This week I will be discussing my observations and
encounters with gender at Super Bowl XLVII. As we discussed in class, the NFL
does a lot to turn the week into more than just a game. With this in mind, I
personally felt that female fans were more involved with these festivities than
men. The first day of our trip we worked with the NFL Experience, which was a
large interactive fair for children and fans to soak up the NFL brand. What really amazed me was the variation
of age and gender among the volunteers that assisted with the event. It seemed
as if for all these events the females tended to be elderly and would have jobs
such as handing out maps, while the men were younger and had higher intensity
jobs.
On the fan side, we worked with and observed many more women
than we had thought. At the NFL Tailgate event the gender interactions were
very interesting. This event was for relatively important people such as
celebrities and those with money. The décor for the venue was very elegant and
was set up like a garden. This was most likely why the majority of those in
attendance were women. There was music, an open bar, and pretty artwork, which
was nothing like any of the other events. I am not sure if this event was
catered specifically to women, but it certainly drew a large female crowd and
acted as a fun experience before the game.
Lastly, something interesting that I noticed was that the
head coordinators and top staff were mostly women. Women were executing these large-scale
events while men seemed to be more of a supporting role. I personally thought
that it was great to see so many females involved in sport, especially with an
event that big. This speaks a lot to the direction of the sport industry in
terms of on field involvement and employment opportunities.
Hunter,
ReplyDeleteI attended Super Bowl XXXIII back when i was younger. I do not remember much, but I do know that mostly men were in attendance and the fan fest was catered to men. It is a breath of fresh air to hear that the Super Bowl this year was catered to both genders. Since football is only played by males, I think it is very important to keep females involved. I see no better way to do this then by marketing to females and having them in charge of a lot of the events operations. this is a very good way to have equality in a sport that is just played by men.
-Tad Margolies
Hunter,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you when you talk about how women seem to get more involved with the Super Bowl when it comes to the festivities. I think that the NFL does a great job of marketing to men and women with the total make up of the Super Bowl week. I have a friend from Michigan who is a female and she attended all the Super Bowl festivities back when the Super Bowl was in Detroit. She agreed that as a female the events that she attended made her get more into the Super Bowl than if there were no festivities and she just had to watch the game.
-Logan Walker
Hunter,
ReplyDeleteI would like to agree with you when you wrote about women getting more involved with the Super Bowl. It is actually nice to see the NFL marketing the event where both males and females can participate and show their love for the game as well. Having different events leading up to the game and having women in charge of them can just show that no matter if you are a male or females you are able to love the game and can enjoy themselves while watching it.
-Lindsey Landversicht
Hunter,
ReplyDeleteThis was a very valuable first hand account of the diversity in today's sports scene. While it is awesome that so many women were involved in the events leading up to the Superbowl, many of the positions you described were very stereotypical for women: organizing the events, hanging out things, greeting, etc. Regardless, it is refreshing to see so many women involved in the Superbowl, and sports in general. I also thought they way they positioned the tailgate (as a sophisticated gathering rather than a drunken mass of people in a parking lot) was interesting. I would have never guessed the NFL Tailgate would be so prestigious and tasteful.
-Andrew Hayes
Hunter,
ReplyDeleteIt is great to see that more women are getting more involved in sports. I think it'd be great if more women were actually interested in the game rather than the other events that surround the game. This is at least a start though, and maybe the more that women get involved with activities that come with the Super Bowl they'll start to understand and enjoy the actual game more.
I was also surprised to hear about this tailgate party. I wouldn't have assumed that the tailgate for the Super Bowl would be so classy! I had a picture in my mind that it'd be a little more rowdy.
Erin