Journalism
Copyright © The Author(s), 2009.
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Vol. 10(5): 627–646 DOI: 10.1177/1464884909106536
ARTICLE
Token responses to gendered newsrooms
Factors in the career-related decisions of female newspaper
sports journalists
Marie Hardin and Erin Whiteside
Penn State University, USA
ABSTRACT
Female sports journalists work as tokens in gendered organizations where masculinity
is integral to hierarchical logic and newswork processes. Through in-depth interviews,
this longitudinal study explores how women in the industry manage their gendered
and professional identities and make career decisions. Our findings suggest that
although participants framed their decisions to stay or to leave in idealized terms,
their choices were also guided by cultural and structural impediments acknowledged
but accepted as natural and immutable. The women noted negative gender-related
experiences, but most minimized them and saw their gender as an advantage. They
also described their struggles to balance their work and social lives, the latter of which
they saw as a necessary sacrifice to become ideal workers. We discuss these issues
and suggest that sports media will fail to reach gender parity until these barriers are
addressed; until then, the revolving door will keep turning.
K E Y W O R D S gendered organizations social identity sports journalism
tokenism women
When US newspapers and websites affiliated with Associated Press Sports
Editors (APSE) were surveyed about newsroom diversity during 2008, the
results were so dismal that researchers gave APSE members an ‘F’ for their
gender hiring practices (Lapchick et al., 2008). In a news release, the lack
of women in sports departments was blamed on the faltering US newspaper
industry. John Cherwa, sports coordinator for a group of major metropolitan
dailies, said:
Newspapers across all regions and circulation sizes have been downsizing at
accelerated rates... There are fewer hiring opportunities than there used to be. For
example, if you look at the figures for ESPN.com and its columnists, you’ll see great
numbers. … where did those columnists come from? Newspapers.
Journalism 10(5)628
Blaming online media and chaos in the newspaper industry for the paltry
number of women in sports departments is as flimsy as newsprint itself.
Women have historically been under-represented in sports journalism, and
the 2008 survey results do not differ from previous research (Etling, 2002;
Hardin and Whiteside, 2006; Lapchick et al., 2006). The most recent study
reflects an enduring industry trend: women in sports departments work in
token status, where they constitute a fraction of sports editors (6%) and
reporters (10%). These numbers represent a decline from even two years
ago (Hardin and Whiteside, 2006; Lapchick et al., 2006, 2008) and compare
unfavorably to the distribution of jobs in the general newsroom, where women
make up 35 percent of supervisors and 39 percent of writers (American Society
of News Editors, 2008). Hardin et al. (2008: 68) likened sports journalism to
a ‘revolving door’ for women – as some enter, many leave, stagnating movement
toward equity. The important question then becomes why women leave
the profession, and even as many report high job satisfaction (Hardin and
Shain, 2006).
In pursuit of an answer to the ‘why’ question, this research explores the
intersection between gender and newswork in the (short) careers of 10
women in sports journalism. Through in-depth interviews with participants
over several years, we interrogated their experiences and their rationales for
working in the industry or, as half did, leaving it. Our findings suggest that
although participants framed their decisions to stay or to leave in idealized
terms, their choices were also guided by cultural and structural impediments
acknowledged but accepted as natural and immutable. We suggest that
sports media operations will fail to reach gender parity until these barriers are
addressed; until then, the revolving door will keep turning.
The journalism workplace
Organizational scholars argue that cultural norms contribute to the construction
of an ideal worker, whose dedication to industry values maximizes
the organization’s goals (Williams, 2000). In journalism, the ideal worker
is objective, practices value-free and dispassionate journalism and is always
available (Robinson, 2005: 102). In theory, such dedication requires the negation
of external demands, especially familial responsibilities (Acker, 1990).
Acker’s (1990) theory of gendered organizations is a useful lens for viewing
newsrooms. She argues that individuals do not bring gender to organizations,
but that gender is integral to organizational processes. An organization
is ‘gendered’ through the division of labor along gender lines, the construction
of symbols that explain, reinforce or contest those divisions and the
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 629
interactions between individuals that enact dominance and submission.
These processes position gender as the underlying framework for the logic
and hierarchy of organizations. The division of beat assignments (men on
sports and politics; women on features) and work policies that privilege
individuals without primary childcare responsibilities (generally, men) are
two examples.
Women and journalism
Feminist scholars have noted that the prevailing newsroom culture logically
leads to lower retention rates among women (Chambers et al., 2004; Robinson,
2005). It is overly simplistic, however, to view women as passive victims.
Nicholson (2007), for example, suggests viewing female journalists as ‘career
confident’ and ‘career conflicted’ to better understand their career paths.
In that study, those categorized as ‘confident’ indicated they were satisfied
with their careers, a sentiment expressed by many female journalists in interviews
(Joseph, 2004; Robinson, 2005; Van Zoonen, 1998). ‘Career conflicted’
women expressed doubt about advancement because of sexism and felt less
support from supervisors (Nicholson, 2007). Studies have also documented
women’s perceptions of sexism in newsrooms, including discrimination in
hiring and promotion and the ‘oppressive pressure of constantly having to
prove themselves’ (Joseph, 2004: 171; see also Chambers et al., 2004; Hardin
and Shain, 2006). Other studies have focused on the ‘motherhood penalty’,
‘glass ceiling’ and ‘leaky pipeline’ as illustrative of organizational structures
impeding the careers of workers who must focus some energy in the domestic
sphere (Media Report to Women, 2002a, 2002b; Peters, 2001; Vavrus, 2007;
Willard, 2007; Williams et al., 2006).
The conflict experienced by many women manifests in a low retention
rate and a female workforce that is disproportionately younger than its male
counterpart. Because younger workers are more likely than older workers to
leave their jobs (Cohen, 1999), women as a group end up treading water,
unable to make major headway.
Neo-liberalism and the rationale of ‘choice’
The exodus of women from newswork and other professions has been
framed as a personal lifestyle choice unrelated to institutional norms; women
leave in response to their natural urge to pursue domestic roles as they feel
an ‘internal, biological “pull” rather than a workplace “push”’ (Williams et al.,
2006: 5; see also Harvey, 2005; Vavrus, 2007). This reasoning ignores the
dynamics of the gendered workplace and instead embraces neoliberalism,
Journalism 10(5)630
a ‘common-sense’ worldview focusing on individualism and oblivious to
institutional reinforcement of political and socio-economic hierarchies
(Vavrus, 2007). Neoliberalism implies the disappearance of mutual obligation
between institutions and individuals and instead emphasizes the individual’s
welfare as independent of institutional structures (Beck and BeckGernsheim,
2002). Thus, ‘choices’ such as accepting or leaving employment
and starting or delaying families are also seen independently from their
institutional context (Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, 2002). Questioning institutions
and their inherent processes, routines and hierarchies, then, is muted,
as they are accepted as natural (Davies et al., 2005). The practical result in the
journalism workplace is that the:
… dramatic failure of high-hours, high-pressure workplaces (such as newspapers)
to retain and promote proportionate numbers of women [are depicted as]
nobody’s fault; in fact, it’s inevitable given that the ‘brains of men and women
light up differently’ … nothing needs to change. (Williams et al., 2006: 9)
Managing social identity
Social identity theory suggests that individuals use multiple identities (e.g.
woman, mother, reporter, sister, and athlete can all be claimed by the same
person) to define themselves. These identities are ‘descriptive, prescriptive,
and evaluative’ (De Bruin, 2004: 4) and hierarchical in a way that is situationdependent
(Joseph, 2004).
De Bruin (2004) positions gender as perhaps the most complex social
identity; it involves everyday assumptions about orientations in thinking,
feeling and behaving attached to the social categories that have been assigned
to sex categories. Gender identity shapes and maintains work structures,
and, as Acker (1990) argues, vice versa. De Bruin noted, after a series of interviews
with male and female journalists, the ways women minimized their
feminine identities to fit in with men and advance their careers; she concluded
that ‘(over)identification with a traditional male work ethos and
professional values …seemed to be instrumental in avoiding gender tensions
and polarization’ (2004: 13).
In this way, women may be compelled to share in (male) rituals, such as
sports talk, although these rituals often have little to do with an ability to do
the job (Helgesen, 2003). Ascribing to established rituals, however, may be
less about fitting in and more about adjusting to male-established rules and
norms (Van Zoonen, 1998).
Robinson, however, suggests most female newsroom professionals do
not opt out or become one of the boys, but rather ‘use their gender strategically
in certain circumstances’ (2005: 187). For instance, they may use an
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 631
assumption about their lack of expertise to spend more time with key sources
or use their interpersonal skills (e.g. ‘flirting’) to secure invitations to important
social events (Hardin et al., 2008).
Many female journalists see their gender as an advantage in doing
newswork (Chambers et al., 2004; Frohlich, 2004; Hardin and Shain, 2006;
Hardin et al., 2008; Van Zoonen, 1998). A 2000 survey found that many women
believe they bring a ‘more human perspective’ to news (Chambers et al.,
2004: 103), a sentiment also echoed in qualitative interviews (Hardin and
Shain, 2006).
It is important to note, however, that although female journalists may
see their gendered identities as strategically advantageous, they also articulate
attitudes and views on surveys that are similar to those of men. Chambers
et al. (2004: 105) speculate that it is ‘perhaps in part because women must
adopt male-dominated newsroom values and practices in order to be regarded
in the profession’.
Women in sports journalism: the theory of tokenism
Although women have not reached parity in US newsrooms, they have
moved beyond token status. Scholars suggest that members of a minority
group have token status when they compose less than 15 percent of the
workforce (Kanter, 1977). Eclipsing this number creates a ‘critical mass’, where
they may be more likely to create change benefiting them directly (Grey,
2002; Saint-Germain, 1989; Thomas, 1991, 1994). Women who work in sports
departments can be understood as tokens because they fail to meet the 15
percent threshold.
The work of Kanter (1993, 2003) and others on tokenism is useful for
understanding women in sports journalism. Tokens are seen as symbols of a
category, and judged as such, rather than as individuals (Riordan et al., 2005).
Tokens have a higher turnover rate than majority groups; it is likely that they
leave a workplace because of their scarcity and its attendant problems rather
than the social group in which they are identified (women, racial minorities,
gays and lesbians, for example) (Kanter, 2003). Studies of workplace tokens,
such as male flight attendants or non-white corporate leaders, have found
that they exhibit lower organizational attachment, higher levels of anxiety,
increased role ambiguity and increased perception that they are a poor fit for
their responsibilities (Riordan et al., 2005).
Because they are highly visible within their organizations, tokens are
under intense levels of performance pressure. Their response to such visibility
may be to: 1) over-achieve to minimize organizational and peer concerns
Journalism 10(5)632
(‘prove themselves’); 2) work to turn their increased visibility to their distinct
career advantage; or to 3) seek to assimilate with the goal of becoming socially
invisible (Kanter, 2003).
Kanter (2003) warns that choosing to overachieve to avoid lack of respect
requires a great deal of job-related competence and political sensitivity, which
could take years to acquire; her 1993 research on young corporate women
found that they had great difficulty at work because of their lack of skills
and political staying power. Those women who capitalized on their visibility
saw other women as threatening their ‘special’ status, but they were also
less likely to be cognizant of the risks associated with their minority status.
The third strategy, aiming for invisibility, involves efforts by women to
minimize their sexual attributes and blend ‘unnoticeably into the predominant
male culture’ (2003: 41). Tokens may find themselves conforming to
the group rather than challenging group norms or expectations (Riordan
et al., 2005).
Research on women in sports journalism
As sports are ‘home to one of the most intense and most historically enduring
gender divisions in journalism’ (Chambers et al., 2004), it is no surprise that
female sports journalists reflect the sentiments of tokens. The struggle to
‘prove themselves’ has been a constant theme for women in sports (Hardin
and Shain, 2005, 2006; Hardin et al., 2008). Others have minimized their
gender by emphasizing their occupational identities as primary. In Hardin
et al.’s study (2008: 72) one woman said she aimed to have the men she
worked with believe, ‘She’s just like us.’ Some saw their gender identities
as holding privileges that could advantage them unfairly.
Tokens have little leverage in the workplace and are more likely to be
subject to harassment and discrimination, two issues that have historically
plagued women in sports journalism (Chambers et al., 2004). Female sportswriters
started the Association for Women in Sports Media (AWSM) in 1987
to address these issues, but recent research suggests female sportswriters may
resist the idea that they face a disadvantage at work (Miloch et al., 2005).
Some women, especially younger ones, believe gender is not an issue in the
workplace and express reluctance to advocate women’s issues (Hardin and
Shain, 2006; Staurosky and DiManno, 2002). Jane Chastain, one of the first
female sports broadcasters in the USA, for instance, recounted a case of
harassment early in her career but denied discrimination as an issue. ‘In your
career, you don’t complain,’ she told an interviewer. ‘You do what you have
to do to get to your goal’ (Kammer, 1994).
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 633
Their reluctance to see the workplace as gendered and their willingness
to take an individualist view seem to reinforce Hall’s (1996) characterization
of women in sports journalism as generally resistant to the politicization of
their gendered status; they instead take a ‘commonsense’ view of their gendered
identity as private and manageable in relationship to their profession. In
light of the theory of tokenism, this view and its accompanying behavior
are also understood as part of a career-survival strategy in an overwhelmingly
masculine workplace.
This research
Female sports journalists work as tokens in gendered organizations, where
masculinity is integral to hierarchical logic and processes. We sought to explore
how these journalists manage their gendered identities and their professional
identities and how they make decisions about their career paths. We did
so by following the careers of women new to the profession over a span of
three years and interviewing them once a year to assess their experiences and
attitudes toward their work in sports journalism.
Participants
The lead researcher recruited 10 women beginning their careers in sports
journalism in 2005, using contacts in the AWSM to meet women who had
begun their careers as reporters or copy editors less than two years previously.
The women represented small, mid-sized and large dailies; the reporters
covered beats ranging from prep sports to prominent university and professional
teams. Some worked as the only woman in their department; others
had a female colleague or two, but also had a work situation that kept seeing
that colleague from being routine.
Only one of the women was married, and none had children. Most were
not in committed relationships, but several developed such relationships
in the course of the project. Most were 26 years old in the summer of 2008,
when the latest round of interviews took place. All of the participants identified
as Caucasian except one, who identified as Asian. Pseudonyms are used in
the findings to protect confidentiality promised in the interviews.
By the third round of interviews, in 2007, five of the 10 women had left
sports journalism; four of the five who left had also left full-time newsroom
work (one woman began working as a features reporter). All, however, agreed
to continue with the interview process.
Journalism 10(5)634
Interviewing procedure
During recruitment, the women agreed to be interviewed in one-year increments
for five years, following their first year on the job; most have completed
their fourth-year interview. One of us, a researcher with formal training and
extensive experience in interviewing, conducted all of the interviews, which
have lasted about an hour (Acker et al., 1991). The interviews were done in
person if logistically feasible; for instance, the researcher interviewed some
participants when they attended annual AWSM meetings. The researcher
conducted the tape-recorded interviews using a ‘semi-structured’ format
that included several main questions that were asked in each session (Rubin
and Rubin, 2005: 135). The lead researcher began the interviews by asking
the participant to describe her current work responsibilities. Other specific
questions asked in all the interviews included: ‘What would make your work
experience better?’; ‘Can you describe your long-term career goals?’; ‘What
are you most proud of in your career?’; and ‘Would you recommend this
profession to other women?’ Although the researcher began with a list of
main questions, follow-up questions were unique to each individual based
on response (Potter, 1999). As the years went by and the participants’ career
paths diverged, interviews with former sports journalists varied from those
who were still working in the business. After completing each interview, the
women were paid $25 as a token of appreciation for their time.
Analysis
The recordings were transcribed and then sent to the participants to review
and make changes, although none did. We analyzed the transcripts using
Braune and Clarke’s (2006) model of a theoretical thematic analysis, which
provides a rich analysis pertaining to a specific aspect of the data, in this case
how newswork relates to tenure and experience. This widely used analysis
allowed for the identification and analysis of patterns in the transcribed
conversations.
We independently analyzed the transcripts and then met to discuss our
interpretations in order to address and improve the trustworthiness of the
findings (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). While the names we chose for our themes
were not always identical, many of our ideas converged. We discussed any
differing interpretations and mutually agreed on the final analysis.
While the ultimate goal of using more than one investigator in the
qualitative analysis of data is not and should not be replicability, discussion
related to the analysis contributes to its credibility (Lincoln and Guba, 1985).
Further, as feminist researchers, we embrace ‘the tendency of feminists to
reflect upon, examine critically, and explore analytically the nature of the
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 635
research process’ in establishing trustworthiness (Fonow and Cook, 1991: 2).
We assessed our own analysis through deliberate focus on our theoretical
lens and through conversations about how our own social identities might
influence our understanding of the women we studied.
Findings: managing expectations and identities
In our analysis, we noted themes common to the work experience and identity
management of all participants. For instance, nearly all noted negative
experiences in which gender played a key role, but most minimized these
experiences and saw their gender as a strategic advantage. All noted their
struggles to ‘prove themselves’ and to balance their work and their social
lives, which they felt had been a (necessary) sacrifice to become ideal sports
journalists. Most also weighed the chaos in the newspaper industry as they
considered their options. We discuss these issues in depth, contrasting the
perceptions of women who have stayed in the industry with those who
decided to leave.
Incorporating the ideal-worker standard
In general, the women accepted the ideal worker norm as part of the sacrifice
of being in sports journalism. Sandra, who had worked as a preps writer at
a small paper before moving to the same job at a much larger paper, said
working 70-hour weeks to cover the 47 high schools in her beat was necessary
for her to keep up with the competition from nearby papers.
Lisa, who had risen in three years from preps reporter to NFL beat writer
for a major paper, also said much of the reason she put in the long hours
was not because she actually had work to do, but because she was afraid of
the work her competition might be doing. She called it the ‘fear factor’. She
did not take days off, she said, because she knew other writers on her beat
were not. She had also moved twice for her job, breaking up with a boyfriend
when she moved; she said she saw no other option.
Lisa and the other participants discussed the toll the grueling schedules
took on their social lives. For some participants, hosting friends for lunch
on a holiday before heading out to work the night shift or figuring out a
way to attend church each week were small victories. Some participants,
most often the reporters, found that they ended up socializing with other
reporters because of the similarities in their schedules. Nancy, who worked
as a reporter and fill-in editor at a small, rural daily paper (and who left after
only about two years), said:
Journalism 10(5)636
It’s almost impossible to date in this job, I have found. Nobody understands.
Unless you are in the business nobody understands why you have to go to softball
practice at night. ‘Can’t you just do it later?’ No, I have to go talk to the coach,
and it’s hard to explain to friends and family why your schedule is the way it is.
Incompatible demands and goals Although most saw the hours and schedule
as a roadblock to satisfaction of personal goals, the women who left often cited
the demanding work hours as a main reason for their departure. Ultimately,
they saw sports journalism as preventing them from pursuing the family they
anticipated when they became involved in a serious relationship. Karen, a
reporter for a mid-sized paper, said about the prospects of balancing a career
in sports and a family: ‘I know people do it, but I just – at least the way I was
going, it just didn’t seem like it was gonna really work.’
Shannon, the only married participant, could envision a family after she
moved from being a sports copy editor at a large paper to features writer at a
small daily:
Now that we’re both 9-to-5 schedules, I can definitely see us having kids in the
next couple of years. We didn’t want to have them before … And, you know, as
far as the kid thing goes, working at night, a lot of times the people I worked with
who had kids, it was horrible. They would have to call at 9 p.m. and say goodnight
to them, and like, you know, then they really didn’t get to see them. I didn’t
want that at all.
Positioning themselves as ideal workers Those who stayed persisted in viewing
the hours as a necessary sacrifice to attain career success. They rationalized
their decision to stay in sports journalism by seeing themselves as taking
advantage of job opportunities because they could: They were young, single,
ambitious and without attachments. Sandra, for instance, complained about
her beat (covering 47 schools), but then said:
The competition has four people. I’m one. So it’s a little intense, so it would make
my job a lot happier if we could get someone else in to share the responsibilities,
but at the same time, like, I kind of like having everything to do myself
because I get all the best stories. I get all the best games.
Mary, a college beat writer at a mid-sized paper with a boyfriend who was
also a sportswriter, said: ‘I think it would be hard to be working weekends all
the time when that’s maybe all the time you have with your kids, but I guess,
again, that’s something I’m not really going to do anytime soon.’
The others, two beat writers at large papers and a copy editor at a small
paper in the town where she attended college, positioned the hours as serving
their career goals and allowing them to stay competitive. Lisa, the NFL writer,
said she appreciated friends who understood her need to send a web feed from
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 637
her Blackberry during dinner; she also speculated that when she did date,
she needed to date another journalist who understood her lifestyle.
The role of romantic relationships as a potential disruption to a sports
journalism career, however, was a possibility. Sandra, the preps writer who
often worked 70-hour weeks and who described herself as an ‘obsessive personality’
in relationship to her work, had aspired to rising to a college beat.
She reported in her fourth interview, however, that she had started a serious
relationship. Her boyfriend, a college coach, had just moved out of state,
she said, and she intended to follow him even if it meant giving up sports
journalism. ‘It’s a really scary point,’ she said. ‘I want to hang on to my career,
but I want to hang on to him, too.’
Managing a gendered identity in the workplace
Participants talked about their work and their work-related relationships
in ways that underscored the complexity of their efforts to manage their
gendered identities. They sought both to minimize their gendered identity
and to use it to strategic advantage.
Minimizing gender identity Most participants were acutely aware that their
status as women meant potential for peril in the way co-workers, supervisors,
sources and readers perceived them. One perception was that they were
unqualified to work in sports. ‘If you ask a dumb question, you don’t know
what you are talking about,’ said Janet, the NBA writer. ‘If a guy asks the
same question, it’s just a dumb question.’ Several participants were perhaps
most sensitive about perceptions by co-workers that they were not hired on
ability and, thus, were not qualified to hold the job. Several hinted that they
felt as though they had been hired because they were women, and they felt
guilty about it.
Generally, the strategy these women used was to minimize their gendered
identities in two ways: by ‘proving themselves’ through overachieving, and
by becoming ‘one of the boys’ through exhibiting toughness and expressing
a preference for working with men. Comments like the following from Jane,
a copy editor who eventually left, were common, especially in the first- and
second-year interviews: ‘I felt right away that I needed to prove myself because
I wanted them to respect me as their equal and as someone who had equal
sports knowledge as them.’
The two women with the most prominent professional-beat jobs talked
less in terms of ‘proving themselves’ and more in terms of making sure they
were not ‘pushed around’ by sources. ‘You always wonder if people are taking
you seriously,’ said Janet. ‘You have to be careful not to let other people
Journalism 10(5)638
dominate.’ Jane, who sometimes supervised her copy desk, struggled for
credibility with the men she supervised and encountered hostility:
Most of the men who work for the preps section are middle-aged men who’ve
never had to work for a woman before and they have a problem with that. I was
called a bitch – which I do not, I don’t think any woman likes to be called that,
but – to have people say it when you’re right there, it’s not good … There are other
jobs where I won’t have to deal with it as much.
The need to prove themselves and to keep from being pushed around
on the job was, in the minds of most participants, connected to the need
to show themselves as tough and ‘thick-skinned’, as more than one woman
characterized it. Lisa wondered during her second-year interview, when she
was still a preps writer:
… do I have that, whatever that chip is that journalists need that are able to
be ruthless and … I don’t think anybody ever wants to be ruthless and destroy
people’s lives … Sometimes I wonder do I have that thing in me.
Janet, the other professional-beat writer, also struggled with the expectation
to be aggressive. She announced in her latest (fourth) interview that
she was considering leaving the industry, and much of the reason, she said,
is that she did not see herself as ‘totally cut out’ for it. She said part of the
reason for her dissatisfaction was that ‘you’re intruding on people. No matter
what, I can’t get over that. I don’t know if that’s being a female …I don’t think
anyone else feels bad doing that.’
The need for a thick skin, however, was also perceived as necessary to
deal with colleagues. Participants did not condemn the sports-department
culture, one where ‘boys will be boys’ was used to rationalize sexist behavior,
but instead discussed their ways of dealing with it. The thick skin was an
asset; ‘we are fighters’, one woman proclaimed as a defining characteristic
of women in sports journalism. Participants who did not think their skin
was thick enough doubted their ‘fit’ in the newsroom. After her second year,
Nancy noted, ‘I take everything personally, and that’s one reason I kind of
thought, you know, maybe I’m not cut out for this.’
Handling the ‘boys-being-boys’ environment was seen as an effective
way to assimilate. For instance, Jane said that being ‘sensitive’ when men
are condescending or sexist was ineffective. ‘I’m a big girl. I can handle it,’
she said. After Jane left her job for a PR position, however, she reflected on
the harassment she had received as a desk supervisor, and decided that perhaps
the tough guise was ultimately not the best strategy:
Some of the stuff that’s happened to me, no one even knew about it. I mean, I
didn’t tell anyone because I don’t want to be a tattletale or immature or anything –
but if they want to keep women around, don’t let some of this stuff happen.
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 639
Most participants, however, were generally not concerned with ways to
‘keep women around’. Most said they enjoyed working in an environment
dominated by men and even preferred it to working with women. Lisa jokingly
referred to the television sitcom ‘My Boys’, based on a female sportswriter
whose best friends are almost all men, as typifying her life. Comments like the
following from Karen were also common:
I’m pretty much left to just hanging out with guys. I mean, for the most part
I’m used to it so it’s not that big of a deal. I’ve always been able to handle myself
around guys because I’m very much a smart aleck and very sarcastic, which is
how 90 percent of guys are.
A few participants viewed other women with suspicion or competition.
Lisa, the NFL writer, said she tended to see other women as competition because
‘you know they’re gonna interview one woman if there’s a job open, and you
feel like, okay … this is our competition, right here.’
Strategically using gender On the other hand, almost all participants talked
at length about the ways their feminine identities could help them on the
job and be an advantage. Copy editors said they use their identity as women
to ask reporters for clarification on a story without hostility, positioning
assumptions about their lack of sports knowledge to their advantage.
Reporters saw the potential to establish an identity. Janet, the NBA writer,
said, ‘I’m the only female, and everyone else is a 60-year-old male, so you
probably have a better chance of standing out and having people remember
you.’ Elizabeth, who worked a prominent college beat, said she did not flirt or
dress provocatively, but:
… if you’re a 21–22 year old college football player, would you rather talk to
me or would you rather talk to a scruffy 45-year-old kind of obnoxious guy who
is every other writer on the beat?
Elizabeth also came to believe that the advantages she had with sources
made up for discrimination she might encounter. She told a story about an
assignment during her first year on the job to survey major league baseball
players during spring training. One day, she brought a male intern with her:
‘He noticed it was much easier for me – these guys gave me the time of day,
and they wouldn’t give it to him,’ she said.
Gendered identity and career-altering decisions Overall, there was little difference
in the gender-management strategies of women who changed careers
and those who still work in sports journalism. All, to one degree or another,
were concerned with fitting in, proving themselves and exhibiting a certain
toughness.
Journalism 10(5)640
Instead, it seemed to be the experiences of participants and their sense
of control over their careers that drove their decisions. For instance, Jane
and Karen, who both reported experiencing discrimination or harassment on
the job, left. Those who stayed, including Lisa, Mary, Vicky and Janet, reported
that they could not recall being treated in a way they would characterize as
discriminatory. Instead, they tended to see their work through the lens of their
professional identities, which minimized their identification with (female)
gender, and had enough positive experiences to make that identity salient.
Although they viewed their futures cautiously, they were confident about
their abilities and expressed a sense of accomplishment about their achievements.
This was in contrast with most of the women who left; rather than
seeing themselves in control of their own careers, those women felt no sense of
accomplishment and saw themselves as lacking power to achieve professional
goals. Again, this was grounded in their experience.
Ultimately, that lack of control may be enough to give women that final
push out. Karen, who landed a job at a mid-sized paper right out of college
noted throughout her first-year interview the bad schedule, low support and
sexist comments she heard on a regular basis; by her second year she had left
her job saying she felt ‘underappreciated’, finally noting:
I didn’t leave sports journalism because I wasn’t good at it. You know, I had a
pretty decent job and I was close enough to getting better jobs that I knew I could
have moved up in the business. I just decided that I didn’t want to.
Uncertainty in the industry
A concern heard only sporadically in initial interviews but which dominated
later discussions with some participants was that of the uncertainty in the US
newspaper industry. None of the women were laid off from their jobs or even
felt a threat of being released, but all – even those who continued in their
careers – said the situation had given them pause for thought. Several who left
pointed directly to the industry as a reason they left.
Janet’s story was illustrative of how these issues became more prominent
for each woman. In her first-year interview, she recognized the challenges
faced by newspapers but did not see them affecting her personally.
By the end of her third year, she talked at length about how industry trends
had directly impacted her job. When asked to ‘bring me up to speed’ by the
interviewer at the beginning of the conversation, Janet noted that consolidation
had decreased the reporter pool for her beat. She missed working with
one writer specifically, a fellow minority who she felt like she ‘clicked’ with;
later she said:
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 641
You’re doing more work now than you were before for the same amount of pay,
vacation and everything else. Probably in a lot of ways it’s less rewarding because
of all the media that’s out there – the Internet and everything else. It’s not like
[you have] the exclusivity or whatever over your beat in the same way.
Several of the participants who had left directly attributed the struggling
newspaper industry as a primary reason for their departure. They could not
envision their own future in an industry that they saw as unstable. Jane
explained:
I just didn’t feel like I was ever gonna make any money because, to get a position
where you’re gonna make money, you have to be an editor, and to be an editor,
you’ve gotta stick it out and put in your time. And the way that papers were
going, it was really discouraging.
The women who stayed, however, saw themselves as being able to survive
and felt they were insulated from layoffs. They were also relatively
optimistic about their ability to adapt to the demands of new media. Two
women also saw potential for advancement in the chaos. Lisa and Sandra, for
instance, both saw the fact that they were younger, less experienced employees
as making them more attractive: they demanded a lower salary than their
older, male counterparts. They wondered however, if their feminine identities
would be strategically advantageous with employers, as they assumed that
hard times in the newspaper business would diminish newsroom diversity
initiatives. They shared the same outlook as Elizabeth, who predicted when
she left that it would become harder for women to grab the small number of
available jobs. ‘Gender issues are inseparable from the state of the industry
right now,’ she said. ‘How is anyone going to solve hiring issues when no one
is hiring right now?’
Discussion: token responses to a masculine culture
Our efforts to make sense of how these women managed their identities and
career decisions were informed by our understanding of their roles as tokens
in gendered (masculine) newsrooms. All of the participants enthusiastically
entered sports journalism careers, and all reported that the actual work was
satisfying. What was not satisfying, within four years, were their careers. Five
of the 10 women had left by year four, and two more (Sandra and Janet)
expressed serious reservations about whether they would stay much longer.
The number of ‘career-conflicted’ women far outweighed, within a short span
of time, those who were ‘career-confident’.
Journalism 10(5)642
Our understanding of the sports department as gendered allows us to
understand the role of masculinity in the standards, norms and expectations
of the women we interviewed. The structure, as Acker (1990) explains, privileges
an ideal (male) worker that is unencumbered by domestic pursuits. ‘Total
availability’, then, is the standard. It is understandable why participants felt
they had no choice but to work long hours, even when they did not have
unfinished tasks. Pursuing this ideal, however, collided with their pursuit of
social relationships and their vision of the possible family lives. It is interesting
to us that it was not the reality of these family responsibilities and
goals – none of the women we interviewed had children – but the anticipation
of such that distressed some women. The sports-journalism career demanded
almost total devotion, and even a romantic relationship (sans children) was
reason enough to pause and ask whether the career was still viable.
Our understanding of the gendered workplace also allowed us to fully
appreciate the gender-management strategies of the women we interviewed.
The women spent a great deal of time and energy in managing their gendered
and professional identities, seeking the sliver of common ground between the
two. Becoming ‘one of the boys’, a strategy Van Zoonen (1998) and others have
observed among women who do not cover sports, was especially salient with
these women, probably because of the enduring rigidity of male privilege
in sports. As they pursued the thick-skinned toughness and socialization
associated with masculinity to varying degrees, they also had to use their
gendered identity when it could expedite a professional goal (such as getting
an interview with a young, male athlete). It seems that the constant juggling
of their feminine identity and professional (masculine-pursuant) identity
could be exhausting, although none of the participants acknowledged such.
Theory of tokenism
Our understanding of tokenism, informed by that of the gendered workplace,
allows us to better understand the ways our participants responded
to their newswork environment. As tokens, the women we interviewed feel
extraordinarily ‘oppressive pressure’ (Joseph, 2004: 171) to prove themselves
because of their visibility – they cannot escape scrutiny. Their decisions
about conformity to the ideal-worker norm and to the masculine culture, for
instance, are even greater than for women in other parts of the newsroom.
Kanter (1993, 2003) suggests that tokens often overachieve in an effort
to prove they deserve the job and/or work to turn their visibility to advantage.
Most of the participants, perhaps also because these were their first jobs,
expressed concern about proving themselves. Those who stayed focused less
on that pursuit as the years passed. Those who left, such as Nancy, were still
Hardin and Whiteside Token responses 643
in the proving process even as they walked out the door. A few of our participants
also sought to turn their rarity into advantage; perhaps the most notable
was Lisa, who said she saw other women as competition; their presence diminished
her value as a scarce commodity.
Kanter (1993, 2003) also suggests that tokens leave the workplace at a
higher rate than do members of the majority for a number of reasons, and
we heard those reasons echoed in our interviews. For instance, several participants
presented lack-of-fit as a reason they left or were thinking about leaving.
We suggest that as US newsrooms downsize, the number of women will
continue to fall – not only because sports editors may lower their priority for
diversity initiatives (as our participants observed), but also because female
sports journalists, who have never been welcome and are more likely to
question their suitability for such careers, may be more likely to leave.
Young women in token positions may also leave because they do not
have the combination of high competence and the political savvy to survive
(Kanter, 2003; 1993). In our interviews, we saw several women, especially
Jane, Nancy and Karen, struggle to overachieve while they grappled with the
harassment and discrimination. It is easy to understand why this doubleburden
is too much to bear, and leaving the workplace is a relief.
Individual choice and institutional responsibility
The women who left and those who considered leaving presented their
decisions as individual, free choice. They acknowledged barriers such as the
time demands and what they called a ‘boys-will-be-boys’ culture, but did
not see these barriers as institutionally constructed. Instead, they accepted
them as natural and immutable. Jane, the copy editor who was verbally
abused on the copy desk, did say that supervisors needed to ‘do a better job
of overseeing everything’ (i.e. spotting and stopping harassment), but did not
see the sports-journalism environment, which privileges men, as part of the
problem.
This ‘commonsense’ logic of neoliberalism, which ultimately equates
personal freedom with institutional lack of social responsibility and individualizes
structural problems (e.g. a bad supervisor is to blame for the expectation
to work long hours), obscures the root of problems in newswork. It also
obscures the nature of newswork as a gendered institution, one where a maleas-norm
ethos is built into its processes and organizational hierarchies. It
perpetuates the dynamics that keep women in perpetual ‘token’ status inside
sports departments, and it produces the kinds of work-life and performance
pressures that drive them out. Thus, when an editor uses low hiring rates in
the newspaper business to justify an ‘F’ for gender parity in sports, few voices
rise in protest. When women leave and cite family or personal reasons, the
Journalism 10(5)644
institutional framework that led to her experience, in which she has grounded
her decision that she cannot fit in the sports-journalism culture, is not interrogated;
thus, the revolving door keeps turning.
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Biographical notes
Marie Hardin is an Associate Professor of journalism in the College of Communications
at Penn State University. She is also Associate Director for Research in the John Curley
Center for Sports Journalism. Her recent work appears in the Sociology of Sport Journal,
Electronic News, International Journal of Sport Communication, and Communication,
Culture & Critique.
Address: Journalism and Women’s Studies, Penn State University, 222 Carnegie,
University Park, PA, 16802 USA.
[email: mch208@psu.edu]
Erin Whiteside is a Doctoral Candidate in Penn State’s College of Communications
and graduate assistant for the John Curley Center for Sports Journalism. Her work
has been published in Women in Sports and Physical Activity Journal and Newspaper
Research Journal among others.
Address: Journalism and Women’s Studies, Penn State University, 115 Carnegie,
University Park, PA, 16802 USA.
[email: eew10@psu.edu]