Who’s Got Game? Gender Bias in Coverage of the 2004 Olympic Games on the Web

This project used content analysis to examine three news and sports websites’ coverage of the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. Using hegemony as a theoretical framework and relying on previous research reporting gender inequities in media coverage of sport, we predicted that despite a fairly equitable presence in the Olympic Games, coverage of female athletes and athletics on the web would still tend to emphasize sexual difference. Our findings support the conclusion in that male athletes were covered more frequently in visual and textual form; male athletes were seen much more frequently in contact or strength sports; and male athletes were photographed more frequently using an upward camera angle rather than a downward camera angle. This and other findings are discussed.

Publisher: Paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Communication Association, Sheraton New York, New York City, NY
Year of Publication: 2008