In this chapter, we pay attention to girls’ social exclusion and perceived social problems, by examining how social inclusion is formed and managed through sports-based interventions in Sweden. The aim is to explore and analyse the conditions for girls’ participation in two sports-based interventions aiming for social inclusion, focusing on construction of norms concerning ways of being a participant (football) girl.

Absence from sport participation among girls from ethno-cultural minorities is often highlighted as an inclusion policy challenge. Based on 35 interviews with community sports coaches, managers and partners, we explore how the absence of girls is problematized in four Swedish sports-based interventions, focusing on how problems, as well as the means and the ends of social inclusion, are articulated. The girls are assessed as being in need of social change due to their alleged social exclusion. Absence is explained by "patriarchal norms" as well as by the introvert conduct of the girls themselves. Girls-only sports activities performed by female coaches as role models are described as a way for girls to gain social inclusion and to become emancipated from subjugating norms. In conclusion, participation in community sport is highlighted in discourse as crucial for adopting powers of emancipation. A similar discourse could be recognized elsewhere, inside and outside the realm of sport.

När historiskt inflytelserika samhällsinstitutioner som fackförbund, politiska partier och kyrkan tappat medlemmar de senaste decennierna har idrottsrörelsen stått sig stark. Identitet formas genom och påverkas av idrott då idrott fostrar, engagerar, styr och präglar och kan ses som viktiga påverkans- och lärandefaktorer i många människors liv. Inte minst för ungdomar är idrotten en central arena för identitetsskapande då idrott, av idrottande ungdomar själva, benämns som något betydelsefullt. Min forskning kretsar kring de sistnämnda – ungdomar inom idrott – och mer specifikt tonårstjejers identitetsskapande inom idrott. I min avhandling "Det är väl typiskt tjejer – om basket, kropp och femininitet" (2015) påvisar jag att tonårstjejers identitetsskapande inom idrott är tämligen negligerat. Såväl flickforskare som idrottsforskare (nationella och internationella) har uppvisat ett magert intresse för idrottande tonårstjejers identitetsskapande i allmänhet och ett ännu magrare intresse för i tonåriga baskettjejers identitetsskapande i synnerhet. Vidare, och mer tillspetsat, rör min avhandling sig kring hur tonåriga baskettjejer skapar och förhandlar genus och femininitet i sin idrottsliga vardag genom kroppsliga och verbala praktiker. Teoretiskt bidrar avhandlingen med en analys av hur genus och femininitet skapas i och mellan olika idrottsliga rum samt åskådliggör hur genus och femininitet transformeras och förskjuts (och därigenom förhandlas). Hur genus, femininitet och sexualitet hänger samman visar och diskuterar avhandlingen därtill genomgående. Vidare blottlägger jag den sprängkraft som diskurser om tjejer har för (basket)tjejer. Jag visar hur (basket)tjejers skapas inom diskurser som verkar i samhället samt hur de är aktiva medproducenter av diskurser om (basket)tjejer. (Basket)tjejers agens framhålls således samt hur baskettjejer måste förstås som mer än baskettjejer, de är tjejer som också rör sig utanför idrotten.

The aim of this dissertation is to analyse how a group of female basketball players – aged 15 to 18 and located in one of Sweden’s largest cities – construct and negotiate gender and femininity through bodily and verbal practices. The study is grounded in poststructuralist theories – primarily using the theoretical work of the philosophers Judith Butler and Michel Foucault. The methods used are qualitative: participant observations, interviews and written dialogues via Facebook. The writing method used is ethnographic fiction.

The first part of the analysis shows how the female basketball players frequently talk about appearance and also how they repeatedly talk about the fleshier matters of the body – such as muscles and fat. These recurrent verbal practices are parts of the processes through which the girls construct gender and femininity, and a way of exercising relational power. The girls themselves explain their frequent talk about body and appearance as something “typical” for girls and thus they use a discourse that circles them (as young women) in order to make themselves understandable.

The second part of the analysis depicts how the female basketball players – in the locker room – before every game construct similar and socially recognizable female bodies. These recurrent bodily practices are further parts of the processes through which the girls construct gender and femininity. Additionally, in the second part, the analysis show how the female basketball players – through verbal and bodily practices – transform gender and convert femininity within sport and also how they, in game situations, embody two different discourses: “Girl Power” and “the insecure (sporting) girl” that encompass young (sporting) women.

One conclusion in the thesis is that discourses that surround young (sporting) females appear to be central in their creation of gender identity. Furthermore, the (sporting) girls are active participants in the ongoing debate regarding what (sporting) girls are, can be and should be.

Research on women and sports tend to focus on structural issues such as how women in sports, throughout history and continuously, have been and are being discriminated, sexualized, objectified, trivialized, and perceived as lesbians, “butch” and so forth. When it comes to an individual level researchers often identify and explore women’s strategies and negotiations, in different times, contexts and sports and in relation to different racial, socio economical, sexual dimensions etcetera with issues exemplified above. But do we know anything about what is happening in the women’s locker rooms? Is this space unproblematic or just unproblematized?

In my thesis I would like to explore how women construct gender as well as sport identity – are these separate or intertwined? - in relation to other women in team sports with special attention given to a very enclosed space: the locker room. What are women athletes in women only spaces talking about and how are they acting? What is considered normal and respectively abnormal in a female sports team? Which kinds of femininities are constructed in women only spaces in sports? Which kinds of femininities are dominating and respectively subordinated in this type of space? 

Ethnographic method will be used to study one or two female sports teams. Theoretically I would like to try if Connell’s usage of hegemony theory (commonly used in critical studies on men and masculinities) is possible to apply, and perhaps even possible to develop, on women’s gender constructions in women only spaces. Could one identify “hegemonic femininities” and accordingly “complicit femininities” or maybe other types of femininities within a women only group? Or is Connell’s “emphasized femininity” - used in describing women’s gender identities in relation to men  - the ultimate concept regarding accepted femininity regardless if men are present or not?

Women and sports is a recurrent topic in the sport studies literature, and consequently in this journal’s review columns. Usually it’s about the classic women’s question, that is, the all too common discrimination against women in sport that has many facets, and most of them displaying the ugly mug of the patriarchy. But there are other problems, which are treated less often, and one is about female homosexuality in sport, heterosexism and homophobia. Nowadays this discussion comes up more often, also outside the gay sports community, but the issue remains extremely sensitive and for some of the sport’s stakeholders downright troublesome. There is a limited body of literature on this subject matter, which is why this editor secured a review copy of a 13 year old book from Human Kinetics, Strong Women, Deep Closet: Lesbians and Homophobia in Sport by the American educator and currently Professor Emerita Pat Griffin, School of Education, University of Massachusetts @ Amherst. Griffin’s own sporting career includes several years as an active college athlete in basketball and field hockey, and then as a coach in these sports as well as in swimming. She won a bronze medal in the triathlon at Gay Games IV and a gold medal in the hammer throw at Gay Games V in 1998, the year her book was published. Julia Rönnbäck has read Griffin’s book, and appreciates the personal tone and the rich empirical data, which more than compensates for the lack of theoretical depth.

Projektet ”Mångkontextuell barndom” genomfördes under perioden 2006–2011 och studerade de stora förändringar som skett vad gäller barnens villkor och barndomens innehåll. Syftet har varit att öka kunskapen och förståelsen för samtidens barndom och dess olika sociala rum, skolan, familjen, fritiden och idrotten, och deras roll och betydelse i denna. Ett av de många forskningsinslagen var en studie av rastfotboll på några skolor i Skåne, vilken resulterade i en av många skriftliga rapporter från projektet, som letts av Ingegerd Tallberg-Broman. Klungan och barndomens sociala rum: Socialt gränsarbete och figurationer i rastfotbollen av Kalle Jonasson (Malmö högskola) lades fram som en licentiatuppsats den 19 maj 2009. Rastfotboll är ett av många uttryck för spontanidrott, om än ett speciellt uttryck eftersom den utförs under skoltid och därmed är underordnad skoldagens indelning i lektionstid och avkopplande raster, vilket begränsar spontaniteten en del. Att det inte är den enda disciplineringen i sammanhanget framgår tydligt av Jonassons uppsats, som mer än väl motsvarar högt ställda krav på bred teoretisk kunskapsbas – så till den grad, faktiskt, att Julia Rönnbäck i sin recension av boken efterlyser en bättre balans mellan empiri och teori. Detta är emellertid bara en aspekt av uppsatsen, och av recensionen av den. Och Rönnbäcks välskrivna och upplysande recension täcker in om inte alla de andra aspekterna, så i alla händelser alla de viktigaste.