“How Can They Like Doing That?” The Ambivalent Definition of Legitimate Work in Sports Journalism

Abstract

This paper investigates the opposing definitions of legitimate journalism between female and male sports reporters in the Swiss daily press, observable through the tensions in the division of work, task hierarchies, and contradictory definitions of what is perceived as distasteful or undesirable. It aims to adopt an inclusive approach that avoids being judgemental towards male perspectives or adopting a cynical view of female journalists, to better understand both male and female journalists' experiences of interaction of work and professional recognition, and identify obstacles to greater gender equality in sports journalism. The analysis relies on the notion of 'dirty work' developed by Hughes and Bourdieu's theory of field and habitus that offers a new way to investigate the links between tasks, roles, moral divisions, and power relations. Our detailed observations and 25 semi-structured interviews conducted with female and male sports journalists revealed the coexistence of two opposed professional styles. Overall, the men control the prestigious tasks and the doxa of this speciality. The women interviewed spoke of resisting, adapting, and finding satisfaction with the work that their male colleagues consider distasteful, as while their work is recognized by their superiors and nonsports colleagues as noble in general journalistic norms.

Analysis of the Management Positions Gender Structure in Sports Organizations in Slovakia

“…Although we believe that this is a consequence of the so-called "typical Slovak nature", it is a barrier that also corresponds to the findings of foreign researches, e.g. [2,[6][7][8][9][10][11]. They refute the assumption that this is a barrier typical for Slovak society, on the contrary, they confirm that this barrier is also common in the management of sports organizations in more western countries.…”

“…We decided to focus on the topic of gender and its connection with the management of sports organizations mainly because it has not been researched in Slovakia yet, on the other hand, this topic has already been discussed many times abroad. This is evidenced by many scientific studies, for example [2,[6][7][8][9][10][11]. Due to the fact that previous foreign researches focused mainly on Western countries, it will also be interesting to compare the results of our research with existing foreign ones.…”

“…Even so, in the results of foreign researches, we can find indications that lead us to this prejudice. They include, for example, the so-called "symbolic violence" manifested by the exclusion of women, their neglect or the fact that they are placed on the side-lines of sports management [7,8,11].…”

“…"A woman in the leadership of a sports organization is rather an exception" [5]. Building a career in a primarily male profession places certain barriers in front of them, which they subsequently have to face in their careers [2,[6][7][8][9][10][11].…”

The radical ambiguity at the heart of Pierre Bourdieu’s critique of journalism

“…Again, Nilsson and Esmaiel's study into the experiences of women TV journalists in the Middle East makes use of Bourdieu's theoretical concepts of field and capital: "For women journalists, the cost of transforming their cultural and social capital into symbolic capital that is effective in the journalistic field is affected by both the journalistic field and the society at large, which creates contextually bound obstacles to women journalists in Iraqi Kurdistan" (Nilsson and Esmaiel 2021). Other recent research which rely heavily on Bourdieuisan concepts include Tworek (2020), Loar (2021), Lucie andFabien (2021), andNölleke et al (2022), to mention just a few.…”