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SSHRC 2024 Proposal
The Athletic Influencer: How do Olympians use Social Media to join Gendered Political Discourse
Research Problem:
At the Paris 2024 Olympics, there were some heated debates about gender on social media, including a trans-investigation of boxer, Imane Khelif. This sparked political debates about gender relating to the Olympics. In recent years, the intersection of sports, gender, and politics has become increasingly prominent, with athletes using their platforms to influence public opinion and political discourse. Olympic athletes, or Olympians, hold a unique position due to their international recognition and symbolic representation of national pride. This research seeks to explore how Olympic status affects the ability of athletes to sway political discourse in the media. Specifically, how gendered political discourse is influenced by Olympians posting on social media.
Social media has become a powerful tool for public figures to engage in political and social discussions. Olympians, with their global visibility, often extend their influence beyond the sports arena by joining and shaping conversations on social issues, including gender politics. This study aims to investigate how Olympians use their social media platforms to engage in a gendered political discourse, highlighting how their participation challenges or reinforces gender norms.
Ultimately my main research question is: How do Olympians use social media to engage in conversations around gender and politics? With a secondary interest in understanding: How does the public engage with or respond to Olympians’ contributions to gendered political discourse?
Context:
In political science and sports, gender is understudied. I want to connect the three, sports, political science, and gender, to conduct research that will highlight the influence of Olympians on political discourse, specifically where gender is concerned. Most importantly, there is a rise of social media being used as a political space (Gainous & Wagner, 2014; Miller, 2016). Therefore, having Olympians using social media, they can be influencing gender discourse and making political statements to share beyond just their athletic achievements. As seen in the recent Olympics, Paris 2024, there has been a surge in gender discourse, especially relating to gender testing of the athletes, such as in boxing (e.g. Imane Khelif).
Objectives:
The primary objective of this research is to investigate the influence of Olympic athletes on political discourse using Meta-owned social media platforms. I am particularly interested to see how Olympians use Instagram as a platform for their voices regarding political matters. The reason I select Instagram is it has recently been demonstrated that it is a strong vehicle for political activism, with Taylor Swift garnering over 300,000 clicks to US voter registrations per the link shared in her Instagram story post (Lebowitz & Marquez, 2024). Alternatively, Christine Sinclair, a prominent Canadian Soccer player, boasts about 110,000 followers but continues to share content being viewed and shared around the world.
The secondary objectives of this research are to identify key themes and issues that Olympians address in their own political statements being shared on Instagram and Meta-based platforms, such as Facebook and Threads. I would like to analyze how the posts create traction in the community. The comment sections of these posts will help me understand how the public is reacting to these political statements made by Olympians.
My research will examine the content of the posts made by Olympic athletes and the comment replies made to these political statements.
Methodology:
My research will rely on qualitative media content analysis with a specific focus on social media posts that bring up relevant political content in relation to the Olympics. Specifically, I would like to focus on social media posts made by Olympians. For data collection, I will create a new Instagram account dedicated to the research, so it is not influenced by previous algorithms. Next, I will use a keyword search to collect posts that relate to political statements by Olympic athletes, hoping to accumulate anything I can find relating to the most recent 2024 Paris Olympics. Finally, my data analysis will use coding techniques to identify reoccurring themes and patterns in the social media coverage. Additionally, I aim to conduct at least 30 interviews with Olympians from the Paris 2024 Olympics on their own political stances and how they choose to share their beliefs. The emphasis will be targeting Canadian athletes, though other nations will not be excluded in the broadcast. The inclusion criteria include athletes who are queer or identify themselves as allies to the LGBTQ+ community. There are no age restrictions since athletes can range greatly in age by sport. I understand that access to this community can be challenging but I have a connection through my brother who competed at the Paris Olympics and advocates for the LGBTQ+ community as a gay volleyball player. These interviews will contribute to my research and understanding of how Olympians are trying to convey their political statements on gender. From a theoretical perspective, I aim to rely on feminist theory to help analyze how Olympians engagement with gender issues may reinforce or challenge patriarchal norms. Social constructionist framework will also support my media analysis. I also aim to use representation theory to investigate how different gendered Olympians may represent gender issues differently on social media. My experience working with social media begins from a personal fascination but stems into my work as research assistant to Dr. Greg Feldman, at the University of Windsor, where I coordinated posts, collected data, and helped run the social media pages for Today’s Totalitarianism.
Program study:
Currently, I am a second-year Ph.D. student in the Department of Political Science at McMaster University, working under the supervision of Dr. Tony Porter. Dr. Porter’s specialization in governance of digital and other technologies will be useful in utilizing social media and digital technology. In addition, Dr. Jules Boykoff, from Pacific University, brings a specialization of Olympics relating to political activism. Finally, Dr. Marshall Beier, the third committee member from McMaster University, will help to understand the Olympians as Political Actors and their roles in political discourse. In the first year of funding, I will initiate data collection and begin conducting an analysis of the information gathered. In the second and third years of funding, I will be focusing on dissemination of the information and sharing it with prominent journals and presenting the information at conferences. By the end of the third year, I will have a completed thesis and will be graduating with a PhD in Political Science.
Contributions:
This research will contribute to understanding the role of Olympic athletes in political discourse and media influence, where queer athletes are otherwise underrepresented. By highlighting how their status as Olympians impacts their ability to sway public opinion, this study will provide valuable insight for athletes, media professionals, and policymakers. The findings can help in developing strategies to effectively utilize the platforms of high-profile athletes for social and political advocacy. While the Olympics are historically apolitical (Bruton, 2020), the athletes posting on social media is a chance for their voices to be heard aside from whatever their institutions share. By sharing on social media, they have a chance to be heard by people outside of the Olympic network and beyond sports.
This research aims to fill the gap in understanding how Olympic athletes influence political discourse through Meta social media platforms. By examining social media coverage posted on Meta, the study will shed light on the power dynamics at play and the potential for Olympic athletes to contribute to political and social change. Support for this research will provide a foundation for further studies and practical applications in the field of sports, media, and politics. My intention is to provide a further gendered based discourse analysis that considers queer athletes and queer voices about the Olympic Games. By producing this gendered and queer based study, an under-represented field of research can be explored by a disabled, racialized, queer student and provide literature representing these values. In doing so, I will be providing insight into how public figures, particularly athletes, contribute to gender equality discussions.
Kayla Lui 