Women and Sports in the United States

Including nearly fifty new selections, this updated, expanded edition offers a selection of cutting-edge pieces about women in sports today. Topics covered range from the many benefits of physical activity to the successes of aging women athletes, from hajibs on the playing field to the emergence of transgender athletes, from the sexism faced by female athletes to USA Gymnastics and the biggest sex abuse scandal in American history. A spectacular transformation in women’s sports has occurred over the past half century in colleges, high schools, and recreational leagues across the nation. Gradual changes during the late 1950s and 1960s within the fields of women’s physical education and amateur sport provided the initial energy for this transformation. But it took the rebirth of a grassroots feminist movement in the late 1960s and 1970s to catalyze the radical changes in women’s athletic opportunities and attitudes toward female athletes. The assimilation of feminist principles into the broader popular culture solidified the belief that sport plays a positive role in the lives of girls and women. Political activists for women’s rights codified this attitude with the passage of Title IX of the 1972 Federal Education Amendments, a law banning gender discrimination in educational settings, thus guaranteeing women’s legal right to an equitable share of athletic opportunities and resources. Though the sea change in American women’s sports is evident in schools, the media, and local playing fields, scholarship has just begun to catch up with this historic change. This new edition of the classic reader Women and Sports in the United States brings together a collection of scholarly articles, journalism, political and legal documents, and first-person accounts that collectively explore women’s sports in America, with emphasis on the post–Title IX era.