Former Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka faces the camera, a firm look on his mustached face, under a heading that reads 'Be the best you can be.' It's an ad for erectile dysfunction. Ford Motor Company's breast cancer ad of Serena Williams takes a different approach: the large-breasted tennis icon is all smiles in her tight-fitting pink shirt that effectively accentuates her cup size.
These are some of the images Columbia College Chicago history professor Erin McCarthy will share on March 4 during her presentation, 'Sport and Sexuality: (Nearly) the Last Bastion of Sexism and Homophobia,' at the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington. The program will take place at 6 p.m. in the fifth floor East Meeting Room as part of the adult education series, Intersections: A Meeting Place for Diverse Ideas on Contemporary Culture and the Arts.
Intersections, a collaboration between the Cultural Studies Program of Columbia College and the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, presents monthly lectures and discussions that investigate and celebrate the complexity of contemporary culture and the arts.
'Sport is the last overtly acceptable and unquestioned bastion of sexism and homophobia,' said 44-year-old McCarthy, who ran the 220-yard dash and played badminton at New Trier East High School just as historically significant Title IX was hitting its stride. (Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits sex discrimination in federally assisted education programs.) 'There's this idea that (sports) is the man's world. Where does this put the men who aren't interested in sports? The accusation of lesbian or lesbo was a strong tool that kept women away.'
McCarthy, the oldest of four girls in her family, remembers when New Trier East and West High Schools were merging, which meant that four varsity basketball coaches must be pared to two.
'I don't remember it ever being discussed, nothing in the news, about who would get the job,' she said. 'We're reminded all the time that this was the social norm. One male coach got the varsity boys team and, as a consolation prize, the other male coach got the varsity girls team. The women coaches were out of a job.'
Teaching the History of Sport in the U.S. at Columbia since 1993, McCarthy owns a painful familiarity with the way sports have affected social issues. When Jackie Robinson joined the ranks of 'white' baseball teams, the well established negro baseball leagues began to disintegrate. Although the opportunity to make more money and potentially attain more fame became available, fewer Blacks got to play. The professor sees a parallel to the evolution of women in sports.
'There are almost ironies or paradoxes that come out of this,' McCarthy said. 'Women's sports were left alone (prior to Title IX). There was autonomy, self-control, opportunity. It did provide this space for lesbians.'
Like the Williams ad, today's sports marketing of women primarily focuses on the femininity of female athletes rather than their excellence in sports.
'I discuss gender, race and class a lot,' McCarthy said. 'Sports are so popular and pervasive, I encourage students to use sports to explore these issues. I'm interested in power and opportunity and who has it. Access and opportunity (for women) has not been achieved.'
McCarthy's love of history, sparked by New Trier freshman teacher Ms. Kelly, drives her to research this topic back to the 19th century definition of masculinity and how sport always has been viewed as a springboard to make a man a better leader, a better minister, etc. As women have become skilled athletes, men have been forced to look at redefining themselves, McCarthy explained, though the complex issue has many, many facets.
No longer actively involved in competitive sports, McCarthy is married and spends as much time as possible with 4-1/2-year-old daughter Judith. She does not foresee an erasure of Title IX from educational institutions, despite current political debate.
'Rising expectation is a powerful historic force,' she said. 'Once that boot has been lifted (off someone's neck), it's hard to ever put it back down.'
