People often associate concussions with traditionally hard-hitting sports like football, ice hockey, boxing, and rugby. In fact, most concussion research, to date, has focused on these types of sports. Those who study concussions have given little attention to non-contact, individual, and alternative sport settings such as surfing, despite studies indicating high rates of head injuries in many of these types of activities. As an avid surfer who does research on action sport subcultures, I recently conducted a study that explored concussion among surfers on the Canadian West Coast.

Contrary to many mainstream sports, surfing lacks both formal key figures (coaches, referees, medical staff, and teammates) and formalized rules (timeframes, scoring, and arenas). Given the lack of key figures and formal rules, I wanted to understand how surfers obtained information about concussion and how they were treating, diagnosing, and preventing the injury within the larger surfing subculture. Through interviews with 12 experienced surfers and participant observations of surf breaks along the West Coast of Canada, I concluded that surfers tended to demonstrate mixed or ambiguous understandings of concussion. For example, the majority of participants knew that concussions were a type of head injury, but they often lacked knowledge about common symptoms, treatments, and protocols to follow when faced with a suspected concussion. This ambiguity fuelled some participants’ decisions to surf through their concussive injuries, downplay the severity of concussion, and in some cases, outright ignore their concussive symptoms. In general, surfers were willing to push through their concussive symptoms for three primary reasons: 1) having a limited amount of time to surf at a particular location, 2) pressure from other surfers in the water, and 3) to avoid missing out on favorable wave conditions.

With respect to the first reason, surfers often stated that they would be more likely to continue surfing with a concussion if they were on vacation, in a remote or difficult to access surf location, or at a location for only a short period of time. Additionally, some surfers claimed that they would be more likely to continue to surf while concussed due to the specific surf season. For example, a number of surfers noted how the best surf in Canada is often in the winter months due to the larger swells produced by Pacific Ocean storms. However, because of this shorter surf season, surfers indicated they would be more inclined to push through their concussive symptoms as a way to catch the larger and more consistent waves. This not only demonstrated the unique sporting environment in which surfing takes place, but also highlighted what previous concussion research has shown—that the sporting environment, such as the importance of an event, can influence an athlete’s willingness to (not) report a concussive injury.

With respect to pressures from other surfers, a number of participants indicated they would be more likely to surf with a concussion if there were other surfers present in the water. They also noted how surfing with friends often placed additional pressures to downplay or ignore their head injuries as a way to demonstrate to friends that they were “real” and “dedicated” surfers. Such findings illustrated surfers’ general willingness to seek out both risk-taking behaviours and thrill-seeking experiences in order to stay out in the water and present themselves as committed surfers.

Another key reason why surfers continued to surf with a concussion was due to the wave conditions present that day. Participants suggested that the conditions and size of the waves influenced surfers’ decisions on whether or not they would continue to surf following a concussive injury. As one surfer put it, “It’s super based on the waves. I mean, if the waves were the best I’ve ever seen, I’d have to fight…I would fight a concussion.” Similar responses were echoed by other participants in the study, illustrating that for many surfers, the thrill of wave chasing, and the search for transcendent experiences (through the catching of waves) appeared to outweigh their general concerns of concussion. Through interviews and participant observations, it became clear that underlying social, political, (sub)cultural, and environmental factors appeared to influence many of the surfers’ attitudes toward and understandings of concussion within surf culture, while also illustrating that ideas linked to risk seemed to influence many of the surfers’ decisions to continue surfing while concussed.

While this research stemmed from gaps in literature and my own personal experience of concussion, one of the main motivations for this research project was the story of Harley Taich and her experiences with a surfing-related concussion. Taich used her platform as a popular professional surfer to create awareness about the severity of concussion in surfing by authoring a children’s book, entitled, “Heads Up!” The Story of Finn and Reef, which educates children about concussion, the acceptance of injury, and importance of allowing time for recovery when dealing with a brain injury or other illness.

Through efforts from people like Harley Taich, and calls to action from researchers studying concussion, such as sociologist Dominic Malcolm’s call for a public sociology of sport-related concussion, more-and-more individuals are beginning to use their own (social media) platforms and public outlets to discuss the larger social, political, and (sub)cultural influences and implications of concussion within sporting cultures. For example, work from this project has been featured in media outlets such as The Guardian and Globe and Mail and has had the capacity to reach much larger audiences because of these public engagements. Through a commitment of sharing new and important information about concussion with larger audiences, it is both my hope and anticipation that the public dissemination of concussion knowledge and research has the ability to stimulate important conversations, networking, and new collaborations amongst various stakeholders, as we try to better understand this complex injury. These collaborations should include the voices of medical professionals, coaches, trainers, researchers, parents, and participants, as the voices of athletes are often excluded from important conversations about concussion. For example, taking a holistic approach toward the topic of concussion, and in collaboration with a number of stakeholders, Surf Canada developed one of the first surf-specific concussion protocols for surfers to engage with following a suspected concussion. Through similar efforts, and by accounting for and including a wide range of perspectives, researchers studying concussion can create a space where important issues related to concussion recognition, management, and prevention can be discussed and put into action through educational platforms, protocols, and policies across sporting bodies.

Nikolaus A. Dean is a PhD student in the School of Kinesiology at the University of British Columbia. Nikolaus’s research interests lie in areas related to the sociology of sport, youth (sub)cultures, action sport research, qualitative methods, and sport and leisure studies. A full version of the study, “‘You’re only falling into water!’: Exploring surfers’ understandings of concussion in Canadian surf culture” can be found in the journal Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health.

Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) is a combat sport that involves a combination of different fighting styles. As it has gained prominence in mainstream cultures, MMA has introduced the world to a variety of martial disciplines, such as wrestling (grappling), Muay Thai (striking), and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (submission grappling). Given that the goal of an MMA competitor is to defeat an opponent, which can occur by way of a knockout or submission (e.g., “tapping out” due to pain or injury), the sport involves a substantial level of physical risk.  When a fighter inflicts visible damage on an opponent, it is categorized under what the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), one of the world’s biggest MMA organizations, calls “significant strikes.”

What determines a “significant strike” ranges from the opponent’s facial expression of pain to blood drawn from a strike. Concussions and head trauma are prevalent concerns in my experience as a combat sports competitor and in contact sports more generally. With rising concerns about the consequences of concussions, head shots are still encouraged by spectators and professional combat sports organizations. It is common for professional combat sports organizations to favor fighters who knock out their opponents, “brawl” or “finish the fight,” because the brutality of knocking an opponent unconscious is seen as entertaining and brings in more viewers. Fighters are encouraged to knock their opponent unconscious through financial incentives, such as Glory Kickboxing’s “Knockout of the Night Bonus,” which offers an additional $5,000 to the fighter who knocks out their opponent. Often combat sports organizations take advantage of the entertainment value of knockouts by prioritizing advertising knockouts as opposed to other facets of the sport. Fighters who have “knockout power” are often portrayed in the media as “knockout artists” to attract viewership for the fighter’s following bouts. For example, knockout footage is compiled together into highlight reels, such as a knockout countdown of the year, that highlights the least to the most intense knockout. So, why do people continue to compete in combat sports despite the risk of serious injury?

To explore this question, I conducted in-depth interviews in my research with combat sports competitors: 11 individuals (2-hour sessions each), ages 18-40 years of age, male (8) and female (3). Based on these interviews, I argue that social bonds with other fighters heavily influences participants’ decisions to continue competing in a sport where physical harm is all but guaranteed. In the discussion below, pseudonyms are used to protect participant confidentiality.

A fighter’s community involvement and the relationships a fighter develops with their training partners are important factors that keep competitors in combat sports. For example, Jake, who is in his mid-20s and a high level Muay Thai amateur fighter, explained that his training partners are his “best friends” and fighting gave him “a sense of belonging.” Sam, a fighter in his late-20s and an amateur Muay Thai world champion, also expressed “a sense of belonging” with his training partners. He continued: “you don’t get these relationships outside where you see each other’s weaknesses and other sides…There is a non-verbal communication which is stronger here. I don’t feel judged in the gym, I feel more authentic compared to outside.” Fighters “sense of belonging” with training partners illuminates the significance of identifying with a community. Sam’s response suggests a sense of comfort and openness, within a combat sports context, that enables fighters to see each other’s weaknesses. A combat sports context offers an openness that leads to a shared intimacy and bond between training partners that is often difficult to foster outside this athletic context. In particular, male fighters’ intimate interactions with each other contrast with traditional gender norms because men showing signs of weakness is often considered socially detrimental under dominant notions of masculinity. 

I also observed social pressure as a key component for fighters to continue to compete in combat fights. Training partners, coaches, and family members were often cited as sources of pressure for fighters to continue fighting. For example, Lucus, a Muay Thai head coach in his mid-30s, said: “definitely, pressure from friends and family to continue, to live up to their expectations, to win in front of them.” Carol, an elite boxer and Muay Thai fighter in her mid-20s, initially stated that social pressure is not a factor in her motivation to compete in combat sports, but then admitted, “but on a subtle level, yes when coaches ask me to take a fight that I do not want to because I feel like I need a break. Also, peers expect something from me.” 

The motivating factors of community and social pressure exemplify the influence of people around fighters they care about. Sociologist Pierre Bourdieu used the term “habitus” to explain the influence of people’s surroundings on their ingrained habits and dispositions. Habitus explains how an environment can shape an individual’s personality to reflect the environment they interact within. An interplay between a person’s agency and the environment they inhabit helps us understand how fighters are shaped by a combat sports context through taking up the social role of a fighter. Fighting becomes part of fighter’s identity and, because of this, quitting combat sports would raise other issues that may seem more daunting than fighting itself, such as an identity crisis, loneliness due to the disconnection from peers, and a loss of “a sense of belonging.”

One participant’s responses succinctly express Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, specifically how individuals are shaped by their surroundings. As Lucus stated: 

it is who I am, but I chose to be in this environment and to be molded by it, I didn’t just be a passive subject to my surroundings. I think the difference between animals and humans is that we can change our environments.

Lucus’ response captures not only how individual identities are shaped by their surroundings, but also the agency individuals have in choosing to adapt to a combat sports environment. Overall, fighters continue to compete in combat sports because of engrained habits, views of others around fighters, and relationships. Social determinants, such as a sense of belonging, pressure or lifestyle, are significant factors in a fighter’s decision to continue to compete in combat sports. 

When we talk about the complex nature of head trauma and the possibility of physical harm, it is important to understand the need for fighters to identify with a community and how these needs come from both internal and external influences. 

John Deidouss (@johndeidouss) is a PhD Candidate at Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada. His research interests are in the sphere of racism and combat sports. He is part of the socio-cultural studies branch in the Kinesiology department. John Deidouss is a striking coach, a Muay Thai Classic World Champion and a 2x Fightquest K1 Champion.

In November 2018, Canadian outdoor recreation giant Mountain Equipment Co-op (MEC) sent ripples through the community of “outdoorsy” folks in Canada with a statement framed around the following provocative question: “Do White People Dominate the Outdoors?” The statement was a response to an Instagram callout from Judith Kasiama (see Figure 1), in which Kasiama pointed out “a narrative that [Black and Indigenous peoples and people of colour] don’t enjoy the outdoor[s] compare[d] to their white friends.” In its statement, MEC took responsibility for its role “in underrepresenting people of colour in the outdoors,” and promised “that moving forward, [MEC] will make sure [they’re] inspiring and representing the diverse community that already exists in the outdoors” (see Figures 2 & 3 below).

In this analysis, we draw on the work of Sara Ahmed to analyze MEC’s announcement, and gesture toward the broader constellation of diversity practices evident in (social) media produced by MEC. Specifically, we take up Ahmed’s ideas about how “diversity work” works. Ahmed suggests that in doing diversity work such as forming equity committees or issuing diversity statements, organizations often reproduce dominant forms of power. She highlights, for example, that diversity statements by organizations are often seen as a “diversity success,” and further work to actually address racism or sexism, for example, does not get done. It is with this in mind that we analyze the kind of work MEC undertakes, and how it serves to erase a key issue in outdoor recreation: settler colonialism.

Settler colonialism is the term used to describe the process by which Europeans colonized the lands now claimed by Canada, despite the presence of hundreds of nations of Indigenous peoples with millennia-long histories and sophisticated systems of government, education, trade, and more. Through a variety of means, European (and later Canadian) authorities claimed these lands as their own and asserted authority over them. Making (and breaking) treaties, state-sanctioned processes confining Indigenous peoples to small parcels of land, and policies and practices aimed at severing Indigenous peoples’ connections to their land are all part of the story of how Canada came to be as a nation, and a key part of the story of how the “great Canadian outdoors” came to be understood.

MEC should be considered in light of this history. Founded as a cooperative by a group of climbers and mountaineers in 1971, MEC aimed to address a gap in the outdoor retail market in Canada, providing gear for outdoor adventure activities. Over almost half a century, MEC has grown exponentially, now boasting almost 5 million Canadian members (in a country of approximately 31 million people aged 15 years and over), 13 million products sold, and $462 million in sales. Named one of Canada’s most trusted brands, MEC is clearly a goliath in the Canadian retail environment.

In their statement, MEC claims that white dominance of the outdoors “isn’t true at all, and [is] part of a bigger problem” (see Figure 2). Further, they note: “We can’t move forward until we acknowledge our past” (see Figure 3). In these statements, MEC acknowledges a past (the company’s past going back to 1971), to name the past that needs acknowledging, to move past acknowledging other (for example, settler colonial) pasts. MEC names the “bigger problem,” and what it means to move forward: better representing the “diversity that exists and continues to grow in outdoor spaces.” In so doing, MEC positions its response as the solution to the problem – it lets itself off the hook as the problem. Further, MEC’s apology is one that homogenizes. In their particular invocation of “everyone,” MEC not only erases Indigenous peoples, communities, and histories, but constructs “everyone” as having the same access to land. To “outside.”

In drawing attention to the “bigger problem” of representation, MEC sidesteps bigger, more enduring problems—problems with longer pasts that MEC seeks to move past. For our purposes here, the most important past (and present!) that is erased in this apology is that of settler colonialism. European settlers came to these lands – lands already occupied by hundreds of nations with sophisticated systems of government, worldviews, kinship, education, and more – and treated the lands as empty, as wild, as available for claiming. The nation now known as Canada, in other words, arose out of concerted efforts to dispossess those already here of their land base. The nation now known as Canada claimed these lands as its own. The nation now known as Canada continues to assume and assert authority over Indigenous peoples in numerous ways, including treaties that have repeatedly been violated; policies and practices (such as the pass system of the late 1800s and early 1900s) aimed at restricting the movements of Indigenous peoples; genocidal government policy (e.g., residential schools and refusal to support clean water infrastructure); and “consultation” processes that have routinely neglected free, prior, and informed consent (for which the United Nations Declaration of Indigenous Peoples calls).

MEC’s letter locates wrongdoing neatly in the past. But the colonial settler past that MEC fails to acknowledge is one that haunts the present, that continues to be (re)written in government policy, in disagreements over land claims and resource development projects, and more. MEC’s apology sidesteps the questions of land dispossession and settler colonial violence altogether; this particular silence speaks volumes…in saying nothing, it says a great deal. It erases both a past and a present, both of which would call for something much more than simply better representing the “diversity that exists and continues to grow in outdoor spaces”. As such, MEC’s statement takes as its unquestioned starting point that “the outdoors” is and should be a playground available to all “Canadians.”

Finally, MEC’s letter frames the “problem” as simply one of representation – the disjuncture between the “reality” of diverse bodies in the backcountry and the white bodies that have historically peopled their catalogue and website. What MEC invokes is the idea from which the Canadian nation state gets so much mileage – that “we” are a hardy, outdoorsy people, that experiences with “wild places” are the very foundation of our so-called nation. That it is what unites us. But our histories – and our present – shatter the rosy idea that on these lands, “outside is for everyone.”

In a country in which we often celebrate outdoor spaces and our relationship to them, MEC is central to how many of us think of ourselves as Canadians. As important as their statement is, it is important that we think critically about it – and outdoor recreation more broadly – and ask ourselves which histories and ideas are being brought to light, and which are being left in the shadows. This is particularly important at a moment when “truth” and “reconciliation” are, in principle at least, on the centre stage.

Tiffany Higham is a queer, white, non-binary scholar and settler on Blackfoot land. They are an undergraduate student of Kinesiology and Sociology at the University of Lethbridge.

Jason Laurendeau is a white, cis, settler scholar in the Department of Sociology at the University of Lethbridge, in Lethbridge, AB, located on lands of the Siksikaitsitapii people, who are part of the Blackfoot Confederacy. His research interests lie at the intersections of sport and physical culture, gender, settler colonialism, and childhood. Find him on Twitter: @JasonLaurendeau.

Danielle Peers is a white, queer, non-binary, crip scholar. They are a treaty six settler and Tier II Canada Research Chair in Disability and Movement Cultures as the Faculty of Kinesiology, Sport, and Recreation, University of Alberta.

Recently, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the leader of Canada’s Liberal Party, made a memorable campaign stop in Sudbury, Ontario. After paddling a canoe around a local lake, Trudeau emerged to make an announcement related to land and ocean conservation during the federal election campaign. Specifically, he outlined a Liberal Party promise to teach young Canadians to camp by Grade 8 and provide support for 75,000 lower-income families to spend time in provincial and national parks. This announcement points to the iconic place the “wilderness” and Canada’s park system play in the Canadian imaginary. In the following narratives, I draw on some of my own experiences with Canada’s park system to situate outdoor recreation in a broader and more troubling history rarely considered in Canadian mainstream media, classrooms, or politics.

July, 2017

I wake before anyone else, and slip out of the tent as quietly as possible. As the sun begins to make its presence known, I follow the trail around Bertha Lake, taking in the majesty of what is now commonly known as Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta.

This weekend, I get to share my love of the mountains with my favourite eight-year-old for the first time, and it is…magic. Yesterday, after we set up camp, we wandered part-way around Bertha Lake, and Quinn was as in awe of this place as am I (see Figure 1).

This is, without a doubt, one of my most memorable moments as a father. I am sharing something that I love deeply with Quinn, and watching him fall in love with it as well.

But here is the rub: More than a simple love of the mountains is connecting the two of us right now. There is something deeper lurking there, something more troubling…

There is nothing inherently “wild” about the wilderness. “Wilderness” on these lands claimed by Canada was, in fact, produced as colonization unfolded. The formation of iconic spaces like Banff National Park came to be through complex processes that involved, among other things, the active removal of Indigenous peoples who called those lands home for millennia, who gathered foods there, who engaged in important cultural practices there, who lived in relation to their non-human kin there. At the same moment as settlers were being invited to come enjoy the splendors of “pristine wilderness,” Indigenous peoples were being subjected to – and often actively resisting – numerous state-sanctioned measures to confine them to small parcels of land.

In the area now commonly known as Banff, for example, the introduction of a pass system in 1885 coincided with the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and criminalized the movements of local Nakoda peoples (by making it illegal for them to leave the reserve without explicit permission from the “Indian Agent”), with the clear purpose of protecting land and “resources” (e.g., wildlife, hot springs) for the consumption of colonizers. At the same time as Indigenous peoples were considered “trespassers” in the lands that were to become Banff National Park and various provincial parks that would collectively come to be known as “Kananaskis Country,” settler entrepreneurs were advertising far and wide for visitors to come enjoy the beauty of this “untouched” wilderness.

September, 2017

It’s day two, and our campsite is perfect; Peter Lougheed Provincial Park is my favourite part of Kananaskis-Country. This morning, as we hike toward Three Isle Lake, we are negotiating a steep section of the trail, gaining a couple hundred meters of elevation in less than a kilometer. I spot a small outcropping that looks perfect for a rest. The views are stunning, and I take several photos, one of which will serve as the lock screen on my cell phone for the next several months (see Figure 2).

I nuzzle in next to Quinn as we munch on trail mix. “Do you know how few people have seen the view we’re seeing right now?” Wrapping my arm gently around his shoulder, I offer: “I am so happy that this is something we get to share, love.”

He leans his head against my shoulder. “Me too,” he says, simply. I am in this moment, knowing that it will be a touchstone in our relationship.

Reflecting on this moment, however, it is more complicated than that. This moment, and our camping trips more generally, are more than simply salve for my soul, more than a collection of touchstone moments and Facebookable photos. I am introducing him to something that I love, something that feels to me like a spiritual home, of sorts. But there is another education at work here, one that I have yet to trouble with him in the ways that I can or should.

In my conversation with Quinn, for example, I erase both the long history of Indigenous peoples’ (especially Stoney Nakoda) presence on these lands, and the fact that these folks lived here. For them, this was not a “view” to be consumed, but a landscape with which they lived in relation. Our presence here constitutes a continuation of this history, and raises critical questions about our complicity in ongoing settler colonial violence on these lands.

Coda

Dear Quinn,

Have I told you, my love, that being a father is the hardest thing I’ve ever done? It’s the most rewarding, but also the hardest. And it’s hard in new ways, too, as I worry about different things. One of the things I’m worrying about these days – as you approach your teenage years – is what kind of future you’re going to help build.

The point here is that we have a role to play in terms of the things I’m writing about. We need to better understand the histories, voices, and memories of the places we go. I also want us to learn about the other parks we visit, and about a number of Indigenous-led movements to create new parks and bring other ones under Indigenous control and management. Indigenous peoples and organizations have been doing this work for a long time. Our job is to listen to them, and figure out how to make space.

To be clear, my love, this is not so that we can be kind, or benevolent. Rather, it’s about asking ourselves what kind of future we want to be part of.

With the deepest love for you, and for the world I can’t quite see yet,

Dad

Letter first composed in July, 2019

Jason Laurendeau is a white, cis, settler scholar in the Department of Sociology at the University of Lethbridge, in Lethbridge, AB, located on lands of the Siksikaitsitapii people, who are part of the Blackfoot Confederacy. His research interests lie at the intersections of sport and physical culture, gender, settler colonialism, and childhood. Find him on Twitter @JasonLaurendeau.

Racial stacking – the tendency of certain racial groups to be overrepresented in particular positions on sports teams – is a longstanding issue in numerous sports, including college football. Even though the last of the segregated college football programs disappeared in the early 1970s, racial disparities still exist on the field today. Even someone observing American football for the first time might notice that white and black players tend to occupy different roles and positions on the field. To explore these issues, I conducted a study – recently published in Sociology of Sport Journal (unpaywalled version) – to provide a contemporary picture of if and how stacking persists in college football. I also looked beyond race and examined the social class origins of college football players at different schools and playing positions. Social class reflects economic forces that affect the development of talent, as well as athletic outcomes. I learned that race and class intersect in both high school and college to provide different playing opportunities and outcomes for black and while players.

The study was based on a combination of three datasets. First, I collected data from university athletics webpages for 41,484 football players. Specifically, the websites included player pictures, positions, hometowns, and high schools. Second, the National Center for Education Statistics Common Core of Data and Private School Survey was used to garner information on the racial composition of players’ high schools. Third, data on median household incomes for high school zip codes were taken from the American Community Survey.

Results showed that positional stacking is still prominent in college football. On team rosters, white players are disproportionately quarterbacks, offensive linemen, and kickers/punters. Black players are disproportionately running backs, defensive linemen, wide receivers, and defensive backs. However, stacking is influenced by the institutional opportunity structures of high school and college football programs. Opportunities for black athletes to play stereotypically white positions are most likely to emerge in high schools and colleges where teams are predominantly comprised of black players. Likewise, when white athletes play stereotypically black positions, they tend to come from whiter high schools and play on whiter college teams. Put simply, opportunities for whites and blacks to play non-stereotypical positions at the high school or college level are more likely to emerge when there are few or no other personnel options for coaches.

In order to highlight one specific example of how institutions influence player stacking and opportunity structures, I compared positional stacking on football teams from “predominantly white” academically elite conferences (Ivy, Patriot, NESCAC, and Centennial) with teams from conferences of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) (MEAC, SWAC, CIAA, and SIAC). When a black athlete plays football on a predominantly white team, they are quite likely to play a stereotypically black position. For example, 30% of black football players at historically white schools play defensive back, even though defensive backs only comprise 14% of Division I football rosters. In contrast, 19% of black players at HBCUs play defensive back. White players are five times more likely to play quarterback than black players in “predominantly white” conferences, although this gap closes to 1.8 times more likely at the HBCUs. Of the 132 white players in those four HBCU conferences, 42% are either kickers, punters, or long snappers. Although those three particular positions are relatively low-status specialist roles, this raises the question of why even at HBCUs, black athletes are less likely to be recruited or developed to play those positions.

Examining the median household incomes for the zip codes of players’ high schools provides another angle on stacking and player opportunities. The average annual income of high school zip codes for white players was $13,000 higher than black players in Division I football and $10,000 higher in Division III. For white players, there was no meaningful relationship between high school income and position. In other words, white players come from relatively similar economic backgrounds, regardless of what position they play.

In contrast, black players come from different economic backgrounds depending on their collegiate position. Paradoxically, black players playing stereotypically black positions (running back, defensive back) tended to come from wealthier schools. In contrast, black players playing stereotypically white positions (quarterback, kicker/punter) came from the poorest backgrounds. Specifically, black quarterbacks’ family incomes were $5,000 less than black running backs, wide receivers, and defensive backs based on zip code data. These results may be surprising, given the importance of the quarterback position both in the game and as a cultural totem for organizational leadership.

So, what causes this paradox? Recall the previous results showing that opportunities for black players to play non-stereotypical positions are more likely to emerge in high schools and colleges with a greater proportion of black players. Thus, it follows that black quarterbacks are more likely to develop and be given opportunities in less-wealthy institutions. Given the competitive disadvantages of playing at economically poorer high schools, as well as underfunding of many HBCU’s – both as athletic programs and schools – opportunities for black athletes at less-wealthy (and less-white) institutions are often a double-edged sword. Playing for college teams representing (often well-resourced) predominately white institutions may be a desirable opportunity for black athletes. However, this upward institutional mobility may circumscribe opportunities for black athletes within stereotypical roles in the football field, if not also on campus. Consequently, some have argued that the prestige and resources of many predominantly white colleges do not outweigh the disadvantages of such institutions for racial minorities.

There are also significant racial differences within the quarterback position. College recruits are distinguished between “pro-style” (passing-oriented) and “dual threat” (running and passing) quarterbacks. Of the 50 top-ranked pro-style quarterbacks by rivals.com at the time of the study, 39 (78%) were white and eight (16%) were black. In contrast, 31 (62%) of the top fifty dual-threat quarterbacks were black, while 18 (36%) were white.

Passing-oriented offenses tend to be resource-intensive. Extra coaches and video resources facilitate the installation of more complex offenses. For example, compare former Pro Bowl QB Neil Lomax “running the snot” out of the same eight running plays at an impoverished Portland (OR) high school with suburban high schools boasting $70 million stadiums. If complex passing offenses are favored by NFL teams – and many college teams hoping to place players in the NFL – it follows that high schools with more resources will be more likely to produce passing quarterbacks. This renders black athletes less likely to play quarterback – especially at wealthier and whiter schools – as they are more likely to develop running skills if they do play quarterback. Running QBs can be successful in college in running-based offenses like the triple option, but are seldom considered as professional prospects.

While college football is just a game – albeit one worth billions of dollars annually and with glaring ethical issues about player health and compensation – this study raises a number of important issues on and off the field. Sports are often symbolic microcosms of the broader society. Equality of opportunity is seen as a virtue in most societies, both as an axiom of meritocracy, and as a means of developing the best possible talent. College football involves racial, institutional, and social class factors that result in different roles and market outcomes for different players. Leadership or stereotype-defying opportunities for minorities may tend to emerge in economically poorer contexts, while upward mobility into wealthier, whiter institutions may circumscribe opportunities for racial minorities.

Dr. Kyle Siler is a sociologist at the Science Policy Research Unit at the University of Sussex. His research mostly focuses on risk and innovation in science. He also studies sport from an organizational theory perspective. A recent preprint analyzes how luck in the National Football League influences subsequent decision-making and performance. Kyle received his Ph.D. from the Cornell University Department of Sociology.

In August 2019, former National Football League (NFL) player Chris Long declared that he smoked marijuana and “is a good person”. Long is not the first professional athlete to discuss marijuana use, and his comments situate him in a conversation many former players are having about the benefits of marijuana compared to traditional pain killers. Long’s comments are also part of larger marijuana reform movements happening in places such as Canada, Mexico, New Zealand, Uruguay, and the U.S. In the U.S., however, it is white marijuana users like Chris Long who tend to get the benefit of the doubt with respect to being a “good person”.

Black Americans are almost four times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites despite similar rates of usage. These racial disparities are still present in U.S. states where marijuana is legal. Even within the legal cannabis industry, those running dispensaries and other parts of the recreational marijuana market are disproportionately white and male, allowing them to profit from the plant while women and racial minorities struggle to gain the same access. These inequities are representative of the long history of marijuana prohibition discourse that has used narratives of race, gender, social class, and nation to argue for the outlawing of the plant.

Within sport, former NFL player Ricky Williams is perhaps the most famous athlete that has used marijuana. In fact, Sports Illustrated called him “America’ s most infamous stoner-athlete”.  This label most likely comes from Williams’s long history with the plant. In 2004, during the prime of his career, Williams retired after a third positive marijuana test. During this time Williams had a medical marijuana prescription for his social anxiety, became a yoga instructor, and went to school for holistic medicine. Williams returned to the NFL in 2005, but was subsequently suspended for marijuana use again in 2006. This period found Williams ensnared into several competing narratives regarding marijuana use, including selfishness, discourses that labeled him a quitter, the “Bob Marley of football”, a bad role model, and Williams’s own description of his drug use as something he did because he wanted to quit football.

Ultimately, narratives about Williams cannot be separated from larger understandings of race and masculinity, and his case provides an important means for exploring broader narratives of Black masculinity in connection to sport and marijuana use. In a recent study, I examined narratives of Williams’s marijuana use in relation to Black masculinity, conducting a systematic investigation of articles appearing in the printed press as well as the documentaries Run Ricky Run (2010) and A football life: Ricky Williams (2014).

Sport is a useful space to examine complexities involved in narratives about marijuana use, as popular culture has been used historically to justify marijuana prohibition. For example, yellow journalism, film, and other forms of popular culture were used to perpetuate the belief that marijuana made Mexican and Black men violent, criminal, and hypersexual. Additionally, prohibitionists spread the belief that white women who smoked would become sexually deviant and have sex with men of color outside of wedlock. By capitalizing on the demonization of oppressed groups and by enflaming stigmatized narratives of interracial sex, prohibitionists such as Harry Anslinger were able to carve an easier path to prohibition. In essence, Blacks, Mexicans, and white women who used marijuana did not get to be “good people”.

By the 1960s, marijuana use grew among white, middle-class college students. This demographic change helped shift media narratives to focus on white teens who were “good people”, but made a mistake by smoking cannabis. The demographic shift also led to marijuana users being stereotyped as unproductive but not violent, with a connection to counter-cultural movements and leftist politics. Thus, Williams’s marijuana use and Long’s comments are part of a long history of marijuana prohibition shaped by issues of race, gender, and social class.

Similar narratives about marijuana use and stereotypical constructions of Black masculinity are prevalent in the sport media’s discussion of Williams. While Williams’ marijuana use was situated across a variety of different narratives, I found that the framing of Williams’s marijuana use as selfish and hedonistic was most dominant. I contend that this is due to the media’s inability to conceptualize the complexity of Williams, his performance of Black masculinity, and his identity as a Black marijuana user. From the onset, Williams was framed as a strange individual. “Ricky’s personality is the furthest thing you’d expect from a football player. He’s more like a writer, a poet,” suggested Greg Colbourne of the Toronto Star. Williams was often classified as a “bohemian” or “someone that cannot be defined”, positioning him as unrecognizable within professional football.

More so, these attributes are not recognizable because they do not fit into stereotypical tropes of Black masculinity as hyper-masculine and criminal or assimilated to white middle-class norms of respectability. The inability to understand Williams and his actions result in his marijuana use being pigeonholed into easily recognizable tropes of the Black male athlete. Comments like Greg Stoda of The Palm Beach Post, stating Williams “doesn’t care about anybody except Ricky Williams”,  or one-liners like “Ricky Williams, whose pot history is positively Marleyesque”, and the many others like it fall into the stereotypical tropes of the Black athlete and Black marijuana use.

The selfish and hedonistic athlete is consistently framed through the Black male body, but these labels of selfishness and hedonism were also applied to Black jazz musicians of the 1930s. Further, by calling Williams the “Bob Marley of football” and other similar labels, the Rastafarian and anti-colonial politics of Marley are erased, and instead both Marley and Williams are situated in historical discourses of hedonism and Black marijuana use. This connection obscures any association of Black marijuana use and politics. Thus, Williams is entwined with multiple messages that narrowly interpret the behavior of the Black body as selfish. And as a result, this obscures more complex reasons for Williams’s actions and choice to use marijuana.

For instance, Williams had a medical marijuana prescription for his anxiety disorder, and after retiring, he went on to train as a yoga teacher and holistic healer. Williams has specifically credited yoga for helping to restore balance in his life. More so, Williams has frequently stated “I didn’t quit football because I failed a drug test. I failed a drug test because I was ready to quit football”. This narrative aligns with Williams’ discussion of losing interest in fame and money leading to his first retirement. These more complex narratives are explored in both ESPN’s 30 for 30: Run Ricky Run documentary and NFL Films’ A football life: Ricky Williams. The NFL Films documentary celebrates football and the career of Williams through a redemption narrative, while ESPN’s 30 for 30 documentary, although not produced by Williams, involved his input capturing the complexity of his life “warts and all”.

These documentaries allow Williams to bring his own narrative into the larger sport media discourse of his marijuana use and retirement. Such alternative narratives from Williams and (occasionally from the press), offer the possibility to open new and wider ideas about what it means to be a Black athlete and a Black athlete who uses marijuana. Thus, considering cases such as Williams’ marijuana use may help us think more critically about the meaning we attach to marijuana and its different users—or more plainly, it helps render visible who gets to be a “good person” that uses marijuana. Reframing our understandings of marijuana and its users could generate support for marijuana and CBD oil to be used medicinally by athletes. More so, critically thinking about narratives of marijuana use and their relation to the history of marijuana prohibition has the potential to humanize both women and racial minorities who use the plant—a process that could work to counter-act racial disparities in marijuana enforcement and issues of discrimination within the legal cannabis industry. To do so would allow a broader scope of individuals to use marijuana and remain a “good person”.

Nik Dickerson is a Senior Lecturer in Sport Sociology at the University of Lincoln, UK. Both his research and teaching use sport and popular culture to explore historical and contemporary narratives of race and its intersections in the United States. He is particularly interested in representations of marijuana users within the marijuana reform movement, and issues of Blackness within ice hockey.  

There is a concussion crisis in sport. In some ways, concern about brain injuries in sport is nothing new. Over a century ago, medical journals started campaigning against the dangers of sport, and there were specific attempts to ban U.S. college football in the early 1900s and abolish tackle football in the 1950s. But the current crisis is different in four key respects:

1. It is a multisport injury crisis, spanning combat sports, various forms of football, hockey, and lacrosse to name but a few.
2. The crisis is global in nature, with debates in North America paralleled in most other English-speaking nations and, increasingly, mainland Europe.
3. The crisis extends beyond one type of injury—concussion or traumatic brain injury (TBI)—and is now inseparable from concerns about second impact syndrome and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). It even includes concerns about the influence of barely perceivable “sub-concussive” impacts.
4. The crisis is distinct in terms of its penetration into the popular cultural imagination, notably through the book and documentary League of Denial and popular movie Concussion.

Until now the issue of concussions has been approached in relatively narrow terms: as a medical problem; a media phenomenon; a governance and regulation issue; and a public health failure. It is, of course, all of these things. Within these areas, more work is needed to effectively diagnose, identify which particular impacts and/or symptoms equate with short- and long-term harm and, most fundamentally, find some kind of medical “cure”. We also need to examine media portrayals, scrutinize administrators’ responses, and change the way concussion awareness campaigns are designed and delivered. But many sport stakeholders and athletes have been slow to react, and the crisis has become bigger than any of these things alone—it is now a cultural crisis.

Conceived of as a cultural crisis, we now need to ask new and different questions, for health crises are rarely simply the outcome of the most pressing concerns, but are socially constructed through ideologies, interests and power relations. In light of this it seems pertinent to ask, what kind of society is it in which concerns over brain injury in sport have become so pronounced? What are the social roots of sport’s concussion crisis?

These are the fundamental questions I attempt to address in a new book, The Concussion Crisis in Sport. The analysis identifies three changing but interconnected cultural ideologies that help us understand the current situation: 1) health; 2) ageing; and 3) of course, sport.

First, concerns about concussions grow out of changes in the way we conceive of health in contemporary societies. Where health was once simply the absence of illness, we now think of health more in terms of our ability to optimize wellbeing through self-management. Concussion is a distinct contemporary health issue because our concerns are not just about the here and now, but also longer term risks, such as dementia and other forms of cognitive impairment.

Moreover, because healthiness has become entwined with ideas about our ability to be in control, brain health has taken centre stage. Neuroscience may be at a relatively early stage of development, but our expectations about how a deeper understanding of the human brain will enhance the human condition are reflected in the burgeoning market for brain enhancement products sold to consumers looking to develop their cognitive capacities. The exponential growth in social awareness of mental health issues is another expression of this. Specifically, while Mike Webster’s NYT obituary explicitly identified sport-induced brain injury as the cause of his 2002 death, it was the broader context (George W. Bush had just launched a comprehensive mental health review) that fuelled both Bennet Omalu’s investigation of CTE as a distinct medical condition and subsequent public and political interest. The concussion crisis stems from what has been termed Brain Culture and a belief that the brain is the key to understanding human existence and controlling human happiness.

Second, the concussion crisis in sport is also fundamentally wrapped up with concerns about different phases of the life-course. Children, once simply seen as small adults, are now thought of as uniquely vulnerable and in need of “concerted cultivation”. Parents invest in private tuition, after school clubs, etc. with the expectation that these actions will reap rewards for their children’s development. Moreover, because we think of childhood as the “cradle of the self” – the beginning of what defines us – the positive or negative experiences of young people are thought to have a spiralling effect. The result: we encourage children into sports, yet become acutely concerned about the potential effects upon them, such as concussions. These considerations explain how an occupationally specific concern related to the NFL has escalated to encompass all sports participants.

The hopes and fears about children’s early years are compounded by broader demographic shifts. As aging populations and medical efficacy for treating – e.g. heart disease – advance, so dementia has grown as a social concern. The primary response to this has been one of panic and fear – panic at the potential economic and social burden of an aging populace and fear at the prospect that we as individuals might also be subject to this “living death”. Medicine’s inability to develop a cure for dementia has led to a search for “faddy avoidance tactics”. Broader concerns about aging and dementia have spawned an ongoing search for a link between concussions and (early onset) dementia.

Third, changes to the structure and consumption of sport are also at the root of the current concussion crisis. Sport has become increasingly specialised in recent years and money and prestige have helped refine the performance experiments of sports science, creating a breed of “super-human” athletes. While we may not recognise it, the lived experiences of athletes have never been more distinct from that of sports fans due to the degree of devotion and singlemindedness required to become an elite performer.

Helping to obscure these differences is the cult of the sport celebrity. Richard Schickel, in his review of celebrity in modern life, describes how the public are drawn into the lives of these Intimate Strangers, which increasingly includes our consumption of the post-career lives of former sports stars. Inevitably this includes the longer-term detrimental health effects of a sporting career that, until recently, were largely beyond the public gaze. The concussion crisis is fuelled by an industry of sporting nostalgia (consider the focus on dementia amongst England’s 1966 World Cup winning soccer team), and a (misleading) conflation of demonstrably dangerous occupations with routine, everyday forms of sports participation.

So what can be done? Cultural crises are not resolved through technical or scientific innovation alone. Neither helmet design, rule changes, nor reliable diagnostic tools will get to the heart of these issues. We need something more than greater awareness and better regulation, for while both would be welcome, they continually fail because they misconceive the problem at hand.

The solution to a cultural crisis rests on uniting opposing factions and addressing their attitudinal differences. The first step toward doing that is to recognise how the current debate is guided by broader social processes. Our expectations for health, medicine, childhood and aging shape attitudes towards concussions. Second, we need to more clearly distinguish between the very different realities of elite and everyday levels of sporting experiences. This may go against the interests of commercial sport organisations for which forming a bond between player and fan creates meaning which creates revenue, but current portrayals misrepresent the levels of risk that most individuals experience in sport. Moreover, research shows that where regulations are out of step with participants’ experiences of concussion, they are likely to be rejected and ignored. Third, we must address the core paradox fuelling the concussion crisis; namely that what is believed to be a simple, cheap, accessible (and effective) strategy for boosting physical, mental and social well-being has become seen as a central cause of potentially the defining health issue of the twenty first century.

Finally—and many will find this counterintuitive—the way concussion has been elevated above and fundamentally distinct from other sport injury concerns may have had negative consequences. The voices calling for greater protection of the brain are contradicted by those that champion the traditional virtues of strength, fortitude and resilience in sport. A culture of sport that celebrates pain and injury creates an environment where disregard for one’s body is positively encouraged. Locating concussion within a more holistic concern about attitudes and responses toward sport injury, and a more realistic evaluation of the relative health benefits and costs of sports participation, would form the basis of a more authentically cultural agenda for change.

Dominic Malcolm is Reader in the Sociology of Sport at Loughborough University, UK. He is also Editor-in-Chief of the International Review for the Sociology of Sport. He has published a dozen books and over 50 journal articles on a range of subjects within the sociology of sport. His latest book is The Concussion Crisis in Sport (Routledge, 2020).

The field of podcasting has experienced rapid growth. Since its coinage in 2004, hundreds of millions have listened to podcasts—digital audio files available on the Internet, which are usually part of a themed series. As of 2019, over 64% of Americans were familiar with podcasts, a dramatic increase from 22% in 2006. In 2018, Google had indexed at least two million podcasts created around the world. According to Edison Research, over 700,000 active podcasts and more than 29 million podcast episodes were available on the Internet in 2019, rising from an estimated 550,000 active podcasts and 18.5 million episodes in 2018. In the United States alone, 51% of the population aged 12 and above have listened to podcasts. Internationally, a 2019 Reuters digital survey reported that 36% of international respondents recently listened to podcasts.

The proliferation of podcasts has acutely impacted the sports media industry. Networks like ESPN and Fox Sports offer menus of podcasts hosted by noted media anchors and former athletes. Current and former athletes are using podcasts to present their unique perspectives and tell stories of inspiration and female athletic empowerment. At the same time, the popular website Barstool Sports produces multiple lucrative podcasts that cater to the 18-34 year old male demographic through misogynistic conversations and the sexualization of female athletes, female podcast hosts, and podcast content. A simple Google search yields multiple lists of the “best” and “top ranking” sports podcasts available on the Internet, with such lists indicating that the current landscape of sports podcasting is dominated by content focused on a narrow set of professional sports, produced and hosted almost exclusively by men, with little perspective through a critical lens.

However, there are prominent sports podcasts on national platforms that critically examine issues in the sports world. Only a Game, produced by National Public Radio, devotes episodes to complex topics like the role of power, corruption and race in the NCAA’s enforcement of amateurism and the U.S. women’s national soccer’s team fight for gender equity. BackStory, another public radio podcast, devoted their July 26, 2019 episode to “the issue of sports and equality in American history.” Celebrity comedian Rhea Butcher’s Three Swings “reinvents” baseball history and culture, with one recent episode on “the hidden queer history” of the All American Girls’ Professional Baseball League. The Nation sportswriter Dave Zirin, meanwhile, discusses pressing issues in contemporary sports on his Edge of Sports podcast, with episodes featuring interviews with former athletes, journalists, and other prominent figures in the sports world. Further, individual episodes about sports have been produced by nationally-recognized podcasts like Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History.

The feminist sports podcast Burn It All Down is a critically-focused sports podcast that unites contemporaneous discussion with scholarly analysis. Hosted by a group of feminist academics, activists and journalists, each episode gives an intersectional take on the latest news and events in sports. According to statistics available on their SoundCloud page (which does not take into account statistics from other podcast platforms like Apple or Google), hundreds of listeners follow the podcast, with each episode receiving roughly 4,000-6,000 plays. The hosts put their scholarly and interpretive tools into practice as they focus on the experiences of women athletes and fans as well as marginalized communities. With thousands of listeners streaming each episode, their continued success demonstrates the existence of listener appetite for critically-focused sports podcasts that present narratives and analyses alternative to mainstream media outlets.

Most of the podcasts outlined above involve similar approaches, with episodes generally geared toward offering critical analysis and reactions to the contemporary news and events in sporting culture. Others, like Australian media and sport academic Brett Hutchins, have created podcasts to highlight the important work of scholars researching sport. Through his MediaSport Podcast Series, Hutchins has interviewed numerous scholars conducting cutting edge research on the “key social, cultural, economic and political issues” in sporting contexts. By relying on the interview format, MediaSport mirrors the New Books in Sports podcast of the New Books Network, as both promote and increase the accessibility of the latest research related to sport. Aaron Lakoff’s hockey-focused podcast Changing on the Fly takes a similar approach, interviewing scholars, activists and artists as each episode speaks to critical issues in Canadian hockey culture, such as racism and gender equity. MediaSport, Changing on the Fly and Burn It All Down demonstrate that scholars of sport are using the podcast to discuss important issues through a critical lens as well as promote the latest research on sports.

The overall growth of podcasting has also created opportunities for scholars to explore its range of uses. Consider popular storytelling podcasts like This American Life and Serial. These acclaimed podcasts draw on a literary tradition of radio storytelling stretching to the early 20th century, when modernist artists and journalists used the radio’s emerging popularity to broadcast avant-garde, cutting-edge programs. Additionally, in taking a different direction, Radiolab, under the lead production of Jad Abumrad, has experimented with a wide array of sound production techniques. The drama and emotional intensity of sporting experiences make them ideal topics for exploring storytelling, sound production, and a range of other elements unique to audio as a medium. This is partly why I have been collaborating with colleagues in developing a podcast series, called Somatic, for the expressed purpose of experimenting with the podcast as a mode for telling evocative stories concerning our bodies in motion through the production of rich sound experiences.

In short, there are a number of podcasts focused on critically analyzing sports news, history and culture. Sport scholars are also being impacted by the podcast boom and are increasingly engaging with the digital audio format in innovative ways. Combined with the increasing audience for podcasts like Burn It All Down, the future is bright for the critical sports podcast.

Oliver Rick is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sport and Recreation Management at Springfield College. This article was written in collaboration with Samuel M. Clevenger, who teaches sport history at Towson University. Their digital audio project can be found at somaticpodcast.com or you can connect with them on twitter @SomaticPodcast

With the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) season underway, one storyline that made waves this offseason was the controversial trade of Chiney Ogwumike to the Los Angeles Sparks. The trade re-united Chiney with her sister, Nneka, in one of the biggest media markets in the United States. Through their success in sport, the sisters have built their social profiles in different ways, with Nneka finding more success on the court (WNBA MVP and champion in 2016) and Chiney in media working for ESPN.

As successful athletes and burgeoning media personalities, the Ogwumikes present themselves as figures of sociological interest, primarily because they exist at the intersection of an increasingly diverse Black America as second generation Nigerian immigrants.

As Black America has continued to diversify since the passage of the 1965 Hart-Celler Immigration Act, larger populations of immigrants from Caribbean and African countries have complicated what it means to be “Black” in the U.S. Sociologists have observed that Black Americans with recent immigrant backgrounds face difficulties integrating into U.S. society. In the U.S., people often use the words “Black” and “African American” interchangeably. But this tendency frequently causes confusion, especially when we consider Blacks who immigrated to the U.S. since the beginning of the 20th Century compared to Blacks whose ethnic identities were shaped through the history of the slave trade. That is why it is important to make distinctions when talking about the experience of “being Black” in the U.S., because not all Black people are treated the same even if they still encounter systematic anti-black racism.

Another issue is that the idea of Black success in the U.S. is often tied to what U.S./Western norms and institutions define as success. So the very institutions that continue to perpetuate anti-Black ideas also define what success looks like, and, simultaneously, often work against the formation of anti-racist coalitions. An example of this problem would be how sport is engaged in the charitable/philanthropy-industrial complex, as it lends itself to overly-simplistic solutions to problems facing poor and marginalized peoples with the idea that sport “builds character”—as if it is a lack of character, or access to sport, that keeps poor people in poverty both in the U.S. and abroad.

Given the issues noted above, our research tries to better understand how the Ogwumikes fit into the changing demographics of Black America. In a recent study, we examined media coverage of the Ogwumikes from 2007 through 2017. In doing so, we considered not only how the Ogwumike sisters were portrayed, but also how their representations fit into the larger context of gender, race, and immigration in sport. Our findings indicate two prominent themes in media coverage of the Ogwumike sisters.

First, representations of the Ogwumikes as Black women are consistent with existing research on Black women in sport. Within these representations of Black women, what sociologists call gendered racism means that there are contradictions in how Black women are discussed compared to white women. For instance, although women’s sports are often devalued as “un-athletic” and not worthy of attention, Black women, including the Ogwumikes, are stereotypically portrayed in ways that explain their athleticism as “natural,” “aggressive,” and “imposing.” The contradiction that women are weak but Black women are physically strong and strike “fear” into their opponents tends to be the norm—Black women are seen and defined as un-feminine, or masculine, from the very start.

Second, the Ogwumikes are often portrayed as “model minorities” in the U.S. because they are second-generation Nigerian immigrants. In particular, White supremacy is maintained through the model minority stereotype because the “success” of some minority groups is coded as the result of adherence to social norms that include hard work, education, and, of course, ignoring issues of race and racism. In the case of the Ogwumikes, both sisters and their mother are quoted as saying the success of Nigerians is due to a “culture of hard work.” Considering that they are professional athletes and Stanford graduates, this seems like a reasonable statement. However, this explanation ignores the hard work that all immigrant groups do when they come to the U.S., regardless of educational or economic attainment. Moreover, while Nigerians, among other nationalities, are more highly educated than native-born white Americans, we must remember that U.S. immigration policy from 1965 has favored highly skilled/educated immigrants from developing countries. This policy means it is unlikely that poor and uneducated Nigerians would have the resources come to the U.S.

Ultimately, our research highlights some of the problems with how Black immigrants are portrayed in white media. Not only is it difficult for Black immigrants to escape stereotypes of blackness, but their immigrant status is also used to (re)marginalize native-born Blacks. By attributing the success of immigrants to their unique culture we simultaneously belittle those Black immigrants who do not succeed. White supremacy works to manipulate ideas of race in subtle and seemingly infinite ways—if we fail to be vigilant, it becomes too easy to buy into this ideology.

Munene Mwaniki is an assistant professor of sociology at Western Carolina University. He is the author of The Black Migrant Athlete: Media, Race, and the Diaspora in Sport (University of Nebraska Press, 2017). His work has appeared in the International Review for the Sociology of Sport, Communication & Sport, Journal of Sport and Social Issues, and various op-eds. His research broadly focuses on the intersections of race, immigration, and sport.

Manuel Zenquis is an independent scholar whose areas of concern are situated in culture, politics, and inequality. He has recently graduated from Harvard University with a master’s degree in religious studies.

The success of the United States (U.S.) Women’s National Team (WNT) has encouraged millions of young female soccer players. With television viewership records being shattered at the 2019 World Cup, these elite athletes may inspire today’s young players to pursue the next level of their game, with the hopes of earning a college scholarship, signing a professional contract, or maybe donning that coveted red, white and blue jersey. However, the opportunity to achieve those dreams remains beyond reach for many girls due to the expenses associated with youth sport.

In recent years, the cost of youth sports has skyrocketed. During this time, physical activity levels decreased among youth from low-income backgrounds, and soccer exemplifies this change. Through informal interviews with several parents and coaches in the Northeast, we learned that a town recreational league costs anywhere from $200-$500 per season, and there are usually at least three seasons per calendar year (spring, summer, fall). More competitive club teams, meanwhile, typically cost between $2000-$4000 per year. One Long Island, New York, club listed their yearly tuition for 11 and 12 years olds at $2,875, excluding uniform costs and players’ travel expenses. The most prestigious clubs come with an even higher price tag. No matter what the level, these fees do not cover the costs of family involvement (such as hotels during tournaments) and/or training gear, which can cost thousands. Needless to say, the costs of participating quickly accumulate. Even though many clubs offer scholarships and financial aid, many families still struggle to get their children to and from practices and games.

Examining the Socioeconomic Backgrounds of Elite Soccer Players

Given these parameters, we wondered if playing at soccer’s top level was correlated with women’s socioeconomic backgrounds. To answer this question, we examined the social class background of elite level female soccer players. While we don’t have personal data on each player, we followed other scholars who have used athletes’ hometowns to approximate players’ socioeconomic status. We first researched the WNT roster and recorded all players’ hometowns as the place where they were born or raised. For example, Christen Press was born in Los Angeles, California but her biography indicates that she raised in Palos Verdes Estates, therefore her hometown was recorded as Palos Verdes[i]. We then looked up each woman’s hometown median income using the American Community Survey’s five-year estimates, which were based on data collected between 2013-2017. Because cost of living varies by state, we also examined how the women’s hometown median income compared to the median of their home state. This was calculated with two separate measures—the difference between the hometown and the state income and a ratio between the hometown and the state[ii].

According to our research, the average hometown income of a WNT player was $84,456. This figure is significantly higher than the US median income of $57,642. Of the 23 women on the WNT, only seven were from hometowns that fell below the US median. That means 69 percent of the athletes come from places with incomes above the U.S. median. Though 10 women’s hometowns fell below their respective state medians, only three women came from places where their hometown income fell far below the state median.  Regardless of which measure we used, middle and upper class women are overrepresented on the USWNT.

The WNT consists of elite-level talent drawn from two major feeder systems—the U.S. Youth Development program and the U.S. college system. Therefore, we also examined the income distribution of players in those pipelines. Without extensive vetted biographies, we could not discern if individuals were born and raised in different places, so we used the hometown listed on their official biography.

We collected data from two college soccer conferences on the West Coast—The Pac-12 and the West Coast Conference. This sample contained 610 players. Ultimately, we were able to collect hometown income data for 560 U.S. born female players in these two conferences.  Using the same income measures, only 100 collegiate players (17.9%) came from hometowns below the U.S. median and only 86 women (15.4%) came from places where the hometown income was far below the state median. The average hometown income for a collegiate player was $80,373. We also collected data from the Youth National Team rosters. These data include all women and girls who were on the rosters in September 2018. Of the 148 women listed on the seven youth teams, we were able to determine the hometown for 142 players. Their average hometown income was $78,920. Only 34 players (23.9%) were from hometowns below the U.S. median, and 22 players (15.5%) came from places far below the median.

Why Socioeconomic Background Matters

Overall, these data show that women from low-income communities are underrepresented in elite soccer. Pay-to-play sports enable girls from wealthy families to have more sport opportunities at all levels while constraining the chances of girls from low-income families. Further, due to the intersection of race and social class, women of color are disproportionally left out of sporting opportunities. Though the percentage of non-white players has increased since 2015, women of color still make up just over 20% of the 2019 roster. Furthermore, the five women of color who are on the team are not from low-income hometowns.

During this year’s World Cup, the fight for equal pay and treatment at the elite level has captured headlines. The 2019 team, inspired by previous generations of players, is making important strides on that front. However, we also need more measures in place that ensure soccer in the U.S. is accessible, affordable, and inclusive for future generations. Moving away from a pay-to-play model for all youth sports can help increase physical activity levels among all children while also ensuring that talented young athletes have the opportunity to strive towards the elite level regardless of their families’ income.

Jen McGovern, PhD, is an assistant professor of sociology at Monmouth University. Her research centers around how race, ethnicity, and gender interact to influence experience and opportunities within sport, exercise, and physical fitness.

Esther Wellman is a senior political science major at Monmouth University and a member of the women’s soccer team.

Notes:

[i] Becky Sauerbrunn was born in St Louis, Missouri ($38,644) but went to high school in Ladue City, Missouri ($203,205).  Because these two places are quite different, we used the median income for St Louis County ($50,936) where both places are located.

[ii] Hometowns where households earned less than 90% of the state median were far below the state median. In the dataset, this ranged from between $25 and $6930 below the median. For example, Julie Ertz is from Mesa, Arizona. At $52,155, Mesa’s median income is below the national median, but on par with Arizona’s state median ($53,510). Julie would be classified as below the U.S. median, below the state median, but NOT as far below the state median.