Skip to main content

ETHNOS_APP

Home • Search • Journals • List 0

What if they need to block her on a kick return

Media framing and self-representation of Sarah Fuller’s historic season as a Vanderbilt soccer player and football kicker

Bibliographic Data

ID7154283
AuthorsShannon Scovel (0000-0002-4991-1011, University of Tennessee at Knoxville, corresponding author)
Year2025
Volume25
Issue1
Pages72-86
Publication date2025-01-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueFeminist Media Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1468-0777 • E-ISSN: 1471-5902
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14680777.2023.2279922
OpenAlexW4388732786
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited29

This paper assesses the representation and self-representation of Sarah Fuller before, during and after her historic kick for Vanderbilt’s football team in 2020. Through an analysis of 193 social media posts and 397 articles, the findings from this study demonstrate that, even in seemingly celebratory coverage of Fuller’s experiences as a football player, media members employed gendered language that “othered” Fuller in relation to her male teammates. Meanwhile, Fuller used her own social media accounts to present herself as a two-sport athlete and occasionally respond to critics. This research concludes that hegemonic themes and patterns remain prevalent in sports media coverage of women athletes. Incorporating women athletes’ voices or perspectives from their personal social media accounts more frequently in sports reporting, however, could serve as one way to increase the depth and quality of such coverage. Building on feminist sports media literature and frameworks around hegemony in sport, the results from this paper ultimately contribute to a robust field of research on women athletes’ representation in the press and on personal social media pages

Advertising · Athletes · Football · Hegemony · Media coverage · Media studies · Political science · Politics · Social media · Sociology · Gender Studies · History · Law · Media, Gender, and Advertising · Psychology · Sport and Mega-Event Impacts · Sports, Gender, and Society

  • Gender Essentialism and U.S. Attitudes Towards the Media Coverage of Women’s Sport

    Open Access•Adam Gemar, R Allison et al.•Communication & Sport•2025

  • If Those Stats Make You Mad, Then You’ve Come to the Right Place”

    Open Access•Monica Crawford•Communication & Sport•2024

  • SeAcabó

    Open Access•Itoiz Rodrigo-Jusué, K Liston et al.•Feminist Media Studies•2025

  • Cultural Studies and the Sociology of Sport

    Jennifer Hargreaves, Ian R Mcdonald et al.•Handbook of Sports Studies•2000

  • Look Who’s Talking—Athletes on Twitter

    Ann Pegoraro•International Journal of Sport…•2010

  • Content Analysis for the Social Sciences and Humanities

    Ole R Holsti•Content Analysis for the Social…•1969

  • I'm Going to Instagram It! An Analysis of Athlete Self-Presentation on Instagram

    Lauren Reichart Smith, Jimmy Sanderson•Journal of Broadcasting &…•2015

  • One and Done

    Open Access•Cheryl Cooky, Maria A Mears et al.•Communication & Sport•2021

  • Players, 23 Voices

    Open Access•Molly Hayes Sauder, Matthew Blaszka•Communication & Sport•2016

  • This Isn’t Just About Us”

    Open Access•Cheryl Cooky, Dunja Antunovic•Communication & Sport•2020

  • SlutWalk as perifeminist response to rape logic

    Annie Hill•Communication and Critical/Cultural…•2015

  • The athletic labour of femininity

    Open Access•Kim Toffoletti, H Thorpe•Journal of Consumer Culture•2018

  • Reclaiming the Feminist Politics of ‘SlutWalk’

    Rituparna Borah, Subhalakshmi Nandi•International Feminist Journal of…•2012

  • Fighting Visibility

    Linda Levitt•Journal of Sport History•2022

  • Sport as a Male Preserve

    Open Access•Eric Dunning•Theory Culture & Society•1986

  • Girls Just Aren't Interested

    Open Access•Cheryl Cooky•Sociological Perspectives•2009

  • Assessing the sociology of sport

    Open Access•Gertrud Pfister•International Review for the…•2015

  • Femininity, Masculinity, Physicality and the English Tabloid Press

    Open Access•John Harris, Ben Clayton•International Review for the…•2002

Unique citing works3
Citations per year1,5
Citation span2024 - 2025 (2)
Citation velocityrecent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 3

Tools

Open DOI
Ethnos_APP • Open Source Project • MIT License • Frontend v2.0.0 • Privacy and Cookies • API Documentation: api.ethnos.app/docs • API Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17049435 • Frontend Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17050053 • cruz.rio.br • Expectantes Misericordiae