Women worldwide are making their presence felt as sport fans in rapidly increasing numbers. This book makes a distinctive and innovative contribution to the study of sport fandom by exploring the growing visibility and interest in women who follow sport. It presents the latest data on women's sport spectatorship in different regions of the world, posing new theoretical paradigms to study the globalised nature of female sport fandom. This book goes beyond conventional approaches to analysing the practices of women sport fans. By using a critical feminist perspective to investigate cultural conditions and social contexts (including globalisation, digital networked technologies, consumerism, neoliberalism and postfeminism), it brings into view a diversity of women's voices and experiences as sport fans. It sheds new light on the power dynamics of gender, ethnicity and sexuality influencing women's participation in sport spectatorship and interrogates the ways female sport fandom is made visible through transnational media networks. Women Sport Fans: Identification, Participation, Representation is fascinating reading for all those interested in sport and gender, the sociology of sport, or women's studies.

Why do women follow sports? How do they participate from the sidelines and what is the significance of this contribution? What can female fandom tell us about gender relations in sport? This book explores these and related questions by bringing together the varied strands of research being conducted internationally across the social sciences and humanities on this emerging and topical field. While sports spectatorship is a popular and well-respected site of analysis, no book-length, scholarly contribution documents women's experiences of sports fandom. For this reason, there is an obvious need for a book that offers researchers, students and non-professional readers an authoritative introduction to women's modes of sport support. Sport and Its Female Fans will be a landmark contribution in the field of sport research and in studies of sports fandom, making an original contribution to the growing, yet under-researched, area of female sports spectators.

Why do women follow sports? How do they participate from the sidelines and what is the significance of this contribution? What can female fandom tell us about gender relations in sport? This book explores these and related questions by bringing together the varied strands of research being conducted internationally across the social sciences and humanities on this emerging and topical field.

While sports spectatorship is a popular and well-respected site of analysis, no book-length, scholarly contribution documents women 's experiences of sports fandom. For this reason, there is an obvious need for a book that offers researchers, students and non-professional readers an authoritative introduction to women 's modes of sport support. Sport and Its Female Fans will be a landmark contribution in the field of sport research and in studies of sports fandom, making an original contribution to the growing, yet under-researched area of female sports spectators.

This edited collection critically explores new and emerging models of female athleticism in an era characterised as postfeminist. It approaches postfeminism through a critical lens to investigate new forms of politics being practised by women in physical activity, sport and online spaces at the intersections of gender, ethnicity, sexuality and ability. New Sporting Femininities features chapters on celebrity athletes such as Serena Williams and Ronda Rousey, alongside studies of the online fitspo movement and women's growing participation in activities like roller derby, skateboarding and football. In doing so, it highlights key issues and concerns facing diverse groups of women in a rapidly changing gender-sport landscape. This collection sheds new light on the complex and often contradictory ways that women's athletic participation is promoted, experienced and embodied in the context of postfeminism, commodity feminism and emerging forms of popular feminism.

This edited collection critically explores new and emerging models of female athleticism in an era characterised as postfeminist. It approaches postfeminism through a critical lens to investigate new forms of politics being practised by women in physical activity, sport and online spaces at the intersections of gender, ethnicity, sexuality and ability. New Sporting Femininities features chapters on celebrity athletes such as Serena Williams and Ronda Rousey, alongside studies of the online fitspo movement and women's growing participation in activities like roller derby, skateboarding and football. In doing so, it highlights key issues and concerns facing diverse groups of women in a rapidly changing gender-sport landscape. This collection sheds new light on the complex and often contradictory ways that women's athletic participation is promoted, experienced and embodied in the context of postfeminism, commodity feminism and emerging forms of popular feminism.

Women worldwide are making their presence felt as sport fans in rapidly increasing numbers. This book makes a distinctive and innovative contribution to the study of sport fandom by exploring the growing visibility and interest in women who follow sport. It presents the latest data on women's sport spectatorship in different regions of the world, posing new theoretical paradigms to study the globalised nature of female sport fandom. This book goes beyond conventional approaches to analysing the practices of women sport fans. By using a critical feminist perspective to investigate cultural conditions and social contexts (including globalisation, digital networked technologies, consumerism, neoliberalism and postfeminism), it brings into view a diversity of women's voices and experiences as sport fans. It sheds new light on the power dynamics of gender, ethnicity and sexuality influencing women's participation in sport spectatorship and interrogates the ways female sport fandom is made visible through transnational media networks. Women Sport Fans: Identification, Participation, Representation is fascinating reading for all those interested in sport and gender, the sociology of sport, or women's studies.

Bringing a lively and accessible style to a complex subject, "Cyborgs and Barbie Dolls" explores the idea of the "posthuman" and the ways in which it is represented in popular culture. Toffoletti explores images of the posthuman body from goth-rocker Marilyn Manson's digitally manipulated self-portraits to the famous TDK "baby" adverts, and from the work of artist Patricia Piccinini to the curiously "plastic" form of the ubiquitous Barbie doll, controversially rescued here from her negative image. Drawing on the work of thinkers including Baudrillard, Donna Haraway and Rosi Braidotti, "Cyborgs and Barbie Dolls" explores the nature of the human - and its ambiguous gender - in an age of biotechnologies and digital worlds.