Sporty Girls

Sheryl Clark is Lecturer and Researcher in the field of educational studies at Goldsmiths University of London, UK. With a particular interest in gender, sport, identities, youth, schooling and girlhood, Sheryl’s research makes use of qualitative methods working with children and young people in schools and other physical activity settings.

• 1. Defining a “Problem”: Girls’ Participation in Sport and Physical Education.- 2. Embodying Sporty Girlhood: Exploring Perspectives on Girls’ Sporting Participation Through Postfeminism.- 3. Becoming a Sporty Researcher: Gender, Legitimacy and Bodies That Move.- 4. A Good Education: School Achievement, Sport and Becoming a Successful Girl.- 5. Being “Good at Sport”: Constituting Bodies Through Competition and Selection Processes.- 6. Responsible Body Projects, Health and Moral Hierarchies.- 7. Gendered and Racialised Bodies in Postfeminist Athletics: Embodied Capacities and Feminist Rage.- 8. Conclusion: Sporting Girlhoods and Feminist Possibilities.

“The author’s emphasis on the lived experiences of girls, their stated reactions—both positive and negative—to sport participation, and a recommendation for more input from girls going forward, is exemplary. … This book, along with others in the series, is worth reading for scholars’ data-driven perspectives that can inform future feminist philosophical theorizing on the body.” (Peg Brand Weiser, Hypatia - A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, November 26, 2024)