"In reports, women are referred to as the Chinese team, while the men are defined by their sex and treated as something of a joke, the upended version of Len Hutton's 1963 opinion on women's cricket: Absurd, like a man trying to knit. State feminism in Chinese elite sport, said He, is underpinned by the logic that medals are gender neutral units of political capital and the means for international recognition."
"The women's team play more games, have more staff, win more matches. They practise more frequently on turf wickets, train more abroad, have better experienced coaches. Over time, this creates an instrumental equality, the promotion of women's sport as an efficient pathway to maximise China's performance in the global medal race."
The Cricket Research Network held its third annual conference at Hughes Hall in Cambridge, where Max He from Xi'an Jiaotong University presented findings on China's unique approach to cricket development. In China, cricket is predominantly a women's sport receiving significantly greater investment, resources, and institutional support than the men's program. Women's teams play more matches, train on superior facilities, have more experienced coaching staff, and receive better international exposure. Official reporting refers to women as the Chinese team while men are marginalized. This inverted gender dynamic stems from China's state feminism strategy in elite sport, where medals are treated as gender-neutral units of political capital. Following disappointing results at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, China's General Administration of Sport restructured investment priorities to maximize global medal performance through strategic sport development.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]