Windows of equity? Media review of Czech gender hegemony during the 2018 Winter Olympic Games

Background: Sport media coverage of women’s participation has long been viewed as perpetuating hegemonic masculinity. Yet several authors have found recent coverage of mega, multi-sport events, such as the Summer Olympic Games, to be more equitable towards women, particularly when examined proportionally to participation. The Czech Republic for various reasons has traditionally been resistant to feminist ideology, marking its unique positioning in providing an equitable presentation of women’s participation. Objective: To examine the influence of hegemonic masculinity in an Eastern European culture, portrayed through Czech online media coverage of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games. Methods: Online media coverage of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games was examined for gendered differences of Czech athletes. Analysis of number of articles, length of articles, type of sport, and whether the article was about domestic or foreign athletes, was evaluated over 17 days of media coverage on two dominant Czech sport media websites. Results were compared in relation to gender, participation rates and medal success. Results: A total of 860 articles were reviewed, with 49.7% favoring male athletes, and 38.6% female. Articles about female athletes were largely composed of reporting on female medal winners (medal winning: media coverage correlation .845, p < .001), while those on male athletes were predominantly from the cultural dominant sport of men’s ice hockey (25.1%). Conclusions: The findings suggest that success is more important than perpetuations of hegemonic masculinity when men and women are competing in mega, multi-sport events. Implications of these findings are also provided in terms of type of media coverage and influences of equity in media coverage for the 2018 Winter Olympic Games.

internationally influenced sporting ventures, the Olympic Games, media coverage is assumed to be most representative of a nation's pride and values (Billings & Angelini, 2007;Billings et al., 2013;Cho, 2009). As such, scholars have consistently sought to examine the ways various media outlets provide coverage of men and women's Olympic participation.
Men's sport coverage often highlights men being bigger, faster and stronger, than their female counterparts. This tradition has only been disrupted when sport is evaluated artistically, or during women's success in mega multi-sex events, such as the Olympic Games Coche & Tuggle, 2016). Emphasis on women's artistic movements in sport are highlighted, even when performing the same movements men perform during competition (i.e., freestyle skiing; Greer & Jones, 2013). Gender coverage between the sexes is only stifled when women outperform men in competition (Billings & Angelini, 2007;Eagleman et al., 2014). Outside of the external acknowledgements of success, traditional gender differences tend to be emphasized, reinforced, and socialized through sport media coverage. The inequitable presentation of women's

Introduction
Resulting from the equal employment of genders under communism (True, 1999), and the apparent high value of women in society during the foundational inter-war First Republic (Šiklová, 1997), the Czech Republic has traditionally been portrayed as resistant to feminist ideology (Oates-Indruchová, 2016). Hegemonic masculinity has been identified in many facets of Czech society, despite this apparent cultural resistance to an ideology (True, 2003;Věšínová-Kalivodová, 2005), including Czech sport. Sport culture is considered to be a social institution that influences and reinforces social structures. In turn, aligned with traditional assumptions of sport's masculine pervasiveness, Czech sport participation and media coverage has been observed to reinforce male superiority (Stříteský, 2015).
Participants and consumers of sport culture often use various media outlets to acquire up to date results, background information, and the latest news items on their favorite teams and individual participants. However, the sport coverage these consumers and participants receive are laden with values that reinforce traditional notions of gender and national identity. Identified as one of the most visibility in sport prompts criticism of sport media's maintenance of sport's masculine social construction (Cooky et al., 2015;Jakubowska & Ličen, 2019;Kidd, 2013).
In the current paper, sport media coverage is analyzed in the Czech Republic in order to identify patterns of hegemonic masculinity. The current assessment is aligned with Delorme and Pressland's (2016) call for studies from various cultural contexts. The most followed sports in the Czech Republic are football and ice hockey (Čáslavová et al., 2007). In general, Pokorná (2016) found that 83% of Czech print sport media covers men. On a daily average, online sport media websites will each produce 14-20 articles about both football and ice hockey. These articles will include coverage of the home league, as well as international leagues, such as the football's UEFA Champion's League or ice hockey's NHL. Yet articles about women's participation in these two dominant Czech sports appear only once in two weeks on these same sport media websites. This imbalanced trend in media coverage, in favor of men, is troubling considering that the women's teams in each of these sports consistently outperform men in the UEFA Women's Champions League and IIHF European Women's Champions Cup, respectively. Sekot (2006) examined the Czech print media coverage of the 2004 Summer Olympic Games in Athens. He examined 817 total articles from three print newspapers, finding 52.4% of articles covered male athletes, 34.8% female athletes, and 12.9% covered both genders. These numbers corresponded to the 57% male to 43% female composition of the Czech team in Athens. Similarly, Slepičková (2010), found that even when taking into account participation proportionality, Czech newspaper coverage during the 2004 Olympic Games under-represented women and over-represented men by 5-7%. Slepičková's findings are similar to the multiple other studies illustrating the disparity between media coverage of men and women originating in the West (Cooky et al., 2015;Davis & Tuggle, 2012;George et al., 2001).
Several authors have examined men and women's media coverage fairness in Eastern European countries, such as Slovenia (Brown et al., 2017;Ličen & Billings, 2013a, 2013b, and Poland (Jakubowska & Ličen, 2019). Building on these findings, the current study examines the influence of hegemonic masculinity in an Eastern European culture, portrayed through Czech online media coverage of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games. A critical feminist framework is employed, asserting that media representation does not just reflect reality, but also structures and shapes gender perceptions in sport.

Hegemonic masculinity
Sport has traditionally fostered hegemonic masculinity, an ideological stance that privileges traditionally masculine traits, such as aggression and physical violence; marginalizing the characteristics and qualities most associated with women participants (Kidd, 2013). Hegemonic masculinity is the privileging of masculinity, qualities most associated with men, over femininity, most associated with women. Men are acknowledged as superior athletes and competitors, while women's contributions are often overlooked (Kidd, 2013).
The concept of hegemony originated from Gramsci (1971) to describe the ideological forces that allow for a hierarchical organization of individual interactions and social practices. Power is established and maintained in a nonviolent, nonphysical manner, such that the ideas of a dominant class are exerted over subordinate groups by means of persuasion, consensus, and manipulation (Connell, 2005). Connell has written extensively about how gender serves as a social construct that is mediated by hegemonic ideals (Connell, 1990(Connell, , 2005. Examination of gender's hierarchical social construction has identified sport leadership positions, opportunities for upward mobility, sport media coverage, among other contributors, as perpetuators of sport's hegemonic masculine construction. Sage (1998) suggested that sport serves as one of most hegemonic institutions in society, due to its masculine structure. Sport has traditionally been a male preserve enabling boys to mature into men (Kidd, 2013). The socialization process reinforces gendered roles that laud the benefits of athletic participation for men, but not women. Men are pushed to dominant aggressive sports such as ice hockey, while women are discouraged on the grounds that such sports are not feminine. Women are praised when they pursue 'socially appropriate' sports: artistic sports such as figure skating, which put their natural beauty on display; or individual non-contact sports such as cross-country skiing (Adams et al., 2005;Billings et al., 2008). The labeling of men and women's athletic contributions are magnified by sport media coverage. Sport media coverage serves as a prominent tool that can perpetuate the perception and understanding of a subordinate class through the presentation of ideals and values of the dominant class to maintain hegemonic masculinity.
The perpetuation of hegemonic masculinity has inextricably been tied to cultural values. Cultural values related to gender dominance are more often in alignment with the social construction of sport -privileging the participation and success of men. To maintain the status quo, in sport, scholars have recognized that the presentation of men and women serves as a microcosm of societal views and cultural values. In turn, the portrayal and presentation of men and women in sport have the ability to shape and reify societal beliefs of men and women (Fink, 2015;McCombs, 2005). This belief calls attention to the influence of men and women's sport media coverage on the value of men and women in society.

Gender and sport media coverage
Multi-sport mega events and online sport media coverage appear to be slowly disrupting hegemonic masculinity. Increasingly researchers are finding the media coverage of women's sports to be more equitable; when the analytical gaze is shifted away from the most visible, dominant sports in a culture (Kian & Clavio, 2011;Vincent, 2004). As such, the Olympic Games provides the best opportunity to examine gender differences in media coverage due to the various competitive matches occurring, simultaneously. During the Olympic Games, the best male and female athletes are able to compete and represent their country, heightening nationalistic pride in media coverage (Billings & Angelini, 2007;Vincent et al., 2002). Much research has focused on the Olympic Games where relatively equal numbers of men and women are competing in the same sporting event at the same time. More recent research indicates that there is increasingly more fair coverage of women in these contexts.
Scholarship surrounding various types of media coverage has provided mixed results regarding the influence of the type of medium (i.e. print) used to cover men's and women's participation has on viewership and commentary. Traditional media has consisted of print and newspapers and has predominantly focused on men (Burch et al., 2012), with few exceptions (Hardin et al., 2002). New media (i.e. online) has been observed to provide more opportunities for well-rounded coverage of men and women athletes and athletic events (Burch et al., 2012;Kian & Clavio, 2011;Kian et al., 2009). In result, online coverage of various national and international events has been identified as providing more equitable coverage of men and women sport competitions (Coche & Tuggle, 2016;Eagleman et al., 2014;Kian et al., 2009).
Scholars have looked to the new media coverage of the Olympic Games to better understand the widespread presence of bias regarding gendered media coverage. Burch et al. (2012) identified increased, equitable amount of coverage between men and women. Their results still criticize the quality of coverage men and women receive. Burch et al.'s study identified no statistical significance between men and women's Olympic coverage, when considering participation rates; denoting a "positive step in regards to coverage of female athletes" (p. 12). Delorme (2014) went further, re-examining 18 studies of the Summer Olympic Games taking into account participation rates and number of female events. When combining all factors, he found that women are only underrepresented in 22.24% of cases, which was significantly lower than the original studies indicated. Coche and Tuggle (2016) conducted a gender analysis of NBC's coverage of the 2012 London Summer Games and found that there was more coverage of women's events than men's; even though the coverage was based on "socially acceptable" sports. In alignment with hegemonic masculine ideals, the characteristics of individuals are relegated to qualities along the masculine-feminine continuum.

National identity and sport media coverage
Similarly, scholars have consistently found that Olympic media coverage reproduces narratives which reinforce national values and feelings of national pride (Milford, 2012;Min & Zhen, 2010). Media coverage within a country during international sport events contributes to national identity by creating national heritage around victory or defeat as they unfold, or by recalling past performances (Billings & Angelini, 2007;Maguire & Poulton, 1999). We are defining national identity here as, "a conception of common cultural heritage, patriotism as a pride in this heritage, and nationalism as the promotion of this national identity as being inherently superior to all other nation states" (Billings et al., 2013, p. 914). Similar to hegemonic masculinity, national identity is reinforced in media coverage by creating perceptions of different identity groups, and often accessing value to each identity group. As such, there is a necessity to examine media coverage in reference to the value placed on these identity groups, particularly in terms of gender and national identity. Delorme stated, "the inherent cultural and structural specificities of each country (e.g., predominance of male hegemony) are able to significantly influence the media coverage of sports according to athletes' sex" (Delorme, 2014, p. 143).
When gender and sport media coverage have been studied in other Eastern European countries, themes of hegemonic masculinity and national identity appear stronger than in western countries. Brown et al. (2017) found that portrayal of national identity, while differentiated from western nations such as the United States, was equally important in a new, small nation, such as Slovenia. A study of Slovenian television coverage of the 2008 Olympic Games stated that notions of nationality and gender using content analysis "would be deemed inappropriate in many societies," (Ličen & Billings, 2013b, p. 379). The Slovenians won two medals, but national identity was enforced as, "Sports announcers behave as (although mild) patriotic supporters, rather than reporters," (p. 392), and coverage of individuals and teams expected to perform well was higher than other Slovenian athletes competing (Ličen & Billings, 2013b). Similarly, Jakubowska and Ličen's (2019) study of newspaper coverage of the Polish teams participating in the European Basketball Championships found 3.5 times more coverage of the men's team than the women's team, and significantly longer articles about the men's championships than women's. Importantly, the author's state, "The divide identified in this study of Polish basketball coverage represents a significant departure from the communist-era promotion of gender equality and women's empowerment in all areas of society including sport" (Jakubowska & Ličen, 2019, pp. 316-317). These findings are significant for the cultural parallels between the Czech Republic and these two other Eastern European, post-communist nations.
The current study seeks to quantitatively assess Czech 2018 Winter Olympics online media coverage of men and women participants. Burch et al.'s (2012) analysis of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games identified 'gender appropriate', 'socially acceptable' sport coverage between men and women. The amount of coverage devoted to men and women, type of sport, length of articles, and participation rates will be analyzed to identify the presence of gendered discriminatory media coverage in Czech sport media.

Research questions
What gender inequities between men and women's online sport media coverage are observed during the 2018 Winter Olympics for Czech athletes?
What influence does participation and performance have on the number of articles devoted to men and women?
What impact does article length provide when comparing men and women's participation and performance? Acta Gymnica, 2021, 51, e2021.004

Overview
For the purpose of this research, a quantitative content analysis was conducted focusing on two dominant Czech online sports websites. Quantitative descriptors examined include: number of articles, length of articles, type of sport and whether the article was about domestic or foreign male and female athletes.

Data set
The choice of data set was modeled on previous online gender media analysis (Burch et al., 2012;Eagleman et al., 2014). The digital media analysis tool rating.gemius.com was used to select the media outlets reviewed. The tool analyzes website traffic, monitors page views and time spent per page. The first monitored file derived from sport media outlet sport.cz after specifying the Winter Olympics 2018 period, and identifying the outlets highest rating regarding searches for sports pages having the highest values of all descriptors. The results for the portal sport.cz were in all monitored categories at least twice as high as the results of other servers.
The second and third place results had similar values, namely the media outlets sport.idnes.cz and isport.blesk. cz. Thus, the second portal sport.idnes.cz was chosen for review.

Data collection
Data was collected on articles for the period February 8-25, 2018. Data collection began one day after the official opening ceremonies and extended to include dates beyond the official competition schedules, similar to previous studies (Kian & Clavio, 2011;Sekot, 2006). For ease in comparison with other studies, the current research does not include articles covering the opening and closing ceremonies, or articles which did not relate to participants' sporting activities, such as general reviews or evaluations of the Pyeongchang Games (Davis & Tuggle, 2012).

Quantitative analysis
Number of articles was the primary quantitative descriptor. Similar to comparison studies when articles referred to both males and females in the same article, the article was categorized as both, rather than male or female (Burch et al., 2012;Davis & Tuggle, 2012;Eagleman et al., 2014;George et al., 2001;Kian & Clavio, 2011;Vincent, 2004). Proportionality is based on this descriptor. The data are compared based on participation proportion, called for by Malec (1994).
Article length is compared based on George et al. (2001). However, these authors calculated article length based on the number of standardized newspaper lines. Measuring online mediums, the word-per-article method was used in this study, with delineations into three categories: articles up to 200 words, articles with 201-400 words, and articles over 400 words. Article length does not include article titles or photo captions.
Articles were categorized and compared per type of sport (Burch et al., 2012;Davis & Tuggle, 2012;Eagleman et al., 2014), with categories based on officially recognized sports of the 2018 Winter Olympics, such as biathlon, skating, curling, ice hockey, skiing. Bobsled and luge were merged into one category due to the small Czech presence in the data sample.
Individual articles were also analyzed based on their comparison of domestic or foreign athletes, as observed by Sekot (2006). Articles were classified as foreign if they predominately reported on men or women from countries other than the Czech Republic.

Data analysis
Data was recorded manually and analyzed using Microsoft Excel (Version 2016; Microsoft, Redmond, WA, USA). All statistics (Spearman correlations, χ 2 , and df) were calculated in IBM SPSS Statistics (Version 26; IBM, Armonk, NY, USA). All articles relating to the Olympic Games on the above identified media websites from February 8 to 25 th , 2018 were read by two independent researchers. A total of 860 articles were reviewed.
Data on individual descriptors was compared between genders, between sports, and between both sports media servers. Proportionality in relation to participation was given high consideration.

Results
A total of 860 articles from the 2018 Winter Olympic Games from the media servers sport.cz and sport.idnes.cz were analyzed. The participation and success rates of the Czech Olympic team during the 2018 Winter Olympics are reported in Table 1. Overall participation was 58.6% male and 41.4% female; the Czech team ratio was lower at 72.3% and 27.7%, respectively. It should be noted that in terms of participation, 26.6% of the Czech team was composed of the men's ice hockey team. In terms of Czech success, six of the seven medals won were won by women. The only two gold medals came from Ester Ledecka, who took a surprise win in alpine skiing's super G; as well as snowboarding parallel giant slalom where Ledecka had been ranked at the top of the world for two consecutive years. Participation and performance numbers help to establish a standard of comparison for quantity of media coverage devoted to sport, gender and success.
As Table 2 and Figure 1 illustrate, media coverage largely reflected athlete participation by sport. Results of the Spearman correlation indicated that there was a positive association between sport participation and media coverage (r s = .659, p = .03). This significance of this correlation increases when we separate genders in regards to male and female participation and media coverage (male: r s = .608, p = .04; female: r s = .876, p < .001). When coverage exceeded participation (biathlon, skiing, snowboarding and speed skating), it is primarily explained by the Czech team winning medals in those sports. Spearman correlations of medal winning and media coverage were not significant for men (r s = .401, p = .22), but were highly significant for women (r s = .845, p < .001). Coverage was greater than representation in the sport of Curling, as Czechs had no  participants, and all articles written were about foreign athletes. When we compare media coverage by sport to participation (Tables 1 and 2, Figure 2), a similar pattern displaying coverage exceeds participation when there were no Czech participants (i.e., curling for men and women, ice hockey for women, ski jumping for women, and speed skating for men); and when Czech medals were won (biathlon for women, skiing for women, and snowboarding for women). Interestingly, men's coverage of biathlon did not exceed participation even though a silver medal was obtained there. Table 3 shows, of the 860 total articles, 49.7% covered men, 38.6% women, and 11.7% reported on both sexes (χ 2 (2) = 10.45, p = .005). Results can be compared between media servers, with sport.cz offering almost equal coverage between the genders, while sport.idnes.cz dedicated significantly more articles to men, than women. When reporting on foreign athletes, coverage significantly favored men, while coverage of Czech athletes was almost equal.
The number of articles were analyzed in more detail, on the basis of proportional participation (Malec, 1994). For the purposes of this research, proportional participation is the ratio of men (70.5%) and women (29.5%) participating as members of the Czech team (Burch et al., 2012). Czech women appear to have received significantly more coverage than their proportional participation would predict, while foreign athletes' coverage was much closer to their proportional gendered participation. If results are compared to proportional medal success (Table 1), with 85.7% of medals won by Czech women participants, then women should have received significantly more coverage. When reporting on medals won, or athletes from whom medals are expected, sport editors generally report on the performance itself, with interviews of athletes and coaches, both before and after the performance.
Length of the articles was examined. The 17 video reports were not included in this analysis, so the data set was reduced to 843. It was hypothesized that articles covering men would be longer than articles about women. Overall, as displayed in Table 4, articles most commonly ranged 201-400 words, and the difference in article length between men and women was insignificant (χ 2 (4) = 4.33, p = .363).

Discussion
The number of articles based on gender was primarily investigated, and this study found uneven distribution in favor of men, namely 49.7% for male athletes and 38.6% for female athletes. These results parallel those found in television research of the 2008 Summer Olympics (Davis & Tuggle, 2012), the US Open in 2007 (Kian & Clavio, 2011), as well as the Wimbledon tennis tournaments of 2000 (Vincent, 2004). Assessing new media coverage in the 2012 Summer Olympics, men consistently had a higher overall percentage among all countries surveyed (Eagleman et al., 2014). When we factor in gender participation percentages and medals won (six out of seven by women), it becomes apparent that Czech online media coverage mirrored equitable success. The largest percentages of articles written, with the exception of the male dominated, culturally primary sport of ice hockey (n = 216, 25.1%), were from the sports of biathlon (n = 107, 12.4%), skiing (n = 136, 15.8%), snowboarding (n = 99, 11.5%), and speed skating (n = 89, 10.4%), where Czech medals were won. In fact, three of these four sports also had significantly higher coverage of women than men, sending a strong message that success is more important than gender when examining multi-sport mega events, such as the Olympic Games. These results mirror the findings of others who found that equitable coverage can be explained by nationalist bias, providing significant visibility for female athletic success (Billings & Angelini, 2007;Delorme, 2014;Eagleman et al., 2014). Media coverage of Czech athletes, similar to that of other nations during the Olympics (Billings et al., 2013;Min & Zhen, 2010), is used to reinforce national identity. Our results show that when measured in terms of participation and national identity, masculine hegemony largely disappears creating apparent windows of equity.
Ice hockey represents an interesting case in this analysis. As previously stated, 26.6% of the Czech team was composed of the men's ice hockey team. These 25 men represent the only team sport, and collectively could only win one medal. Proportionality, though clearly driven by market forces, is apparent here as 25.1% of the articles written covered ice hockey. This finding is in contrast to those of Delorme (2014), who stated that individual Olympic athletes who succeed will typically generate more media coverage than team success. The Czech ice hockey team entered the 2018 Winter Olympics considered a favorite for the gold medal, but lost the bronze medal game to finish fourth. Ice hockey is a primary sport in the country and success in this sport is very closely tied to national identity (Numerato, 2010). Our findings parallel those of Ličen and Billings (2013b), who found increased coverage of expected medal winners in the similarly small, new nation-state of Slovenia. All ice hockey articles written about women (n = 9) or covering both (n = 4) men and women, concerned success of the two teams which made it to the final, or the unified North/South Korea women's team. This observation reinforces the notion that women may appropriately compete in individual sports, but men still rule the team sports.
Article length was observed to be insignificant between men and women's online media coverage. Thus, our findings confirm those of past studies (Burch et al., 2012;Eagleman et al., 2014;Hardin et al., 2002;Kian et al., 2009), supporting the claim that the internet affords the media to be more equitable in their coverage and consequently present a more accurate depiction of multi-sport mega events. As Burch et al. (2012) stated this is a positive step for the coverage of women. In the context of Czech online media coverage, the findings are remarkably similar to those found by Sekot (2006), 14 years prior, in the context of the Summer Olympic Games. The distribution of media coverage was within 4% each for men, women and both; but the total coverage allotted was greatly increased via internet coverage. Sekot was examining three print media sources and had a total of 817 articles (number of days was equal, though the Summer Olympics has significantly more events). Our examination only covered two internet sources, resulting in 860 articles, or a 157.9% increase in total coverage.
Like Burch et al. (2012), our study covers the Winter Olympic Games, which is composed of only one team event, ice hockey. Thus we would add to Coche and Tuggle's (2016) list of socially acceptable sports for women the winter sports of biathlon, cross-country skiing, figure skating, skiing, snowboarding and speed skating. At the same time, we contend that not only is the online media coverage of ice hockey representative of hegemonic masculinity, but also the individual winter sports of bobsleigh and luge, nordic combined and ski jumping.
Similar to the sport gender media studies conducted in Slovenia and Poland (Jakubowska & Ličen, 2019;Ličen & Billings, 2013a, 2013b, and in contrast to the Czech Republic's historic resistance to feminist ideology (Oates-Indruchová, 2016), the communist era promotion of gender equality and women's empowerment is only upheld as a means of supporting national identity. While coverage of Czech women was significantly bolstered by their out-performance of Czech men, coverage of foreign athletes reflected hegemonic masculinity in granting foreign men 57.2% of coverage, while only allocating 29.4% to women. Windows of equity are provided in order to support national identity in coverage of a multi-sport mega event. As Delorme (2014) has stated, national coverage of such events tends to "overrepresent and glorify their athletes" (p. 122). Similar to other studies, proportional gender coverage in sport media around the Olympic Games, provides macro narratives about national values and ideals (Milford, 2012).
The quantitative methodology chosen for this article is only one way of examining equity. While we contend that quantitative differences in coverage between gender, when relative participation is taken into account, does provide evidence of hegemonic masculinity, further qualitative research could be used to further develop these claims. Even if Czech female Olympians are afforded relatively equitable amount of coverage, if they are not framed through their athletic accomplishment, but by how they "do gender" then notions of hegemonic masculinity are reinforced.

Conclusions
Overall, our results, consistent with previous studies, showed more articles written about male athletes, than female. In all sports where Czechs won medals, media coverage exceeded participation percentages. Given that six of the seven medals won by Czechs were won by women, we should not be surprised to have found high correlations between medal winning and media coverage among Czech women. Consequently, our results show that success brought Czech women increased visibility, but inequitable coverage relative to participation, and not relative to their actual success (which would have equaled 85.7% of coverage).
The question remains, what opens these windows of the apparent equity in media coverage the Czech context? The Czech Republic has traditionally been resistant to feminist ideology. This notion has not meant that hegemonic masculinity was not evident in the culture, but is actually preserved in sport media coverage. However, it appears that when the sport event is important to national identity, such as the Olympic Games, then reporting on the collective success of the national identity supersedes gender identity. Additionally, our research affirms that the move to online media coverage, as others have noted, provides space for more equitable coverage; both in terms of number of articles and length of articles. Finally, we propose that the specific context of winter sports, with the exception of the sport of figure skating, asexualizes athletes. While team sports remain primarily the bastion of men, the only team sport represented in the Winter Olympic Games is ice hockey.
For future studies, the authors believe qualitative analysis, examining gender framing through text and photographs, is needed of Olympic winter sports online media, in order to examine the presence of gendered appropriation of winter sports.