The objectification and fetishism of women`s beach volleyball athletes` bodies

Abstract

This study attempted to analyze how the media portray female athletes` bodies through the visual contents and which social meanings are connoted through such portrayal. Using the critical feminist epistemology about women`s body and sex, this study investigated the photographs of women`s beach-volleyball tournament presented in the internet general portal sites. The selected 26 photographs were analyzed with the interpretive textual analysis. The results showed that, first, with the objectification of bodies, the photographic coverage treated female beach-volleyballers` bodies as things possessed and consumed. Second, the photographic portrayal of women`s beach-volleyball provided readers with voyeuristic pleasure. The readers seemed to enjoy such erotic scenes as if they saw the pictures through secret cameras. Third, with the verbal messages from photographs, the possible diverse decodings were limited to look at the photographs in terms of erotic ways. This study argued that the media photographic coverage of female athletes reflected the patriarchal capitalistic attitudes and practices toward women`s body and sex and that the media construction of female athletes should be based upon the athletes` bodies as subjects, not sex-objects.