Maintaining Femininity in Female Sports

During class on Thursday, we discussed how women have to uphold a feminine image in sports and try to present themselves as women first and athletes second. After hearing this it made me do a lot of thinking on the truthfulness of this fact, so I began to do a little research in regards to this with BGSU Athletics. I figured Bowling Green may be a small portion of the sporting world by being a mid-major Division 1 school, but something that can verify this suggestion.

So as I was sitting in the office the other day, I began to look around and view the team photos for the men and women's teams here at Bowling Green State University. By seeing these I was able to compare and see the feminine image being upheld first hand.

In the men's team photo, the men have a look of intensity on their face. This shows a competitive nature and something that men's athletics thrives on! This look of competition can be intimidating and is used to intimidate the competition of the team and viewers. Some believe smiling in a team photo shows weakness! Even if you look at the coaches and staff in the back, only the women are smiling! This is also showing that even women coaches have to be feminine in their image towards the team.

Now comparing the men's image to the women's is what was surprising to me. As you take a look at the image, you will notice all of the girls have their hair and makeup done. I don't know about you, but I think it would be kinda hard to play a sport like basketball with your hair straightened and make up done. Another thing to take a look at is, everyone of the players is smiling. This is showing a welcoming nature and a sense of warmth. This does not give a look of competition, but instead a look of warmth. The last topic I am gonna bring up is the coaches facial features in the background. In the men's image, the coaches were stern and intense, but in this image the coaches are smiling just as much as the players. This again, makes the viewer feel more welcome and also gives a sense of fun and not so much competition.

It was crazy for me to see so much of a difference in something as small as a team picture. These team pictures are for the same sport as well, I can't even imagine comparing a sport like cheerleading with a sport like football. The differences would most likely be overwhelming and be even more influential on the topic. I am interested to see what everyone else has to say about this topic, and look forward to seeing the comments about this discussion.

By Nathan Riley

Magazine Group Activity- Jeff, Lori, Nate, Junho

For our group activity we were told to look at different ads that were placed in fitness magazines and for each of those ads we had to figure out which category that each ad represented and also look at the similarities between male and female fitness magazines. The magazine we chose to examine was the fitness magazine Shape which was the August 2008 issue and for the first category Dietary supplements we were able to find that shape magazine had about 14% of ads that had to do with dietary or ads that had dietary in them. We also found that shape magazine had some food ads in it as well, we found about 27% of food ads in that magazine which we found kind off odd because in a fitness magazine you don't think that they would have any food ads in them just ads about fitness or ads helping to maintain a certain body image that people think they need. We also found two ads that had dealt with body equipment we found that very odd as well because you would think they would have more body equipment ads in the magazine as well. We found 6% of clothing ads in the magazine and the highest percentage of ads we found in the magazine which was cosmetics which came to 28%; I don't think they should really put cosmetics into a fitness magazine because it doesn't fit with the purpose of the magazine at all. I don't see how any type of cosmetics will help you stay fit, it will help you with facial features but I don't see how it will help you in fitness. Also some of the themes in the magazines where odd too which were directed towards the women, many of the ads encouraged women to prevent or fight wrinkles or signs of aging. Also they promote eating healthy for women which is a popular ad in women's magazines. In conclusion we were able to find that in women's magazines they bring light on women on their physical appearance and focus on their facial appearance more so than trying to help them stay fit.

Magazine Group Activity

I have never really looked through any magazines like we did in class so I was surprised to see the amount of ads in them. In the male magazine, 82.3% of the ads were of dietary supplements which are a crazy amount of them. If I was on a advertising team for one of these supplements I would put my add in all the men’s magazines I could. Coming in second place in the ad count with 11.4% was knowledge systems which makes sense. It is always good to know different workouts or methods to try to work out differently that way the gym does not get boring. The men’s magazine also had some equipment and food advertisements but only accounted for a little over 6% of the magazine. In most of the ads in this magazine they used the theme of positioning the reader as inferior.

In the women’s magazine there was a big difference in the amount of ads placed in it. Dietary supplements only contributed 1.9% of the ads and knowledge systems had 13.2% of the total ads. The majority of the ads were places under the categories of adornment and display of the body. Cosmetics were the main portion of this having 30.2% of the ads and clothes were at 16%. I can definitely see why these advertisements would be put in the magazine, but I am surprised that one of those categories weren’t the highest of them. The other category was the highest with 37% of the ads. The ads included in this category were vehicles and food mainly. Our group found a common theme in a lot of these and we titled it beauty.

There are huge differences in what each magazine is trying to get across to the readers. In the women’s magazine all the girls were smiling and acting like they were having the time of their lives wearing the shoes, make-up, shirts, shampoo and anything the ad was trying sell. This is more of a fun loving and cute way of getting across the ads to the readers. In the men’s magazine the guys are all jacked and intimidating; trying to convey the message, hey if you use this supplement you will look like me and have this inferior look as well to people. These are 2 totally different methods to take when advertising however they both are effective. It just goes to show the differences in mind set between male and females.

The ideal image of a person’s body is definitely evident in these magazines, and they are on different ends of the spectrum. The male body portrayed in the magazine is super muscular, tipping the point of extreme. It is the idea of you cannot get big enough, as long it is with muscle, so that they appear dominant to other males. Some males look fake because of the extreme muscle mass of their bodies. On the other hand the female body that was so repetitive in the ads was very small and skinny. They were tone but no muscles were popping out or none of them were trying to flex to show off what they had. Most of the ads were just trying to catch the models having fun with their item of advertisement, not really showing off their body, but their smile.

By: RJ Hefflinger

Magazine comparison

By: Kevin  Meyers, Mason VM, Josiah Blevins, Marlin Pickens, and Ollie Goss

Our group examined the men's and women's fitness magazines "Flex" for men and "Muscle and Fitness for Her". While White and Gillett's (1994) original study discovered that 83.4% of men's magazines had advertisements for technologies of the body, our magazine consisted of 99% technologies of the body and very, very little adornment and display of the body.
Our female magazine was similar, but had it's own differences. 76% of our women's magazine was technologies of the body with 64% dietary supplements and 12% bodybuilding equipment. Adornment and display of the body was more evident at 24% consisting of 24% cosmetics advertisements.
The three main themes we found in the Men's magazine were positioning reader as inferior, promise of transformation, and hegemonic masculinity. Examples that were found positioning the reader as inferior had advertisements of extremely large men flexing and appear to be looking down at the reader, as well as, men lifting weights and screaming. Promise of transformation advertisements were exemplified with before and after pictures for dietary supplements. Hegemonic masculinity were evident with an advertisement that was "The guide to the ultimate body" and showed a picture of a man carrying a woman on his back.
The themes we found in Women's magazine were positioning the reader as inferior and were illustrated as the woman in the ad looked down intensely at the reader. Promise of transformation that was evident in the women's magazine also had before and after pictures from using dietary supplements.
In conclusion, we determined that both magazines were dominated by the amount of dietary supplement advertisements showing in the Men's to build muscles and get "jacked", while the women's magazine showed dietary supplements that lost weight to get toned. As expected the women's magazine showed more cosmetics advertisements than the male magazine. In conclusion, our group determined that the female magazine aimed for the perfect female body to be more toned and fit and the male magazine dictated the perfect body to have gigantic muscles that bulged out of their shirts.

Advertisements in Female Magazines, 11/6/13

During class this past week, our group looked at the advertisements in a magazine directed at females entitled, "Muscle and Fitness Hers," that came out in March/April of 2008.  The article featured 1 protein advertisement, 11 ads for dietary supplements, 3 for bodybuilding equipment, 1 for the Marines, 6 for knowledge systems (such as workout DVD's or 'how-to become a personal trainer' books), 1 for clothes, and 1 for cosmetics.

We classified these ads into 3 separate themes; Sexy and Fit, Strength, and Sexiness.  'Sexy and Fit' themed advertisements featured very toned women showing off their muscles while at the same time, smiling for the camera while in a "sexy" stretching or exercise position.  She could also be in a sexy pose while in her workout clothes and while stretching that accentuates those female parts that most stereotypical males are attracted to (i.e the "ghetto booty.")  The second theme that we divided the advertisements into was "Strength."  In these ads, females were featured that weren't necessarily showing off their sexy features but were rather in non-revealing clothing and were solely showing off their toned muscles.  Our third and final theme was "Sexiness."  This theme didn't seem to feature strength at all and nor were female models were working out to place them them in the "Sexiness and Fitness" category.  This theme feature very attractive women in very attractive poses with "sexy" attire on.  In one of these ads for example, a woman was glaring at the camera in a sexy pose and she was also wearing a cheetah print bra.

In the end, our group concluded that magazines targeting women wanted to prove that women could both be sexy and fit at the same time.  Also, they differentiated completely from the magazines targeting men because male magazines featured models that were only aiming to show off their huge muscles and didn't care to show their sexy side.  Also, female advertisements were much more "friendly" and welcoming whereas male advertisements tried to prove that if a supplement was taken or if a product wasn't bought then the reader would never be as strong as the model in the ad.

-Chris Cournan, Derek Zyski, Kyle McQuillen, Aaron Mehling

Magazine Similarities/Differences

Last class, we analyzed both a men's and women's fitness magazine.  There were some interesting trends seen between the two, along with major differences.  For the men's magazine, 55.5% of the advertisements were for dietary supplements.  This was a huge contrast to the women's magazine having only 26%.  The other big difference was the heavy promotion of cosmetics in the women's magazine (30.5%) compared to the smaller percentage in the men's (6.9%).  This doesn't come as a huge shock as women are more concerned about beauty products than men are in most cases.

Our group identified three themes in the women's magazine.  The first theme was cosmetics.  As mentioned, this was heavily prevalent in the magazine.  We decided that foods were the second theme.  We felt that some dietary supplements were classified as food and there were many other advertisements that fell into the "other" category that were food related.  There were many advertisements for things such as chips or ice cream bars which we found interesting.  The snack foods were portrayed as fun and very enjoyable.  Finally, our third theme was dietary supplements.  These were pills or medicine needed to maintain or create a healthy and sexy body.

The men's magazine identified three continuing trends.  The first was positioning the reader as inferior.  This is done is most advertisements when the male pictured in the advertisement is usually extremely muscular and looking down on the reader.  It is made seem the ad is more masculine and tougher than the reader.  The second was an advertisement's promise of transformation.  This is seen in advertisements for dietary supplements that show a very muscular male featured on the page.  It also goes on to essentially say the model is this muscular because they took the given supplement.  Finally, hegemonic masculinity is shown in several advertisements.  This is where a male is projected as the dominating figure to a woman.  This was shown in a Lectric Shave advertisement where a man is shown dominating the relationship with a beautiful woman.

All in all, it was interesting to see the two different trends between the two magazines.  We believe that the ideal man's body is extremely muscular and powerful; where a woman is projected as skinny and sexy.  We also decided that the ideal male body is not one of such terrific muscle.  The pictures struck our group as disgusting and extremely unattractive.

Wes Gates
Mike Discipio
Samantha Melchor
Joey D'Agostino

Magazines- Gene Csakany

In both last Tuesday and last Thursday's class, we went over men and women's fitness magazines.  I found it very interesting with what we saw in many of these magazines as far as how male and females are depicted.  In the men magazines many of the men depicted are extremely muscular and in the process of working out with heavy weights and most of the time shirtless with a fearsome look on their face.  Something I found very interesting is these are typically men magazines, for men, yet most, if not all the photos in the magazine are of men, shirtless men at that.  I am extremely curious at the difference of these men magazines and maybe a magazine like men’s health.  Men’s health features workout techniques, eating tips, and new products for everything from technology to workout formula, yet it thankfully lacks in the department of page after page, of shirtless guys working out.  What interests me is how these magazines such as “Flex” are so popular with men?  It is very interesting how our society depicts males in these magazines as so dominant and “better” than the reader, yet still this magazine is bought by the masses.  Similarly, the women magazines depict equally interesting things.  Most women do not look like the “ideal” women that are depicted in the women’s health magazine, yet still various women buy these magazines to see societies few of the “ideal” female.  Often times whenever men are included in these magazines, the female is shown as inferior to the muscular, fierce man, which is interesting because these are women’s magazines so it asks the questions why would men be put in the dominant role in these magazines as well?