ABSTRACT

Two key value issues in youth sports development intersect in this article: 1) gender equality, and 2) the opportunity for youths to voice their concerns about their own participation. The purpose is to explore ‘gender equality’ as a topic of deliberation in Swedish youth sport, and specifically young sports person’s possibilities for speaking out about gender equality issues. The article draws on material from an interview study with 17 leaders and coaches, and 24 teenage athletes, with a particular attention on a focus group interview with three young badminton players. The findings indicate a dominating discourse about sport and gender that may contribute to undermine both the legitimacy of gender equality efforts and the opportunity for youths to voice their concerns. According to most leaders and coaches in the study, no problems with gender equality exist. However, some of the athletes voice experiences of injustice in their sports participation. At the same time, they indicated that talking about perceived injustice can be problematic in a sporting context. The article concludes that that there is ample room for creating opportunities for young athletes to systematically voice their concerns about their own participation, for example concerning gender (in)equality.

摘要

本文中涉及青年体育发展的两个关键价值问题：1) 性别平等，以及 2) 青年有机会表达他们对自己参与的担忧。目的是探索“性别平等”作为瑞典青年体育审议的主题，特别是青年运动员就性别平等问题发表意见的可能性。这篇文章借鉴了对 17 位领导者和教练员以及 24 位青少年运动员的访谈研究的材料，特别关注对三位年轻羽毛球运动员的焦点小组访谈。调查结果表明，关于体育和性别的主流话语可能会破坏性别平等努力的合法性和青年表达他们关切的机会。根据研究中的大多数领导者和教练的说法，性别平等不存在任何问题。然而，一些运动员在参与体育运动时表达了不公正的经历。同时，他们表示，在体育环境中谈论感知到的不公正可能是有问题的。文章的结论是，有足够的空间为年轻运动员创造机会系统地表达他们对自己参与的担忧，例如关于性别（不）平等。