I think it’s interesting that the National Federation of State High School Associations defines cheerleading as a sport.

When you separate it from its origins, competitive cheerleading is not that different from several forms of women's artistic and rhythmic gymnastics, anyway.

I'd like also to see the distribution for chess.... it is close to 99%-1% . Just to add that IMHO, the point is not about physical activity but about competitive activity. I am European and I am not sure about how competitive cheerleading is...

It's not that surprising that cheerleading is defined as a sport, as Elena says.

What I find interesting is that the little black sliver in the competitive spirit column represents 5,673 (at 560 schools) while the yellow tall line represents 111,307 girls (at 4510 schools). So there is a story about gendered sports here, where boys have fewer chances (or more social strictures against) participating. However, that little black sliver makes it look like no boys participate.

Also, going to the NFHS website, I'm troubled by the way they talk about these sports. They use two different approaches: "girls participating in sports" and "boys sports" (without the possessive apostrophe too! grr!). Thus there are many "boys sports", claimed and delineated, which erases girls' participation in those same sports. Meanwhile, girls participate in sports which are not theirs.

Competitive cheerleading is fairly distinct from cheerleading in the sense most of us think of it (standing on the sidelines cheering for another team)--there are many more physical stunts, larger squads, and they travel to cheer competitions that have nothing to do with supporting another sport. Since the 1980s, many cheerleaders and cheer coaches have actively tried to redefine it as a sport, arguing that it in fact takes a lot of physical ability and skill. If you watch competitive cheerleaders, it's sort of hard to get around the feeling that we would automatically classify it as a sport if it weren't a gendered activity we associate with a certain type of femininity, and if being a sport in and of itself didn't threaten the idea that cheerleaders are there to support other (usually male) athletes.

In fact, in their effort to distance themselves from the older idea of cheering, some competitive cheerleaders actively put down "traditional" cheering or cheerleaders, stressing that what they do is respectable and difficult, in contrast to "regular" cheering.

So it brings up an interesting question: are we inflating the number of female athletes by claiming cheerleading as a sport (thereby making it look like more progress has been made in integrating girls into athletics), or are we denigrating a physical activity as "not a sport" simply because (mostly) women do it?

Add me to Elena's pile. Cheer leading might have some gross roots, & might essentially be a messed up stand-in for the tribes women (as attached to the ritual combat of football, or whatever) but that aside, it totally counts as a sport.

What Gwen says reminds me of the point at which competitive ballroom dancing rebranded itself as "dance sport", at least in the UK. I have never been involved with it myself, but a friend of mine at university was, and the University society changed its name from the Oxford Ballroom Society to the Oxford Dancesport Society during that time. Again, it was an attempt to make it sound more like a competitive sport and less like entertainment.

Of course, men do ballroom dance, but it still has a reputation as not particularly manly. I wonder if Strictly Come Dancing / Dancing with the Stars has changed that?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1sp8RDjTpw
Whether modern cheer leading is really a sport isn't really the question. I think that the sport's focus on tossing girls about, as well as the sexualized costumes are sort of an issue, though.