Baseball and Gender

How did baseball become androcentric? To explore this issue, one must first understand the meaning of androcentrism, and how deeply baseball is ingrained in American culture. In her book "The Lenses of Gender: Transforming the Debate on Sexual Inequality" (1993), Sandra Bem explains androcentrism as "not just the historically crude perception that men are inherently superior to women but a more treacherous underpinning of that perception: a definition of males and male experience as a neutral standard or norm, and females and female experience as a sex-specific deviation from that norm. It is thus not that man is treated as superior and woman as inferior but that man is treated as human and woman as 'other' (Bem, p. 2). It is not a far stretch to apply this definition of androcentrism to baseball, and this writing will address this issue once a foundation for the argument is established. To view how deeply baseball is ingrained in American culture, one need only remember the well known saying "as American as baseball, hotdogs, and apple pie". Now, how does one get from androcentrism to baseball and American culture? One answer is to examine the history, and see if the definition complies.

Between 1866 to 1935, women actively participated in "amateur, semiprofessional, and professional baseball" (Berlage, 2000). Because women were involved in the sport of baseball, almost from its inception, one would imagine that baseball would be a coed sport played by both men and women equally today. That is not the case. Baseball, and its cultural meaning changed dramatically in the 1930s and 1940s because of two distinct incidents, World War II, and the formation of the American Softball Association. Before the 1930s, women were allowed to play baseball as long as they played the feminine version of the sport. Play was often limited to women in the upper class who attended women's colleges such as Vassar and Smith, or women from the working class. Any athletic activity for women was looked upon as suspect unless it contributed to the general health of a woman. "Women who didn't conform to cultural definitions of femininity or who appeared unattractive ran the risk of being labeled masculine, a freak, or homosexual" (Berlage, 2000). Regardless of cultural norms, from the 1800s until the 1930s, some women played competitive baseball. Working class women were often recruited to play on barnstorming teams for promoters seeking money and attention in a "battle of the sexes" (Smoot-Kimble, 2003), yet despite the motivation, many of these women played serious baseball. The team would enter a town and challenge the local men's club. To the surprise of many, they were often successful at beating the men's teams. Unfortunately, women's participation in baseball soon waned, with only a short lived resurgence during World War II, because:

The history illustrates how baseball became officially gendered and androcentric. American culture had clearly defined baseball as a male domain and softball as the female equivalent, thus polarizing the two sports by sex. Of course, baseball is not the only sport to do this, and because of the equal rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s, women demanded equal federally funded programs in both education and athletics, if not equal opportunity to play on the same team.

Title IX was extremely important in 1972 because it was the first time that discrimination in education and athletics was officially recognized and remedied in society since the civil rights amendment of 1964, which ended sanctioned racial segregation.

This legislation opened the doors for women to receive access to education, employment, military, and sport. Unfortunately, any 'neutral' or 'separate but equal' legislation does not recognize the foundation of hegemonic inequality that pervades American culture. Some feminists argue that this kind of legislation starts the process of women's access to power, but they still do not recognize that the power itself, in fact the system itself, has been defined by men and for men (androcentrism). Softball (also defined by males in a male system of sport) as the female alternative to baseball illustrates this thinking because it gives a 'female', or softer alternative, to the 'male' sport of baseball rather than recognizing that the two sports are separate and unequal.

Has Title IX actually hindered the course of female equality in sport? One feminist writer states:

One cannot end a discussion about females in baseball without a discussion of biology. The argument has always been that women are biologically smaller, and weaker than men; therefore, the argument goes, women must be protected from playing sports with men. The argument does not acknowledge that there is a great deal of variation within and between the sexes. In fact,

So the answer to the question of biology is "yes, there is a difference." But should that difference be judged on the "average", which applies to neither male or female elite athletes, or should the difference be judged on a continuum model? The continuum model removes the need to judge athletes and sport on the basis of sex.

This argument still does not address how to change androcentrism in a patriarchal world. Instead, it discusses some of the issues and assumptions about sex and gender inequality in our culture. We do know, however, that providing 'sexed' alternatives such as softball for girls and baseball for boys only perpetuates the hegemonic system. Breaking down the barriers to the system in baseball will require not only societal and institutional change, but female representation in the sport.

I believe the answer is to have more and more girls on mixed teams. We need to force the issue, and make girls on the team a cultural “norm”. If we continue to base our strategy on separate programs, we will continue to receive the short end of the stick (I remember in high school…the boys baseball team was fully funded by the school, while our softball team was privately funded (uniforms, field care) by my father’s cousin and other parents). Polarizing the genders always gives way to value statements about the level of play, and I have found that when male and female players are coached on the same team, their level of play is relatively equal.

People say that women could never compete against male ball players. I say that if they receive the same training, over the same period of time, there is no reason women cannot compete. I want to go to the World Series and watch highly skilled individuals from both sexes play. We should not have to go to the “men’s” World Series, and then the “women’s” World Series (which we know would be under funded, and under respected by the general population).

Title IX was effective in obtaining an arena where women could finally compete in sport, but it is not 1972 anymore. Let’s start training and encouraging our girls to play baseball on baseball teams. The more girls there are, the more normal it will be, and it will not be a question of “boys” or “girls” baseball. In addition, the future transition of baseball will be influenced by both males and females, which may finally put to rest the androcentric nature of baseball.