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Title IX began the change of integrating women's sports into universities, but it was up to each university's athletic administration, external media sources, and public relations practitioners to determine how female athletes and sports were supported and publicized. In 1976, Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah hired Ellen Larsen as its first female sports information director responsible for women's sports. Through her 19 years as a sports information director at BYU, Larsen was an advocate for her athletes and helped pave the way for future female athletic administration roles. While there is plenty of literature on male sports information directors, literature on female sports information directors is thin. Even less has been published on pioneer women in this role. This paper will tell the story of Ellen Larsen, BYU's first female sports information director, and describe her pioneering impact in the publicizing of women's athletics at BYU from 1976 to 1995.

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A content analysis and post hoc content analysis of 362 news articles in national newspapers, regional newspapers, and Internet news Web sites investigated the prevalence of issue-specific and generic frames, frame valence, and the personalization of media coverage of the steroid scandal in Major League Baseball. Research guided by framing theory found 2,353 frames present in the initial analysis and 2,834 frames present after the post hoc analysis. Generic frames were more prevalent than issue-specific frames in coverage in initial analysis. The post hoc analysis, however, indicates that issue-specific frames were more prevalent than generic frames in terms of times present. Frames are valenced negatively more frequently than neutrally or positively in coverage. Media coverage was focused on the individuals more often than on the organization, however, both the individuals and organization were treated similarly in terms of valence of frames. The findings of the analyses supported scholarship calling for more analysis of generic and issue-specific frames, the presence of valence in frames, and the personalization of media coverage in the political communication context that in this case is present in the sports media context as well. Findings merit further scholarship on broader source comparison in coverage of this scandal, agenda-setting in various forms, and further frame analysis in the sports media contexts and other contexts outside of the political communication context as well. / Master of Arts

The aim of this study was to examine what Swedish elite athletes’ experiences, opinions and ideas are about Swedish sports journalism. We wanted to understand how sports journalism works through the athletes’ point of view, since there is a symbiotic relationship between professional sports and the media. To approach this we carried out a qualitative study based on seven personal interviews with elite athletes representing seven different sports. The theoretical frames used in this study are symbolic interactionism, the agenda-setting theory, framing theory and the sports media complex.The result shows that according to the athletes the journalistic content depends on a range of components, the most important being the relation between the journalists and the athletes, which is mainly based upon the journalist’s knowledge and participation. The sports media complex, which explains the symbiosis between sports and media, is very explicit in our results and so is how journalists set the agenda for the audience. We discuss whether distorted coverage and insufficient knowledge can result in the citizens not getting a chance to fully understand the reality of sports in Sweden and how stereotypical journalism communicate certain meanings and values about sports to the audience.

Title: Popularity of the sports media in the press and on the Internet - the sociodemographic profile of readers Target: The aim of thesis is to analyze the popularity of the media in sport. The thesis is focused on the sports media in the press and on the Internet and their development over the last few years. Own contribution of the thesis is the creation of socio-demographic profile of reader and exploring its relationship to sport. After that created profiles are compared to find similarities and differences. Methods: The research part of the thesis is based on analysis and processing of data from market research. Research is focused on sports media in print and on the internet, therefore is the final chapter of the research used the method of comparison that reveals differences and similarities of both types of media. The theoretical part of the thesis uses methods of analysis of documents. Results: The results of the thesis show us that print and online media experience different time and this is also reflected in the sports media. The print media loses popularity and their future is uncertain, on the the other side online media have experienced a sharp increase in popularity in recent years. This is obviously reflected in the different socio-demographic structure of the sports readers both...

Title: The Lilja case – a study about discourse and media representations of violence within ice hockey The purpose of this study is to examine the discourses that influenced the debate in Swedish sport media around the professional ice hockey player Jakob Liljas 10-game suspension and subsequent assault conviction by the Swedish legal system. The aim is to see how Lilja’s violence was defined and what voices were the most prominent in the debate. The study is based on a theoretical framework consisting of Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory and Agamben’s ideas of the Homo Sacer and the State of Exception. Using Laclau and Mouffe, an analytical toolbox was assembled to deconstruct the discourses present in the debate. The analysis found two dominant discourses within the debate: a sports discourse and a law discourse. The study found two nodal points that defined how the discourses treated Lilja’s violence; the nodal point “crime” within the law discourse, and the nodal point “rule violation” within the sports one. The sports discourse argued against the legal process maintained that Lilja had already received a sufficient punishment through his suspension. The law one was centred around the premise that legal action was required to properly punish Lilja. The analysis found that the sports discourse unsuccessfully tried to position the sport of ice hockey as a State of Exception where the laws of regular society should not apply. There were also similarities between the underlying masculine norms that informed how the sports discourse treated player health and Agambens Homo Sacer, how people’s life worth is reduced in order to justify certain conditions imposed on them. While a true State of Exception or Homo Sacer does not exist in this scenario, as Lilja was ultimately convicted according to the rules of the law discourse, it is interesting that ideas that align with these concepts were well represented in the medial debate.

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2017-01-10T12:50:44Z No. of bitstreams: 1 tayanemockdecerihan.pdf: 11617253 bytes, checksum: 199468c456187b3b2cdf5043f023c631 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Diamantino Mayra (mayra.diamantino@ufjf.edu.br) on 2017-01-31T11:20:33Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 tayanemockdecerihan.pdf: 11617253 bytes, checksum: 199468c456187b3b2cdf5043f023c631 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-01-31T11:20:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 tayanemockdecerihan.pdf: 11617253 bytes, checksum: 199468c456187b3b2cdf5043f023c631 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-08-22 / FAPEMIG - Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Minas Gerais / Esta dissertação busca compreender como são veiculadas as notícias das mulheres futebolistas no ciberespaço, mais especificamente, no webjornalismo (Globoesporte.com). Visa também descrever as maneiras pelas quais o público leitor interpreta os discursos midiáticos e interage entre si e com as reportagens sobre as mulheres no futebol. Partimos de uma perspectiva teórica metodológica pós-estruturalista, presumimos que os discursos midiáticos são construídos de maneira atender interesses generificados na veiculação das notícias de homens e mulheres no futebol. Para atender a esses objetivos utilizamos a etnografia virtual. O período de coleta dos dados ficou compreendido entre Abril e Junho de 2015, na medida em que abarcou importantes campeonatos de mulheres com visibilidade nacional e internacional, como o Campeonato Paulista, os Jogos Pan-Americanos e a Copa do Mundo FIFA. As reportagens publicadas no site Globoesporte.com sobre as mulheres no futebol e selecionadas pelo estudo foram trinta e quatro e os comentários totalizaram seiscentos e doze. O material empírico foi analisado a partir de três temáticas, a saber: Feminilidades em jogo: imagens e discursos (midiáticos) no futebol de mulheres; Impedimentos de gênero: quando será a vez delas? e “Desenvolvimento do futebol feminino”: agendas para as mulheres. Essas temáticas foram atravessadas pela Interpelação. De maneira geral, verificamos que os discursos midiáticos e a maioria dos comentários são performativos, ou seja, são construídos e constituídos socialmente através de atos reiterados na cultura. Essa repetição estabelece normas cristalizadas sobre corpo, sexualidade, feminilidade e identidade de gênero para as jogadoras de futebol presentes nas reportagens, valorizando a beleza física das atletas quando essas atendem determinados traços corporais. Também reforçam a hierarquia de gênero, através da valorização de títulos conquistados por técnicos homens, e opiniões de “especialistas” que mantém o status quo no qual as mulheres ocupam lugares inferiores aos homens, tanto no que concerne às habilidades para o jogo quanto para a ocupação de cargos de gestão esportiva. Apesar de destacar em seu discurso as agendas e projetos a curto prazo que visam o desenvolvimento do futebol de mulheres no Brasil, percebemos que o próprio globoesporte.com traz as notícias delineadas de pré julgamentos e preconceitos e que muitas vezes não fazem jus às conquistas das atletas, invisibilizando e enviesando informações acerca do futebol praticado por mulheres. Também em alguns momentos o Globoesporte.com “erra o alvo”, deixando de corresponder às expectativas dos/as leitores/as, que cobram por mais informações acerca do futebol de mulheres. Concluímos que a desconstrução acerca das mulheres no futebol deve ser feita através das mídias paralelas, bem como através das redes sociais, que se constituem na atualidade importantes ferramentas de disseminação de informações e através das quais, usuários e usuárias possuem mais liberdade de comunicação e expressão. Além disso, pesquisadoras e pesquisadores devem se mobilizar para além do ambiente acadêmico, buscando debater suas pesquisas com a sociedade, sensibilizando um maior número de pessoas à sua volta. / This dissertation seeks to understand how news about women soccer players are transmitted in cyberspace, specifically, on web journalism (Website: Globoesporte.com). It also aims to describe how readership comprises the media discourse, interacting with one another and with reports about women in football. From a theoretical-methodological post-structuralist approach, we assumed that media speeches are built in such a way to fulfill gendered interests when news about men and women in football are broadcasted. In order to meet those purposes, we used virtual ethnography. The data collection period was between April/2015 and June/2015, in that some important national and international women championships took place, such as the tournament from the State of São Paulo, Pan American Games and FIFA's World Cup. Within the reports published on the website Globoesporte.com about women in soccer, we had selected thirty-four for the paper and the comments totaled six hundred and twelve. The empirical material was then analyzed as of three topics, namely: "Femininities in game: images and speeches (of media) on women's football"; "Gender impediments: when will be their turn?" and "Development of female football: schedule for women". Those themes have been crossed by interpellation. In general, we could verify that media discourse and most of the analyzed comments are performative, that is, they are socially built and constituted through reaffirmed acts in culture. This reoccurrence sets sound standards about body, sexuality, femininity and gender identity for the women soccer players appearing in the reports, and yet, values the athletes’ physical beauty when those fit into given body traits. That repetition also reinforces the gender hierarchy, through the value of awards won by male coaches, and opinions of “experts” that keep the status quo in which women occupy lower places than men, both as regards women soccer game’s skills as occupation of sports management. Despite highlighting on its speech the schedules and projects short term that aim to develop soccer for women in Brazil, we could realize the Globoesporte.com itself reflects the news outlined by prejudgments and prejudice and often not doing justice to the athletes' accomplishments, making invisible and biased information about soccer played by women. Also, we noticed, at time, Globoesporte.com “misses the mark”, not corresponding to the readers’ expectations, who claim for more information on female soccer. We concluded that the deconstruction near women in soccer should be made through parallel medias, as well as the social networks, which are in the present an important tool to disseminate information and through female and male users have more freedom of communication and expression. Furthermore, female and male researchers should mobilize themselves for beyond the academic environment, seeking to debate their researches with society, raising awareness in more people around them.

Existing research shows that increasing numbers of young men are dissatisfied with the appearance of their bodies. Research has found that men will use sport and health-related sports acts to conceal these concerns from others. Accordingly, men s body dissatisfactions are documented less frequently because the practices drawn upon to conceal them are perceived as routine forms of masculine behaviour. Rugby union is one of the most popular sports played by young men in England. Historically, the male rugby player is culturally perceived as strong, tough and unemotionally articulate. Existing research draws attention to health issues, such as performance stress and injury that arise through participation in this sport. Research also shows that rugby union players are likely to experience concerns about gaining weight, yet these are disguised within the requirements of training for the sport. Although, there are studies that examine the constitution of masculinities, the experience of pain and injury and career transitions among rugby union players there are no studies, as yet, that examine how rugby union men experience body concerns and manage these experiences through their sport. The research discussed in this thesis examines how a group of rugby union men (25) aged 18-25, of varied racial identity, ethnic and social backgrounds, participating in an elite university rugby union 1st XV team, experience concerns about the appearance and performance of their bodies and the ways in which such concerns develop. It also examines if and how these men used the sport and health-related sports acts, to overcome their concerns and conceal them from others. A theoretical framework, which draws on the concepts of the three theorists: Connell (1995, 2008) Goffman (1959; 1961; 1979) and Bourdieu (1978; 1979; 1984), is developed. As part of this, a new concept has been created from Goffman s dramaturgical approach: that of the intimate dimension. In this dimension intimate relationships occur. It is located away from the front region, (the public), and the back region (semi-public spaces) where less formal relationships occur. It includes the research interview, with a woman researcher, and some other women such as girlfriends, sisters or female friends and also one or two other rugby men with whom the rugby men demonstrated a close bond. Within this dimension the rugby men are more forthcoming about the personal elements of their rugby lives. The theoretical framework is used to examine these men s concerns, how they are developed, experienced and managed. Recognising that cultural assumptions of a tough and less expressive masculinity assigned to this sport can potentially make it difficult for men to express these concerns, a combination of visual research methods and ethnography are used to examine these men s body concerns and their management. This includes collaborative collection of photography and photo-elicitation interviews. The research shows that embodied experiences of discomfort, associated with pain, injury, concerns about height, being overweight or out of shape, and social experiences of exclusion led to the development of the rugby men s body concerns. For these rugby men, their rugby masculinities are influential to the management and concealment of their body concerns. They suppress and conceal their body concerns in the front and back regions of the sport and reveal them in more intimate dimensions. The rugby men s relationships with each other, in the back regions of the sport, were the most influential to this identity, but more importantly, to the management and reinforcement of these concerns. This thesis contributes to filling the gap in existing academic research by examining body concerns and its management amongst rugby union men. It also extends existing research that has found men conceal their body concerns in sport, because it looks at how these men manage these concerns differently in different regions of their sport. Furthermore, a theoretical framework that combines interactionism and phenomenology is used to study sociologically men s body concerns in these different contexts. The combination of visual methods and ethnography goes beyond some of the existing methods used in clinical and sociological research that have examined men's body concerns. They can be used to enhance understanding of clinical forms of body concern and other emotional concerns rugby union men and other sportsmen, of all ages, have about performance, pain and injury. The incorporation of visual methods is potentially widely applicable because they have increasing precedence in sportsmen s lives to analyse performance and to represent them.

The introduction of Social Media (SM) into sports communications in professional leagues is disrupting the traditional methods of sports media relations. In the past, teams used websites to post information for fans, but it was strictly a one-way format of communication whereby a story was posted for fans to read. To fully engage with this new communication channel, the sports communications departments in professional leagues have begun to use SM to communicate directly with fans through platforms like Twitter and Facebook. Currently, SM like Twitter allows the team communication departments to communicate directly with fans in an interactive two-way format that is not mediated by a reporter or someone from a traditional media outlet. In addition, the open format of SM means that media relations staff are no longer the only intermediary between the media and the players; through the use of SM like Twitter, a professional athlete can now communicate directly to fans without gatekeepers like the media or the sports communications department of the team. This thesis will explore how SM has changed media relations from several different perspectives. The first perspective is related to the risks that are associated with the use of SM by professional athletes: without an intermediary or a filter for athlete-fan communication, many athletes have caused irreparable damage to their reputation and the reputation of their team. The second perspective is related to the benefits for teams that use SM as a platform to connect with fans: the ability to connect with fans using SM is new to sports communications and represents an interactive one-to-one and one-to-many mode of communication through which the fan can directly communicate with the team. Finally, this research will look at how Twitter has changed media relations in sports from the perspective of the lived experiences of people who work in sports media. To explore the risks associated with athletes’ use of social media, this research used Situational Crisis Communication Theory as a theoretical framework to explore reputation-damaging incidents that occurred through social media. The study reviewed national media stories reported in North America from 2009 to 2010 that were perceived to have negative impact on athletes’ reputation. In total, 17 incidents were reviewed — seven incidents in particular demonstrated the athlete as the source of the SM crisis. Through the review and categorization of these 17 situations, the study was able to identify four broad categories of situations that a sports communication manager needs to be prepared for. The four categories identified were “Rookie Reporter”, “Team Insider”, “Opportunist”, and “Imposter”. Each of these categories are invaluable for team communication managers to recognize in order to address the risks associated with social media. To explore the benefits associated with the communications department’s use of social media, this research used Uses and Gratification theory as a theoretical framework to explore how and why fans followed team Twitter accounts. This study was conducted in partnership with the Canadian Football League (CFL) and a total of 526 people responded to an online survey that was tweeted out to them for their feedback. The results of the survey indicated several significant findings — in particular, the phenomenon of converged sports fan consumption was identified, which has not been previously acknowledged in academic research. The phenomenon of converged sports fan refers to the multi-screen environment whereby a sports fan decides where, when, and how they want to consume sporting content. This research identified that in-game consumption of SM while watching television and the mobile consumption of SM are both dominant ways for fans to interact with their teams. This multi-modal format of connecting with the team supports the idea of Henry Jenkins’s Black Box Fallacy (2006, p. 13): as teams move forward in developing communications platforms to reach their fans, they will need to recognize that all channels can and do work together. In order to further understand how Twitter has changed sports media relations, the study used long semi-structured interviews with a phenomenological research design to understand how Twitter has impacted sports media relations. The phenomenological analysis of the informant interviews suggested that Twitter is the source of three themes of change: general media relations, mechanical job functions, and other changes specific to sports media relations. The significance of Twitter’s impact on sports media relations cannot be understated. With the ubiquitous use of SM like Twitter, it is important to understand how sports media relations can use SM to manage the image of their respective teams and athletes. After looking at SM and sports from three different perspectives, the pivotal finding was the role that Twitter and mobile communications play in ‘flattening’ sports media relations. Similar to how Friedman (2006) argued that the convergence of the personal computer drove globalization, Twitter and the increased adoption of mobile communications have flattened the role of sports media relations. This research will explain how the flattening of sports media relations happened and what the implications might be for sports media professionals.