What is Marta's soccer: Feminine, women's soccer, just soccer or feminist?

Gustavo Andrada Bandeira^[1]

From a perspective with which work, anchored in post-structuralist gender studies and feminist studies (Louro, 2004; Meyer, 2003), the concept of gender cannot be reduced to face-to-face interactions between subjects distinguished in culture as masculine or feminine. The genres cross the institutions and cultural practices. As institutions produce and are produced by gender budgets. Other implications of the concept are the relational perspective. As constructions of feminilities possuem in masculinidade or its limit, at its border or at its complementarity. Nessa logic makes no sense to talk about the world of women or the world of men, women's football or men's football as something that does not exist in constant dialogue and dispute.

Based on these assumptions, I allow myself to return to the question that gives the title to this writing. During the months of June and July 2019, in France, the FIFA Women's Soccer World Cup is being held. In 2018, in Russia, the FIFA Soccer World Cup was held. In Russia was it necessary to adjective male football? The World Cup is feminine because it is played by women. Does the World Cup played by men need to announce that it is male? A pass, a dribble, a shot, a goal, can we be masculine or feminine? How do you dribble as a non-feminine? Is Marta's goal feminine?

It seems difficult to maintain that there may be a sports performance marked by the gender of its participants, perhaps it is the case of stating that the French World Cup is a women's soccer game. The sport cannot ignore the seriousness and classification. The sport does not divide its participants solely by sex/gender, but by size, weight and other indicators that will be measured in documents or by searching for chromosomes or hormones. Once again, saying that football is played by men is a simple confirmation or marking that it is not played by men, or that it is still serious or expected?

And let's just talk about soccer? Can the size of the grass, two goals, or number of athletes, or time of play be essentialized and be all football? This year we have the FIFA World Cup just like last year. Does this seem to make sense? We take it, as Judith Butler (2003), that the genre is a feito, a verb, a performatividade, could we think of a genre of performance that encompasses as many men as women regarding the practice of playing soccer? Or would the “football” genre make sense?

The genre cannot be thought of as cast into naturally distinct bodies. Eventually, the sports could potentialize a discussion on the concept of gender in some directions. I point out two possibilities of tension in opposite directions: a) returning to the logic of gender performativity, could there be a demand for sports practice that disregards the body of men and women? Could an identical performance expectation erase these gender boundaries? b) once it is a gender-generating and androcentric institution of our culture (Mühlen; Goellner, 2012), in the absence of an adjective it will not be associated with practice directly to the masculine or, not least, to the men? How masculinities can be the protagonists in sports representations that sport ends up being understood as masculine, dispensing with the necessities of these adjectives? Com isso, would we always be talking about something hierarchically inferior, reinforcing the existing borders?

Marildes Maciel Mota, or simply – and nothing less – Formiga, is the athlete who most competed in World Cup editions, seven in total, in addition to being the athlete who most times wears the jersey of the Brazilian soccer team. In the third round of the group stage, Marta Vieira da Silva, six times voted the best soccer player in the world, scored her seventeenth goal in five editions of the World Cup. In both cases, the information could be complete, but it always continues: between women and men. The German Lothar Mathäus played five world cups. Ronaldo in 2006 scored his fifteenth goal and Miroslav Klose ultrapassed in 2014, scoring six. It could be a memory problem, but I can't remember which plugin was used. Is it increasing or diminui or feito de homens ou de mulheres? Is it the same for you?

But there is still an adjective to be thought of in this text: feminist! To become the top scorer of the tournament, Marta, who is playing in the world championship as a symbol of gender equality in her game, affirmed that her personal record was dedicated to women: “a sport that is still masculine for many.” The French World Cup is increasing the visibility of the sport in South America, I authorize myself to say about the mobilizations that have occurred in Brazil and Argentina, countries that have the greatest contacts. This visibility is accompanied by athletes and day laborers supporting the need for greater equality in the fields of sports, sports newsrooms and in all spheres in which differences are transformed into inequalities. If women's or men's soccer allows a more forceful approach to feminism, but an important step will be taken for this revolution, this commitment of all in ending our sexist and patriarchal culture! Until victory!

References

Butler, J. (2003). Gender problems: feminism and identity subversion. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: Civilização Brasileira.

Louro, GL (2004). Gender, sexuality and education: a post-structuralist perspective. Petrópolis, Brazil: Voices, 7th ed.

Meyer, DEE (2003). Gender and education: theory and politics. In: GL Louro; Neckel, J.F.; Goellner, SV (Orgs.), Body, gender and sexuality: a contemporary debate (pp. 9-27). Petrópolis, Brazil: Voices.

Mühlen, JCV; Goellner, S. V. (2012). Representations of femininities and masculinities (re)produced by the Terra site. Brazilian Sports Sciences Magazine. Florianopolis, 34(1), p. 165-184.

^[1] Doutor e Mestre em Educação (PPGEdu/UFRGS). Sports Journalism Specialist (PPGCom/UFRGS). Member of the Group of Studies in Education and Gender Relations (GEERGE). Through the concept of masculinities curriculum and twisting the work on machismo, heterossexism, racism, emotions and elitization in football stadiums. Email: [email protected]