68 Soccer .................................................................................................................... 70 Feminism ............................................................................................................... 73 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 77 Imperialism and Representation of the US National Team .............................................. 78 1999 Women’s World Cup- Messages from the Organizers ................................ 79 The US National Team and Subplots of the 1999 Women’s World Cup ............. 82 Measuring Stick for Women’s Soccer ...................................................... 82 Setting the Style ........................................................................................ 86 vi Role Models for the World ....................................................................... 88 Summary and Discussion ...................................................................................... 95 Imperialism and Representation of the Nigerian National Team ...................................... 98 Wait Your Turn ..................................................................................................... 99 Playing Outside the Style Boundaries ................................................................. 104 The “African Woman” Athlete ........................................................................... 112 Commodification of the Athletic African Body.................................................. 121 Fighting For Position- Voices of Resistance ....................................................... 125 Summary and Discussion .................................................................................... 128 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 132 Limitations of the Study ...................................................................................... 136 Suggestions for Future Study .............................................................................. 137 Bibliography .................................................................................................................... 139 vii LIST OF FIGURES Nigerian National Team- Wait Your Turn ...................................................................... 100 Representation of the “African Woman”- Ann Chiejine ................................................ 113 US National Team Appropriation- Saskia Weber ........................................................... 121 Commodification and the Official Program- Front Cover .............................................. 123 Nigerian Voices of Resistance- Mercy Akide ................................................................. 125 viii INTRODUCTION By the end of the 20th century, largely a result of the globalization process seen in many other aspects of society and culture, women’s participation in sport worldwide had reached record levels. International competitions, such as the Olympics, expanded to include many more sports for women athletes and a version of the World Cup was created for women’s soccer players. Closely tied to this emphasis on international competition was an unprecedented exposure of female athletes to media markets. The representation of the woman athlete made its way onto the cultural landscape via newspapers, television, magazines, and the internet. For the first time in significant numbers, women athletes from across the globe were competing and receiving media attention at high profile international events. Much of the existing scholarship and discourse addressing the representation of women athletes in international competition has been conducted by scholars from the global North on athletes from the United States, England, Australia, and other countries. This scholarship tends to reflect an approach that assumes the perspective of the global North as neutral. This approach often recapitulates biases that exist both
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