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Gender Inequality In Professional Tennis

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Introduction
Since the dawn of time gender inequality in society has been a prominent issue that has impacted upon generations of society. Social norms of men being above women in a hierarchy have stained many facets of society such as the labour force and sports. One example of gender inequality that is of particular interest to this subject is the pay gap in prize money between male and female in professional tennis. While men and women players receive comparable media attention, there is a tendency for men to receive a greater amount of income, compared to women. This research paper will attempt to identify causes of gender inequality in professional tennis while also providing possible solutions, with the use of relevant statistics, journal …show more content…

These social structures include sports, education, popular culture and media. Connell expands on this idea by stating that an embedded hierarchy is embedded in hegemonic masculinity. This hierarchy is caused by factors such as heterosexual marriage, social authority and physical strength. Throughout history we can see examples of hegemonic masculinity such as the role of women in the workforce and their struggle to break through the glass ceiling.

A prime example of hegemonic masculinity in sport is unequal prize money in professional tournaments between males and females. The career length of female professional tennis players is just as long as their male counterparts, and the number of tournaments both genders compete in annually is almost identical, yet women earn significantly less than men. (Coates & Robbins, 2001)
This finding reinforces the notion of hegemonic masculinity’s effect on society, as both genders are spending the same amount of time travelling to and playing in a similar amount of tournaments, but men are being paid more. The impact upon female athletes is then even more significant as a greater proportion of their earnings are being spent as costs of business when they must pay for flights and hotels all over the …show more content…

Russell (2005, cited in Du Bois and Heyndels 2008, p.4) discovered an important finding in the level of media attention between male and female tennis players. Russell states, “While women’s tennis used to attract less public attention, it now has about equal TV ratings to that of men’s tennis.” This raises an important question, why are female players earning significantly less than male players despite both sides of the sport garnering a similar audience level. As a result of this, there is a greater amount of pressure felt by women to compensate their earnings through product endorsements and sponsorships. There is a greater emphasis on physical appearances in order to appeal the hegemonic male society in order to get sponsorships from companies such as: Nike, Adidas, Wilson and

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