Sexual Assault and Rape in Sport
- Par Helen Owton
This chapter considers the norms for gender and sexuality in sport subcultures (e.g. team-based contact sports) that may involve more violence-supportive attitudes, which means characteristics embedded in a masculinist culture can normalise the sexist part of sport and trivialise sexual harassment, rape and abuse. Sexual assault and rape in sport are motivated by ‘power over’ and ‘power as property’. The vignettes and poems that are presented in this chapter focus on the rape Bella experienced at 17 years of age. The discussion that follows considers the possibility of destabilising readers’ preconceived assumptions about gender and power in sport, challenging some of the commonly held beliefs about rape where the rapist is usually a stranger.