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In The Pool, on the Ice: Contested Terrain

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Gender Politics and the Olympic Industry

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in the Olympic and Paralympic Games ((OPG))

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Abstract

From the earliest Olympic Games, the bodies of skaters and swimmers were gendered, raced and sexualized, with media coverage playing a key role in these processes. Debates about appearance, attire and comportment are central to questions of identity construction and the swimming and skating body. The Gay Games provide a compelling case study of a counter-hegemonic sporting event, and reveal some of the contradictions in Olympic sport.

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Notes

  1. R. Cashman, Barrackers’ Corner: A Rejoinder to a “One-Eyed” Review of Staging the Olympics, Sporting Traditions 18:1 (2001), 127–9.Cashman was reacting to Douglas Booth’s well-argued critical review of Staging the Olympics (co-edited with Anthony Hughes) in an earlier issue of Sporting Traditions.

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© 2013 Helen Jefferson Lenskyj

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Lenskyj, H.J. (2013). In The Pool, on the Ice: Contested Terrain. In: Gender Politics and the Olympic Industry. Palgrave Studies in the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Palgrave Pivot, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137291158_5

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