Although sport historically represents an important vehicle for the dissemination of values and principles, it is often an arena of discrimination, most all based on gender (Balbo, 2001). The paper is aimed at analyzing the issue of the participation of transgender women in female sports in order to identify which are the main discrimination factors. To achieve this goal, the article analyzes the online conversations on the House Bill 2706 of Arizona that proposes that transgender female student athletes should not take part in female sporting activities, as they have physiological benefits that would make unequal the sport competitions. In particular, the paper studies the contents about this issue hosted on Twitter, the popular real-time microblogging social network. The method is based on design data mining analysis, supported by the use of software for quantitative analysis of the content. The study considers Tweets published during the period between February and March 2020. Sentiment analysis of Tweets shows that the road to the complete acceptance of the female transgender universe in sport is still very long and difficult to follow.
Sports beyond genders. Sociological analysis on the participation of trangender women in female sport competitions
Salvatore Monaco
2020-01-01
Abstract
Although sport historically represents an important vehicle for the dissemination of values and principles, it is often an arena of discrimination, most all based on gender (Balbo, 2001). The paper is aimed at analyzing the issue of the participation of transgender women in female sports in order to identify which are the main discrimination factors. To achieve this goal, the article analyzes the online conversations on the House Bill 2706 of Arizona that proposes that transgender female student athletes should not take part in female sporting activities, as they have physiological benefits that would make unequal the sport competitions. In particular, the paper studies the contents about this issue hosted on Twitter, the popular real-time microblogging social network. The method is based on design data mining analysis, supported by the use of software for quantitative analysis of the content. The study considers Tweets published during the period between February and March 2020. Sentiment analysis of Tweets shows that the road to the complete acceptance of the female transgender universe in sport is still very long and difficult to follow.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
