Gendering Sport: Football and Masculinity

Football is probably one of the most famous sports in Indonesia although there has not been any significant achievement in this field for quite some times. Growing up as a boy, football became some sort of obligatory sport to play, or just to be liked.  But who says so? Who says it is obligatory? When you’re a boy and you don’t like football, there will be some people, and most of them are males, who will comment “you’re a boy and you don’t like football? For heaven’s sake!” From this comment, it seems like football is somehow gendered, to be male sport. To be masculine, boy/man should love, or just like football.

Football is gendered. Yes, sport which is supposed to be genderless is gendered. Football is a man. Football’s gendering is constructed through some points. First, it is constructed by the players. In football there are twenty two males on the field. The players quite often meet the standard of masculine man. They have the ‘Greek God’s’ body with six (or even eight) packs and muscular arms. The display of the body makes up football players as macho, and thus as masculine men. Therefore, it is quite often that football players become the icon of masculinity. The body posture of football players are often displayed in some advertisement.

The other point that constructs football as man is by the display of various masculine traits such as strength, accuracy, strategy, endurance and speed during the game. These values are connotated with man. The values emphasize activeness, a value that is streotyped to be man’s characteristic. When we watch football we actually see these masculinity displays. The twenty two players play in the football field trying to compete and make some goals. It is also quite often that they should stand in the midst of rain or in the cold breeze of winter (in Europe). No matter how the weather and condition is, the show must go on. These distractions add the masculine image to the football players, positioning them to be the MAN who can stand against all of the distractions.

In addition, there is sexual imagery that is attached in the football. I don’t know in your culture, but I’ve got this in my culture. When a goal is made it becomes the metaphor of sexual intercourse. There are many jokes that compare goal and sexual intercourse. Thus, it displays the male as the ordinate, as the one who is in control. It completes gendering football as the male’s sport.

Therefore, when one male watches football he consumes these masculine images. Males seek for the identification of masculinity in football. Males who do not like footballs or rarely watch them are considered not masculine enough. But, that is just a social construction afterall.

Then what about women who love  playing football. Last week, there was a FTV ‘Film Television’ in SCTV that told about a girl who loves to play football. In the FTV she is depicted as tomboy girl. She is more masculine than her male friends. It seems like true, when women love playing (not watching football) she is somehow considered as a “masculine” girl. It is because when she plays football she also consumes the gender stereotypes attached to it. She genderes herself to be masculine. But still, it is her right to choose to be so. Even, there is the World Cup Women Football held by FIFA in June 26. It shows that the concept of gender is fluid.