The impact of sex and gendered stories of sport in Australia

This article is the result of collaboration by a public historian of sport and a scholar who specializes in biomechanics. They report on their research project titled ‘Do men and women participate in community sport differently? A pilot study to understand modifiable risk factors in female athletes’. It is focussed on contemporary Australia. The aim of this study was to gather qualitative data through surveys with grassroots level athletes to record how they understand people’s participation in sport, their different experiences of engaging in community sport and how their family, social and cultural contexts make an impact on their participation. It also draws on data from an oral history project on women in sport. The article examines how historical consciousness and an awareness of social and cultural change makes an impact on people’s experiences of sport at the elite and community level. It reveals how participants use history to construct stories of their sporting selves, and its impact on their engagement with sport in the present. It argues that biological and scientific expertise on female athletes needs to be twinned with social and cultural analysis of sex and gender to better understand the barriers to women’s participation in sport.