Tailgate Warriors Exploring Constructions of Masculinity, Food, and Football

Par Maria J. Veri, Department of Kinesiology, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Ave., San Francisco, CA 94132, USA. Email: mjveri@sfsu.edu

Abstract

This study provides a textual analysis of the 2009/2010 Food Network series, Tailgate Warriors (TW). The show features teams representing National Football League (NFL) cities in competition to determine who has the best tailgate fare. TW is part of an evolution in Food Network programming from an instructional model with a largely female audience to a competition-based entertainment spectacle geared increasingly toward men. Hegemonic masculinity is reinforced across the four themes identified in our analysis of the mediated intersection of food and sport. Competitive spectacle, the preoccupation with meat, the complexity of menus and food preparation, and discourses around place identity all work to distance cookery from the femininely coded domestic space of the kitchen.