Commanding The Room In Short Skirts

Cheering as the Embodiment of Ideal Girlhood

Bibliographic Data

ID2366751
AuthorsNatalie Adams (0000-0003-2228-6727, University of Alabama), Pamela J Bettis (University of Idaho), Pamela Bettis (University of Idaho)
Year2003
Volume17
Issue1
Pages73-91
Publication date2003-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueGender & Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0891-2432 • E-ISSN: 1552-3977
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0891243202238979
OpenAlexW2163776748
LanguageEN
Citations received32
References cited10

More than 3.5 million people participate in cheerleading in the United States, with 97 percent being female. A staple of American schools, American life, and popular culture, the cheerleader, however, has received scant attention in scholarly research. In this article, the authors argue that a feminist poststructuralist reading of cheerleading situates cheerleading as a discursive practice that has changed significantly in the past 150 years to accommodate the shifting and often contradictory meanings of normative femininity. They maintain that the ideal girl of the new millennium embodies both masculinity and femininity and that cheerleading offers a culturally sanctioned space for some girls to embody ideal girlhood. They argue that cheerleading is a gendered activity representing in some ways a liberatory shift in reconstituting normative femininity while simultaneously perpetuating a norm of femininity that does not threaten dominant social values and expectations about the role of girls and women in society

Aesthetics · Art · Developmental psychology · Femininity · Girl · Masculinity · Normative · Political science · Sociology · Diverse Music Education Insights · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Gender Studies · Law · Physical Education and Pedagogy · Psychology