UNDERSTANDING SPORT THROUGH HER EYES: A PARTICIPATORY PHOTOVOICE APPROACH TO GIRLS’ SPORT PARTICIPATION By Lauren Szczygiel A DISSERTATION Submitted to 2019 Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Kinesiology – Doctor of Philosophy ABSTRACT UNDERSTANDING SPORT THROUGH HER EYES: A PARTICIPATORY PHOTOVOICE APPROACH TO GIRLS’ SPORT PARTICIPATION By Lauren Szczygiel The purpose of this dissertation was threefold: (1) to expand the body of literature on facilitators and barriers to African-American girls’ participation in sport; (2) to ensure that the girls’ own voices remain an essential part of the story; and, (3) to give girls the skills and empower them to be agents of change in their communities. In order to achieve these goals, a Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) framework using the PhotoVoice method was employed. YPAR is a methodological approach to positive youth and community development based in social justice in which young people are trained to conduct systematic research to improve their own lives, the lives of their community members and promote or instigate change to the problems they identified. PhotoVoice is a participatory method which sends youth out into their communities with cameras to document their lived experiences. The narratives surrounding these photos are then used to promote dialogue about community assets, social issues and issues of access and barriers. For this project, a girl’s sport leadership council in Detroit were given cameras to document their experiences in sport and physical activity in the Detroit community. The girls participated in focus groups over the course of 12 weeks to discuss their photos and identify ways that key figures in the community can address issue they have identified. Finally, the project culminated with the girls presenting their findings to decision-makers at Detroit PAL, funders and parents. Results of the study revealed that girls participated in sport for a variety of reasons including achieving a sense of personal growth and development, forming friendships and connections with teammates and coaches and the sense of pride and connection to their city that participating in sport gave them. Facilitators of their sport participation were emotional and instrumental support from their families, and increased access to public recreation spaces in Detroit. Barriers included lack of facilities and general access to sport in middle school and high school, difficulty balancing academics and sport and perceived lack of community support for girls’ sport. Finally, the participant’s in this study identified reasons why they believed more girls were not interested in sport. Reasons they identified included incompatibility of sport with societal expectations of beauty and girl’s not seeing sport as a viable activity due to overemphasis of boys’ sport. In addition to identification of facilitators and barriers of sport participation depicted through the photos that the girls took, and Critical Race Theory and gender lens analysis of the data was also conducted. The girls in the study described a heightened awareness of their race when they were at predominantly White competitions or when they were members of predominantly White teams. During focus groups, the girls would often narrate their experiences through what they believed White people perceived them as. The girls also described times when they experience racial “micro-aggressions” and ways that that affected the ways they viewed White referees, competitors and teammates. This dissertation is dedicated to my husband, Ed, thank you for sticking with me through this whole thing. We finally did it. To my parents, See what happens when I apply myself? Thank you for all your love and support. To the wonderful ladies of the Girls Changing the Game program, this is as much your work as it is mine. Thank you for your strength, perseverance and boundless curiosity. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my tireless advisor, Dr. Daniel Gould for his advice and guidance throughout my entire doctoral career. Thank you for showing me how to put my love of sport to good use. Additionally, I’d like to thank the members of my committee for their assistance and valuable advice. I would like to thank Dr. Ramona Cox of the Detroit Police Athletic League for her invaluable help and assistance in seeing this project through beginning to end. I could not have done it without her. v TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES ......................................................................................................................... iv LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................................... v CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................. 1 Sport as a Tool to Enhance Health and Psychosocial Well-being ................................................... 1 Racial and Gender Disparities in Sport Participation ...................................................................... 3 Context – Detroit ............................................................................................................................. 8 Participatory Action Research ....................................................................................................... 11 Purpose of the Study ...................................................................................................................... 12 CHAPTER 2 – REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE ...................................................................... 14 On Race and Gender – The Cultural Meanings of Sport ............................................................... 14 Critical Race Theory ................................................................................................................. 14 Seeing Girls’ Sport Participation through a Critical Lens ........................................................ 19 Race and Sport Participation - Black Athletes in America ....................................................... 25 Socialization into Sport ................................................................................................................. 28 Sport and the Urban Context ......................................................................................................... 33 Barriers and Facilitators to Girls’ Sport Participation ................................................................... 36 Youth Empowerment through Community Engagement .............................................................. 38 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 40 CHAPTER 3 - METHODOLOGY AND METHODS ................................................................. 42 Reflexivity Statement .................................................................................................................... 42 Methodology .................................................................................................................................. 44 Youth Participatory Action Research ....................................................................................... 45 PhotoVoice: A Method for Youth Participatory Action Research ........................................... 47 Method ........................................................................................................................................... 52 The Study Site ........................................................................................................................... 52 Participants ............................................................................................................................... 53 Procedures ................................................................................................................................. 53 Recruitment and Sampling. .................................................................................................. 53 Phase I: Data collection. ...................................................................................................... 54 Phase II: Youth ReACT data analysis. ................................................................................ 60 Phase III: Turning research into action. ............................................................................... 61 Methodological Rigor and Ethical Considerations ........................................................................ 62 Validity and Trustworthiness .................................................................................................... 62 Ethical Considerations .............................................................................................................. 64 CHAPTER 4 - FINDINGS ............................................................................................................ 66 Participant Profiles ........................................................................................................................ 66 vi Ruby ......................................................................................................................................... 66 Ava ............................................................................................................................................ 67 Brooklyn ................................................................................................................................... 67 Destiny ...................................................................................................................................... 67 Jessie ......................................................................................................................................... 68 Ashley ....................................................................................................................................... 68 Brittany ..................................................................................................................................... 68 Sasha ......................................................................................................................................... 69 Emily ......................................................................................................................................... 69 Overview ....................................................................................................................................... 69 PhotoVoice Narratives ................................................................................................................... 70 Why do Girls Play Sports? ....................................................................................................... 70 Summary .............................................................................................................................. 73 What Makes It Easier to Play Sport? ........................................................................................ 74 Summary .............................................................................................................................. 77 What Makes It Harder to Play Sports? ..................................................................................... 78 Summary .............................................................................................................................. 81 Why Aren’t More Girls Interested in Sports? ........................................................................... 82 Summary .............................................................................................................................. 85 Girls’ Experiences and Perspectives on Race in Sport .................................................................. 85 “You Just Feel Really Disrespected” - The Centrality of Race and Racism ............................ 87 “I Feel Like White People Think We Are a Threat” - The Centrality of Experiential Knowledge ................................................................................................................................ 93 Girls’ Experiences and Perspective on Gender in Sport ............................................................... 97 “We're Just Left Under a Rock” ............................................................................................... 97 “Girls Are Always Worried About How Their Body Looks and How They Present Themselves” ........................................................................................................................... 103 Youth-Led Analysis of Findings ................................................................................................. 106 Higher Order Theme 1: External Factors ............................................................................... 106 Higher Order Theme 2: Societal Standards and Expectations ................................................ 108 Higher Order Theme 3. Passion .............................................................................................. 109 Higher Order Theme 4. Empowerment .................................................................................. 110 Higher Order Theme 5. Gender Inequality ............................................................................. 111 Higher Order Theme 6. Internal Factors ................................................................................. 112 Higher Order Theme 7. Pressure from Adults ........................................................................ 113 Debrief and Exit Interviews ......................................................................................................... 113 Recommendations and Suggestions ............................................................................................ 114 External Factors ...................................................................................................................... 114 Societal Standards/Expectations ............................................................................................. 115 Passion .................................................................................................................................... 115 Empowerment ......................................................................................................................... 116 Gender Inequality ................................................................................................................... 116 Internal Factors ....................................................................................................................... 117 Pressure from adults ............................................................................................................... 117 vii CHAPTER 5 – DISCUSSION .................................................................................................... 119 Key Finding Links to Existing Research ..................................................................................... 120 Reasons for Participation ........................................................................................................ 120 Race and Gender ..................................................................................................................... 126 YPAR and Youth Empowerment ................................................................................................ 129 Limitations, Strengths and Future Directions .............................................................................. 130 Study Limitations .................................................................................................................... 130 Study Strengths ....................................................................................................................... 131 Future Research Directions ..................................................................................................... 132 Implications ................................................................................................................................. 133 Girls’ Sport Programming and Youth Voice .......................................................................... 133 Policy Implications ................................................................................................................. 135 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 136 APPENDICES ............................................................................................................................. 138 APPENDIX A - Human Subjects Approval ................................................................................ 139 APPENDIX B - Recruitment Flyer ............................................................................................ 140 APPENDIX C - Parental Consent Form ..................................................................................... 141 APPENDIX D - Participant Assent Form ................................................................................... 144 APPENDIX E - Participant Consent Form ................................................................................. 147 APPENDIX F – PhotoVoice Project Schedule ........................................................................... 150 APPENDIX G - Schedule of PhotoVoice Introduction/Training Sessions ................................. 152 APPENDIX H - Participant Ethics and Safety Handout ............................................................. 154 APPENDIX I - Photo Reflection Sheet ....................................................................................... 155 APPENDIX J - Schedule of Discussion Sessions ....................................................................... 156 APPENDIX K - Candy Sorting Game ........................................................................................ 157 APPENDIX L - Newspaper Editor Game ................................................................................... 158 APPENDIX M - Message Scavenger Hunt Game ...................................................................... 159 APPENDIX N - Photo Release Form .......................................................................................... 160 APPENDIX O - Study Information Brochure ............................................................................. 161 APPENDIX P - Youth Authorship Release Form ....................................................................... 162 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................ 163 viii LIST OF TABLES Table 1. Barriers to Girls’ Sport Participation ............................................................................... 37 Table 2. Facilitators of Girls’ Sport Participation ......................................................................... 38 Table 3. Research questions and photo framing questions ............................................................ 56 Table 4. PhotoVoice Ethics: Minimum best practices .................................................................. 64 Table 5. Five Central Tenets of CRT use in Analysis ................................................................... 86 ix LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Racial distribution of Metro Detroit from the 2010 Census ............................................ 9 Figure 2. Overview of Project Phases ........................................................................................... 62 Figure 3. Why she plays sport - Ruby ........................................................................................... 70 Figure 4. Why she plays sport - Brittany ....................................................................................... 71 Figure 5. Why she plays sport - Brooklyn ..................................................................................... 72 Figure 6. What makes it easier to play sport - Ava ....................................................................... 74 Figure 7. What make it easier to play sport - Ruby ....................................................................... 75 Figure 8. What makes it easier to play sport - Jessie ..................................................................... 76 Figure 9. What makes it harder to play sport - Jessie .................................................................... 78 Figure 10. What makes it harder to play sport - Ava .................................................................... 79 Figure 11. What makes it harder to play sport - Emily ................................................................. 80 Figure 12. Why more girls are not interested in sport - Jessie ...................................................... 83 Figure 13. Why more girls are not interested in sport - Destiny ................................................... 84 Figure 14. Diagram of Theme 1 - External Factors ..................................................................... 107 Figure 15. Diagram of Theme 2 - Societal Standards ................................................................. 108 Figure 16. Diagram of Theme 3 - Passion ................................................................................... 109 Figure 17. Diagram of Theme 4 - Empowerment ....................................................................... 110 Figure 18. Diagram of Theme 5 - Gender Inequality .................................................................. 111 Figure 19. Diagram of Theme 6 - Internal Factors ...................................................................... 112 Figure 20. Diagram of Theme 7 - Pressure from Adults ............................................................. 113 x CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION Sport as a Tool to Enhance Health and Psychosocial Well-being Sport has traditionally played an essential role in the lives of children and adolescents and is associated with many physical and psychosocial benefits. Several studies have reported an association between sport participation, physical fitness and risk of overweight and obesity (Perkins, Jacobs, Barber, & Eccles, 2004; Pharr & Lough, 2014). A study of British youth found that sport participation was associated with higher amounts of accelerometer-measured moderate-vigorous physical activity, and sport participants had lower body fat percentage than non-participants (Basterfield et al., 2015). A similar study conducted by Leek and colleagues (2011) found that for young athletes, sport accounted for 20 percent of their total daily energy expenditure. Sports have been shown to be a fruitful avenue for promoting physical activity in children and adolescents because they are a fun and motivating way to encourage young people to meet physical activity recommendations (M. C. Nelson, 2006; T. F. Nelson et al., 2011). In addition to being a fun way to be physically active, sport participation is associated with positive psychosocial outcomes. Eime, Young, Harvey, Charity and Payne's ( 2013) systematic review of health benefits of sport found a relationship between organized sport participation and social functioning, emotional well-being, reduced risk of suicide, increased self-esteem and decreased social anxiety. Sport has also been pursued as an avenue to foster positive development in youth. While sport participation in and of itself does not create changes in youth, programs which are designed with personal development in mind have been found to promote teamwork and cooperation, a sense of responsibility and civic responsibility among other positive psychosocial benefits (Conroy & Coatsworth, 2006; Côté & Hancock, 2016; Petitpas, Cornelius, Van Raalte, Jones, et al., 2005). One of the most robust studies of positive 1 youth development through sport is the First Tee golf program which is a sport organization whose aim is to build character, instill positive values and promote healthy habits in youth. An evaluation of this program found that when coaches and volunteers were adequately trained, youth learned interpersonal and self-management skills and were able to transfer these life skills to other settings (Weiss, Stuntz, Bhalla, Bolter, & Price, 2013). Weiss and colleagues (2019) conducted a study which examined the effects of Girls on the Run, another national PYD-based after-school program that was designed to enhance girls’ social, psychological and physical development. Results of the evaluation reveal results similar to the First Tee study; girls’ who participated in the program improved on measures of character as identified in Lerner’s 5 Cs model (Jones, Dunn, Holt, Sullivan, & Bloom, 2011; Lerner, 2005). Moreover, sport is an important leisure-time activity for children and adolescents because of the social and cultural role that it plays it the United States (Coakley, 2014). Sport is traditionally a context where children can work with same-aged peers to achieve a common goal. This kind of teamwork requires responsibility, dedication and an ability to problem solve and overcome adversity (Driska, Gould, Pierce, & Cowburn, 2017). Sport participation, as with participation in other extracurricular activities, exposes young people to positive peers and adult role models. Research has shown that exposure to positive significant others increases the likelihood of positive life outcomes such as employment and college attendance (Larson, 2000; Lerner et al., 2017). Therefore, given the benefits of sport participation, researchers are reasonably concerned about the amount of youth who have access to sport opportunities. Unfortunately, there is a lack of national surveillance of youth sport participation and dropout rates by public health agencies in the US, so the most up-to-date and comprehensive information comes from private organizations such as the Sport & Fitness Industry Association 2 (SFIA). According to participation numbers provided to the Aspen Institute by SFIA, after a decrease in 2013, youth sport participation rates have been slowly increasing (Aspen Institute, 2018). However, girls sport participation rates still lag behind those of boys with the report showing that boy’s participation rates increased slightly from 61.1% to 61.9% while girls’ participation rates decreased slightly from 52.8% to 52.3%. Prior research has shown that girls are less likely to get involved and stay involved than boys (Butcher, Lindner, & Johns, 2002; Eime, Harvey, et al., 2013). As outlined previously, sport participation and physical activity are associated with positive psychosocial and academic outcomes when the context is designed to meet the needs of developing children and adolescents intentionally. Girls, in particular, may receive additional benefits of sport participation over and above the general benefits of sport participation. Gore, Farrell, and Gordon (2001) found that sport participation helped protect girls but not boys with low GPA from depression symptoms. Female athletes have also been shown to be more self- confident, achievement-oriented and have higher perceived physical and academic competence than female non-participants (Sabo, 2009). Additionally, girls who participate in high school sport are more likely to complete college, when controlling for income (Troutman & Dufur, 2007). It is therefore essential to ensure that sport programs are accessible to all members of a community, regardless of race, gender, income or ethnicity. While facilitating access is a necessary movement towards a more equitable society, it is also a movement towards healthier communities. Racial and Gender Disparities in Sport Participation Since the implementation of Title IX in 1972, girls’ participation in school organized sport increased significantly. The title IX reform, which prohibited discrimination on the basis of 3 sex in any federally funded education program or activity, led to a 600% increase in girls’ sport participation between 1972 and 1978 (Kaestner & Xin Xu, 2010; Stevenson, 2007). Title IX’s passage marked a landmark achievement in women’s rights, and the benefits introduced by the bill are still present today. Pre and post cohort analysis showed that a 10 percentage point increase in girls’ sport participation was associated with a 1 percentage point increase in female college attendance and a 1 to 2 percentage point increase in female labor force participation rates (Stevenson, 2007, 2010). However, despite these increases, there is still a gap between male and female sports participation. A survey of high schools found that approximately 4.5 million boys participated in high school sport in the 2017-2018 school year while only 3.4 million girls participated in sport (The National Federation of State High School Associations, 2019). Girls’ most frequently reported barriers to participating in sport were lack of time, concerns about appearance (e.g. sweating, makeup, hair etc.), body consciousness, teasing by boys and lack of social support (Allender, Cowburn, & Foster, 2006; Eime, Young, et al., 2013a; Grieser et al., 2006; Robbins, Pender, & Kazanis, 2003; Slater & Tiggemann, 2010). An analysis of middle school students’ perceived barriers to participating found that while boys and girls reported similar constraints, girls rated the influence of these constraints significantly higher than boys (Casper, Bocarro, Kanters, & Floyd, 2011). This finding suggests that while boys and girls may have similar access to sport, girls are more affected by these constraints, and although the reason for this difference in perception is not apparent, it is clear that these constraints play a significant role in the difference in sport participation between boys and girls. Looking at trends in girls’ sport participation rate, one pattern, in particular, stands out. For both girls and boys, sport participation, as well as the amount of physical activity, starts to decrease around middle school, and the rate of decrease is much more pronounced in girls. A 4 2015 report of girls’ and boys’ sport participation rates showed interesting differences in participation by grade (Child Trends Databank, 2015). Approximately 66 percent of eight grade boys and 61 percent of eight grade girls participated in at least one school-sponsored sport. The gap in participation was greater for 10th graders with 67 percent of boys participating in sport and only 59 percent of girls. The gap widens even further for 12th graders to 62 and 51 percent of boys and girls, respectively. This pattern was also supported by Butcher and colleagues (2002) in a retrospective analysis of competitive sport withdrawal. Specifically, the researchers found that sport withdrawal peaked for both girls and boys in seventh and tenth grade, when children are transitioning to new schools, and girls were quitting sport at a significantly higher rate than boys in 9th and 10th grade. Similar results have been found in other studies such as an analysis conducted by Pharr and Lough (2014) which found that 8th grade girls were almost twice as likely to participate in at least one sport compare to girls in grade 12. Pate, Dowda, O’Neill, and Ward (2007) found that girls’ sport participation rates decrease from 45.4% in 8th grade to 34.1% in 12th grade. Overall, these studies show that as girls grow and develop and advance in school, additional factors affect either their motivation or constraints to sport participation. Disparities in sport participation are even more pronounced for urban girls when compared to their suburban counterparts. Girls who live in urban areas enter sport at a later age than boys, and urban girls are also significantly more likely to drop out of sport than rural or suburban girls (Sabo, 2009). Research shows that while urban, suburban and rural families report similar constraints to their children participating in sport or physical activity (Moore et al., 2010), differences in sport participation rates can partially be explained by a variety of factors including family income, community makeup and cultural factors (Sabo, 2009). Factors that contribute to this phenomenon include larger populations of Black residents in urban 5 communities and Black girls, in particular, have lower rates of sport participation compared to White girls and Black boys, due in part to cultural views of sport participation, access to sport programs and facilities and income (Goldsmith, 2003; R. W. Turner, Perrin, Coyne-Beasley, Peterson, & Skinner, 2015). While girls as a group participate in sport at a lower rate than boys, Black girls have significantly lower rates of physical activity than girls of other races and are more likely to be overweight or obese even when controlling for income (Sabo, 2009; Sabo & Veliz, 2014). Getting more Black girls involved in organized sport and physical activity in middle school and high school is essential as these critical developmental periods set the foundation for behaviors later in life. Girls who play sport in high school and middle school are significantly more likely to be physically active later in life (Eime et al., 2013; Greenleaf, Boyer, & Petrie, 2009; Pfeiffer et al., 2006). Explanations for disparate rates in physical activity between Black girls and girls of other races have ranged from differences in neighborhood structure, access to parks and recreation facilities and just different interests (Carroll-Scott et al., 2013; Casper, Bocarro, Kanters, & Floyd, 2011). This avenue of research has led to many school and neighborhood interventions which have been somewhat effective but difficult to implement due to costliness (Dobbins, Husson, DeCorby, & LaRocca, 2013; Lonsdale et al., 2013). However, even well-intentioned programs and interventions can perpetuate the same issues that they were created to address. A particularly informative example of this kind of issue is found in Cooky’s (2009) study of the Girls Play Los Angeles (GPLA) program which was designed to improve sport access and participation for low-income girls. Through interviews with girls and adults associated with the program and ethnographic observations, Cooky (2009) found that the program ended up 6 reproducing societal structures that contribute to disparities in the first place. For example, games and practices in the GPLA were held at times that were inconvenient for girls. Either they were earlier in the day when girls’ parents were at work and unable to take them or they were late at night when girls’ parents did not feel it was safe to have their daughters out of the house. Low practice numbers then led coaches to believe that girls were not coming to practice because they were not interested in sport which in turn led to a decrease in the number of practices offered, further hampering girls’ access. Another example includes a GPLA game being canceled because another team (made up of girls whose parents paid a large registration fee for them to join the team) had scheduled the facility for the same time. The paying team was given preference because organizers assumed that the girls were more interested because their families had invested more for them to play the game (Cooky, 2009). These examples show how disparities in society such as income and access can still be present in programs that are designed to combat them. Therefore, it is important that researchers be critical in the way that they explore these disparities and attempt to address them. Sport is an activity which offers significant benefits to those that participate and is also an important cultural experience for many living in America. It has the potential to form habits and create experiences in childhood that can have a lasting impact into adulthood. The participation disparity between boys and girls is an area that critical for sport and exercise scientists to address. Additionally, research should address the issues of the most vulnerable in society, in this instance, girls of color who live in urban areas and participate in sport to an even lower extent than their white counterparts. 7 Context – Detroit We hope for better things; it shall rise from the ashes. Detroit is the largest city in Michigan and the largest majority Black city in the US. It has - Motto of Detroit experienced a population decline from a peak of 1.85 million residents in the 1950s to 672,000 since the most recent census data (Eisinger, 2014). In 2013, Detroit filed for bankruptcy, the largest filing for municipal bankruptcy in US history. While Detroit has been on the path to recovery since former Michigan Governor, Rick Snyder, announced the end of the bankruptcy period in December of 2014, it has still been faced with a significant lack of infrastructure, high unemployment and poverty rates (McCann, 2018; U.S. Census Bureau, 2018). At the same time, Detroit can be seen as a comeback case. Its downtown area has been thriving and is the home to two brand new professional sport stadiums, modern housing and hundreds of new restaurants and stores with additional plans for further development (Curbed Detroit, 2019). In 2013, a coalition of local businesses commissioned a report which described the central downtown area of Detroit as “growing,” “vibrant” and “diverse” (7.2 SQ MI, 2015). The report detailed areas of increased economic opportunities with busy tourist areas and high tech jobs. This divided picture of, on one side, a vibrant, up and coming city, and on the other, one of the poorest cities in America, has been dubbed “The Tale of Two Detroits” (Alvarez, 2017); an instance where prevailing structural inequalities have prohibited access for members of vulnerable communities to this “new” Detroit (Rubin, 2016). This disparity is reflected in census data which shows that Detroit’s median household income has risen to $28,099, the first rise in the median income since 2007 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2018). However, the census data also show that the majority of the income gains went to Hispanic and White residents; there was not a 8 significant rise in income for Black Detroiters. Moreover, according to a report by the Urban Institute, a disproportionate amount of state subsidies and private investments are directed toward midtown and downtown while other neighborhoods are mostly neglected (Theodos, Dev, & Latham, 2017). Detroit remains one of the most racially and economically segregated cities in America (Sauter & Frohlich, 2016). Nearly 57.7% of Detroit’s Black residents live in predominantly Black neighborhoods, defined as areas where more than 80% of residents are Black. This kind of racial segregation is alarming and problematic because predominantly Black neighborhoods, on average, have deeper concentrations of poverty, lower school funding, and lack of neighborhood resources and infrastructure (Ostrander, 2015). Studies show that Black residents who live in racially segregated neighborhoods have lower incomes and lower educational attainments than Black residents who live in integrated neighborhoods (Boustan, 2013). In Detroit, 8 Mile Road Figure 1. Racial distribution of Metro Detroit from the 2010 Census White African American Asian Hispanic Other (Each dot represents 25 people) Fischer (2013). Racial Distribution of Metro Detroit map. Licensed under Creative Commons on wikimedia.org represents a physical de facto cultural dividing line between the predominantly Black city of 9 Detroit and the surrounding White suburbs and metro area. Figure 1 shows the racial distribution of the metro Detroit area. The noticeable separation between blue and red is 8 Mile Road. The reality that more attention is being paid to Detroit and that significant investments are being made into the city’s infrastructure is a sign the Detroit “shall rise from the ashes,” however, it needs to be rebuilt from the inside out. Rebuilding efforts must use Detroit’s communities as pillars of strength to empower populations of overlooked and ignored residents. If all residents do not have access to the city’s success, and if recognition of systemic injustices does not happen, then no real recovery can be made. A recent Project Play report by the Aspen Institute showed that progress is being made in Detroit to expand access to sport and recreational spaces for youth that live in the city (Aspen Institute, 2018). The report showed that 94% of children who live in Wayne County have adequate access to sport facilities. This is due to efforts by the city as well as philanthropic and non-profit youth sport organizations working to restore parks and facilities as well as fill the gap left by the financial emergency of Detroit Public Schools. The report also offered recommendations to what it saw as some of the key challenges facing youth sport in Detroit and the number one recommendation was to “Ask kids what they want” (Aspen Institute, 2018, p. 6). Research which prioritizes the voices of underserved communities is crucial to ensure not only that knowledge is representative of all people but that policies are also equitable. Participatory Action Research (PAR) is a methodology which prioritizes the voices of those who have been historically missing from knowledge production and policy crafting. Because the views of girls, particularly minority girls and those from underserved communities have been underrepresented in sport research, this project will employ a PAR framework. 10 Participatory Action Research Participatory Action Research (PAR) is a methodology in which people directly affected by an issue are actively engaged as co-researchers in either problem identification, data collection, intervention or some combination of the above (Rodríguez & Brown, 2009). PAR researchers believe that local co-researchers possess expert knowledge of their environment and experiences and provide unparalleled insight into community problems. In this kind of research, university researchers relinquish the role of sole experts to engage in collaborative research. PAR has been used extensively in research with marginalized communities whose voices have been absent from traditional academic discourse (Goh et al., 2009; Hergenrather, Rhodes, Cowan, Bardhoshi, & Pula, 2009; Holt et al., 2013). In PAR methods, local co-researchers actively engage and exercise influence over the production of scholarly knowledge; research is conducted with not on those affected by the issue (Cornwall & Gaventa, John, 2015). PAR is also pedagogical. Drawing on Freire’s (2000) ideas of critical consciousness, it is structured to enable local community members to develop the knowledge and skills to confront the problems in their lives and communities. As an aspect of validity, how problems are conceptualized, researched and how meaning is made of the results found must be authentic to local community members to ensure the applicability to the local context (Rodríguez & Brown, 2009). Youth-led participatory action research (YPAR) puts the tools of knowledge production in the hands of young people. It acknowledges their competence and expertise to understand sociopolitical processes which affect their lives and the power to create change. It acknowledges that young people deserve “meaningful participation in the construction of knowledge that guides policies and practices important to their experiences” (Rodríguez & Brown, 2009, p. 25). 11 Purpose of the Study The purpose of this dissertation project was threefold: (1) to expand the body of literature on facilitators and barriers to Black girls’ participation in sport; (2) to ensure that the girls’ voices remain an essential part of telling their health and physical activity stories; and, (3) to give girls research skills and empower them to be agents of change in their communities. To achieve these goals, the study employed a Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) framework using the PhotoVoice method. YPAR is a methodological approach used to facilitate positive youth and community development. Young people are trained to conduct systematic research to improve their own lives, the lives of their community members and to promote or instigate change to the problems they identified. PhotoVoice is a participatory method which sends youth out into their communities with cameras to document their lived experiences. The narratives surrounding these photos are then developed and used to promote dialogue about community assets, social issues and issues of access and barriers. For this project, a girl’s sport leadership council in Detroit were given digital cameras and asked to document their experiences in sport and physical activity in the Detroit community. The methods for this project were adapted from Foster-Fishman, Law, Lichty, and Aoun's (2010) Youth ReACT methods guidebook which has been used previously to conduct youth-led PhotoVoice research projects. The girls participated in weekly focus groups over six weeks to discuss their photos and identify ways that key figures in the community can address issues they have identified. The aim of this study was to explore and answer four main research questions: RQ1. Why do girls in Detroit participate in/play sports? RQ1a. What environment/contextual factors influence girls sport choices? 12 RQ2. What are facilitators to girls’ sport participation? RQ3. What are barriers to girls’ sport participation? RQ4. How do girls conceptualize girls’ interest or lack of interest in sport? RQ4a. What messages or signals to girls receive about the gender or racial appropriateness of playing sport? While there is considerable research on barriers and facilitators, this project went further in depth on these issues by utilizing a YPAR methodology to engage girls as co-researchers and knowledge generators in critical analysis of study data and identification of broader societal factors which may impact their access to sport and sport facilities including culture, social class, gender norms, economics and inequality. Finally, the project culminated in a community exhibition in which the girls were given the opportunity to share their findings with their parents and family members, administrators in Detroit PAL and other interested members of the community. 13 CHAPTER 2 – REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE On Race and Gender – The Cultural Meanings of Sport Critical Race Theory Critical Race Theory (CRT) is an academic theory formed during a movement in the mid- 1970s when a group of lawyers, activists, and academics noticed the civil rights progress of the earlier decade had stalled and some policies were being rolled back (Crenshaw, 1995). To counter this, scholars such as Derrick Bell, Richard Delgado, and Alan Freeman argued that the incremental, step-by-step progress of the civil rights movement was no longer meeting the needs of oppressed individuals to achieve true equality (Crenshaw, 1995). These writers and others who shared their vision argued that for real social progress to be made the very foundation of societal order had to be questioned. They posited that racism is endemic and deeply embedded in American life. Racism is not a series of individual actions, but systemic ingrained discrimination that resulted in widespread economic, educational and cultural inequality along racial lines (Crenshaw, 1995). When racism is viewed as a product of institutional power and whom that power lies with, it shifts the discussion of race in American from a White/Black discourse to one that includes multiple voices, colors, and experiences (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). CRT has expanded to educational research and, more recently, sport and physical activity research to uncover and interrogate racialized experiences and shed light on the racial oppression that people of color face (Harrison & Clark, 2016). Solorzano, a researcher in the educational field who has frequently been referenced in the sport literature for his work on CRT, outlined five central tenets of CRT: (1) the centrality and intersection of race with other forms of oppression; (2) CRT’s role in challenging the dominant ideology; (3) the importance of 14 experiential knowledge in the form of story-telling and counter story-telling; (4) a commitment to social justice, and (5) a transdisciplinary perspective (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001a, 2001). The first central theme is that racism is an ordinary and enduring part of American society and intersects with multiple other forms of subordination (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). Critical Race theorists do not acknowledge the separation of race and class oppression. They argue that these two are inseparable; class alone cannot account for racial oppression (Crenshaw, 1995). Additionally, race and class alone cannot adequately account for gender oppression. Therefore, the complexities of belonging to more than one marginalized group can only be interpreted through a lens of intersectionality. Black girls face additional challenges, both structural and cultural, which can limit their sport participation. Compared to their White counterparts, even when controlling for socioeconomic status, Black women and girls’ sport participation rates are far lower. They also lag behind the participation rates of Black men and boys (Eime, Harvey, et al., 2013; Telford et al., 2016). Second, CRT research must challenge the dominant ideologies present. Most often, this includes the ideas of a color-blind society, meritocracy, and objectivity (Brooks, Knudtson, & Smith, 2017; Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). In sport, a pervasive belief is that girls just are not interested in sport, that something biological or psychological makes them fundamentally different than boys and thus sport is not their domain. While not explicitly utilizing a CRT lens, Cooky’s (2009) comparative study of two different units of a girls’ sport program, outlined previously in the introduction of this paper, found that the unit which accepted the dominant ideology that girls just were not interested in sport had fewer participants and also participants that were less engaged in the sport. The unit that challenged this ideology by proactively addressing barriers to sport participation that their girls faced through constant engagement with 15 their girls and assessments of their own policies had more positive outcomes. One example of this is that the program organizers knew that there was a perception that their neighborhoods weren’t safe at night and parents weren’t letting their daughters go to practices or games at “unsafe hours”. To combat this, organizers set up “buddy walks” for practices that were later in the evening and schedule games on Sunday afternoons. As a result, their practices and games had consistently high attendance. This is in contrast to organizers on the other team who assumed that their low attendance numbers were due to girls not being interested or motivated to play sport (Cooky, 2009). The third pillar of CRT is the importance of experiential knowledge and the commitment to the belief that the knowledge and experiences of marginalized communities are valid and valuable and essential for understanding and theorizing about oppression (Brooks et al., 2017; Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). CRT researchers draw on this experiential knowledge in the form of counter-storytelling and narrative research. Most researchers in the sport and physical activity field are White, upper-middle class, academic men. While this does not take away from the knowledge and expertise that these individuals have brought to the field, their own worldviews are not representative of all sport participants, and the dominance of their voices can drown out the voices of other populations (Hylton, 2010). For example, Long and Hylton's (2002) examination of Whiteness and White privilege in sport argues that most sport research on the area of race and ethnicity has focused on the othering participants of color and further rooted the idea of Whiteness as “normal.” Singer's (2005) interviews with Black football players at Division I institutions showed that Black athletes had very different experiences from their White teammates. The Black athletes felt that their own experiences did not align with the image that the universities wanted to portray of their athletic departments. These Black athletes felt that 16 they lacked the opportunity to capture leadership position and have a say in decision-making processes and that most of the positions of power were held by White males. They lamented that Black athletes had to impress White power brokers for opportunities and recognized that it was White males who had the power over leadership positions in the organizational structure of the athletic departments (Singer, 2005). In terms of research and voice in girls’ sport, Bruening (2005) points out that much of the research on girls’ sport experiences has focused on middle- class White girls and their understandings versus low SES girls of color. The fourth tenet is a commitment to social justice and an obligation to address social and economic inequalities (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). Social justice is defined as “the elimination of racism, sexism, and poverty; and the empowerment of underrepresented minority groups” (Solorzano & Yosso, 2001). Anti-racism movements are not something new in the sport arena, athletes as activists have been somewhat commonplace in US history and this movement still exists today and can be seen in #BlackLivesMatter protests by athletes all across the country. Agyemang, Singer, and DeLorme's (2010) conducted and interview study with Black athletes on the topic of athlete activism using a CRT framework. The researchers found that athletes overwhelming thought that race and racism was still a problem in the US today and the athletes expressed skepticism that racism would ever be eliminated. The participants in the study noted that the position of Black athletes today was due in large part to athlete activists of the past such as Mohammed Ali and Bill Russel. The participants believed that Black athletes had a responsibility to speak of for injustices in their schools and communities due to their position in the public eye in addition to the “debt” they owed to athlete-activists who preceded them (Agyemang et al., 2010). 17 Finally, CRT gains its strength from its transdisciplinary approach drawing from fields such as history, sociology, law, psychology, education policy, and economics (Brooks et al., 2017). CRT finds a suitable home in the study of sports because of the history and relevance of sport in the US. Sport is an arena where racism, sexism, nationalism, and politics have converged throughout history; sport is not merely a reflection of society but is an area where these contestations are fought on the public stage (Coakley, 2014). “Sport privileges and stratifies and marginalizes at the same time it continues to have emancipatory and empowering potential” (Brooks et al., 2017, p. 6). A key example of using a CRT framework in sport to interrogate the role the race and racism plays was a study conducted by Glover (2007). Through interviews with Black Little League baseball coaches, Glover used a CRT framework to depict racist attitudes which were at the center of the professed color-blind policies of youth baseball. Interviews were conducted with seven adult volunteers with the First String program, a youth baseball league for Black children which was intentionally created to address dissatisfaction members of the Black communities had with the Little League baseball programs that existed in their neighborhoods. The goal of the Frist String program was to build neighborhood cohesion, promote Black heritage and provide Black role models for neighborhood youth (Glover, 2007). The most salient theme that arose from the interviews was that baseball policies and practices which were supposed to be color-blind and race-neutral privileged white children and disadvantaged children of color creating power imbalances among coaches, parents, and youth. An example of one of these policies was the practice of randomly distributing players across community teams to integrate all children impartially. The policy assumes that if Black youth are placed on teams with White teammates that race would cease to be an issue. However, this policy ensures that 18 any Black child who joins the Little League team would be the only person of color on that team, “it is unlikely that African American participants, no matter how integrated they become, will ever enjoy full acceptance as an equal because of their racial identity” (Glover, 2007, p. 204). Their minority status on the team characterizes their “integrated” experience. Glover argued that the color-blind policies of Little League actually reinforced the status quo and resisted the redistribution of power; White spectators did not have to deal with Black spectators, White players and coaches only had to “tolerate” the single Black player on their team, White values and conduct would be imposed on the Black player. This type of integration ensured that the Black player has no power because he or she is a minority on the team (Glover, 2007). In a similar way, a CRT framework can be used to re-shape the current conversation of girls’ sport participation in several ways; (1) it acknowledges the intersection of race, class and gender and how these affect the experiences of girls’ in sport; (2) it counters the narrative that girls are “the problem” rather than the gender discourses that hinder girls’ interest and opportunity to participate; (3) it prioritizes girls’ own words and stories and acknowledges the unique meaning of sport for girls of color based on their historical, social, economic and cultural relationship to sport remains racially segregated for most minority groups; (4) it recognizes the role that the civil rights movement as well as the women’s movement in sport have changed and shaped the way society views race and gender; and, (5) it provides a specific and richer historical, social and cultural context for understanding what sport means to girls and how they learn about, interpret and frame their own experiences. Seeing Girls’ Sport Participation through a Critical Lens While Black women share similarities with other women and Black men, they also have unique characteristics, experiences, and histories. Research, sport research, in particular, has 19 failed to acknowledge this. “Black women’s experiences have been assumed to be similar to White women or to Black men…The result is women of color have been systematically overlooked in sport research and theory” (Bruening, 2005, p. 331). Therefore, in order to understand that experiences of women in sport and physical activity settings, we must “develop more comprehensive feminist/womanist and race-relations theories as they apply to sport. Thus, more comprehensive and inclusive theory-building on gender, race and class relations can be developed” (Smith, 1992, p. 245). However, as (A. Hall, 1995) argued, merely including minority women as study participants is not enough. She argued that the existing theories and frameworks used in sport research are not necessarily sufficient to understand minority women’s experiences in sport and physical activity. More research needs to be conducted which includes and prioritizes the voices of women of color. A prominent belief in sports is that simply creating new programs or opportunities for participation, such that they are inclusive of minority groups should increase the representation of these groups (Cooky & McDonald, 2005). However, expanding opportunities does not necessarily lead to increased acceptance of minorities or changes to issues of access. A problem with this outlook, is that it presupposes that equal treatment of the sexes and race has been more or less achieved and people only need to be given access to sporting institutions to increase participation, and it fails in its inability to alter persistent sexist and racist ideologies which serve to legitimize and maintain systemic discrimination (Cooky, 2009). Research has repeatedly shown that girls lag behind boys in sport participation; this begs the question why does this inequality exist? While girls mention similar barriers to participation that boys do, these barriers appear to affect them more strongly (Casper et al., 2011). Sometimes, this disparity is characterized as a general lack of interest in sport. Some assert that because Title 20 IX exists, the playing field is equal, and any differences in participation are due solely to individual decisions and lack of interest or motivation. However, this perspective fails to take into account the multiple societal and contextual factors that shape and constrain individuals’ choices such as access to income and resources, the cultural value placed on sport and others activities as well as subtle messages about the acceptability of sport for girls and people of color (M. Messner, 2011; Svender, Larsson, & Redelius, 2012). Therefore, there has been a call for researchers to “examine the individual within the social, political, cultural and historical context which influences the sport and physical activity experiences of both males and females” (LaVoi, 2011, p. 272). A brief overview of the history of women’s sport participation, as well as some of the overarching themes that still affect girls’ participation today, will be discussed below. In 1972, the year before the Title IX was passed, only 7.2% of high school girls participated in sport (M. A. Messner & Solomon, 2007). Sport has traditionally been seen as the domain of the masculine, where boys learned the behaviors of heterosexual manhood (Coakley, 2014). Girls’ participation in sport was seen as unfeminine and against societal norms. There were even pervasive myths concerning women’s sports including the idea that strenuous sports or activities would lead to reproductive malfunction or that getting hit in the chest with a baseball would cause breast cancer (Coakley, 2014). Many people believed these myths because they were consistent with the dominant cultural belief that women were weak and more frail than men and needed to be protected. These myths also reflected the cultural idea that a women’s primary purpose was childbearing and that sport participation could risk this goal. Even when sports were offered for women in the early 1900’s, they were limited to artistic sports such as gymnastics and figure skating or sport with lanes, nets or dividers which separated competitors to protect girls from physical contact with each other (Cahn, 2015; Hargreaves, 2002). Therefore, these myths 21 and separation sport and physical activity into feminine or masculine categories discouraged many girls from participating in sport. Girls and women who challenged these boundaries and attempted to gain access to the male world of sports were perceived as invaders and threats to male domination in this area and were ridiculed and condemned by both men and women who accepted the orthodox gender hierarchy (Cahn, 2015; Hargreaves, 2002). In Cahn’s (2015) book on the history of women’s sport in the US, she described the tensions associated with women’s rise in sport rooted in societal fears about the changing role of women in the household and the workforce following the war, Try as they might, though, health and physical education experts failed to persuade the skeptics who were convinced that sport would turn the female body into a facsimile of the male. Such corporeal suspicions were often rooted in deeper concerns about the social implications of females’ athleticism…With her physical daring and spirited temperament, she took her place alongside politically minded suffragists and feminists, young working women known for their cheap finery and bold manners, and more staid but powerful professional women. Together they formed a threatening cadre of New Women whose public presence prompted shrill calls for a return to more familiar patriarchal arrangements (Cahn, 2015, p.20). Resistance to women and girls in sport, rooted in the historical context and meaning of sport, can still be seen today despite increasing numbers and participants and opportunities to play. Girls who decide to play sport may face pushback from their peers. Vu, Murrie, Gonzalez, and Jobe, (2006) conducted a qualitative study including interviews and focus groups with seventh and eighth-grade boys and girls to explore perceptions of girls’ physical activity. They 22 found that both boys and girls described physically active girls as “aggressive” and “tomboys.” One boy in the focus group stated, “it kind of makes me uncomfortable if a girl is more athletic than I am . . . cause it makes me feel less dominant. I feel inferior. I feel lacking. It makes me feel like the woman.” Moreover, when asked about girls sweating when they were physically active, the boys responded, “That’s gross…That’s nasty”. A survey of adolescent girls’ experience found that the majority (76%) of respondents had experienced sexism and discrimination in sports in the form of discouraging comments (Leaper & Brown, 2008). Girls are also more likely to experience being teased while playing sports by both same-sex and opposite-sex peers (Slater & Tiggemann, 2011). Moreover, the same study which sampled 714 adolescent boys and girls found that girls were more likely to feel that they were being stared at because of their appearance when they played sport and that the combination of teasing and body objectification made them feel less likely to want to continue playing sport. These results indicate that while there has been a considerable effort made to make sports more accessible for girls, there is still a social stigma surrounding sport and physical activity, especially when girls’ participation does not conform to the feminine ideal. The pressure to conform to the feminine ideal has frequently been mentioned by girls as a significant barrier to participating in sport or physical activity. Several qualitative studies which allowed girls to voice their concerns about physical activity and sport participation have found that girl’s worry about not being able to wear makeup, or having their hairstyles ruined made sports unappealing (Dwyer, Allison, Goldenberg, Fein, & al, 2006; Grieser et al., 2006; Whitehead & Biddle, 2008). Girls frequently expressed a “need” to look good, and that sport participation is in direct conflict with that need, with one girl stating that “you are completely 23 windswept, completely sweaty and out of breath…you can’t look perfect” (Biscomb, Matheson, Beckerman, & Jarrett, 2000, p. 660). Girls’ and women’s sport have also been viewed as inferior when compared to men’s sport. For example, Shakib & Dunbar's (2002) research on male and female high school basketball found that student’s view girls’ basketball as ‘less-than’ boys’ basketball, despite the girls’ team having a better winning record. This narrative is also reflected in the treatment the US National Women’s Soccer team who won the World 2015 and received $2 million from International Association of Federation Football (FIFA) while the winning men’s team received $35 million (R.L. Hall & Oglesby, 2016). Women’s sport also receives significantly less media coverage than men’s sport, with only 3.2% of the segments on ESPN’s SportsCenter focusing on women’s sports (Cooky, Messner, & Musto, 2015). Even when women do receive media attention as a result of their sporting successes, a concerning amount of coverage focuses on women’s bodies, clothing or other things that have little or nothing to do with her sport performance (Fink, 2015). A review of the literature on women’s sport media coverage conducted by Sherry, Osborne, and Nicholson (2016) showed in the media, women engaging in “gender appropriate” sports made up the bulk of women’s coverage. For example, female tennis players, followed by gymnasts and volleyball players, were significantly more likely to be featured than women from any other sport. The researchers also found that women were more likely to be photographed in passive positions, rather than actively engaging in their sport and that female athletes were more likely to be photographed in sexualized poses. This finding highlights the role that sports media plays in promoting an idealized feminine form through either not taking women’s sport seriously 24 by not offering equal amounts of coverage or, when women finally received media attention, portraying them not as athletes, but as sex symbols. In addition to constant social and cultural reinforcement that sport is not a girl’s place, girls are also more burdened with household chores and sibling care when compared to their male siblings (Dodson & Dickert, 2004; East, 2010; Romich, 2007). In the sport and physical activity literature, lack of time due to household responsibility has frequently come up as a barrier to girls’ sport participation. Dwyer and colleagues' (2006) qualitative study of adolescent girls’ perceived barriers to sport and physical activity found sibling care to be a significant barrier. One participant stated, “My parents go to work at night. I have two little twin brothers to take care of. So my parents are not home. So I feed them, wash the dishes, and clean the house” (p. 80). A study on the time use of American teenagers found that, on average, ninth grade girls and boys spent an average 17 and 15 hours per week, respectively, on household tasks including caring for younger siblings, cooking and cleaning (Gager, Cooney, & Call, 1999). This gap widens significantly to 13 hours of household tasks for girls and 9 hours for boys in 12th grade. This effect is especially noticeable in low income and single-parent households where “girls emerge as a prime substitute for parents” (Dodson & Dickert, 2004, p. 328). Having to devote so much time to housework detracts from both the time and energy that girls have available for sport or other leisure pursuits. Race and Sport Participation - Black Athletes in America The history of sport for Black Americans did not begin as a form of leisure as it did for White, typically upper-middle class individuals; it was often a means to an end (Brooks et al., 2017). Tom Molineaux, a former slave, and boxer grew up boxing with other slaves to entertain plantation owners in a way similar to cockfighting. Eventually, he was able to earn enough 25 money through prize fights to buy his freedom and move to England where he found success in London’s boxing rings (Virginia Historical Society, 2002). During Jim Crow, Black athletes used sport as a way to resist White dominance. During the 1960’s, athletes such as Tommie Smith and John Carlos used their sport platform as a way to bring attention to the plight of Blacks in America (Wiggins & Miller, 2003). Sport provided social and economic rewards for successful Black athletes and, in a world where they were regarded as second-class citizens, it gave them opportunities triumph over the dominant group (Brooks et al., 2017). Racially integrated sport is a relatively recent phenomenon. This change historically marked with Jackie Robinson’s integration of baseball in 1947. Previously, Black people were prohibited from playing White-organized sport and experienced difficulty gaining access to others (Blackman, 2016; George, 1994). While Black athletes experienced more success in sports such as boxing, and track and field, narratives of Black athletes in sport focused notions of their “genetic predisposition” towards sports which involved brute strength a speed, while more genteel sports were for White sportsmen and women (Cahn, 2015). In the mid-1900s, Black women found Olympic success and recognition in track and field, a sport which had been mostly abandoned by White American women as it was considered inappropriate and unfeminine (Cahn, 2015). Although Black women’s sport played second fiddle to Black men’s sport in the Black community, many still rallied around the icons of the day. And while sport was not completely accepted as an appropriate pursuit for women at the time, Black women were able to carve out their own definition of womanhood which fit with “…a heritage of resistance to racial and sexual oppression found in African American women occupying multiple roles as wageworkers, homemakers, mother, and community leaders…They created an ideal of womanhood rooted in the positive qualities they cultivated under adverse conditions: 26 struggle, strength, family commitment, community involvement, and moral integrity” (Cahn, 2015, p. 117). However, the cultural significance of sport participation for Black women took on a negative light when viewed through the White lens. Black female athletes’ successes were underpinned by racial framing of Black women as hypersexual and masculine(Cahn, 2015; Hargreaves, 2002). The influence of societal beliefs concerning race and gender still have an effect on Black girl’s perceptions of sport and physical activity. In their study of Black and White girl’s perceptions of the meanings of their body and physical activity, Azzarito and Solmon (2006) found that girls were concerned about the size, shape, and muscularity of their bodies and how these aspects reflected the way they fit into the societally prescribed meaning of femininity. Race and gender intersected with the meaning of and constrained girls’ participation in sport and physical activity. Taylor and colleagues’ (2000) qualitative analysis of Black girls’ experiences in physical activity and physical education classes found that girls consistently mentioned their hair as a barrier to being physically active. For Black women, hair can be a particularly pernicious and politicized issue. Hair texture and styling has served as a key marker of racial identity and a powerful visual cue for bias. (Robinson, 2011). For decades, “good hair” which means hair that is smooth, straight and long, has been idealized within the Black community, however, this texture is not naturally achievable for most Black women. Many Black women chemically straighten their hair and moisture, such as that from sweating, can undo the effects of the straightening and it takes large amounts of time and effort to straighten the hair again. When asked about how exercise affects their straightened hair, girls in Oliver and Lalik's (2001) study responded, “It looks a mess! It gets all wrinkly and stuff…It looks terrible!” The effects of a 27 common side-effect of being active (sweating) on their unique hair texture compounds with the pressure for Black women to look attractive. When beauty standards are tied inextricably to race, black women experience a specific burden not experienced by either black men or women of other races. Because Black women’s place in sport and physical activity have been shaped and framed through history, culture and society in ways that make it different from the experience of White women or Black men, the concept of intersectionality is critically important when examining the relationships between race, sport, and gender, whereby, the complexities of being a minority and a woman in sport cannot be reduced to either gender or race alone. Socialization into Sport The effects of race and gender in the US and women’s access to sport is not something that is relegated to the past. The inequalities which were once formally ascribed to, still influence women and girls today despite laws and formally policies that are supposed to address this. One way that girls’ sport experiences and choices are constrained is through the socialization process. Socialization is a complex social process of learning and cognitive development. It takes place when we interact with each other, and learn and internalize a culturally agreed upon set of beliefs and values (Coakley, 2014; Greendorfer & Ewing, 1981). Socialization involves forming ideas about who we are and what is important to us. It is a reciprocal process that encompasses all of the people, objects, images and cultural artifacts that we interact with. Socialization “represents a complex and dynamic assimilation of social, cultural, and cognitive processes through which we interact with others, synthesize information and actively participate in the world around us” (Greendorfer, Lewko, & Rosengren, 1996, p. 153). 28 Stemming from the ideas of Social Learning Theory (Bandura & Walters, 1963), socialization involves a process of imitating role models and receiving positive or negative feedback on one’s actions. Consistent reinforcement of behaviors serves as a primary mechanism for teaching children norms, values and societal rules and expectations. For example, as children interact with parents, other adults and peers they learn norms about what activities and behaviors are appropriate to engage in. For example, a child may receive praise or extra attention from parents when they engage in a behavior (e.g., music, sport), therefore, strengthening the positive association of engaging in it. Furthermore, socialization is not a one-way, one-off occurrence; it is an interactive process between children and their socializers. Children engage in the socialization process by accepting, rejecting, and providing feedback and as a result changing the way the socializing agents react to them (Coakley, 2014). In sport socialization research, Eccles’ expectancy-value model has been used as a framework to explain parent’s influences on their child’s sport choices. The expectancy-value theory states that parent’s expectations, values, and modeling behaviors influence their child’s choice of activities and their decision to persist in those activities (Eccles, 1983; Eccles & Harold, 1991; Wigfield & Eccles, 2000). Essentially, a child’s expectation of success in a task and the subjective value that they place on a task is directly influenced by their socializer’s beliefs and behaviors. In sport, parents are primary socializers in their child’s early years, but that influence wanes during adolescence when coaches, teammates and peer influences become more salient (Anderssen, Wold, & Torsheim, 2006; Brustad, 1992; Sheridan, Coffee, & Lavallee, 2014). A critically important but understudied factor in children’s sport socialization is the role that cultural influences play. As discussed in the previous section, sport is a culturally significant 29 institution in which ideological gender and racial barriers have been contested throughout history. Sport’s historical connection to male identity and masculinity has attached cultural and ideological meanings to children’s motor skills and development (Coakley, 2014; Greendorfer et al., 1996). Cultural beliefs about gender and race are profoundly influential in the socialization process. The socially constructed idea of what a woman “should” do and be or what a person of a particular race “should” do and be influence parents and essential others to treat children differently based on what is considered appropriate or inappropriate. When people hold ideas about appropriate activities or behaviors based on biological sex, they are engaging in gender role stereotyping. Gender role stereotyping is “a process in which a child’s biological sex frequently determines which activities s/he will and will not be exposed to as well as the way (or manner) in which s/he will experience those activities” (Greendorfer et al., 1996, p. 154). Research on children’s gender socialization has found that parents engage in gender role stereotyping very early on in their children’s lives (Karraker, Vogel, & Lake, 1995; Stern & Karraker, 1989). Karraker and colleagues (1995) conducted a study in which they interviewed parents of newborns and asked them to describe their babies and then rate them on nine different bi-polar adjectives. The researchers found that parents described their newborns in gender-stereotyped ways. They described their daughters using words such as “small”, “soft”, “delicate” and “fragile”. They referred to their sons as “active”, “alert” and “strong”. In addition to the ways that parents talk about their children, research has also found that parents also make gender stereotyped choices for their young children. When choosing toys, decorations and furniture for their children’s rooms, parents were more likely to choose more sports and action- oriented items for the son’s room while girl’s rooms were more family oriented (Pomerleau, Bolduc, & al, 1990). 30 Research on gender role stereotyping and early socialization processes show that males and females prepare/are prepared differently for social roles. When focusing on sport socialization, the process for males is “extremely consistent or institutionalized” (Greendorfer & Ewing, 1981, p. 303). Sport is of great importance to American males. It is a context in which boys can learn traditional male values an earn social status (Coakley, 2014). While girls are not actively discouraged from playing sport, for the most part, sport is seen as a choice, an option rather than an expectation. So a common belief is that if opportunities for girls to play sport are made available, they can make a choice to take it, and the lack of girls in sport is simply due to their lack of interest (Cooky, 2009). Boys are not only encouraged to play sport, but it is also expected of them. Girls’ socialization into sport is less consistent than boys’. Girls’ interest and involvement in sport is not a random occurrence that is based on their physical skills or any innate biological or psychological factor, but “a function of gender roles and how those roles are integrated into sport” (Bruening, 2005, p. 336). Despite differences in sport participation rates, evidence does show that traditional gender roles have become less constraining for women and girls. However, some sport sociologists say that gender still matters, and there are still “many girls who do not participate because of limited opportunities, structural barriers, and gender ideologies” (Cooky, 2009, p. 260). Shakib and Dunbar's (2002) analysis of a high school’s basketball program showed that a “two-tiered” system had emerged: feminized versus masculinized basketball. Gender inequality was reproduced through the ways students at the school talked about the girls’ and boys’ basketball teams. Despite being higher ranked, the girls’ basketball team was seen as inferior to the boys’ team; they were described as less competitive, slower and “more boring” to watch. Girls’ basketball was delegitimized as not the real version of the sport and girls complained 31 about lack of recognition from the school. This lack of respect for their sport was seen as a barrier, something that dissuaded girls from wanting to play or returning to their teams. When examining sport socialization of girls of color, the influences of race, class, and gender on becomes more complicated. The “socialization of African American and other women of color historically has been different from Anglo American women” (Smith, 1992, p. 234). Greendorfer and Ewing’s (1981) analysis of the effects of race, class, and gender on the sport socialization process found that Black children’s participation was guided more by the actual structure of society and contextual factors while White children were more influenced by peers and significant others. Black girls’ socialization into sport may be the result of a combination of factors such as a lack of role models in the media, lack of money for lessons and equipment, child care and wage earning responsibilities, and lack of available opportunities in areas of minority population concentration (Bruening, 2005; Dixon, Warner, & Bruening, 2008). Additionally, Black girls face cultural barriers within their communities with regards to their sport participation. Within the Black community, male athletes have “long been a symbol of pride, empowerment, and achievement” (Entine, 2001, p. 297) and have been seen as symbols of hope; a means to rise above one’s present circumstances (Beamon, 2010). On the other hand, Black female athletes have to cope with additional scrutiny when standing in the limelight. From Don Imus’ referring to the Rutgers Women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hos” (ESPN, 2007) to critiques of Olympic gymnast Gabby Douglas’ hair, by other Black women, as she received her medal on the podium, “African American women are often still ignored by White America and still receive less than enthusiastic receptions from the Black community compared to their male counterparts” (Bruening, 2005, p. 337). 32 Dixon and colleagues’ (2008) qualitative analysis of Black female college athletes’ sport socialization experiences found that the support the girls received from their parents as well as the way they saw other prominent Black female athletes portrayed in the media greatly influenced their decisions to participate in sport and which sports they participated in. This information was also highly impactful to the way that the girls conceptualized their abilities in sport. Participants in the study attributed their success and longevity in their sports in part to their parents’ support without pressure and a lack of gender role stereotypes while growing up. The process of socialization is incredibly impactful on young peoples’ sport and physical activity decisions. Beginning from an incredibly young age, children are molded by socializers including their parents, teachers, peers and the media. These socializing agents mold and shape children and influence their development through the type of activities, objects, and experiences they are exposed or not exposed to. In sport, in particular, gender role stereotyping has played a large role in girls’ experiences in sport and physical activity. Cultural framing of sport as a man’s domain, one where traditionally women’s sport is seen as less than impact the way that girls interpret their sport experiences. Differences in the sport socialization process have been hypothesized to play a large role in the gender disparities in sport participation. For Black girls, in particular, their status as both female and minorities plays a complex role in their socialization process, and the lack of in-depth research in this area is concerning. Therefore, it is critically important to understanding the way the multiple influences in girls’ lives affect their sport participation. Sport and the Urban Context The terms “urban” and “underserved” are often used as euphemisms for poor, typically Black or Hispanic, city-dwellers. To prevent confusion, the way that these terms will be used in 33 this paper will be briefly defined. When taken literally, the term urban defines areas of high population density and large amounts of human-made structures. City dwellers often rely on public transportation to get around which can vary in their degree of efficiency and neighborhood penetration. Regarding social structure, “class extremes characterize the cities” (Wark & Galliher, 2007). It is not uncommon to find areas of economic prosperity near areas of poverty. Additionally, at least within the US context, despite the presence of racially diverse inhabitants, urban areas are also characterized by racial segregation. The term “underserved” is used to characterize the lack of public services and funding as well as the expense of private services for low-income, or otherwise marginalized individuals. As Pitter and Andrews (1997) stated, regarding sport and leisure opportunities: Private leisure providers are increasingly targeting their services toward members of America’s upper strata - people who have access to the disposable income and free time necessary to consume these services. The poor are lefts with a shrinking pool of public services and a variety of private services, none of which they can afford. These people are the underserved (p. 86). Sport plays an important role in city life. The most obvious one is the distinct place professional sports teams have. The jewel in the crown of most major metropolitan areas is often a professional sports stadium, usually one of the big three: basketball, football, or baseball, and always men’s sport. Civic pride is often entwined with the success of a city’s sport team. Similar to the way that a small community may coalesce around high school sport, professional sport has a larger effect on city dwellers (Karp & Yoels, 1990). In addition to the role that sport spectatorship plays, participation in community sport teams can help to foster civic engagement and a sense of community attachment in youth (Bruening, Clark, & Mudrick, 2015; Spaaij, 34 Jonathan, & Ruth, 2013). Sport within the urban context remains a topic of particular interest because of the unique barriers to sport participation that present themselves in the city as well as the positive effects that community sports programming can have for youth in the city, particularly those from low-income and underserved neighborhoods. Two main research avenues on sport in the urban context which are of particular importance to this paper is first, how the structure and context of these programs reflect societal values and priorities and secondly, the benefits that sport participation can have for urban youth. As an example, Midnight basketball is a crime prevention model which was developed based on the idea that involving youth in a supervised activity during “peak crime hours” would reduce crime rates in cities (Hartmann, 2001). However, this program was colored with racial undertones from its conception. The fundamental premise of midnight basketball, that having young Black men playing sport would be a deterrent to crime “not only plays off of both the positive and the negative stereotypes of African American men, it actually puts the negative stereotypes of Black men and sport in service of addressing the perceived pathologies and dysfunctions” (Hartmann, 2012, p. 1012). But there is also evidence which shows these kinds of programs provide significant benefits in the form of exposure to positive adults, increased social capital and potential for cultural and economic capital as well as the others benefits associated with physical activity and sport in general (Bruening et al., 2015; Pitter & Andrews, 1997; Spaaij, 2009). In a study of the benefits of a large sport for development program that was conducted in a large urban area in The Netherlands, Spaaij (2009) found that sport was able to moderately improve youth’s social and economic capital. The youth in the study were considered to be disadvantaged and were mostly lower-income refugees and immigrants. The study found that 35 participation in the sport organization played an important role in linking youth to a broader social network and gave them access to a far wider range of resources and information within the local community and larger government programs (Spaaij, 2009). In some instances, participants were also able to leverage their new social networks to take hold of employment and education opportunities and better their financial standings (Spaaij et al., 2013). Within an urban context where different social networks can be harder to break into or even find, programs which give youth the opportunity to be connected to diverse networks and resources are invaluable (Shihadeh & Flynn, 1996). For urban girls, in particular, sport programs such as the one discussed previously which cater to their needs are lacking (Sabo, 2009). Programs that do exist may be harder to access due to a lack of time, accessible recreation locations or lack of safe transportation. Urban girls often complain about a lack of programs or enough spots on their school teams when wanting to try out for a sport. Additionally, parents who live in urban areas complain about the safety of sports as well as transportation safety when going to and from sports (Moore et al., 2010). Parent’s concern about their children’s safety and how they act upon those concerns tend to be gendered. Parents are more likely to let their boys travel by themselves and stay out later than girls (Quarmby & Dagkas, 2013). Moreover, since sport practices and games are more likely to take place after-school and continue until it is starting to get dark, this presents a unique challenge for urban girls, especially for those who live in cities where public transportation may be unreliable (Cooky, 2009). Barriers and Facilitators to Girls’ Sport Participation A variety of studies, both quantitative and qualitative, have been conducted to ascertain barriers and facilitators to participation in sport and other physical activities for girls. Table 1 and 36 Table summarize results from research across kinesiology, physical education, nursing and community health outlining barriers and facilitators explored in the literature. Girls report a variety of environmental, interpersonal and intrapersonal factors which hinder their sport participation. Some parallel facilitators, but most do not. A factor which frequently comes up in studies of girls’ barriers is the idea that sport is incompatible with traditional conceptualizations of femininity. Coakley and White’s (1992) in-depth interviews with British adolescents about sport and their transitions into adulthood found that girls did not consider sport to be particularly relevant to their lives. They felt that sport did not prepare them to become women and that the aspects of sport which were societally valued, strength, aggression, competition, were not the same as what is valued in traditionally feminine women, softness, nurturing and appearance. Similar results were found in focus groups conducted by Slater and Tiggemann (2010) in which girls said that they were less likely to play sports than boys because sports were seen as “uncool,” and something that did not raise girls’ social status. Table 1. Barriers to Girls’ Sport Participation - Negative experiences - Peer pressure - Lack of transportation - Teasing from boys - Unfeminine to do sport - Revealing athletic wear - Lack of teacher/coach support - Sport too competitive - Lack of time - Lack of competence - Sweating/ruining appearance - Lack of anyone to play with - Lack of availability/accessibility - Distraction by technology - Lack of resources/finances - Not enough options (Allender et al., 2006; Casper et al., 2011; Coakley & White, 1992; Dwyer et al., 2006; Eime, Harvey, et al., 2013; Grieser et al., 2006; Robbins et al., 2003; Slater & Tiggemann, 2010, 2011; Wright, Griffes, & Gould, 2017) 37 Features which facilitate girls sport participation mostly reflect support from significant others in their lives as well as factors which ease access to sport facilities which are available. As evidenced in interviews conducted by Bruening and colleagues (2008), women who were far along in their athletic careers reported parents and other adult roles models as significant influences for their perseverance in sport. Parents played an important role by exposing their daughters to sport early on and encouraging their continued participation by taking them to practices and attending their games. Table 2. Facilitators of Girls’ Sport Participation - Family support - Peer support - Positive female role models - Perceived benefits of being active - Encouragement from coaches and - Flexible practice/game schedules program staff (Bruening et al., 2008; Dixon et al., 2008; Martins, Marques, Sarmento, & Carreiro da Costa, 2015; Stodolska, Sharaievska, Tainsky, & Ryan, 2014; Wright et al., 2017) Youth Empowerment through Community Engagement We often do not think of age as an area of oppression like race, class, gender or class. However, youth represent a marginalized group in society; youth are often not afforded the power to make meaningful decisions, and their voices do not often contribute to broader societal conversations (Nygreen, Ah Kwon, & Sanchez, 2006). To understand this, it is important to have a sense of what is power. Power is the ability to influence or have control over resources, other’s behaviors and environmental conditions (Pearrow, 2008). Youth lack power in the sense that they often have little control over resources and decisions, they are often stuck below others who make decisions for them: parents, teachers, adults. Youth have little to no presence in decision- making boards and are not present in governing and legislating. A growing body of research has shown that having power, being empowered, can have a life improving impact on the immediate 38 and long-term outcomes of youth (Larson, 2000; Lerner, 2005). When youth not only feel like they have control but can create actual change in their lives, they are more likely to have better mental health, better academic performance, reduced rates of delinquency and substance abuse and lower rates of school dropout (Pearrow, 2008). Empowerment is a complex, multifaceted construct that refers to “individuals, families, organizations, and communities gaining control and mastery, within the social, economic and political contexts of their lives, in order to improve equity and quality of life” (Jennings, Parra- Medina, Hilfinger-Messias, & McLoughlin, 2006, p. 32). The concept of empowerment assumes that society consists of different groups that have different levels of power and that social problems emerge from the failure of society to meet the needs of individuals, not from individual deficits (Pearrow, 2008). To achieve the lofty goal of achieving youth empowerment in organizations that cater to young people Jennings and colleagues (2006) applied a critical youth empowerment approach to evaluating four different youth programs and found that successful programs had six key features. These include: (1) they provided a welcoming and safe environment; (2) youth had meaningful participation and engagement; (3) equitable power sharing between youth and adults; (4) engagement in critical reflection on interpersonal and sociopolitical processes; (5) participation in sociopolitical processes to effect change; and, (6) integrate community and personal empowerment. If one is to help young people make the choice to engage in beneficial physical activity empowering them to help their communities become more physically active friendly would seem critical. Hence, empowering Black girls by having them become co-researchers in studying ways to enhance physical activity makes logical sense. 39 In summary, this literature review covers a significant, but not exhaustive amount of the Conclusion research and scholarly writing that has been done on the influence of race, gender and culture and how these factors intersect to affect girls’ sport participation rates. The emphasis here is taken off of “the problem of girls” and instead, focused on the history, politics, and culture of women’s sport participation. It outlines the barriers that women faced trying to break into the man’s world of sport along with the triumphs along the way. It shows the unique issues that Black women have faced throughout history and factors which still affect their sport participation today. To increase girls’ sport participation rates, especially girls of color, attention needs to be paid not just to the immediate, surface level issues which have been covered in the literature such as access and motivation but to the more in-depth questions. Who has access? Is access equitably distributed to all members of society? How does upbringing affect attitudes and motivation? What messages are girls receiving about themselves? More importantly, there is a need for studies which put power in the hands of girls and ask them to devise ways of addressing these issues which are more meaningful and relevant to their lives. Therefore, as stated previously, this study has three main purposes. The first is to expand the body of literature on facilitators and barriers to Black girls’ participation in sport. This will be achieved by employing a method which is embedded in the lived experiences of girls in Detroit. While in-depth qualitative interviews have provided rich data on girls’ experiences, there is a lack of depth and exploration with girls on the contextual factors which affect their participation. This study will use a participatory method which uses pictures taken by girls as the starting point of critical reflection and discussion over the course of six weeks. Engaging in focus 40 groups over an extended period of time will allow girls to practice engaging in critical reflection and equip them with the vocabulary to describe more complex sociopolitical processes. The second purpose is to ensure that the girls’ voices remain an essential part of the story. This will be done by using a YPAR PhotoVoice design in which girls will be active co- researchers in collecting and analyzing data as well as dissemination of findings and recommendations. Lastly, the third purpose was to give girls the skills and empower them to be agents of change in their communities. 41 CHAPTER 3 - METHODOLOGY AND METHODS Reflexivity Statement There are three main forces that have driven my research interests and the trajectory that my academic life and career has taken. The first is my identity as a Black woman. The second, which conflicts and shapes the first aspect is my identity as an immigrant, an other and the times I have been held up as a “model minority,” seen as separate from African Americans because of my academic and economic successes, finally, the importance of sport and physical activity. Being a Black woman in the US and seeing the inequalities that exist between people of color and the privilege racial groups has drawn me to research that seeks to identify unequal access to resources and challenge the status quo. My original area of interests was in coaches and leadership, with no particular focus on minority populations. My father was a coach; I wanted to be a coach, it seemed like a no-brainer. However, my advisor encouraged me toward projects that involved underrepresented populations. While this change in focus caught me off-guard at first, I thought that it would provide a new and exciting direction to focus my academic path. What solidified this focus as the right one for me was working with a colleague on a project with coaches working in Detroit. It was not the project itself that shaped me but my conversations with my colleague. He was also a Black, Caribbean immigrant and our conversations ranged from our home countries to the reality of being Black in America. He expressed frustration towards areas of our field that focused on more well-off populations, people who could afford sport psychology service while those who could not afford these kinds of services went virtually ignored. He felt a sense of purpose to go to bat for the underdog, and his sense of purpose was contagious. I felt angry when I thought about systemic racism that existed in the US and how it 42 infects every area of society. I felt the need to address these injustices in whatever way I could, even though my field might not be considered the most impactful by some. Given that the majority of my research participants are people of color, I believe that my race can give me an “in,” a way to relate to my participants, to encourage them to open up through a shared experience. I also recognize that this presents a challenge for me in research as well. There may have be times when I “filled-in-the-blanks” for my participants. Meaning that during an interview, I may have missed a follow-up question or not probed as deeply as I should have because I am familiar with the experience. Clearly, this can lead to not getting a participant’s full story or bias during the interview or data analysis. To counteract this, I was vigilant in separating my experiences from those of my participants when necessary. I also developed interview guides which took some of my blind spots into account. Finally, thorough field notes and a researcher journal was also maintained. In contrast with my identity as a Black woman in America, is being an immigrant in America. I am from a country where Blacks are the majority, therefore, during the formative years of my life, my race wasn’t a salient part of my identity. Being involved with research with minority populations has now brought this part of me to the forefront of my identity and its done so in a way that makes me feel empowered as well as isolated. Empowered in the sense that I feel that I am in a unique position to understand cultural phenomenon that is not obvious to people who have lived their whole lives in America. Taken for granted occurrences are novel to me, and I feel like this adds to my work by enabling me to shed light on issues that other researchers may have overlooked. I feel isolated in the sense that sometimes I feel like a cultural imposter, people are often shocked when I tell them that I’m not American because I am so integrated into the culture. My research attempts to give voice and tell the stories of Black people 43 in America, a story that I am not inherently a part of. In life and in my research I must be careful not to overcompensate and act in ways that are disingenuous to my own culture as well as topics that may me appropriative of Black culture. I must also be careful and make sure that I am telling the story of my participants and, while it would be impossible to completely eliminate any bias, limit the extent to which I allow my own perspective to blur the experiences of the participants. The final aspect that influences my research is the benefits that I see in participation in sport and physical activity. Some of the important work that has been done in the field include describing and addressing barriers to sport and physical activity in underserved populations, showing that sport and exercise participation can improve school performance in children and generally create ways to encourage people to be more physically active. Blacks (as well as other minority populations) have significantly lower levels of physical activity than Whites during both childhood and adulthood. Engaging in physical activity, particularly sports, at a young age significantly increases the likelihood that a person will be physically active later on in life. Therefore, I believe that my area of research, identifying and addressing barriers to physical activity in Black girls can have a meaningful and lasting impact on the lives and well-being of vulnerable populations. Methodology Essential to any qualitative research project is the explicit statement of the paradigms the work is situated in. Braun and Clarke (2013) refer to the presence of philosophical paradigms as the difference between “small q” and “big Q” qualitative research. These paradigms are beliefs about ontology, epistemology, and axiology. Ontologically, this project acknowledges that reality is subjective and shaped by each individual’s contexts and experiences. 44 Epistemologically, knowledge is socially constructed and value-laden, it reflects the power and social relationships within society, and thus the purpose of research is to put the tools of knowledge construction into hands of the less powerful. The axiological assumption is that research is value-laden and it is impossible for a researcher to completely un-bias him or herself. Therefore, researchers state their own positionality and outline how their own views and biases may affect interpretation of a study. Youth Participatory Action Research “Nothing about us, without us, is for us.” - slogan popularized by South African disability and youth activists In keeping with the study’s goal of achieving an understanding of girls’ experiences in sport within the Detroit context through a process of critical inquiry and reflection, this study was situated within the qualitative research tradition of Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR). YPAR is an approach to youth-led research which focuses on involving youth throughout the research process as fully participative co-researchers and translating the results into community change (McIntyre, 2008; Rodríguez & Brown, 2009). According to Cornwall and Gaventa (2015), YPAR can provide participants with opportunities to expand their knowledge and contribute to community knowledge production, develop their critical thinking skills and raise their consciousness of societal ails and injustices and inspire and/or pursue action. YPAR researchers believe that local co-researcher possess expert knowledge obtained from their participation in the contexts under investigation and their direct engagement and experience with the problems under study (Rodríguez & Brown, 2009). YPAR is situated within a transformative framework which posits that “knowledge is not neutral and it reflects the power and social relationships within society, and thus the purpose of knowledge construction is to improve society” (Creswell, 2013, p. 25) 45 The objective of participatory action research methods is to support communities in addressing their local needs. Researchers help to create empowerment opportunities for fostering the development of critical consciousness which may, in turn, lead to an understanding of social, structural and cultural barriers and facilitators for marginalized individuals. The expectation is that through this collaboration researchers give back to the communities from which they take valuable information (McIntyre, 2008). Philosophical, theoretical and practical implementation discussions of YPAR are often centered around the work of Paulo Freire, a Brazilian teacher and activist who expounded on the need for individuals from marginalized communities, who lacked power, to be actively involved in the creation and ownership of knowledge (Freire, 2000; McIntyre, 2008). Through this creation of knowledge and reflection on it, people may be able to achieve a critical consciousness, that is, perceiving the social, political and economic contradictions that affect them, and engage in thoughtful reflection of their communities strengths and needs to take action against oppression and inequality (Freire, 2000). Participatory research, and youth-led participatory research has three main principles: (1) all people can think and contribute; (2) information, skills, and resources should be shared equally; and (3) social justice and liberation requires contribution from all members of society (McIntyre, 2008). YPAR is particularly useful in the exploration of girls’ experiences in sport because of its foundational use as a counter to positivist research that used a deficit-based approach to explain marginalized populations concerns (Rodríguez & Brown, 2009). For example, Oliver, Hamzeh, and McCaughtry (2009) conducted a YPAR study with Mexican-American and Hispanic middle- school girls on the intersection of race, gender and sexuality on girls physical activity participation. In the study, girls indicated that one of the reasons they did not want to be physically active was because it interfered with being a “girly-girl,” someone whose hair is never 46 messy, who always wears dresses. Whereas wanting to be a girly-girl could be interpreted as a problem with girls’ attitudes and therefore dismissed as something wrong with girls, the authors used participatory photo taking, the authors engaged the girls in exploration of what it meant to be a “girly-girl” and the barriers that prevented the girls from being physically active while also being girly-girls. The authors engaged the girls in co-creating games that would allow them to be physically active while also being girl-girls. They found that the games that the girls created often contradicted the initial reasons for not being physically active, the games were often vigorous and made them sweaty and messy, but the games allowed them to express themselves and their personal and cultural values. “It may be that when girls are put into physical activities in which they are forced to abandon their cultural values and practices, are offered no choices, are forced to be competitive…or are denied an opportunity to participate they use wanting to be girly girl as an excuse for not playing (Oliver, Hamzeh, & McCaughtry, 2009, p. 108). Sport and exercise psychology research has frequently problematized girls and women and viewed them as issues that need to be fixed (LaVoi, 2011). Rarely are girls included in the discussion of how society, culture, and others limit their ability or influence their decision to participate or not participate in sport. When youth are given the opportunity to be actively engaged in the research process and reason with evidence, come to conclusions and make their own suggestions, outcomes may be quite a bit different than those adult researchers might come up with and interventions are tailored to the interests of youth and the contexts in which they live in (Oliver et al., 2009). PhotoVoice: A Method for Youth Participatory Action Research Because of the flexibility of Youth Participatory Action Research, there is no set way or prescriptive framework on involving youth as co-researchers. This presents the opportunity to 47 employ ambitious and creative methods that challenge traditional research paradigms. Inspired by Paulo Freire’s approach to education for critical consciousness, Wang and Burris (1994, 1997) developed PhotoVoice as a community-based needs assessment tool. PhotoVoice was envisioned as a way to “[perceive] the world from the viewpoint of the people who lead lives that are different from those traditionally in control of the means for imaging the world” (Wang & Burris, 1997, p. 372). To accomplish this, community members are given cameras and asked to document their world as they see it and tell the story of their community and by doing so, “it confronts a fundamental problem of needs assessment: what researchers think is important may neglect what the community thinks is important” (Wang & Burris, 1997, p. 372). The primary goals of PhotoVoice research is to: “(1) enable people to record and reflect their community’s strengths and concerns, (2) to promote critical dialogue and knowledge about important community issues through small and large group discussion of photographs and (3) to reach policymakers” (Wang & Burris, 1997, p. 369) The photographs taken by community members serve as a focal point for critical discussion. The idea of using pictures to spark discussion builds on one of Freire’s ideas that one way to enable people to think critically about their communities and themselves and to begin discussing the everyday social and political forces that influence their lives was through the visual image (Freire, 2000; Wang & Burris, 1997). Through these discussion sessions, participants construct a narrative that explains the meaning and significance of the photos. These narratives then become the focus of community exhibits and presentations to key policymakers with the purpose of stimulating some community or policy change (Wang, 2006; Wang & Burris, 1997). 48 PhotoVoice was initially developed to explore the lived experiences of women in the Yunnan Province of China, however, because of its flexibility and social justice underpinnings, PhotoVoice has been used by a variety of academics, teachers, activists and community organizers to explore a wide range of topics including neighborhood safety, homelessness, food desserts and issues of aging (Hergenrather et al., 2009). However, PhotoVoice has been underutilized in the sports science field and only recently gained ground within the youth sport context with young athletes from underserved communities positioned as community co- researchers. McHugh, Coppola, and Sinclair (2013) used PhotoVoice in Australia with Aboriginal youth to explore the meaning of sport and the roles that it played in their lives. Additionally, Sackett, Newhart, Jenkins, and Cory (2017) is one of the only studies which used PhotoVoice to explore girls barriers and access to sport. However, this study did not employ a critical perspective in regards to race and gender, and while youth were active participants in the data collection phase, adult-youth contact was brief (only one phot guided interview was done with each participant) and youth were not involved in the data analysis phase. As a YPAR method, PhotoVoice invites youth into the role of co-researchers as they are the experts in defining their community’s and their individual needs and the adult researchers act as facilitators and guides in the exploration process (Wang, 2006; Wang & Burris, 1997). This collaboration creates a mutually beneficial youth-adult relationship in which each participant can gain insights into each other’s world. Youth benefit by participating in the analysis of policies and programs that directly affect their lives and adults benefit by recognizing the skills and competencies of young people which contribute to the creation of policies and programs that are relevant and useful to their lives (Wang, 2006). 49 The use of YPAR and PhotoVoice in this study aided in exploring and developing an understanding of the experiences of girl’s in Detroit in the youth sport context. To accomplish this, girls in this study will used digital cameras to capture images illustrating experiences they encountered around their communities to answer the questions: (1) Why do you play sports?; (2) What makes it easier to play or access sports?; (3) What are some barriers or things that make it harder to play or access sports?; and (4) Why do you think more girls aren’t interested in sports? The girls will then met to participate in a guided critical reflection on the images that they generated and constructed a narrative that tells the story of their images and experiences. The images and narratives were presented in a community exhibition, and the list of the girls’ needs were shared with key policymakers at Detroit PAL. Given the purpose, process, and goals of PhotoVoice and YPAR, a study with girls from underserved communities within Detroit is appropriate. As discussed in the context and literature review chapters of this proposal, girls and particularly Black girls and girls from low-income areas, are underrepresented in sports and physical activity (Sabo, 2009). They may experience unique barriers to sport participation, including concerns about safety, disproportionate amounts of time spent in household work and teasing from peers and lack of support from family members (Burk & Shinew, 2013; Chalabaev, Sarrazin, Fontayne, Boiché, & Clément-Guillotin, 2013; Clark, 2015; Dodson & Dickert, 2004). The process of identity and critical consciousness development, which are both underlying goals of YPAR and PhotoVoice require youth to engage in in critical reflection as a part of becoming an empowered and liberated individual (Freire, 2000; Wang & Burris, 1997). For young female athletes, becoming aware of the dynamics of race, gender, culture and community resources (or lack thereof) through participation in the in the critical discussion phase of PhotoVoice can help them to engage in the community and 50 national conversation surrounding these issues and foster a stronger sense of connection to their community (Allender et al., 2006; Wang, 2006). For example, Foster-Fishman and colleagues' (2010) YPAR PhotoVoice project found that youth said that the project provided them with the opportunity to see things that they had never noticed before. One youth was quoted, “If everyone heard and considered everyone else’s opinions, no matter what age, I think the world would be better. If I was by myself I doubt adults and organizations would value my opinions” (Foster- Fishman et al., 2010, p. 80). In addition to including youth co-researchers in the data collection process of this project, they also played a significant role in data analysis. Reflections of the researchers of the YES! YPAR project which aimed to promote civic action and engagement in youth (Wilson et al., 2007; Wilson, Minkler, Dasho, Wallerstein, & Martin, 2008), highlighted the importance of study design, mainly how the selection of which portions of the research process youth engage in can ultimately constrain the success of a YPAR project. The authors felt that the project failed to generate deeper critical understandings of community issues in youth and felt that their voices were missing from the analyses of the data that they generated. This, in turn, led to a lack of insight and long-term solutions to the issues that they were targeting (Wilson et al., 2007). In their own YPAR project, (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010) developed the Youth ReACT (Research Actualizing Critical Thought) method to address the issue that “even data collected or reported by youth can be misrepresented if youth, themselves, are not involved in defining the meaning behind their data” p. 75. They posited that involving youth in the data analysis stages can also help to foster deeper critical awareness “root causes of local conditions and problems” (Foster- Fishman et al., 2010, p. 75). 51 The ReACT data analysis stage involved a series of games that were designed to train youth in the process of formal qualitative data analysis including first and second order thematic analysis and exposes youth to three phases of analysis: (1) data reduction, (2) data organization and (3) conclusion drawing and verification (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). The specific strategies will be discussed in more detail in the procedures. The experiences and voices of girls are underrepresented in the sport and physical activity literature. Therefore, this project was designed to further our understanding of this segment of the youth sport population. The Study Site Method The Detroit Police Athletic League (PAL), in Detroit, Michigan served the study site for this project. Detroit PAL is a non-profit organization whose mission is to build character in young people through athletics and leadership development programs. Detroit PAL currently serves over 12,000 youth in over 13 different sports with representation in every Detroit neighborhood as well as many outlying areas and suburbs. As of 2017, 70 percent of Detroit PAL’s participants were male, and 30 percent were female (Detroit PAL, 2017). Detroit PAL serves mostly lower-income households with 80 percent of participants being eligible for free/reduced lunch. 73.9 percent of participants identified as Black/African American, 11.1 percent Hispanic/Latinx and 15 percent other racial groups. Recently, Detroit PAL has been making significant efforts to address the gender disparity in their participation rates so that girls in Detroit can reap the same benefits from sport involvement and networking as the boys do. As a result, this participatory action research is a result of the partnership between the researcher and the organization. 52 Participants The target population for this study was adolescent girls between the ages of 14 to 18 who live in Detroit and currently participate in the girls’ junior coach’s program and at least one Detroit PAL sport. The junior coach’s program was developed to train high school girls to be coaches for middle school sports team. Its goal was to provide middle school girls with positive peer role models as well as to give girls the opportunity to develop their leadership, coaching and communication skills. As a part of the program, the junior coaches were required to assist a middle school team practice two times a week and attend personal development seminars once a week. For the present project, all members of the junior coach’s program were asked to participate. To ensure that participation in the research project would not take away from their regularly scheduled events as well as to ensure that any girl who declined to participate in the study was still included in the junior coach’s program, project meetings took place every other week, alternating with the junior coach’s meetings. Procedures Recruitment and Sampling. University Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval was obtained to ensure that the study met ethical standards. Participants in this study were girls who were a part of a future women coaches and girls’ leadership group in the Detroit PAL organization. Participants were contacted by Sheila1, an Assistant Athletic Director and one of the key community contacts and organizer who was heavily involved with the project. Sheila had been running the girls’ leadership council for the past three years and has established contacts 1 Pseudonyms used to protect identity of participants and co-researchers. 53 with parents, athletes and other coaches in the league. In addition to her regular efforts to find girls to participate in her program, Sheila presented girls with a flyer explaining the PhotoVoice project to them and what it will entail (Appendix B). Criterion sampling was used for this project; as long as participants were a member of the girls’ leadership council they were eligible to participate in the study (Creswell, 2013). Because the girls’ program was one that already existed, any girl was allowed to participate and therefore was eligible for the study. Inclusion criteria included being a current sport participant in a Detroit PAL sport and being between 14 to 18 years old. While race/ethnicity was not being considered as an inclusion/exclusion criteria to ensure that no one was excluded from participation in the junior coach’s program, it was anticipated that the majority of participants would be Black/African-American. A sample size of N = 9 was obtained for this study which is within the recommendation by Wang (2006) for a YPAR PhotoVoice study. Parental consent and child assent was obtained as well as consent for participants who were 18 years old (Appendices B-D). Additionally, participants completed demographic questionnaires to provide information about other extra- curricular activities they participated in and a brief history of their sport participation and family information. Phase I: Data collection. The PhotoVoice data collection process proceeded through the following stages which are outlined in Table 1; Step 1 - participant training, Step 2 - photo taking, Step 3 - individual and group photo selection and Step 4 - photo discussion and critical reflection (Foster-Fishman, Mortensen, Berkowitz, Nowell, & Lichty, 2013). During the data collection phase, participants attended one two-hour training and briefin session and four, two- hour discussion sessions. These sessions took place every other week, alternating with the junior 54 coach development meetings. This timing allowed girls who were not interested in the study to still be a part of the junior coach’s program. Sessions were held in the Detroit PAL headquarters in Downtown Detroit. The weekly schedule of the PhotoVoice sessions can be found in Appendix E. In Step 1, participants attended a session in which they were trained on the PhotoVoice process including how to select and portray subject matter, basic photography skills, and ethics and safety of taking photographs (Foster-Fishman et al., 2013). This session was led by the primary researcher. The outline for the training session can be found in Appendix F. Youth practiced how to select and portray subject matter by playing a brainstorming activity. Participants were given a variety of magazines, and then asked questions unrelated to the research project and instructed to show how they would answer the question using photos they selected from the magazines. Participants had to explain why they chose the pictures they did to the group, and how their pictures answer the question, they then received feedback from facilitators. For example, participants were asked question such as, “What makes school fun?”, “What are your dreams for your future?”, “What are you educational and career goals?” These kinds of questions not only provided the girls the opportunity to practice answering abstract questions using photos, but it also served as a fun icebreaker. Throughout the project, additional opportunities for bonding and relationship forming occurred which allowed the girls to feel more comfortable sharing and discussing critical issues. Next, the girls were given digital cameras provided by the primary researcher. Each girl was given a camera and digital memory card and taught basic care and maintenance for the cameras. Then, participants were taught basic photography principles including how to operate their cameras, framing shots and basic lighting. Finally, participants were briefed on the ethics 55 and safety of photographing their community including not taking pictures of people engaging in dangerous or embarrassing behaviors, always getting permission to photograph someone and to not put themselves in dangerous situations. The handout that participants were given explaining how to be ethical and safe can be found in Appendix G. After the training session, participants met for bi-weekly, two-hour facilitated focus group discussions. In Step 2, participants were given digital cameras and asked to go out and take pictures to answer the research questions of the study which were: (1) Why do you play sports?; (2) What makes it easier to play or access sports?; (3) What are some barriers or things that make it harder to play or access sports?; and (4) Why do you think more girls aren’t interested in playing sport? First, participants were given the question then they had two weeks to take as many pictures as they would like in response to a single question. The process of taking pictures in response to one question at a time allowed the participants to become more experienced at taking pictures over time and also helps to build rapport amongst the participants and facilitators. Table 3 outlines how each photo framing question aligns with primary research questions. All photos taken were stored on individual memory cards that the girls were given during the training session. Girls then choose one photo that they wanted to present to the group and fill out the photo reflection sheet on their selected photo. The photo reflection sheet asked the girls to describe why they wanted to share the photo, what was important to understand about the photo and what the photo said about their community (Appendix H). Table 3. Research questions and photo framing questions Research Question Photo Framing Question RQ1. Why do girls in Detroit participate (1) Why do you play sports? in/play sports? 56 Table 3 (cont’d) RQ1a. What environment/contextual factors influence girls sport choices? RQ2. What are facilitators to girls’ sport (2) What are some things makes it easier to participation? play or access sports? RQ3. What are barriers to girls’ sport (3) What are some barriers or things that participation? make it harder to play or access sports? RQ4. How do girls conceptualize girls interest (4) Why do you think more girls aren’t or lack of interest in sport? interested in playing sport? RQ4a. What messages or signals to girls receive about the gender or racial appropriateness of sport? The weekly group discussions consisted of individual photo presentations of each individual’s photo followed by in-depth group discussion of four selected photos. The procedures for each discussion session were as follows and a detailed outline can be found in Appendix I. When participants arrived at the weekly sessions, they brought their cameras, memory cards and filled out reflection sheets with them. It was anticipated that some girls would forget to complete their reflection sheets ahead of time, therefore the first 10 minutes of each session was set aside to allow youth to complete their reflection sheets if needed, or to grab a snack. Then, participants gave their memory cards to the primary researcher and indicated which photo they wanted to share with the group. The primary researcher then saved the selected photo and printed it using a computer and portable photo printer. 57 Participants took turns presenting their photos to the group and described why they wanted to share the photo, what was important to understand about the photo and what the photo said about their community (Appendix H). This reflection is the first step in developing a critical consciousness in youth by encouraging them to think deeply about the photo that they selected and what it means to them and their community members (L. Smith, Bratini, & Appio, 2012; Wilson et al., 2007). All individual presentations were audio recorded and transcribed. Youth had the opportunity to ask individual presenters questions about their photos and the facilitator asked probing questions such as, “Can you tell me more about this?”, “Why do you think this is important?” and “What do others in your community think about this?” To narrow the focus of discussion on photos which most represented the framing question, Step 3 involved group photo selection (Foster-Fishman et al., 2013). After all individual photos were presented, the group selected and critically analyzed the photo. The girls selected which photo to discuss by voting on their favorite photo. They were advised to choose photos that they felt best captured the meaning of the framing question, or that they found the most interesting and wanted to discuss. Ultimately, girls were free to vote for whichever photo they choose. Narrowing the number of photos provided the space and time for conversations to go past the surface of the photos themselves and into themes beyond them as L. Smith, Bratini, and Appio (2012) demonstrated in their youth PhotoVoice study. Such group dialogue is essential to promoting a deeper analysis of an issue. Nowell, Berkowitz, Deacon, and Foster-Fishman (2006) demonstrated in their PhotoVoice project that group discussion of photos brought up issues and connections that were different from those discussed in individual photo presentations. In Foster- Fishman, Nowell, Deacon, Nievar, and McCann's (2005) retrospective interviews with previous 58 PhotoVoice participants, the youth felt that group dialogues helped them to critically reflect on their photographs and gave them further insight into the implications of community and neighborhood contexts. The final stage of data collection was group reflection and critical discussion of the photos selected. To promote similarities in photo discussion across the weekly sessions and across different research questions, Wang and Burris’ (1997) SHOWED PhotoVoice facilitation method will be used. The SHOWED process asked the participants to discuss the points listed below as it related to their photos: • What do you See happening here? (Described what eyes can see) • What is actually Happening here? (What is the unseen story behind the picture? How did this come about? • How does it relate to Our lives? (How has it impacted girls in the community?) • Why does this problem/strength exist? (What supports this happening? What can get in the way of this happening?) • How can this photo Educate others on what is happening? • What can we Do about what is portrayed in the picture? (How does the photo provide opportunities for community change?) In some studies, participants complained that the SHOWED process was too restricting or repetitive (Hergenrather et al., 2009). Therefore, in the present study further clarifying questions were asked when necessary and participants were able to ask any clarifying or probing question that they liked. Groups discussion sessions were recorded using an electronic recorder and were transcribed verbatim. 59 Phase II: Youth ReACT data analysis. Participants were included as a key part of the data analysis phase because this presented an important opportunity to involve youth in critical thinking and reflection as well as maintaining their voice throughout the research project. As discussed earlier in this chapter, the ReACT data analysis method was developed by Foster- Fishman and colleagues (2010) to ensure that data collected by youth in PhotoVoice is not misrepresented by adult researchers. Data that were analyzed included the pictures selected by individuals in Phase I, Step 4 along with the reflection sheets and the transcribed group discussions from Phase I, Step 4. The ReACT data analysis involves four steps: Step 1 - data reduction, Step 2 - theme identification and data organization, Step 3- thematic matching and integration, Step 4 - overarching theme identification (Foster-Fishman et al., 2013). Each of these steps represents a stage in thematic data analysis (Clarke & Braun, 2014). Each of these steps was conducted as a series of games to keep the data analysis fun and engaging for participants. These games were created by Foster-Fishman and colleagues (2010) and are outlined in detail in Appendices J-L. The data analysis phase took place over two, four-hour sessions. Step 1 focused on data reduction. Participants were divided into groups of three to four people, and each group worked with a different set of individual photo sharing transcripts and group discussion transcripts based on one of the photo framing questions; (1) Why do you play sports?; (2) What makes it easier to play or access sports?; (3) What are some barriers or things that make it harder to play or access sports?; and (4) Why do you think girls aren’t interested in playing sports? Each participant was asked to read through the data they were given and search through the transcripts for messages that were salient to them and important for the community to hear (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). They identified these messages by highlighting passages in 60 the printed transcripts that they felt were particularly meaningful. Whenever they highlighted a passage, the girls were instructed to then write the key message of the passage on a notecard. This continued until they felt they had captured all the important messages in their narratives. At the end of this step, the data was reduced to a series of key messages (meaning units) that youth felt best represented their stories (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). Step 2 focused on further data reduction and theme identification (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). Participants took the messages that they identified in Step 1, shared them with group members and worked together to cluster their messages into similar categories. Once youth had clustered their messages together, they were asked to label the clusters (lower order themes), and these themes were used in the next step (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). In Step 3, participants organized and integrated the themes they identified previously. All participants worked together collaboratively to cluster themes (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). Finally, in Step 4, youth labeled the clusters with higher order themes. Throughout each step in the data analysis process, participants were assisted by adult facilitators, including the primary researcher. Whenever youth created clusters or matched similar ideas, they were asked probing questions to further promote critical dialogue and identify connections between the ideas that were analyzed (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010). Phase III: Turning research into action. Once participants identified the issues that affected their sport participation, the next phase was to develop recommendations which were then presented to the community and key decision makers in Detroit sport and recreation. The girls were asked to re-read the messages, lower and higher order themes that they generated and turn them into recommendations that other girls, parents, and other adults could do to address the issues. Results from this brainstorming session were compiled into a report that was distributed 61 to the Detroit PAL staff. Participants also presented the findings to Detroit PAL along with their suggestions for improving girls’ sport programming. Methodological Rigor and Ethical Considerations Validity and Trustworthiness It is essential for any research project to ensure that standards of rigor and validity are strictly adhered to. For qualitative research, Creswell (Creswell, 2013) recommends that Figure 2. Overview of project phases researchers employ at least two validation strategies. Three validation strategies will be used in this study: bracketing, or clarifying researcher positionality and potential sources of bias which was undergone in the “Researcher positionality” section of this proposal, prolonged engagement with study participants, member checking and a thick detail-rich description of the phenomena under study. Clarifying researcher bias through bracketing from the outset of a study was important so that readers understand the researcher positionality and anything that may have affected the results of the study (Creswell, 2013). To achieve this, the researcher explored her own experiences, characteristics, and understanding of the phenomena under study. 62 Prolonged engagement involves building trust with participants, learning their culture and checking for misinformation which may stem from misinterpretations by the researcher (Creswell, 2013). Building trust between participants is essential to making them feel comfortable enough to share information or opinions that they may not necessarily share with a stranger. This study took place over the course of six, non-consecutive weeks, with the researcher meeting with girls for weekly two hour sessions. This length of time was sufficient enough to help the girls feel more comfortable participating in the study. This was evidenced by the girls developing a friendly relationship with the researcher, often sharing their sport successes and losses through group text messages and speaking openly about their sport experiences during exit interviews. Member checking was a core component of this study. Member checking involves researchers soliciting participants’ views of the findings and credibility of the study (Creswell, 2013). Because participants were heavily involved in data collection and data analysis they were highly influential in generating the findings of the study for themselves. Finally, a rich, thick description of participants’ stories was generated. Having a detailed description allows readers to determine which contexts results of the study can be transferred to because of detail in describing study participants and contexts (Creswell, 2013). The beauty of PhotoVoice research is that in addition to the stories and discussions participants tell, their narratives, which included their written reflections and audio recordings of individual presentations and group discussions, were accompanied by the images which spurred the discussion. 63 Ethical Considerations Critically essential to any research study, but particularly those that involve minors as co- researchers is ensuring that everyone is safe and that research is conducted in a way that protects the physical, mental and emotional wellbeing of participants. Image ethics are crucial to understand in any PhotoVoice project. Image ethics involve the consideration of consent when taking someone’s picture including the possibility of capturing them in any potentially embarrassing or illegal activities, placing individuals in a false light or invading someone’s personal space or private domain (Khanlou & Peter, 2005; Wang & Redwood-Jones, 2001). To mitigate some of these risks, youth co-researchers were trained in how to safely take pictures (Appendix G), and this included instructions to never trespass to take a picture, never take a picture of someone engaged in illegal activity and to never take someone’s picture without consent. Participants were also be provided with photo release form that they will had photo subjects sign to give permission for their photos to be used. Table 2 list best practices for PhotoVoice recommended by Wang and Redwood-Jones (2001). Additionally, all ethical requirements outlined by Michigan State University’s IRB were strictly followed including informing participants about risks and benefits or participating in the study, their right to withdraw from the study at any time as well. Parental consent and participant assent were also obtained. Table 4. PhotoVoice Ethics: Minimum best practices • Provide and review with participants a consent form, regardless of whether required by facilitators’ sponsoring institution (Appendix D) 64 Table 4 (cont’d) • Provide an “Acknowledgement and Release” consent form on which participants obtain the signatures’ of the people they photograph, regardless of whether required by the facilitators’ sponsoring institution (Appendix N) • Frame the first training around a group discussion about the use of cameras, power, and ethics, emphasizing safety and authority that come with using a camera • Provide written material such as a brochure that describes the general goals of the PhotoVoice project, who will participate, how photographs will be used, and whom to contact for more information that participants can give to subjects or interested community members (Appendix O) • Provide participants with prints to give back to people they have photographed • Provide and review with participants a consent form indicating permission to publish any photographs, or only specified photographs, to promote project goals, regardless of whether required by the facilitators’ sponsoring institution (Appendix P) • Mentor project staff and participants on the ethical principles and actions underlying PhotoVoice. (Wang & Redwood-Jones, 2001, p. 570) 65 CHAPTER 4 - FINDINGS The overall objective of this study was to explore the sport experiences of young girls of color in Detroit. The goal was to advance understanding of the meaning these girls attributed to their sport and recreation experiences and investigate the role they felt race and gender played in their sport and city environment. The sample of this study included 9 girls aged 14-18 and consisted of girls 8 who identified as Black/African-American and 1 girl who identified as Hispanic/Latina. Participant Profiles All participants attended a high school in Detroit and played volleyball as at least one of their primary sports. They were all also members of a future young coaches training program where they participated in this study as a supplemental form of leadership training. The names presented in the following sections are all pseudonyms that the girls were allowed to choose for themselves. All of the participants’ played volleyball as at least one of their primary sports. They all played on different school and travel volleyball teams and were unknown to each other prior to participating in the study with the exception of two participants who were twin sisters (Ruby and Ava). Ruby Ruby is 14 years old and identifies as African-American. At the time of the study, she was a Freshman in high school. Ruby has been playing volleyball since the 6th grade and was a member of her school’s varsity team and a travel volleyball team. Her other sport experiences included soccer which she played for less than one year when she was 9 years old. She had no other extracurricular activities. She had one sister who also participated in the study and one younger brother who played football. Ruby lives with both her mother and father at home. 66 Free/reduced cost lunch: Yes Ava Ava is 14 years old and identifies as African-American, she is also Ruby’s twin sister. Similar to Ruby, she started playing volleyball in the 6th grade and is a member of her school’s varsity volleyball team and played soccer for less than one year. She was not involved in any extracurricular activities during the project but joined her school’s journalism club the year following the study because she wanted to be involved in reporting girls’ sport experiences and making change. Ava lives with both her mother and father at home. Free/reduced cost lunch: Yes Brooklyn Brooklyn is 18 years-old and identifies as African-American. She was a senior at the time of the study. She had been playing volleyball for five years and prior to that, participated in cheerleading, golf and basketball for less than two years each. Her extracurriculars included student council and yearbook club. As of the conclusion of the study she graduated high school and enrolled in a 4-year university and has stopped all sport participation. Brooklyn lived with her mother. Free/reduced lunch: No Destiny Destiny is 17 years-old and identifies as African-American. She was a junior and high school and had been playing volleyball for four and a half years and had previously participated in basketball and cheerleading. Destiny had been playing volleyball for about four and a half years at the time and had previously participated in basketball and cheerleading. Her 67 extracurricular activities included the NAACP youth council. Destiny lives with both her mother and her father. Free/reduced lunch: Yes Jessie Jessie is 17 years old and identified as African-American. She was a junior in high school and had two main sports: volleyball which she had been playing for about 12 and a half years and softball which she had been playing for four years. Jessie’s previous sports included cheerleading and track & field. She had no other extracurricular activities. Jessie lives with her mother. Free/reduced cost lunch: Yes Ashley Ashley is 14 years old and identified as African-American. She was a freshman and had been playing volleyball for two years. Ashley also played track & field and basketball. She had one older sister that played volleyball and an older brother that played football and basketball. Ashley’s extracurricular activities included student council, church youth group and yearbook. Ashley lives with both her mother and her father. Free/reduced lunch: Yes Brittany Brittany is 15 years old and identifies as African-American. She was a freshman in high school and had been playing volleyball as her first and only sport for three years. She did not participate in any other extracurricular activities. She had two older brothers who both played basketball. Free/reduced cost lunch: Yes 68 Sasha Sasha was 14 years old and identified as African-American. She was a freshman in high school and had been playing volleyball for three years at that time. She played softball for about one year prior to that. She had no other extracurricular activities. She had one older brother who played baseball. Sasha lives with her mother and her father. Free/reduced lunch: Yes Emily Emily is 14 years old and identified as Hispanic/Latinx. She was a freshman and had been playing volleyball for five years. Other sport participation included hockey, swimming and softball. Emily had one older brother who did not play any sports. Her extracurricular activities included math corps. Emily lives with her mother and her father. Free/reduced cost lunch: yes Overview The rest of this chapter is structured in three sections. Presented in the first section of the chapter are selected photographs and accompanying narratives elicited by the photos during the focus groups discussions. This section is structured around the four research questions which guided the design of this study and the framing questions that the girls used to take their photographs. Each photo selected represent photos that participants felt best represented their interpretation and answers to the framing questions. The second section of this chapter includes themes identified by the researcher after thematic qualitative analysis of the transcribed focus groups and also includes a compilation of community needs or actions that the girls identified at the end of their analysis. The third section contains results from the youth-led data analysis 69 process, youth-generated recommendations and excerpts from exit interviews conducted after the conclusion of the study. PhotoVoice Narratives The following pictures and accompanying narratives are the result of eight weeks of picture taking and focus group discussion based on the pictures. The girls who participated in the study selected these 11 images because they felt best represented their experiences playing sport. The images included below have not been altered except to protect the identity of participants when needed. Why do Girls Play Sports? Figure 3. Why she plays sport - Ruby As long as you have the initiative yourself you can always grow. And what it says about my community is that just because people be like, “Oh, Detroit is down for the count or, “Oh or even in volleyball that teams not going to do nothing out here”, we can always do better just because we want it for ourselves. The framing question for this week was “Why do you play sports”. And the girls took on their first task with enthusiasm. A major theme that was emphasized through some of the photos and during the focus group session was the importance of growth and development. The girls felt that an important aspect of sport was having the opportunity to showcase their skills and improve 70 in an area that mattered to them. Some of the girls also talked about how playing sport allowed them to show a side of their personalities that they may not get a chance to show in other areas of their lives. For them, volleyball was a central part of their identities, Sasha said, “without volleyball, I don’t know where I would be.” Figure 3 also illustrates another theme that the girls depicted in their photos and further elaborated on in the focus groups discussions. They saw their own growth and development in sport and successes that they achieved as parallel to the growth and development of Detroit. In Figure 4. Why she plays sport - Brittany I want to share this picture why I play volleyball. It's important for the people to understand that the tree shows how volleyball makes me grow physically and mentally and the rock shows how strong I can be because it's solid and it's big. This photo shows that the schools and community can grow together and also be strong together and since you only see one rock the community can work together to be one solid rock. speaking of an out-of-state competition, one girl said, “They thought we was down for the count, but we wasn’t. We made a come-back, just like Detroit. It felt good to be a team from Detroit.” 71 Playing sport, travelling and representing their city, made the girls feel connected to and a part of the “renaissance” of Detroit. The girls saw sport as a facilitator of their mental, physical and emotional development. In sport, they were challenged beyond their comfort zones. Many times during the session, they reflected on where they were when they first started their sport journeys and where they are now. Figure 5. Why she plays sport - Brooklyn I feel like this describes why I fell in love with volleyball or even started playing is because or—kept playing is because I built bonds with people and the teams I was on. Every single team I made a bond with a number of girls not just one. This is important for people to understand because I feel like building bond can happen anywhere. They talked about moments where they wanted to quit but were able to overcome difficulties by receiving support from their teammates, coaches and family members. They also talked about how learning to persevere in sport helped them to persist in challenges that they may be facing in other parts of their lives. The girls also shared how, through sport, they were able to develop lasting relationships and connections with their teammates. While some shared experiences of having teammates with “negative energy” who sometimes made sport more difficult, the girls mostly had positive experiences with their teammates. Over and over again, the girls emphasized the importance of 72 relationships and connections with regards to staying in sport. Having supportive teammates who were there to make sport more enjoyable helped to increase the sense of responsibility that girls had to their teams and motivated them to keep going even when things got harder. They also mentioned the importance of connection for becoming involved in sport. Several of the girls in the study were able to identify a friend that introduced them or encouraged them to pursue volleyball and how they in turn recruited other friends. Additionally, the girls also shared how this connection and camaraderie was especially important when playing at predominantly White tournaments or attending predominantly White sport conferences. The girls shared some of the isolation they felt when they were the only Black girls on teams. They emphasized that having teammates that they felt that they could better relate to, or showing solidarity with other minority teams was another important aspect of sport. They even saw sport as being an avenue to transcend racial stereotypes. The girls shared stories of times they felt boxed-in or underestimated due to their race. They felt that predominantly White teams prejudged them as “lazy” and not good at volleyball. However, playing sport, and getting good at their sport allowed them to “prove the haters wrong.” Summary The girls identified a variety of reasons why they played sport. Mainly, sport gave them the opportunity to engage in an activity that they found personal growth and development in. They enjoyed being able to observed their own progress from season to season. They also felt that sport gave them the opportunity to develop skills that were applicable in other areas of their lives. Not only did they find sport important in their own stories, they played sport because it allowed them to positively represent the city of Detroit and show their own strength as well as the strength of their community. 73 Building bonds and forming connections with teammates was another reason why these girls played sport. They valued being able to okay with similarly motivated teammates and coaches. Girls valued the friendships that they formed through their sport participation. They found that when things got difficult in sport they were able to lean on their teammates and coaches for support. What Makes It Easier to Play Sport? The girls recognized that resources and parks available in Detroit had increased and made sport accessible for more people. Although, they did note that most of these new complexes were located in the downtown area and that not much of these structures existed in the neighborhoods or surrounding areas. However, the girls did not perceive that as much of a challenge to their Figure 6. What makes it easier to play sport - Ava I took a picture of the YMCA because it shows how it's given people access to sports. It's given us access to sports because it's a place where it's easily accessible. People can drive from anywhere to the YMCA. There's YMCAs everywhere. People can go and get practice in their sports, or if they need to, they can just play or they can invite other people and they can practice and stuff like that. And I feel like it's just helping people get better at sports. Yeah. It's important to understand that places like this still exist. 74 Figure 7. What makes it easier to play sport - Ruby And I want to share this photo because of the framing question was what makes it easier for you to play sports? Then this is the place where you can go and play sports for and not just this place but any. It's more and more the same courts starting to be built around the city. It's weird for people to understand what this photo is like. This place is literally in the middle of Downtown Detroit, so they built a place where kids can come play and families can come sit and eat and sit under the sun, just enjoy the fresh air. own sport participation, and it should be noted that the girls in this study faced fewer barriers to accessing organized sport. They consistently had transportation to focus group sessions and getting to and from practices and games was also not a significant issue for them. Most of the girls in the study had parents who were able to transport them to sport, as well as focus group sessions, with their own owned vehicles. And one of the girls, Brooklyn, had her own car that she would also use to get to the focus group session and on occasion, help other teammates get to and from practices and games. 75 The conversation about resources continued, and the girls commented that they did not really see the same amount of sport equipment and resource allocation in their schools when comparing them to more affluent schools. Brittany even mentioned that coming to high school was the first time she had seen a volleyball court with functioning equipment and that even then she still felt that the quality of the equipment was lacking. They complained about not having necessary equipment or time and resources to learn their preferred sport, volleyball, when they were in middle school. Almost all of the girls’ first experiences with volleyball were in the sixth grade or later. The girls felt that while access to sport in Detroit had improved in public Figure 8. What makes it easier to play sport - Jessie It represents someone who cares so much about me and will do anything for me. Also, she will do anything to see me succeed. It’s important for people to understand that it represents people like my mom (coaches) who will do anything to see me succeed. recreation facilities, schools were still lacking, especially when it came to sports outside of the Big 2; basketball and football. Social support, from family, teammates and coaches made it easier for the girls to play sport. The girls shared tangible sacrifices that their parents made to help them play sport, including sacrificing time and money for games, clinics and practices. They also discussed the 76 emotional support that they got from parents and family members as well, including support at games, introduction to older players who could mentor them and words of encouragement. However, having family support was not always a guarantee for the girls. Emily and Sasha shared struggles that they had getting their family on board with their sport participation. The tone of the conversation became more somber as Emily described her family’s favoritism for her brother. She shared how her parents tried to persuade her to stop playing sport to free up time to take her brother to his games. Other girls felt that while there may be support in their family and team that they did not perceive there sport as being valued in the broader community. They complained that boys’ sports still received more attention and praise from schools and from the community more broadly. Summary Facilitators of sport participation that the girls identified included improved access to sport and recreation spaces in Detroit. The girls found that parks and facilities such as the YMCA were available for them to play in. The recent Project Play report conducted in Southeast Michigan supports this, they found that non-profits and philanthropic organizations have stepped in to improve recreational facilities in Detroit where municipal or school resources were missing (Aspen Institute, 2018). Additionally, girls found social support from their families, peers and coaches. Significant others provided girls with instrumental support such as parents who funded their children’s sport participation and provided transportation, and coaches who connected the girls to additional resources. The girls also received emotional support by families and friends encouraging their sport participation. 77 What Makes It Harder to Play Sports? Figure 9. What makes it harder to play sport - Jessie I wanted to share this picture because it shows the world surrounding me. And what's important for people to understand about this picture is that the picture shows the many things surrounding me and everything going on. And it ties into the question because oftentimes what makes it hard for people to play sports are outside factors. For example, other people or other things standing in their way like school or just family things and stuff like that. And I chose this picture because it's like I mentioned in the beginning, the lanes they go different way and there's a stop sign. So say you could be going one way going toward your goal playing the sport and then there's this factor that stops you completely and you have to take a moment to just sit and look around you and realize. Okay, so what does this photo say about my school and community. This says my school and community are some outside factors that can make it hard for me, for other people like myself to play sports. The girls talked about factors outside of their control that made it more difficult to play sport. These ranged from teammates who did not always put in their best effort, and the frustration that comes with dealing with that, to lack of introduction to sport at their schools. They discussed challenges that they faced with regards to gaining enough experience in their 78 sport to compete at higher levels. They observed that White volleyball players were more likely to have started playing volleyball at a much younger age. They also recognized that some White parents had more money and resources to invest in their children’s sport participation. They felt that this could make playing sport more difficult because, when playing outside of Detroit, they had to catch up to teams that had more playing time and experience than they did. The girls also opened up about the normal challenges that came with playing the sport such as losing, having a difficult time at practice and self-doubt. Figure 10. What makes it harder to play sport - Ava Because what makes it harder to play a sport is people prioritize sports based on their beliefs. So of course, basketball and football are more important than other sports such as volleyball, and soccer, and stuff like that. And I feel like this photo really shows how the world views sports. As long as football and basketball is around it don't really matter to people. And I feel like that its other sports out there and people really need to understand that. One of the more animated discussions of the focus group was how the emphasis placed on boys’ sports made it harder for the girls to enjoy or persist in their own sports. All of the girls expressed frustration that girls’ sport wasn’t seen as important or as good as boys’ sport. They complained that football and basketball received more praise and recognition in schools. The 79 girls thought that teachers and administrators were more lenient towards male athletes when it came to grades. Some of the girls also stated that their parents had a similar bias. Ava and Ruby Figure 11. What makes it harder to play sport - Emily I wanted to share this photo because I don't think teachers realize how hard it is to be a student-athlete. And what's important for people to understand about this photo is that teachers give out unnecessary amount of assignments or work, not only for us, but for themselves because it's exaggerating. And what this photo says about my school, it kind of had me thinking. I just want to basically say that I think they put too much pressure on just students and mostly student-athletes because you have to have a certain amount of-- a certain GPA, and you must attend practices. shared that their parents let their brother who was an athlete, ‘get away’ with lower grades. The girls also felt that society in general valued men more and male dominated sports more, boys were seen as the “superstars” and “money-makers” of the family. They mentioned the gender pay gap as well as the focus placed on men’s sport such as the Super Bowl. They observed that new sport stadiums had been built in Detroit recently, but that these were all for professional men’s teams. 80 Finally, the girls also pointed out how difficult it was to keep up with schoolwork and sport at the same time. They complained about receiving large amounts of homework and not having enough time to complete it all. When asked if they had ever had a time when they had a conflict with school or sports, every girl said yes and they all recounted time that they had to miss sport events to keep up with school work. The girls felt that the amount of homework that they were assigned was not congruent with what they felt necessary to be successful in school. They expressed frustration that school work kept them from sport and other leisure-time pursuits. As stated previously, the girls were also saddened by the lower standards they felt that boys were held to with regards to school work and sport. The girls expressed the belief that boys either weren’t expected to maintain as high a GPA to remain on a sports team or were given easy passes by teachers at the request of their coaches. It should be noted that previous research on this topic has identified that overemphasis on the sport socialization of Black boys can lead to lower academic achievement and greater reliance on sport as a means of upward mobility (Beamon, 2010). In this regard the girls may be lucky, but they did not perceive the potential long-term benefits of the disparity of academic leniency in the long run. Summary Barriers that girls identified to their sport participation included external factors that they perceived as outside of their control, including lack of funding or equipment for school sport, lack of family resources to support sport participation and more typical challenges such as losing or differences in effort between teammates. The girls also perceived lack of support for girls’ sport as compared to boys’ sport as a barrier to their sport participation. They felt that society as a whole valued boys’ sport and this led to differences in ways that male and female athletes were treated. The girls felt that this made 81 it harder for them to participate in sport because they didn’t get the encouragement and support they desired from the community. A few of the girls even commented on preferential treatment that their brothers received with regards to sport participation. Finally, school and feeling overburdened with homework made it more difficult for the girls to play sport. They described the challenges of balancing sport practice, travel and competition with keeping up with school and maintaining good grades. They felt that boys were held to lower academic standards and this gave them greater flexibility with balancing school and sport, whereas girls were more likely have to choose just one as a main priority. Why Aren’t More Girls Interested in Sports? For this framing question, the girls were asked to find a friend who did not play sport and work together to take a picture that captured that friend’s point of view. This approach was used seeing as all of the girls who were participants in the study were active sport participants. The girls found that one major barrier that other girls faced to sport participation was societal expectations of beauty. They felt that having to look pretty, maintaining well-done makeup or hair were incompatible with the sweating and vigorousness of sport. The girls felt that too much pressure was placed on girls, particularly Black girls, to always look pretty. The girls shared that 82 Figure 12. Why more girls are not interested in sport - Jessie I wanted to share this picture cause it represents what a lot of girls worry about and that's their looks or how they look. What's important for people to understand about this picture is that looking cute is always something some girls worry about so it causes them miss out on all of the fun that comes with playing the sport and also the relationships that can form while playing that sport. And what does this say about my community? It says that my community has put such an emphasis on beauty and has such high beauty standards that it makes some girls not want to play a sport because they get all sweaty and their hair will get messed up making them what people who say ugly. they felt these standards were not applied equally across girls of different races, specifically, that White girls who looked messy or sweaty were given the benefit of the doubt. Whereas Black girls may be seen as gross or dirty. The girls felt that while they weren’t too concerned with how playing sport made them look, they were saddened that these factors could cause other girls to miss out on the benefits of playing sport. 83 Figure 13. Why more girls are not interested in sport - Destiny What I want people to understand about the photos, it's not just a football field, it hinders a girl's desire to play sports because they feel like it doesn't matter. The football team and the basketball team is going to be-- they're going to outshine us so football comes first, then basketball. And then volleyball is literally last. We're just left under a rock. And what this says about my community and my school is that they're jerks. That's ridiculous. Lastly, the girls also thought that another reason that girls weren’t interested in sport was the lack of recognition that girl’s sport got compared to boy’s sport. They said that in high school, girls wanted to pursue activities where they stood out, where they were recognized for their accomplishments. But that the prioritization of boys’ sport made it feel like girls’ sport did not matter. The girls wanted their schools to recognize the successes of their girl’s teams through PA announcements and pep rallies. The feel that not only would this encourage girls who were already in sport to keep going and be proud of their accomplishments, it would also introduce girls who haven’t played before to sports that were available at their schools. 84 Summary Factors which influenced girls’ interest, or lack thereof, in sport included sport participation being perceived as incompatible with certain standards of beauty, mainly that sweating and playing rough in sport would ruin girl’s makeup and hairstyles. And finally, lack of recognition of girls’ sports was also seen as playing a role in suppressing interest. Some of the girls felt that when girls’ sport weren’t popularized or celebrated that girls were less likely to see it as an activity worth pursuing. Girls’ Experiences and Perspectives on Race in Sport This study used photo elicitation in order to understand that ways the girls in Detroit navigate their sport experiences and make sense of and incorporate the messages they receive from their families, schools and communities and shape their sporting experiences. The project used Critical Race Theory as a way to frame the girls experiences in sport. A predominant theme of CRT is the act of storytelling with the purpose of describing the reality of the lives of people of color to help further bridge the gap in understanding and bring their stories and narratives to life. The girls were able to tell their stories through taking pictures of the way they see their world and sharing their interpretations with each other, as well as with stakeholders in sport in Detroit. CRT was utilized in two main ways in this project: (1) the five main tenets were used as a guide in deductively analyzing the qualitative data; and, (2) the act of storytelling was used to frame the photos and accompanying narratives to describe the girls’ experiences in sport. For the analysis, Dedoose, a qualitative analysis software was used to thematically code the. First, the five tenets or CRT were entered into Dedoose as codes; as outlined by Solorzano and Yosso (2001a, 2001b); 85 Table 5. Five Central Tenets of CRT use in Analysis CRT Central Tenet 1) The centrality of race and racism in society Component of CRT Race and racism are a defining characteristic of American Society 2) The challenge to dominant ideology 3) The centrality of experiential knowledge 4) The interdisciplinary perspective 5) Commitment to social justice Reveals how these claims serves as a cover for self- interest, power, and privilege of dominant groups in American society Asserts that the experiential knowledge of people of color is appropriate, legitimate and an integral part to analyzing and understanding racial inequality Challenges ahistoricism and focuses of most analyses and insists that race and racism be placed in both a contemporary and historical context using interdisciplinary methods CRT is a framework committed to social justice agenda What to look for Race and racism: i. Takes on institutional and individual forms ii. Has conscious and unconscious elements iii. Microagressions Interest convergence i. ii. Disparate Impact i. Deficit thinking ii. Cultural deficit iii. Genetic determinist models models iv. Whiteness i. ii. Lack of historical analysis Lack of interdisciplinary perspectives i. ii. Lack of social justice Interest convergence (1) The centrality of race and racism in society; (2) CRT’s role in challenging the dominant ideology; (3) the importance of experiential knowledge in the form of story-telling and counter story-telling; (4) a transdisciplinary perspective and (5) a commitment to social justice. Then the transcripts were read and re-read to develop a deeper understanding of the data. Whenever a piece of datum that reflected one of these five tenets was discovered as outlined in Table 5, that 86 meaning unit would be highlighted and the code was applied. Additionally, whenever a CRT code was applied to a meaning unit, analytic codes and memos were applied using the Dedoose memoing feature. The second way that CRT was used in this study was through allowing the girls to tell their own stories. Delpit (1995) argues that one of the tragedies of education is that the voices of children of color are often missing. CRT provides a way to communicate about the experiences of people of color and to restore their voices. Two pillars of CRT were most prominent in the data and are presented in the next section, those were: (1) The centrality of race and racism in society; and, (2) The centrality of experiential knowledge. “You Just Feel Really Disrespected” - The Centrality of Race and Racism All of the girls who participated in the study, found race to be a salient issue in their sport experiences. Interestingly, when discussing the significance of race in their experiences, the girls would often interpret it through the lens of how they assumed White people viewed them. This phenomenon has been described in early social science literature on social interaction as “The Looking Glass Self” (Rawls & Duck, 2018): So in imagination we perceive another’s mind some thought of our appearance, manners, aims, deeds, character, friends, and so on, and are variously affected by it… The thing that moves us to pride or shame is not the mere mechanical reflection or ourselves, but an imputed sentiment, the imagined effects of this reflection upon another’s mind…We always imagine, and in imagining share, the judgments of the other mind (Cooley, 1902, p. 184). 87 A similar concept was also described by W. E. B DuBois when discussing the “double- consciousness” of African-Americans (Du Bois, 2006). The way in which African Americans perceived themselves through the veil of White America, “this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others” (Du Bois, 2006). For example, the girls would sometimes start a sentence with “White people think that…” or “when White people see us doing…” The girls frequently spoke about race from a position of being spotlighted, an almost self-consciousness when they were in predominantly White contexts. One of the emotions the girls described having to instances where they felt like “others” because of their race was pride. The topic first came up after the girls voted on and chose to discuss Figure 3 which was a fist, in the recognizable “Black Power” salute, holding flowers. One of the meanings they took from this photo was that of “Black girl camaraderie”, strength and sticking together as young Black athletes. Destiny said that the idea of having to stick together reminded her of tournaments that she and her team had played in where they were the only, or one of very few all Black teams at a predominantly White volleyball tournament. Being one of the only Black teams present at the tournaments made the girls hyper aware of their race and their actions. They felt like they stood out as different, at these tournaments. Destiny described the experience this way, “I would just like walk up into the places we would go to Kentucky, Florida, Georgia, we will go to big places and like will be literally the only Black people there and they'll just be like so weird. I would just be walking around by myself and Caucasian would just look at us like, wow.” Sasha described a similar experience to Destiny and added how feeling spotlighted in these situations made her feel more aware of the negative stereotypes of Black people, 88 Caucasian people just think that we might give up and lose and just like stop playing giving our best and just give up because that what they think African American people do and when we stick together and actually beat them they're like oh well we were wrong and then it gives us the higher advantage. Feelings of being “other” also manifested at times when girls were the only Black person on their teams. Three of the girls specifically mentioned being on predominantly White teams before. They described feelings of isolation and not being sure of how to make friends or relate to their teammates. Ashley recalled when she was the only Black girl on her track and field team, I was the only Black girl and it was just like wow. I really didn’t say nothing. It took me until the end of the season to actually start making friends because it was like this one girl who just wouldn’t stop looking at me. And I was just like is she—I was thinking in my mind, what is she thinking? Is she thinking she don’t want me here or is she trying to be my friend? Just in a weird way, I was really scared. Again, a common way the girls described times when they were in predominantly White spaces was becoming hyper-conscious of how they were being perceived through the eyes of White people. Always wondering if any differences in behavior, any slights were due to their race. As Ashley described, this can be a painful and isolating experience especially given that being able to form connections and make friends was an important benefit that the girls described receiving from sport. Emily, the only girl in the study who identified as Hispanic/Latina, described a similar experience that she had being in the minority on a team, So actually, when I first came to my team I was the only Hispanic or any other race and I was so quiet…So yeah, I just used to sit there and watch everything. I wouldn’t say a 89 word and it was really weird. And it was really hard for me to make friends even though I’m really social. One occurrence that potentially factors into this sense of isolation could be perceived microaggressions, brief verbal, behavioral or environmental indignities which can be intentional or unintentional that communicate negative or derogatory racial slights. Experiencing microaggressions in other areas of their lives could lead the girls to being hyperaware when around predominantly White teammates. Sasha described a situation where a White teammate asked her about music and while the interaction may have seemed harmless, it had a significant impact on her. So it just makes me mad when I see Caucasian people trying to fit in with me. They be like, “oh you know this song,” and then they’ll play like a rap song and I’ll just be like of course I know this song but you don’t got to like [pause], you just feel really disrespected. The girls also talked about the isolation of being one of the few minority players on a team more broadly. During the second week’s discussion, when the topic of diversity on sport teams came up. The girls engaged in an animated back and forth about times when they felt like White referees at predominantly White tournaments were perceived as making more lenient calls for White teams. Ruby suggested that this occurred because White people felt threatened when they were being outperformed by Black people, I been hearing that all the time but Whites think Black people are just more athletic or like-- I don't know, is it athletic or stronger, something about the difference in between the Black and White people, but when an African-American do get a chance to go play 90 with the White people, they dominate. When they do get the opportunities that the White people get, they do dominate. Ruby felt that White referees were biased because of a perceived challenge to their racial group’s superiority, although she did not think this was a conscious choice to be unfair. Ashley continued, relating this perceived threat to White parents, Because it's like, on one hand, they want us because they want to make they team better, so they do want Black people out there. But at the other hand, it's like they need to get the parents and be like, "No. Don't put your kid out here because they taking away from our kid’s shine." So I just feel like it's a mindset all the way across the board and different point of views and perspectives. After a moment of side chatter, Ashley continued, I feel like White people think we are a threat when we get the same advantages as they do. I don't think they want-- it's like you know how you always in competition with somebody? I feel like they feel like they always in competition with us, that we cannot be better than them. Like if we were better than them it would be a serious problem. The other girls nodded in agreement with this and Destiny added, “A disaster [laughter].” Ava added, Because they have always been a head of us even in history, they have always been ahead of us. So I feel like even now, White people got their mind set, “They can't get ahead of us. We got to stay ahead of them.” From there, Ashley related this to the idea of diversity on sports teams. She thought that the stereotype of Black and Hispanic athletes being better at sport led coaches and parents to 91 wanting more “diverse” teams. However, she felt that the pursuit of diversity led to minority athletes being included on the teams as a form of tokenism, Like in the tournament, we was talking about, in one tournament you was in a certain volleyball team and I just started noticing a pattern. It's like I did not see one White team that had more than two Black kids on it. So I think people just-- not because of their skill, but people just be like-- people put a Black or a Hispanic or any type of other ethnic group inside of a White team, just to say that their team is diverse. Ava noted that being the only minorities on a team would lead to those athletes separating themselves from the predominantly White team socially, We talk about that too in the car and stuff because you got these two Black kids on the team, it's 15 people on a team, it's two Black people and the other 13 is White people. So, yeah. They might be able to get along with you at that time, but they still feel out of place. You can't tell me that they don't feel out of place or they talk to y'all and communicate with y'all, but then when they get together or they might just slide off to the side, it just might be them two because they do live a different life than y'all it is a different culture than y'all. So I feel like you can be one, but it's not always going to be one because it's not really diverse when said it's only two of them. So they going to sit together even if they can get along with everybody else. These moments give some insight into the ways that the girls navigate and perceive their own race as well as “Whiteness” in sport. First, either due to their own experiences of microaggressions, their awareness of stereotypes of Black people or a combination of both of these factors, the girls act and react to White people and people of their own race in a racially conscious way. They feel a sense of camaraderie when they encounter another Black people, and 92 feel suspicious and isolated when they are the only minority on a team. They projected these feelings of apprehension onto the way they perceive the thoughts and motivations of other Black athletes on a predominantly White team would have a hard time relating to their White teammates. Stereotypes of Black people both from within or outside of sport shaped the girls’ experiences. “I Feel Like White People Think We Are a Threat” - The Centrality of Experiential Knowledge While not directly related to sport, it’s important to discuss the girls’ perceptions of race as they experience it in school and their everyday lives. As the previous section highlighted, perceptions of racial stereotypes broadly can have a more narrow effect on behavior in sport. First, as described in the previous section, the girls were aware that Black people get stereotyped as lazy. In relation to sport, this made them feel like they had to push themselves harder to prove the stereotype wrong. As Ava said when reflecting on how stereotypes affect her, I feel like it pushes me to do better or work harder because you don't you know how walk into a tournament and everybody is old like they're from Detroit they're going to lose or whatever it's all Black team they're not as good as us so it pushes you to do better because you don't want to be you don't want them to be right. You don't want to be stereotyped. so like it just pushes you to work harder. Ruby expressed a similar reaction to negative stereotypes of Black people, however, also expressed the opinion the negative stereotypes existed for a reason and said, African-Americans need to get themselves out there like showing what we really are, like who we are not just killing each other stuff like that. Because you know you can't blame Caucasian people for saying stuff like that. Like Black people, we want respect from 93 everyone. Then we be like contradicting ourselves so it's like if we want respect from other people we got to start respecting ourselves first. Although Ruby was the only one during the focus groups to strongly place blame of negative perceptions of the race on Black people themselves, other girls still felt the responsibility and weight of having to prove negative stereotypes wrong. This kind of respectability politics is not an uncommon discourse among marginalized populations; the idea that negative stereotypes and racism would cease to exist if only marginalized peoples would conform to more respectable and socially accepted ways of existing. Additionally, this line of thought can also lead to the belief that the misbehavior of one marginalized person stands as a representation of the entire group. Ruby went on to say, I always have to push people to be better than what people perceive Black people to be so like when we go or when they start fight at your school and people think that's funny and stuff and I just feel like you're wonder why we're perceived this way you get mad when White people or Caucasian people say stuff like this but you're not trying to change it. So for me I'm just trying to change the stereotype make it out of being a stereotype and proof that we can be more. Ava connected the effect that not wanting to succumb to stereotypes could have on Black girls’ decision on whether or not they want to play sports. During a conversation about beauty expectations for girls, Ava identified different expectations for Black girls versus White girls, I feel like it's stereotypical. So White girls' not supposed to wear braids. Or Black girls are supposed to wear natural hair or Black girl's supposed to be wearing the booty shorts and crop tops walking around and stuff like that. And White girls are supposed to be nice and cute and dressed. 94 And Emily added, “and Black girls are ghetto. It depends on – it’s stereotypes. So people stereotype other people and that's what they expect of them.” Jessie identified how this might affect a girls’ decisions to play sport, noting that when you play sport you may get sweaty or look disheveled different judgements may be assigned to Black girls as compared to White girls, I feel like they see the White girl with a more promising future just by her skin color whether they're equally talented or there's a difference. Yeah, yeah. Like she said, because it hurts, I feel like they would look at it with a different perspective. So say the Caucasian girl, she might be messy and people see her like, “Oh. She's probably somewhere working hard for her future, doing what she needs to do.” And then the Black girl, everyone's like, “Oh. She probably hasn't washed in days. What is she doing?” They stereotype someone like that, but they wouldn't ask those questions or assume those things about the Caucasian girl. So that plays a big factor in it. Again, when talking about different stereotypes that Black girls may have to overcome in sport an physical activity, the Jessie refers to the way in which their bodies and behaviors may be viewed by White people and how that lead her interpret her own experiences. Finally, the girls thought that race played a role in structural inequalities that exist in sport. First, that White children had better access to resources such as training, clinics and travel and earlier access to sport and greater parental investment. When discussing sport facilities available at high schools in Detroit, all of the girls felt disappointed in facilities made available, and the general state of sport facilities for their schools. Ashley believed that this disparity was in part due to White schools versus Black schools. She said, “I feel like White people do get it better than us…Me coming to high school the first time we ever seeing Black and minorities really have the equipment and opportunities to training and stuff.” And again, in addition to these 95 differences being related to resources that are available to Black versus White people, Brittany also felt that part of this unequal distribution of resources in the schools was due to stereotypes on Black students, saying, I think, sometimes when it comes to sports like with the equipment and stuff like that, money is a big issue but sometimes I think people base it all on skin color just like a discrimination period. It's like, “See how hard how Blacks had to work to get to where we are now.” But it just seems like they-- it's like they always base it off like, “Oh, she’s dressed a certain way,” or, “she looks a certain way, so if we give him this, he probably just go use it for a couple days or a couple years and just start breaking it down.” So it's like they never really give us a chance to actually how to do something what we want to do. Destiny noted how deeply invested she observed White parents being in the children’s sport. She noted that this difference led to a distinct disadvantage for Black players who started much later or whose parents did not have the same amount of money to dedicate to their children’s sport career, So White people, they just really care about what their kids do. They just like, "Oh. You want to play a sport?" You hear White people like, "As soon as they come out the womb, putting volleyball in their hand or a football in their hand. That's what they going to do." They care. And they start playing volleyball at two. Literally at two. And I got in at sixth grade. I got some catching up to do. And it's just the whole sport you can see the difference in these White people who started their kids at a very young age and the Black people who just figuring it out what volleyball is and started to play, you can see the difference. And the years they've been playing and the years they've been training, the 96 years they've been working and the different type of equipment and stuff, like you can see the difference. Girls’ Experiences and Perspective on Gender in Sport Similar to race, the girls also found gender to be a salient part of their sport experiences. The girls’ experiences of gender in their sport experiences was analyzed from an intersectional perspective. As Mowatt, French & Malebrenche (2013) argued, Black women’s experiences in leisure and recreational activities with their voices focused as the center of the narrative is underrepresented. The authors argued that Black women’s experiences in this field could be viewed from the perspective of invisibility and hypervisibility. Black women are invisible in leisure and recreation because they remain underrepresented in studies where they are the key demographic being studied additionally, Black women and girls are underrepresented in sport participation as a whole. On the other hand, Black women and girls are hypervisible within sport and leisure in part because of stereotypes about Black women’s bodies and personalities that are perpetuated throughout sport. The codes invisibility and hypervisibilty were entered into Dedoose. After reading through the transcripts, the codes were applied to meaning units where they emerged. Each identified code was also accompanied by an analytic memo which justified why it embodied the code. The themes and quotes from the narratives from which they emerged are presented below. “We're Just Left Under a Rock” The girls described feelings of their sport being overlooked and overshadowed by more popular boys’ sports. They felt that boys’ sports got the majority of recognition and validation from their schools and that girls’ sport lacked comparable levels of support and funding. During 97 her explanation of her photo (Figure 14), Destiny expressed frustration over the amount of support and attention that boys’ football and basketball got in her school saying, They literally idolize and prioritize the football team over anything. These boys don't even-- they don't even have to go to class to get a passing grade. Anything's wrong and their coach steps in and is like, “Oh well, he's on the basketball team, so pass my player.” And the whole school turns a blind eye, least Ms. [Name], our principal, she turns a blind eye to it and she even condones it really. And I just think it's sad. Destiny’s frustration is clearly palpable in this quote and as she was explaining her photo choice all of the girls were nodding in agreement and support. Later on in the discussion Brooklyn also talked about attempts that she had made to get more recognition for girls’ teams in her school by asking teachers to make the announcements over the PA system which proved to be unfruitful, During our volleyball season, we tried to just get trying to get them to announce our games because they weren't. They would not announce it…They're like, “Oh, we'll get to you. We'll get to you.” But somehow, volleyball was always painstakingly left off. [Interviewer: How did it make you feel?] Annoyed. Because we do just as good as the football team. The topic of PA announcements was particularly animating for the girls with almost all of them describing similar experiences despite going to different schools in Detroit. They felt that getting acknowledgement from their schools was important and it shaped the way they view their own sport experiences. Additionally, they thought that lack of recognition or publicity of girls’ sport discouraged other girls from joining sport, seeing it as something potentially not worth their time and investment as Destiny emphasizes in this quote, 98 So what I want people to understand about the photos, it's not just a football field, it hinders a girl's desire to play sports because they feel like it doesn't matter…We're just left under a rock. And what this says about my community and my school is that they're jerks? That's ridiculous. In addition to girls’ accomplishments not being as valued by their schools, there were also different expectations put on boys and girls concerning grades. Girls’ sport efforts were not as encouraged because they felt that their schools and families expected them to focus more on their grades while boys were either given more leniency, such as the example above where teachers and administrators turn a blind eye to boys’ grades, or girls are discouraged from adding on activities that may take their focus away from academics. As Emily said, Because for a boy, it’s just a given. For most boys, it's a given to play sports. You have to play a sport and you have to go to school and you have to do this and do that because, for a boy, that's just everything in high school playing a sport or just period playing a sport. So, yeah. They don't put that in girls’ heads, so they don't feel like they can balance it. The girls noted the lack of attention given to women’s sport more broadly. During an exchange about availability of sporting facilities in, Sasha noted that society as a whole seems not to care about female sport. Noting all of the new sport facilities that have been built in support, she called out a lack of support for professional women’s teams, I feel like some people are just not interested in girls playing because they're interested in boys playing more. When we get together, we don't all get together like how we get together for the Super Bowl. It's always a party for a Super Bowl game. But do you see that with the WNBA? 99 Over the course of this line of conversation, the girls frequently expressed frustration and sadness with having to deal with a lack of recognition for their sport accomplishments. When sharing how the lack of recognition made them feel and why it was important, the girls talked about their internal struggles and having to deal with moments of self-doubt, feeling that having to be the only source of support for themselves and other girls was extremely difficult at times. And it's like at one point, you just get fed up because I'm working for volleyball and football. The volleyball girls, they're working to the same extent and to the boys, but somehow the boys still get more recognition, and then the girls are still just in the same place. So they're constantly building theirselves up. They have each other and they do have self-recognition but at the same time, you can't just keep putting yourself out there. When asked why receiving recognition was important to her, Emily responded simply, “I don't think it's technically like people need recognition from other people, need the "Good job", need that satisfaction. I feel like they just want to be treated equal.” In addition to a lack of recognition from schools, the girls also noted more support from the community for boys’ sport. Ruby described a scenario which highlights how individuals in the community treat boys’ sport participation differently from girls’ sport participation. They felt that boys’ sport choices were reinforced while girls’ sport participation went broadly unnoticed for the most part. Have you ever went out and you could see a boy playing football and then this random man walk out and be like, “Right here. Right here. Oh, nice throw.” But if you get a girl playing volleyball on the sand court, she's just playing by herself. Don't nobody be like, “Oh, pass it over here. Need help?” For men, everybody is this young man's coach or this young man's support system but for a girl, it's different because they don't know nothing 100 about their sport because they always had the men to teach them football and basketball and all that good stuff. Of the girls who had brothers, a few expressed the idea that their brother’s sport participation were given a higher priority by their parents. Emily talked about her struggles with getting her parents to support her sport participation, So, my brother used to play sports but now he's a senior. So, he used to do soccer, hockey, and swimming and my parents actually really wanted him to play sports, “Dude come on. Why don't you play sports?” And me on the other hand though, they were like, “Why don't you just stop playing. Come on.”…It made me sad. I'm like why do you tell him-- why do you encourage him but you want me to quit volleyball it doesn't seem fair. When describing the start their younger brother got to sport, Ava and Ruby said that he was introduced to sport much earlier that they were and felt that this wasn’t fair. As Ruby said, “I feel like it took too long for us to get there. But that should have been talked about as much as his sports was talked about.” Both girls were introduced to sport at around age nine but said that their sport participation wasn’t taken seriously, especially when they compared it to their brothers’ sport participation, “Especially because we was older, too. Especially, when we was little that's how we felt. We were older than him. So how did he get to do this before we got to do ours?” However, not all the girls shared this same experience. Despite having multiple siblings who all played sport, Ashley felt that everyone was treated consistently in her home, “‘Whatever you want to get, you're going to have to work for it just like your brother and your sister.’ So everything is really just equal in my house. Nothing is based off-- well, some things, it's based 101 off of age but nothing is really based off anything. It's just it started to work and that's just how it goes.” Differences in expectations of sport and academics for girls and boys also persisted in schools. During multiple focus group sessions, the girls talked about the differences in expectation placed on them when it came to balancing their school work and sport participation. They complained that when school conflicts came up, they would often have to sacrifice sport to catch up/keep up in schools, whereas for boys, they felt the calculation was different. They felt that boys weren’t expected to achieve as much academically and so standards were lowered or they were given additional allowances in school by teachers. As Brooklyn said, I think when it comes to a girls team and a guys’ team they-- if a girl has below a 2.5, they won't think about it. They'll cut you. But when it's a guy, we think it because you might be a better athlete. Boys don't try to pass their classes. You already set those expectations and standards low for them. So if somebody tells me I'm I don't have classes I'm going to pass their classes. I'm not going to make or work to my full ability that I can to pass the rest of them because they already gave me a pass from the beginning. Additionally, when talking about the relative popularity of girls’ and boys’ sports, they talked about what may make men’s volleyball different from men’s basketball. When probed on why men’s volleyball isn’t as popular, Jessie responded “Because I feel like they see it more as feminine, and more like— From a boy's perspective, it's like when you hear volleyball, it's like, ‘Girls' sports.’” The girls had expressed the belief that traditionally feminine sports were perceived as less valuable than traditionally masculine sports. Emily pointed out a double standard that she perceived as existing between the way girls and boys who play sports that are not traditionally associated with their gender play. Saying, “I think when a girl plays a guy sport, 102 they applaud her. They see her as stronger…But I feel like when a guy’s playing a girl sport it’s more of a – they worry.” Jessie extended this further, noting the stereotypes that exist with regards to sexuality and sport choice for boys, I just feel like [parents] wouldn’t be as proud or – no. No. No. Forget that. I feel like they’d start making assumptions like the parents would probably start thinking like, “Oh, my son’s gay. My son’s not much of a guy because he’s not playing basketball or football.” Here, the girls expressed a sense that not only are girls’ sports not as valued as boys’ sports, but that even being associated with a feminine sport was enough to have boys’ sexuality questioned. Emily even noted that one of the first things she perceived as coming to people’s minds when they thought about volleyball was the uniform, as she puts it, “When you first think of volleyball, it’s girls. It’s shorts. ‘So what’s my son about to look like out there [laughter] playing a girls’ sport in shorts?’ And I feel like that’s what everybody think it is, just girls running around in shorts.” “Girls Are Always Worried About How Their Body Looks and How They Present Themselves” In sport, the girls in this study reported hypervisibility in terms of the stereotypes they were aware of with regard to their bodies and appearances. First, they identified one of the reasons why more girls aren’t interested in sport as being having to negotiate societal beauty standards for girls. Particularly, the friends that they worked with in taking these picture felt that being active and playing a sport was incompatible with wearing makeup and maintaining a neat hairstyle. Jessie identified this issue when she presented her photo (Figure 12) to the group, 103 What’s important for people to understand about this picture is that looking cute is always something some girls worry about so it causes them to miss out on all of the fun that comes with playing the sport and also the relationships that can form while playing that sport. The girls believed that boys were not held to the same appearance standards as girls were and this gave them more latitude to engage in physical activity. They felt that boys’ physical appearance was not judged as heavily as girls’ appearances were as Ashley highlighted during a discussion of femininity and sport, When a girls shows up in sports, with their hair in a bun, and they look like they’re ready to work hard, people look at them crazy. Rather than a boy showing up in his little messed up little White shirt or whatever. And they’re like, “Oh, they’re ready to go put in work in the gym. Additionally, girls felt that their bodies appearance would also be held to different standards than that of White girls. As discussed in the previous section, Jessie felt that White girls and Black girls would be judged differently for their appearance after exercising or playing sport, “They stereotype someone like that, but they wouldn’t ask or assume those things about the Caucasian girl. So that plays a big factor in it.” They also thought that beauty standards were applied differently to Black girls than White girls. Again, increasing the pressure on Black girls to refrain from activities that might make them look unkempt or messy. Additionally, although it only came up once over the course of the project, Ashley also expressed the idea that the volleyball uniforms are a hypervisible element of the sport. Mainly that volleyball uniforms could potentially lead girls to feeling self-conscious about their bodies, 104 Play for volleyball, you see a girl, anyway like I said, she said it before, when you think of volleyball you think of girls in shorts. So it's like girls are always worried about how their body looks and how they present themselves. So it's just they want to present themselves I guess to guys so that it makes them seem feminine so people actually want them. An interesting aspect in which the concept of invisibility and hypervisibility intersect is when it came to recreational play spaces. The girls felt that one thing that made it difficult to access recreational spaces was that these spaces may be predominantly occupied by boys and they didn’t feel comfortable using them. They felt like their desire to have a recreational space that was all their own was overlooked. But the girls were also hypervisible when they described feelings of being safe by themselves in parks and recreational spaces. That they potentially stood out as easy targets, increasing how uncomfortable they felt in recreational spaces, Ruby: it's also more likely for something to happen to a girl that she-- that's what I'm saying. Brooklyn: Yeah because people do think we're defenseless. Ruby: If you was a male like put yourself in a man's shoes or anybody's shoes and you see a little girl, she nice and cute, just walking down the street, right? Wouldn't you be like easy target? Destiny: I don't think that should be something because if I was in a male's shoes, I should have some respect for myself to not touch that little girl. Additionally, in her exit interview, Ava elaborated on how being able to talk about the challenges in accessing recreational spaces made her more aware of reasons why she did not use spaces such as basketball courts, 105 Yeah, when we were talking about not feeling safe in your neighborhood and the lack of volleyball nets in the neighborhood and how girls some girls are scared to play sports at the local parks and things. I didn't know that I felt unsafe in my old neighborhood. Like I didn't know that I feel unsafe to walk down the street or go play at a basketball court with the other boys and things like that…It's just really sad to me how I couldn't feel safe in my own neighborhood. Like girls can't feel safe enough to play at a local park in their own neighborhood. Youth-Led Analysis of Findings In addition to researcher-led, thematic analysis of findings. The girls also participated in qualitative analysis and identified their own lower and higher order themes after the Youth ReACT process. Girls worked together to read transcripts of the focus groups, highlight meaning units, condense meaning units into lower order themes and then grouped the lower order themes into higher order themes. At the conclusion of this process, the girls identified 7 higher order themes and 28 lower order themes. The following diagrams were all generated by the girls using notecards during their qualitative analysis and are presented here in digital form.\ Higher Order Theme 1: External Factors The first higher order theme the girls identified was that there were a multitude of external factors that affected girls’ sport participation. During the analysis process, the researcher asked the girls to explain what they meant by external differences, the girls shared that this was anything outside of their direct control. 106 The girls identified safety as a major external factor that affected their experiences in sport, particularly in regards to accessing sports. Whether recreational spaces were perceived as safe and welcoming was a unique barrier to why more girls were not interested in sport as well as something that made it easier or harder for the girls in the study to access sport depending on the perceived safety. Figure 14. Diagram of Theme 1 - External Factors The girls also found that the attitude of teammates greatly impacted their enjoyment and motivation in playing sport. This theme frequently came up as something that made it harder for girls to play sport. This theme consisted of girls’ teammates who may have a different competitive spirit, such as not trying as hard or not attending practices as well as teammates who were rude or did not fit in socially with the team. This is particularly salient given how important social connections and team bonding was to the girls. This theme played a major role during the discussion of why more girls did not play sport as well as why more girls weren’t interested in sports. The girls identified times when girls were discouraged from playing sports, told they were not good enough for sports or just not supported in their sport endeavors. An interesting theme that the girls identified within the data was the idea that a barrier that girls had when it came to playing sport was age discrimination. Meaning that adults underestimated the capabilities or ideas of young people. The girls identified times when they 107 were dismissed or told to just listen to adults blindly. The girls felt that this affected their sport participation because it limited the amount of influence or impact that they could have on their own sporting experiences. Either coaches who did not take them seriously enough or parents who thought that they knew what was best. Another theme identified was the impact that teammates’ level of commitment could have on their own sport enjoyment. This theme encompassed the difficulties that arose when teammates did not consistently attend practices or did not play up to the same competitive level. The girls were often frustrated when they had teammates they felt brought their own playing level down. A strategy that the girls discussed in overcoming this problem was to focus on their own personal growth and development and encourage those who were not putting in full effort while not letting it get to them. Higher Order Theme 2: Societal Standards and Expectations Figure 15. Diagram of Theme 2 - Societal Standards The second theme that girls identified was what they labelled, “Societal Standards/expectations”. This theme included instances where girls felt that cultural expectations regarding race or gender affected their sport participation or the sport participation of other girls and minorities. This lower order theme included instances of when girls felt that standards and 108 expectations were set low for Black athletes. And that these lower standards could lead to people not pushing or not trying to reach their full potential. Additionally, girls felt that their sport experiences were affected by negative stereotypes such as those mentioned previously for instance, Black people being lazy or Black girls being “ghetto’, affected the way that they perceived themselves in sport, particularly in conferences or tournaments that may be predominantly White. The girls also recognized the impacts that racial diversity can have on sports and teams. The girls felt that while diversity could has positive effects such as exposing people to different cultures and contexts, that it could also have negative implications. Particularly, the girls described times when they were the only minority on a team and how that lead to a sense of isolation. Finally, the girls recognized standards that society placed on girls as something the makes it more difficult for girls or Black people to play sports. These included standards such as appearance standards, expectations of always having to look pretty or never disheveled. Higher Order Theme 3. Passion Figure 16. Diagram of Theme 3 - Passion This theme encompassed the main reasons that girls participated in sport and the benefits that they received from their sport participation. Playing sport allowed the girls to engage in an activity that they found intrinsically rewarding. They identified codes in this theme that emphasized having an activity that let them play games that were engaging and having the opportunity to participate in an activity that they found engaging. Sport also gave the girls the 109 opportunity to compete, to improve their performance against others as well as improve in skills that they set for themselves. Most of the girls found competition in sport to be stimulating and motivating. However, Emily mentioned that over competitiveness in sport could be a reason why more girls aren’t interested in playing. Some girls just wanted to play sport in a low-pressure environment. However, lack of access to recreational sport or pick up sport limits the choices that girls have available to them. Finally, the girls valued playing sport because it helped them practice skills such as goal setting. It also gave them opportunities to reach and achieve goals they may have in life such as having access to college scholarships. Sport also gave them access to broader opportunities by connecting them with a network of positive adults and peers. The girls identified coaches who made them aware of opportunities outside of sport that existed and giving them access to events they might not be able to take place in otherwise such as travelling, attending professional sports games and academic activities. Higher Order Theme 4. Empowerment Figure 17. Diagram of Theme 4 - Empowerment The girls also outlined ways that sport participation enable them to exert power over their own lives. During the analysis activity, the girls were asked to specify what they meant by “empowerment”, and they said that it involved making decisions and feeling powerful and 110 connected to other people. A part of their sport experiences was the feeling of having control over their lives. Accessibility was identified as a facilitator as well as a barrier to girls’ sport participation. They felt empowered when adults prioritized their access to sport. With the study, girls’ accessibility focused on parents who were able to provide transportation for them. They also mentioned that for friends who did not play sport that the lack of transportation was a barrier to sport participation. The girls identified teamwork as an empowering aspect of sport because it gave them the opportunity to practice decision-making with same aged-peers. They got to coordinate during practices and at competitions to put their plays into action. Girls’ families, coaches and peer support systems played a major role in empowering them and giving them the space, time and encouragement to participate in sport. They found strength and perseverance through those who were supportive of them. Finally, girls valued the motivation they received from sport participation. Mainly, they valued being able to find an intrinsically motivating activity and dedicate time and practice to getting better at it. They felt that this enabled them to learn more about themselves and find their passion. Higher Order Theme 5. Gender Inequality Figure 18. Diagram of Theme 5 - Gender Inequality 111 In this theme, the girls identified the ways that sex and gender affected their sport participation. They identified disparities in the ways in which boys’ sports were treated as compared to girl’s sport both in regards to attention that they received from families and the community as well as preferential treatment that they perceived male athletes receiving at school. They also identified stereotypes about what are feminine and masculine sports and stereotypes of what is expected of girls’ appearances that may prevent more girls from participating in sports. Higher Order Theme 6. Internal Factors Figure 19. Diagram of Theme 6 - Internal Factors The theme of “Internal Factors” encompassed individual-level factors which can affect girls’ sport participation. These included things such as a lack of self-confidence on and off the court that might lead girls to quitting sport or not trying out for sport in the first place. The girls also identified the challenge of girls who critique themselves to harshly either because of their appearance or because of their performance in sport. They also identified the ways in which competitiveness affect their sport participation. Some girls found it to be an exciting and highly motivating part of sport, while others preferred a more laid-back approach to sport. 112 Higher Order Theme 7. Pressure from Adults Figure 20. Diagram of Theme 7 - Pressure from Adults Finally, pressure from important adults such as coaches, parents and teachers significantly affected the girls’ sport participation. First, the girls identified moments where not seeing eye-to-eye with parents on the importance of sport created a barrier to participation. Additionally, coaches were unsupportive or gave off “negative energy” also presented a barrier in sport. Debrief and Exit Interviews After the photographs, narratives, action items and several weeks of discussion, the girls were asked to provide feedback on their experience with the project in the form of exit interviews done over the phone. In addition to feedback on the more practical aspects of the project, the student comments below represent qualitative evidence of growth in critical consciousness vis-a-vis a heightened sense of awareness and empowerment. Ashley: I did start to like really notice things. So like if I would playing sports and I will always hear boys saying, “Oh, I play better than you I play better,” and like this or that. I never really noticed how much they said it but now that it’s been brought to my attention like I'm hearing it like all the time. But I'm like I'm viewing sports so much differently because it's like now I really value girls that really have that drive to play something. So when they want something like I will support them through it. 113 Destiny: I really liked the discussion that we had and I don't think I've been a part of something where we've been I've been able to like express my opinions, especially with sports. We've just been given a chance to like sit down and have a serious conversation about what we know is going on what we don't like or we like to see more. So being able to go to MSU and to have that conversation regarding your project was just really fun. Ruby: It was a different experience and it gave me a chance to use my voice. So I'm just happy that I got the opportunity to use my voice and share my point of views. And like looking into this, like doing this project has made me want to do more in the sports world and come up with more ideas to accomplish and just use my voice even more especially because after this I started doing journalism to draw attention to the sports world for girls and African-American men and girls in general. Recommendations and Suggestions Finally, after the conclusion of the youth-led data analysis of the study, the girls were asked to brainstorm recommendations for each higher-order theme they identified. The following suggestions are all transcribed verbatim from handwritten notecards the girls wrote. External Factors • • PAL can offer more support to their players and check up on them to make sure they’re okay. Many kids have problems with money/ride complications. PAL should keep the current monthly paying method, but they might want to either decrease the payment amounts and/or get more vans to help with transportation. • Individual player interviews to make sure everything on the team is running smooth and there aren’t any conflicts on the team 114 • • • • Doing fun competition as a team Provide transportation to children so more kids can do sports Start a big brother/big sister program for children Ice breakers to give people opportunities to get to know each other Societal Standards/Expectations • • • • • • • Provide examples (people) that show that these standards/expectations don’t have to control your life PAL staff can speak more to the kids (boys/girls) about the issues both genders might face with the expectations held on them from society and how they should focus on helping fix the issues instead of being a part of it. A camp teaching girls about sports and playing different sports with them Expand to more sports Expand to urban communities, do more programs where Black and Whites mix Post poster telling people to be themselves Show more diversity and more inclusiveness to break stereotypes Passion • • • • Make it fun – have pep rallies PAL should plan more events and activities for players/parents/staff to make playing sports more fun and appealing for us The coaches should also make sure that they aren’t too hard/mean to their kids because some coaches can make players not like or want to ply sports anymore. Have meeting between alumni and current players and let them explain to each other their experiences and what they love most about the sport. 115 • • • Make annual field day for all sports (carnival, picnic, something a person would look forward to) Try to make sports fun Make sports more appealing Empowerment • • • • • • • Provide basic necessities PAL coaches should encourage and motivate their players to become better. If their players are struggling, they should comfort and support them because it makes a difference Pull in more sponsors and try to include the kids in more decisions Scholarships for girls Make sure coaches check on players and get to know them Have coaches have a relationship with the players Understand what the player/child needs in order to help meet those needs Gender Inequality • • • Recognize girls’ sports more PAL should hold seminars/meetings with boys and girls explaining the importance of gender inequality. They could have public speakers come in and speak about different sports, the experiences/challenges they faced when play that sport etc. (Ex: a man comes in speaking about how he plays volleyball, a girl playing basketball or wrestling etc.) • Have camps or game days for boy & girls, letting them know they’re equal and on the same level. 116 • • • • Ads directed towards females Big sisters/big brothers, little sister/lil brother. Help with homework, talk about social skills, help them deal with homework Give the same amount of opportunities to both genders Advertise and promote girls sports just as often as boys sports Internal Factors • • • • • • • Do workshops that deal with mental confidence/toughness Have teammates write anonymous encouragement notes about each other Counsel your players, make them feel confident, help them if they’re struggling, try to make relationships with them Have journals for the players to write in at the beginning of practice and turn in to the coach and the coach can write responses. Giving coaches the training to talk to their players in a motivating way Make the child aware of themselves so that they can tackle the issue Helping them address the problem they have Pressure from adults • • Make adults aware of what we do; show them the ins and outs of the sport PAL can have more parent meetings explaining the importance of their child being able to get where they need to be on time, being able to make the competitions and practices and the importance of their child and themselves as parents being committed to the team and just how important volleyball is to us so they’ll understand. • A day where parents can come to practice with their kids and at the end hold a parent meeting explaining what the teams working on and what they need as a whole. 117 • • • • Building boundaries for parents and relationships to ensure they understand their players’ commitment. Parent player day Provide outlets for youth to unload their stress Make adults aware so that they’ll be more mindful of the stress they put on youth 118 CHAPTER 5 – DISCUSSION Sport presents a unique context for building life skills, fostering positive development, encouraging physical activity and building positive peer and adult relationships (Eime, Young, Harvey, Charity, & Payne, 2013b; Holt & Neely, 2011). However, these outcomes must be purposefully fostered in the sport environment and do not arise automatically from sport participation. Research shows that youth receive the most benefits from sport when coaches, parents, and other sport decision makers create environments which facilitate positive development and in which youth who participate can receive the many benefits that sport offers (Petitpas et al., 2005; Weiss et al., 2013). However, the potential benefits of participation do not much matter if the young people who need them do not participate. Previous research has shown that girls participate in sport at a lower rate than boys. For girls of color, this disparity is even more pronounced (Debate, Petee, Zwald, Huberty, & Zhang, 2009; Eime et al., 2015; R. W. Turner et al., 2015). Therefore, given the benefits that young people can receive from sport participation, the purpose of this dissertation was to explore some of the factors that facilitate and discourage sport participation for girls of color. This study explored the experiences of a group of girls who lived and played in Detroit. Because a primary goal of this study was to make sure that underrepresented girls’ voices remained central to the research process. A Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) methodology was employed. The participants in this study were engaged as co-researchers and active participants in knowledge co-creation and generation of solutions to the challenges that they and other girls like them face. Who better to inform reasons for participation and non- participation than the young people actually involved presently or in the past? 119 Through the use of PhotoVoice, a YPAR method in which community members take photos of their environment to identify challenges and opportunities in their communities and tell the stories of their experiences (Wang, 2006; Wang & Burris, 1997), the girls in this study were able to identify aspects of their sport experiences that they found particularly meaningful. Using photography, the girls answered four questions; (1) Why do you play sports?; (2) What are some things that make it harder to play sports?; (3) What are some things that make it easier to play sports?; (4) Why do you think more girls are not interested in sports? These findings will now be discussed. First, key results pertaining to the four research questions addressed will be considered in light of current research and theorizing relative to youth sports participation for girls of color. Next, observations related to the girls as co- researchers using the PhotoVoice technique will be forwarded. Third, study limitations, strengths and future directions will be examined. Finally, based on the results of this investigation programming implications will be forwarded. Key Finding Links to Existing Research Reasons for Participation The results of this study revealed that the girls involved participated in sport for a variety of reasons. First, they felt that playing sport gave them a sense of personal growth and accomplishment. Sport gave them the opportunity to participate in an activity that they found meaningful and a context in which they could track their progress and successes. Additionally, they participated in sport because they valued the relationships that they developed with teammates and coaches. Both of these motivators for participating in sport are well substantiated in the literature. Scanlan, Carpenter, Lobel, and Simons (1993), for example, found that effort and mastery along with social support from teammates and coaches were the predominant 120 sources of sport enjoyment for young athletes. Visek and colleagues (2015) found similar results, in their study of young athletes who listed “trying hard”, “positive team dynamics” and “positive coaches” as the primary things that made sport fun and enjoyable. A potential motivator for sport participation which was identified in this study which is not well explored in the literature is the role that city representation plays in attracting youth to sport. Interestingly, the girls in this study identified finding a connection to their city and community as a reason that they played sport. They described sport as an opportunity to “prove the haters wrong” and valued representing their city in a positive light. Figure 3, which featured street art in Downtown Detroit, answered the framing question of “Why do you play sports?”. Previous research has forwarded sport as a way to foster civic engagement in youth by reinforcing a sense of pride and purpose (Hart & Atkins, 2002). Studies also show that presence of a professional sport can foster civic pride and engagement in city dwellers (Groothuis, Johnson, & Whitehead, 2004). However, little research has been conducted to specifically examine the role of recreational youth sport participation and civic pride within the US context. Some research has been conducted in other contexts, for example a study conducted by Leng, Kuo, Baysa-Pee, and Tay (2014) in Singapore showed that participation in a major sport competition engendered a sense of national pride in youth Singaporean athletes. This raises the question of why did being from Detroit, being one of the few minority teams help the girls feel connected to Detroit even though they weren’t playing for a team that directly represented the city? How can this sense of city pride through representation be used to leverage community engagement and giving back? These are questions that need additional study. A key part of their descriptions of their early sport experiences the girls highlighted ages at which they were introduced to sport. Some of the girls complained that their introduction to 121 sport happened at a late age (e.g., first sport experience in middle school). This topic came up when they compared their sport training to that of White athletes, they believed that White athletes started playing sport at an earlier age and that put them at a competitive advantage. Age comparisons were also brought up when Ava and Ruby compared their introduction to sport to their younger brother’s. They expressed frustration that he was enrolled in sport at a younger age than they were. Research supports this observation. Urban girls typically entered age an average of one year later than boys did and girls from lower income families entered sports nearly four years later than girls from higher income families (Sabo, 2009). Age of entry into sport is an important factor to consider in girls’ access to and continued engagement in sport. Early introduction provides the opportunity to develop competence in sport skills. Girls who have had less time to develop sport competence may find themselves at a disadvantage when playing with or against girls who started sport at a younger age (Kirk, 2005; Ulrich, 1987), especially in this age of travel teams and early sport specialization. Developing and implementing ways to engage girls in sport at an earlier age is a key programming focus of Detroit PAL. One of the recommendations that the girls made highlights that program administrators also understand the importance of early sport engagement. They suggested mentoring programs in which older girls are paired with younger athletes in order to introduce them to sport. One important factor to consider when implementing this recommendation, however, is ensuring that sampling is the primary focus of earlier sport introduction. Given the potential negative effects of early single-sport specialization, while girls should be exposed to organized sports at earlier ages, programs and coaches should emphasize multiple sport participation at 122 appropriate developmental levels (Côté & Hancock, 2016; Waldron, DeFreese, Register-Mihalik, Pietrosimone, & Barczak, 2019). The girls identified other conditions which affected their sport participation, such as factors which made it easier for them to continue participating in sport. A key facilitator that girls identified was support from their parents and other family members. Girls’ whose parents were supportive of the sport participation provided them with both instrumental and emotional support. Parents were reported to have supported their daughters by providing them with transportation to and from practices and games, as well as financial support for attending clinics and sport competitions. Additionally, parents provided emotional support by encouraging participation and attending competitions. This finding supports previous studies showing parental social support as a key factor affecting young athletes’ continued sport engagement (Beets, Cardinal, & Alderman, 2010; Dixon et al., 2008; Turman, 2007). Girls also identified accessibility in sport as a facilitator of sport participation. For the most part, girls perceived recreational spaces such as the YMCA and community parks as accessible and broadly available. Two of the pictures taken in response to the question “What makes it easier for you to play sport?” included recreational spaces as something that made it easier to play sport. However, it should be noted that both of these photos were taken by twin sisters and may be more representative of what they have access to within their households. A recent report by the Aspen Institute (2018) confirms the girls’ observations. There has been a concerted effort to expand access to recreational spaces in Detroit. Recent progress has been made in creating “pocket parks”, areas which take advantage of the abundance of vacant lots in Detroit to build areas where young people can play. However, there is still more to do in the area of providing safe and accessible recreation spaces. As Cooky (2009) described in her 123 study of after school girls’ sport leagues, just because programs and locations exist doesn’t mean that they are actively being used by girls. The girls in the present study identified factors that may prevent their use of these spaces including whether or not they felt safe using them as well as not feeling comfortable if boys were already using the spaces. Quantitative studies on public park use and physical activity in urban areas show that boys were more likely to make use of these spaces than girls (Cohen et al., 2007; Ries et al., 2009). A qualitative investigation into Black urban youth use of outdoor parks showed that boys were more likely to use basketball courts to play with friends (Ries et al., 2008). Young Black girls in Ries and colleagues’ study expressed not feeling safe and not feeling welcome to play with boys who may already be on the court. To facilitate girls’ use of recreational spaces we have to think availability. However, we have to go beyond providing facilities and ask ourselves, do girls feel supported? Do they have sufficient access to these spaces? Do they feel like these spaces are for them? Similar to what had been found in studies such as those conducted by Robbins and colleagues (2003), as well as other researchers who study girls’ sport participation, some of the girls identified transportation as a potential barrier (Allender et al., 2006; Casper et al., 2011). During focus groups discussions, the girls talked about friends they knew who had difficulty finding rides to sport practices. Two of the girls also stated that while their parents were able to get them to and from practice, they were aware of the sacrifices their parents were making to do so. Detroit, like many other medium-sized Midwestern cities, has public transportation that may not be viewed as accessible to everyone either because it is perceived as unsafe or due to issues of reliability (Kotval-K & Vojnovic, 2015). Therefore, young people are more likely to have to rely on parents for transportation. For working-class families this can add an additional burden to 124 parents’ busy schedules. However, transportation did not present a significant challenge to most of the participants in this study. The absence of transportation as a significant barrier is potentially due to the sample, a group of girls who were already sports participants and who were participating in a leadership council. Additionally, even though six out of the seven girls were from low-income families, based on free/reduced lunch eligibility, most were from two parent households. Household composition is important because previous research has shown that even in lower-income families, two parents households are better able to provide transportation to facilitate their child’s sport participation (Hoefer, McKenzie, Sallis, Marshall, & Conway, 2001). The girls also identified difficulties with balancing sport and academics. The girls perceived their schools as showing favoritism toward male athletes. They felt that their schools facilitated boys’ sport participation by relaxing academic standards or giving boys additional academic support that was not made available to girls. They perceived this as an unfair advantage the boys had and it was something they resented. However, Beamon (2010) argues that sport is overemphasized in the socialization of Black males, potentially to their own detriment. For low income minority families, sport may be seen as a way for boys to “make it” through getting sport scholarships to attend university or by playing sport professionally. This overemphasis may lead to Black males experiencing lower academic achievement and lower levels of career achievement (Beamon, 2010; Morris & Adeyemo, 2012). Nonetheless, the girls in this study still perceived their school’s leniency as demotivating. It made them feel as if their sport participation was not as valued. The devaluing of girls’ sport achievement was also present in Shakib and Dunbar (2002) study of boys’ and girls’ high school basketball. The researchers found that despite the girls having a better winning record, school staff and students still prioritized the boys’ team for attendance and recognition. The key going 125 forward, then, is to make teachers and coaches aware of the biased treatment of girls relative to sport participation, and urge them to be more supportive and understanding while not falling into the trap of emphasizing sport over academics. Race and Gender While sport has long been thought of as a meritocracy free from prejudice, where all who play are equal in terms of access and opportunity (Coakley, 2014), it is clear from this study that girls perceived that they still face stigmas and stereotypes which have historically affected people of color and women. The girls in this study showed that they are aware of these negative perceptions and that awareness of these perceptions can influence the ways that they perceived themselves and the ways that they behave within the sport environment. When describing their sport experiences with regard to their race and gender, the girls expressed feelings of frustration, sadness and self-consciousness but also pride, determination, and confidence. Race was reported as a salient aspect of girls’ experiences in sport. Primarily of interest were the ways the girls described ways they thought White people perceived them, mainly at predominantly White competitions. W.E. B. DuBois (2006) described this phenomenon in his writings as the “veil” between Black Americans and White Americans, the cultural divide which divides them and the ways that Black Americans may perceive themselves through it, [G]ifted with second sight in this American world—a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see himself through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. 126 The concept of “double-consciousness” describes a way in which some Black people perceive themselves as well as the “second-sight” of how they assume they may be viewed by White people, whether or not this perception is real or imagined. As (Rawls, 2000) described in her study of communication patterns between Black and White Americans, White Americans do not take the role of Black Americans towards themselves. African Americans, on the other hand, because of the essential inequality and incompatibility between the two communities, are forced to take the role of White other towards themselves and are as a consequence uncomfortably aware of looking at themselves through the veil. The girls in this study showed this “double consciousness” when they described their experiences at predominantly White sport tournaments as well as the way they saw themselves and other Black people being portrayed and perceived in society. They would use phrases such as “White people think that…” or “When White people see us…”Although not the primary focus of this study, it was still interesting to take note of the ways that girls described their experiences and feelings through this lens. Very few studies in sport research interrogate the racial experiences and perceptions of Black girls (Bruening, 2005; Bruening et al., 2008). Those that do exist primarily focus on college-aged student-athletes. After a search of the literature, the researcher found only one study which focused on younger Black girls’ perceptions of race and sport participation. Degener (2018) found that middle-school Black girls in a Title IX book club demonstrated that they are aware of the stereotypes and stigmas that surround their sport participation and want the opportunity to “name and speak back to negative narratives.” (Degener, 2018). 127 Awareness of stigmas as well as viewing themselves through “the veil” lead to some relational issues for girls who were on predominantly White teams. Both Sasha and Emily described times when they were on teams in which they were the only minority players, they felt isolated and had difficulties relating to and forming connections with their White teammates. Given the importance of team relationships as a primary reason for girls’ sport participation, the way that race affects girls’ social functioning on their teams is important to understand. Bernhard's (2014) qualitative study of female Black collegiate athletes who attended predominantly White institutions also identified struggles with feelings of isolation and not being able to relate or find comfort in their White teammates. Athletes in the study gravitated toward their Black teammates or Black student organizations to seek out additional support. Research conducted in the education field also show that Black students at predominantly White high schools tended to maintain same-race peer networks as a way to cope with racism that they experienced at school and reinforce their racial identities (Carter, 2007). The girls also identified gendered expectations of appearance as a barrier to participating in sports. Some of their pictures depicted images of makeup and focus groups discussions around these pictures revealed the pressure the girls perceived to conform to societal standards of beauty. As Wright and colleagues (2017) found in their study, girls’ were likely to report not wanting to get sweaty or mess up their hair as a reason for not participating in physical activity. This problem may be compounded for women of color as the beauty standards, and expectations may be even more exacting. The “Good Hair Study”, one of the first to conduct an implicit association test of hair texture found that Black women perceive a level of social stigma against textured hair (MacFarlane, Tropp, & Goff, 2017). Previous studies that took these cultural considerations of hair and beauty into account when designing physical activity interventions for 128 women of color found significant differences compared to interventions which were not culturally sensitive (Barr-Anderson, Adams-Wynn, Alhassan, & Whitt-Glover, 2014; M. E. Turner, 2014). YPAR and Youth Empowerment Relative to this sample of girls acting as co-researchers, several observations are important. First, throughout the project, the girls remained engaged and interested in the project. During focus group discussions the girls were able to bring up their thoughts and emotions as well as probed and ask for clarification and further discussion on the emotions and ideas of others. Additionally, during the Youth ReACT process in which the girls participated in thematic qualitative analysis, they showed mature thinking and pattern recognition and connection when analyzing the qualitative data. Finally, during the community presentation, the girls showed depth and understanding of their assigned topic areas and were able to respond thoughtfully to questions and comments from the adults in the audience. Statements from the girls during exit interviews as well as the girls’ engagement during the community presentation are evidence that engagement in the Photovoice project helped the girls develop critical consciousness in recognizing disparities in sport for girls of color. Results in terms of development of critical consciousness and youth empowerment found in this study are similar to what has been found in other studies employing YPAR and PhotoVoice methodologies (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010; Wang, 2006). Mainly, youth were: (1) able to share their voices in a safe and welcoming space, (2) meaningfully engage as co- researchers and equal partners in knowledge generation, (3) experience equitable power sharing between youth and adults, (4) engage in critical reflection on interpersonal and some sociopolitical processes, and (5) integrate community and personal empowerment by sharing 129 their findings with Detroit PAL stakeholders (Jennings, Parra-Medina, Hilfinger-Messias, & McLoughlin, 2006). Study Limitations Limitations, Strengths and Future Directions To recruit participants for this study, the researcher collaborated with the Detroit PAL, a non-profit sport organization which promotes sport and physical activity while maintaining a positive developmental focus. This organization was selected based on prior relationships the researcher. Additionally, with DPAL being the largest private youth sport organizer in Detroit, they were ideally suited to receive and implement changes suggested by the girls in the study. Additionally, DPAL was undergoing an initiative to increase female participation in their sport leagues. Therefore, participants were recruited from an already established girls’ leadership program. As such, the girls in this sample were already more likely to be involved in extracurricular activity and interested in youth advocacy. Girls who did not participate in sport or such a leadership program may have reported different experiences or be less effective as co- investigators. The fact that none of the girls were nonsport participants is a limitation, especially given the studies purpose of exploring barriers and facilitators of girls’ sport participation. Specifically, all of the girls in the study participated in at least one sport throughout the school year and there were no non-sport participants in the sample. However, the girls were able to give valuable, in- depth insights into previous barriers they may have experienced in sport. The girls had unique insights on ways they overcame the barriers that they faced and recommendations for keeping girls in sport. 130 Study Strengths This study afforded these young girls of color the opportunity to tell the story of their sport experience. The community sharing phase of the study conveyed the message that others cared about and valued their experiences and suggestions. Hash and Cramer (2003) suggest that research participants who are members of underserved groups may appreciate the opportunity to be heard and in doing so there is the potential for more immediate benefit to the study participants (Catalani & Minkler, 2010). The girls in this study developed skills that were age appropriate and described instances where they used skills such as critical reflection, perspective taking and advocacy in other areas of their lives since participating in the study (Foster-Fishman et al., 2010; Wang, 2006). Use of digital technology to engage the girls in the research process also had benefits. Use of digital photography to document and narrate experiences speaks to the contemporary behaviors of young adults, which meant a very small learning curve for the students. The enterprise of critical reflection and photographs may have kept the students more engaged with the project as all of the girls maintained interest and engagement in the project from data collection all the way through results presentation. Through personal conversations with the girls, they expressed excitement with the opportunity to engage with adults and share their findings. Benefits of recruiting from this participant sample were that because the girls are already committed to the junior coach’s program, they were more likely to commit to the Photovoice project, a project which requires a significant amount of time and consistency from participant/co-researchers. Girls in this program were also more likely to have broader 131 perspectives from their experiences as junior coaches as well as their experiences as current athletes. Future Research Directions The experiences of Black athletes in predominantly White spaces or teams is lacking, particularly little is known about how Black athletes form bonds and build relationships with teammates and coaches in these situations. Learning more about this process is especially relevant to understanding girls’ sport experiences given the importance of the social aspect of sport to girls’ decision to play sports. Moreover, if we want to improve sport experience underserved girls, more needs to be known as to why girls of color do not perceive primarily white tournaments as more welcoming and what they and their white counterparts can do about it. The few studies that do qualitatively explore Black athletes in predominantly White spaces focus primarily on males and are primarily in the college athletics setting (Bruening, 2005). After a brief search of the literature, this investigator could not find any studies which looked at Black high school or middle school athletes on predominantly White teams, and only one study which focused on Black female college athletes’ experiences. This present an interesting avenue to pursue in that future, in-depth qualitative interviews or ethnographic studies can help shed light on this topic and perhaps provide insight into another aspect which may be hindering Black girls’ sport participation. Researchers and practitioners in sport have not fully explored participatory action research or Photovoice’s potential to inform and transform youth sport’s mission of providing positive and equitable experiences for all young people. A cursory review of the literature cataloged in the EBSCOHost SportDiscus database revealed 10 articles published from 1999 to 2019, where the author(s) used Photovoice methodology. Researchers, especially in the sport 132 sciences due to the length of contact that youth have with sport and sport’s capacity for addressing societal inequalities, are uniquely situated such that they can and should employ research methods that reveal, challenge and facilitate micro and macro level change to make sport an activity that is more aligned with the needs of its youth participants. For example, while it appears young adults have attitudes that are more accepting of racial diversity, athletes of color still perceive experiences such microaggressions, which whether intentional or not, as challenges still present which make them feel uncomfortable in sport spaces. Additionally, despite expanded access to sport and recreation spaces for youth, girls may still not be making use of these spaces due to feeling uncomfortable or unsafe. Future researchers would do well to employ YPAR and or PhotoVoice to explore the issues of race and gender in sports, thereby bringing attention to athlete, school and community needs. Girls’ Sport Programming and Youth Voice Implications The results of this study have several implications for girls’ sport programming, especially for girls of color from relatively poor backgrounds. Youth sport stakeholders and practitioners should take the lead on acknowledging the role that race and gender play in youth’s sport experiences. With elite professional athletes taking on an increasing role in shedding light on issues of racial and gender inequality, young athletes should be invited to contribute to the conversation as well. Young people are constantly negotiating their role and their place in society and coaches need to be able to have these conversations with their athletes, because as this study shows, youth are aware of how they and others are affected by these issues and want a chance to share their views. 133 For girls of color in particular, giving them the opportunity to share their experiences with audiences who may not get to hear from them is important. The girls in this study felt like they were underappreciated and their needs and opinions were invisible in sport so engaging these young female athletes in activities which give them the opportunity to share their voice shows them that their views and voices are important. Photovoice can be used as a relatively easy to implement team activity. While the girls were given digital cameras for this study, the vast majority of young people in America use cell phones with built-in cameras every day. Given youth’s familiarity with the technology, coaches or other youth sport administrators can use youth photography as a way to both capture the views of the athletes as well as stimulate discussion on issues that are important to them. Furthermore, males and females could both benefit from being informed of the ways in which the sports system is currently biased. According to Cooky and McDonald’s (2005) findings, too often girls did not recognize “institutional gender discrimination” when they faced it, schools should take on more responsibility for putting an end to the commonly held notion that all individuals have equal access. They could include in the physical education curriculum, an examination of access to sports and physical activities from a more critical standpoint. This would allow more space for visible girls of color and young women to comfortably move into this area in which they are currently seriously underrepresented. Girls need to feel, from very early on, that they can and should question and challenge the way sports and physical activities are implemented in their schools and communities. Boys also need to be educated in this way in order to prevent continued gender discrimination on their part. Stakeholders should also consider the recommendations that were given by girls. One way to leverage or increase girls’ sport participation could be by focusing on the social aspect of 134 sport. Not only was developing a relationship salient to girls explanations of why they played sport, it was also present when girls talked about how their race affected their sport participation. Coaches should pay special care and concern to preparing girls for interactions at predominantly white tournaments or clinics or being on predominantly white teams. Specifically, they should engage in open and honest conversations with athletes about race, gender and other sensitive topics. Policy Implications As detailed in the Aspen Institute’s State of Play report (2019), and noted by the participants in this study, access to recreational spaces in Detroit have been increasing. Particularly in the Downtown area, parks, playgrounds and courts are being built including “pocket parks” as well as more formal sport facilities and play areas. However, as also noted by participants in this study, not all youth feel safe or comfortable making use of these spaces. As Cooky (2014) argued in her study, oftentimes, policymakers assume that creating opportunities for sport participation automatically translates into increased participation rates, but other factors which may not be directly observable can still limit interest and access. This study shows that other factors such as perceived safety and relevance to interests play just as large of a role in whether youth make use of recreation spaces and therefore, there is a need for local governments to put policies in place which address social and psychological barriers to accessing recreation spaces in addition to physical barriers. Social policy is a plan of action adopted by a government, non-governmental organization or business enterprise to remedy or prevent a social problem or make society better (Hall & Midgley, 2004). Social policy is related to creating, maintaining or improving living conditions and, as such, is associated with human welfare or the wellbeing of society (Dawson, 135 2010; Segal, 2007; Smith, Stebbins, & Dover, 2006). To this end, the World Leisure Organization (2008) advocated for governments throughout the world to set social policies in order to optimize leisure opportunities for their citizens. If social policy aims to improve living conditions, enhance society and prevent social injustices, a commitment to provide inclusive outdoor playground spaces so that all youth can experience play and leisure. For girls in particular, this means addressing issues of safety and perceived relevance to improve the accessibility of play spaces for them. A PhotoVoice study conducted by Azzarito and Sterling (2015) found that boys and girls differed in the way they photographically depicted their relationship with reaction spaces and sport. Boys were more likely to take picture of physical activity taking place in public spaces such as public basketball courts, pick up games and school competitions. On the other hand, girls took photos of physical activity within confined, typically gender segregated, private spaces. Along with the results of the present study, this indicates that just the existence on recreation spaces does not lead to sufficient impetus for girls to make use of them. Additional research is needed. First, future research could include interviews with girls and families to determine their perception of recreation spaces. Second, a replication of the present study in other communities or with non-sport participants may provide researchers and coaches with a broader understanding of recreation spaces inclusion. Conclusion In conclusion, results of the study revealed that girls participated in sport for a variety of reasons including achieving a sense of personal growth and development, forming friendships and connections with teammates and coaches and the sense of pride and connection to their city that participating in sport gave them. Facilitators of their sport participation were emotional and 136 instrumental support from their families, and increased access to public recreation spaces in Detroit. Barriers included lack of facilities and general access to sport in middle school and high school, difficulty balancing academics and sport and perceived lack of community support for girls’ sport. Finally, the participant’s in this study identified reasons why they believed more girls were not interested in sport. Reasons they identified included incompatibility of sport with societal expectations of beauty and girl’s not seeing sport as a viable activity due to overemphasis of boys’ sport. 137 APPENDICES 138 APPENDIX A - Human Subjects Approval Initial Study APPROVAL April 16, 2018 To: Re: Daniel Roy Gould MSU Study ID: STUDY00000494 IRB: Biomedical and Health Institutional Review Board (BIRB) Principal Investigator: Daniel Roy Gould Category: Expedited 4, 6, 7 Submission: Initial Study STUDY00000494 Submission Approval Date: 4/16/2018 Effective Date: 4/16/2018 Project Expiration Date: 4/15/2019 Title: UNDERSTANDING SPORT THROUGH HER EYES: A PARTICIPATORY PHOTOVOICE APPROACH TO GIRLS’ SPORT PARTICIPATION This submission has been approved by the Michigan State University (MSU) BIRB. The submission was reviewed by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) through the Non-Committee Review procedure. The IRB has found that this research project protects the rights and welfare of human subjects and meets the requirements of MSU's Federal Wide Assurance (FWA00004556) and the federal regulations for the protection of human subjects in research (e.g., 45 CFR 46, 21 CFR 50, 56, other applicable regulations). Documents Approved: • Appendix D - Ethics and Safety Handout.docx, Category: Other; • Appendix H - Demogrpahics questionnaire.docx, Category: Other; • HRP-503 - Template - Protocol 3.5.18.docx, Category: IRB Protocol; • Appendix B - Participant Assent Form, Category: Consent Form; • Appendix A - Parental Consent Form, Category: Consent Form; • Appendix G - Photo Release.docx, Category: Other; • Appendix E - Photo Reflection Sheet.docx, Category: Other; • Appendix F - Recruitment Flyer.jpg, Category: Recruitment Materials; • Appendix C - Participant Consent Form, Category: Consent Form; Continuing Review: IRB approval is valid until the expiration date listed above. If the research continues to involve human subjects, you must submit a Continuing Review request at least one month before expiration. Modifications: Any proposed change or modification with certain limited exceptions discussed below must be reviewed and approved by the IRB prior to implementation of the change. Please submit a Modification request to have the changes reviewed. If changes are made at the time of continuing review, please submit a Modification and Continuing Review request. Office of Regulatory Affairs Human Research Protection Program 4000 Collins Road Suite 136 Lansing, MI 48910 517-355-2180 Fax: 517-432-4503 Email: irb@msu.edu www.hrpp.msu.edu 139 APPENDIX B - Recruitment Flyer 140 APPENDIX C - Parental Consent Form Research Participant Information and Parental Consent Form Michigan State University Department of Kinesiology Your child is being asked to participate in a research study. Researchers are required to provide a consent form to inform you about the research study, to convey that participation is voluntary, to explain risks and benefits of participation, and to empower you to make an informed decision. You should feel free to ask the researchers any questions you may have. Study Title: Understanding sport through her eyes: A participatory Photovoice approach to girls’ sport participation Researcher and Title: Lauren Szczygiel, Doctoral Candidate & Dr. Daniel Gould-PI Department and Institution: Kinesiology, Michigan State University Address and Contact Information: 308 W. Circle Drive, Room 134 1. PURPOSE OF RESEARCH Your child is being asked to participate in a Photovoice research project that will use pictures that she takes to understand her experiences in sport. Your child was selected because she is a female between 14 and 18 years old, lives in Detroit or the surrounding area and participates in a Detroit PAL sports league. The reason this study is being conducted is to understand factors which make sport accessible or inaccessible for girls in Detroit. This will be an opportunity for your child to share her story through pictures. Your child will be asked to take pictures of her community and participate in focus group interviews about her pictures and pictures taken by other study participants. 2. WHAT YOUR CHILD WILL DO If you agree to allow your child to participate in this study, your child will be asked to do the following: She will meet with the lead researcher and other project participants for two hours every other week over the course of 12 weeks. Each week, your child will take as many pictures as she would like to show why she plays sport and what makes sport easier or harder to access. These sessions will be recorded using an audio recorder. During the first meeting the Photovoice project will be explained to your child, including the safety and ethics of taking photographs. She will be given a digital camera and memory card to take her pictures. Finally, your child will be asked to participate in a community exhibit of selected photos. 3. POTENTIAL BENEFITS Indirect benefits of participating in this study are: 141 1) Your child will help to increase the understanding of girls’ views on sport participation in your community. 2) She will be able to share her stories and experiences and this may be helpful to other girls’ and community sport organizers. 4. POTENTIAL RISKS While there are risks inherent to any research projects, the risk involved with Photovoice are minimal. The project has the following risks: 1) Someone may try to take the camera away from your child while she is carrying it. 2) There is the potential that your child may place themselves in a dangerous situation when taking photos. 3) Your child may feel uncomfortable talking about her pictures to the researchers or other participants. To lessen these risks, she will be trained on how to remain safe while taking photos. She will be instructed to keep her camera in a safe place and only take it out when taking photos for the study. She will also be told not to take pictures of anyone engaging in embarrassing or dangerous behaviors. She should not take pictures of anyone who has not given permission to have their picture taken. She should not trespass on private property to take a picture. These risks will be explained to your child during the first training session, she will be given a handout which will explain how to be safe, and the safety protocol will be reinforced at each meeting. If your child is uncomfortable or does not want to answer any question during group interviews she may refuse for any reason. If at any time your child would like to withdraw from the study for any reason, she is free to do so with no penalty. 5. PRIVACY AND CONFIDENTIALITY Your child’s confidentiality will be protected to the extent required by law. If the study results are published, your child’s name will not be made public. Your child will have the option to have her photographs included in a community exhibit. A separate written consent/media release will be required to participate in this portion of the project. Without written consent from you and your child no images will be released. The only access to recorded interviews will be by the researchers and research staff involved in the study and the Human Research Protection Program (HRPP) at Michigan State University. The results of this study may be published or presented at professional meetings but the identities of all research participants will remain anonymous. Data will be kept for at least three years after the project closes. 6. YOUR RIGHTS TO PARTICIPATE, SAY NO, OR WITHDRAW 142 Your child’s participation is voluntary. If you or your child refuses to participate in this study there will be no penalty or loss of benefits. You or your child may change your mind at any time and withdraw. Your child may choose not to answer questions or to stop participating at any time. 7. COSTS AND COMPENSATION FOR BEING IN THE STUDY There are no costs for you or your child to participate in this study. Compensation for participation in the study includes: 1) At the completion of the study your child will be allowed to keep the digital camera that she will be given to take her pictures. 2) She will also be provided with a light dinner and snacks at each group interview session. 8. CONTACT INFORMATION If you have concerns or questions about this study, such as scientific issues, how to do any part of it, or to report an injury, please contact the researcher: Lauren Szczygiel or Dr. Dan Gould (517) 303-8734 (517) 432-0175 308 W. Circle Drive, Room 134 Michigan State University East Lansing, MI 48824 If you have questions or concerns about your role and rights as a research participant, would like to obtain information or offer input, or would like to register a complaint about this study, you may contact, anonymously if you wish, the Michigan State University’s Human Research Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu or regular mail at 4000 Collins Rd, Suite 136, Lansing, MI 48910. 9. DOCUMENTATION OF INFORMED CONSENT. Your signature below means that you voluntarily agree to participate in this research study. ________________________________________ Signature Your signature below means that you give parental consent for your child to participate in this research study. ________________________________________ Signature ________________________________________ Signature of Assenting Child (13-17; if appropriate) You will be given a copy of this form to keep. _______________________ Date _______________________ Date ______________________ Date 143 APPENDIX D - Participant Assent Form Participant Assent Form Michigan State University Department of Kinesiology Hello, my name is Lauren Szczygiel. You are invited to participate in a Photovoice research project that will use pictures to understand your sport participation experience. You were chosen because you are between 14 and 18 years old, you are a female, you live in Detroit or the surrounding areas and you participate in a Detroit PAL sports league. I ask that you read this form and ask any questions you may have before agreeing to the project. Your parent or guardian will also be asked to sign a separate consent form. Study Purpose The reason that I am conducting this project is to understand what affects girls’ sports participation. Taking pictures will help others to see your world. This will be an opportunity for you to share your story through pictures. At the end of the project your friends, family and community leaders will be invited to see your pictures and hear your stories. I hope that this project will increase the community’s understanding of your sport experiences. Study Procedures If you agree to participate in this project, you will be asked to do the following: You will use a digital camera to document your daily experiences with sport participation in your community. In group photo selection and discussion sessions, you and other study participants will discuss the photos with the goal of creating a list of images that best represent your community experience. During this process, you will be asked to participate in two hour group interviews over the course of 12 weeks which will be led by me. All photo discussion sessions will be audio recorded. You have the right to decline to answer any question asked during the group sessions. Finally, you will be asked to plan and participate in a community show of selected photos. Important things to know… • You get to decide if you want to take part. • You can say ‘No’ or you can say ‘Yes’. • No one will be upset if you say ‘No’. • • You can say ‘No’ at anytime. If you say ‘Yes’, you can always say ‘No’ later. Risks of Study Participation The project has the following risks: 1) Someone might try to take your camera away from you. 144 2)You might place yourself in a dangerous situation when trying to take a picture. 3) You may feel uncomfortable talking about your pictures with me or other study participants. To lessen these risks, I will teach you how to remain safe while taking pictures. You should keep your camera in a safe place and only take it out when taking photos for the study. You should not take pictures of anyone engaging in embarrassing or dangerous behaviors. You should not take pictures of anyone who has not given permission to have their picture taken. You should not trespass on private property to take a picture. It is important to make sure you are safe when taking your pictures. You will be taught how to take pictures safely and responsibly. You will also have to get a signed form if you decide to take a picture of other people. If at any time you feel you want to stop participating in the project, you are free to do so. The pictures will not have your name on them, unless you want them to, but people might know who you are by the pictures you took. Benefits of Study Participation Your participation in the project will help other people to understand issues that affect girls’ sport participation in your community. Photovoice gives you the opportunity to share your story with the community, and call for changes. Costs and Compensation There are no costs for you to participate in this study. You will be compensated for participating in the study in the following ways: 1) At the end of the study you will be allowed to keep the digital camera that you were given to take pictures. 2)You will also be provided with a light dinner and snacks at each group interview session. Confidentiality Your confidentiality will be protected to the extent required by law. If the results of the study are published, your name will not be made public. You will have the option to have your photographs included in a community show. I will ask you for your permission again to participate in this part of the project. Without your written consent, none of the pictures that you take will be released. The only access to recorded interviews will be by the researchers and research staff involved in the study and the Human Research and Protection Program (HRPP) at Michigan State University. The results of this study may be published or presented at professional meetings, but the identities of all research participants will remain anonymous. Data will be kept for at least three years after the project closes. 145 Contact Information If you have concerns or questions about this study, such as scientific issues, how to do any part of it, or to report an injury, please contact the researcher(s): Lauren Szczygiel (517) 303-8734 308 W. Circle Drive, Room 134 Michigan State University East Lansing, MI 48824 Dr. Daniel Gould (517) 432-0175 308 W. Circle Drive, Room 134 Michigan State University East Lansing, MI 48824 If you have questions or concerns about your role and rights as a research participant, would like to obtain information or offer input, or would like to register a complaint about this study, you may contact, anonymously if you wish, the Michigan State University’s Human Research Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu or regular mail at 4000 Collins Rd, Suite 136, Lansing, MI 48910. Documentation of Informed Assent Your signature below means that you voluntarily agree to participate in this research study. ________________________________________ Signature You will be given a copy of this form to keep. ______________________ Date 146 APPENDIX E - Participant Consent Form Participant Consent Form Michigan State University Department of Kinesiology Hello, my name is Lauren Szczygiel. You are invited to participate in a PhotoVoice research project that will use pictures to described things that you see that has to do with you sport participation. You were selected because you are between the ages of 14 to 18 years old, live in Detroit or the surrounding areas and participate in a Detroit PAL sport league. I ask that you read this form and ask any questions you may have before agreeing to the project. Your parent of legal guardian will need to sign a consent form for you. Study Purpose The reason that I am conducting this project is to understand what affects girls’ sports participation. Taking pictures will help others to see your world. This will be an opportunity for you to share your story through pictures. At the end of the project your friends, family and community leaders will be invited to see your pictures and hear your stories. I hope that this project will increase the community’s understanding of your sport experiences. Study Procedures If you agree to join this project, you will be asked to do the following: You will document using a digital camera, your daily experiences with sport participation in your community. In group photo selection and discussion sessions, you an other study participants will critically analyze the photos with the goal of creating a list of images that best represent your community experience. During this process, you will also be asked to participate in two hour group interviews over the course of six weeks which will be led by me. All photo discussion sessions will be audio recorded. You have the right to decline to answer any question questions asked during the group sessions. Finally, you will be asked to plan and participate in a community exhibit of selected photos. Risks of Study Participation The PhotoVoice project has the following risks. It is important to make sure you are safe when taking your pictures. You will have to get a signed form if you decide to take a picture of other people. There is potential risk if you place yourself in an unsafe position trying to take a picture. You will be taught how to take pictures safely and ethically. If at any time, you feel you want to withdraw from the project, you are free to do so. The pictures will not have your name on them, unless you want them to, but people might know who you are by the pictures you took. Benefits of Study Participation 147 You will directly benefit from participating in the following ways: at the completion of the study you will be allowed to keep the digital camera that you were given to take pictures. You will also be provided with a light dinner and snacks at each group interview session. Indirectly, your participation in the study will increase the understanding in your community of issues which affect girls’ sport participation. PhotoVoice gives you the opportunity to share your story with the community, and advocate for changes. Compensation You will receive money or any other form of compensation for participating in this study. Confidentiality Your privacy will be protected to the extent required by law. If the results of the study are published, your name will not be made public. You will have the option to have your photographs included in a community exhibit. A separate consent/media release will be required to participate in this portion of the project. Without your written consent, no images will be released. The only access to recorded interviews will be by the researchers and research staff involved in the study and the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at Michigan State University. The results of this data may be published or presented at professional meetings but the identities of all research participants will remain anonymous. Data will be kept for at least three years after the project closes. Your rights to participate, say no, or withdraw Your participation is voluntary. Refusal to participate will involve no penalty or loss of benefits to which you are otherwise entitled. You may discontinue participation at any time without penalty. You have the right to say no. You may change your mind at any time and withdraw. You may choose not to answer specific questions or stop participating at any time. Costs and compensation for being in the study You will not receive money or any other form of compensation for participating in this study. Contact Information If you have concerns or questions about this study, such as scientific issues, how to do any part of it, or to report an injury, please contact the researcher: Lauren Szczygiel (517) 303-8734 308 W. Circle Drive, Room 134 Michigan State University East Lansing, MI 48824 If you have questions or concerns about your role and rights as a research participant, would like to obtain information or offer input, or would like to register a complaint about this study, you may contact, anonymously if you wish, the Michigan State University’s Human Research 148 Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu or regular mail at 4000 Collins Rd, Suite 136, Lansing, MI 48910. Documentation of informed Consent Your signature below means that you voluntarily agree to participate in this research study. ________________________________________ Signature You will be given a copy of this form to keep. ______________________ Date 149 APPENDIX F – PhotoVoice Project Schedule Phase I: Data Collection Week 1 - Introduction Explanations of goals and expectations of the project and signing of assent forms. Introduction of project researchers and facilitators, icebreaker for co-researchers to introduce themselves. Practice photo selection and analysis using magazines. Digital cameras distributed to participants. Instructions on how to frame and take good pictures. How to be safe and ethical when taking pictures. Explanation of photo consent and release forms. Assignment of first photo taking topic: “Why do you play sports?” Week 2 – Critical First critical discussion and photo reflection. reflection and Assignment of second photo taking topic: “What makes it easier to discussion access or play sports?” Week 3 – Critical Critical discussion and photo reflection. reflection and Assignment of third photo taking topic: “What are some barriers or discussion things that make it harder to play or access sports?” Week 4 – Critical Critical discussion and photo reflection. reflection and Assignment of final photo taking topic: “Why do you think more discussion girls aren’t interested in sport?” 150 Week 5 – Critical Final critical discussion and photo reflection. reflection, discussion and wrap-up Wrap-up. Phase II: Data Analysis and Development of Action Plan Week 6 Day 1 – Introduction to qualitative data analysis with candy sort game Introduction to data (Appendix H). analysis and training Week 6 Day 2 – Data Newspaper editor game: identifying key messages and creating analysis session lower order themes (Appendix I). Message scavenger hunt game: thematic integration and creating higher order themes (Appendix J). 151 APPENDIX G - Schedule of PhotoVoice Introduction/Training Sessions Introduction Meeting Agenda Goals of the Meeting: • Explain PhotoVoice • Explain the roles and time commitment of the PhotoVoice project • Explain who is involved in the project (primary research, facilitators, graduate and undergraduate assistants) • Give timeline of the project • Distribute consent and assent forms • Brief discussion of issues surrounding girls sport participation • Play magazine game to practice telling stories through photos • Answer questions Total meeting time: 2 hours Schedule of meeting: 7pm - 7:10pm: Girls arrive and find their seats, grab snacks and drinks 7:15pm - 7:30pm: Welcome and introduction, girls will introduce themselves 7:30pm - 7:45pm: Explanation of what PhotoVoice is and the goals of the current project. Outline times commitments and ensure the meeting times and location works for everyone. 7:45pm - 8pm: Introduction of lead research, facilitators and assistants 8:00pm - 8:10pm: Break 8:10pm - 8:40pm: Open discussion of issues surrounding girls sport participation including gender disparities, types of sports played and differences in what is expected of girls and boys 8:40pm - 8:55pm: Play magazine game 8:55pm - 9:00pm: Take question, comments and concerns 152 Training Session Agenda Goals of the Meeting: • Understanding PhotoVoice • Photography ethics, safety and legal issues • Cameras 101 • Photography 101 Total Meeting Time: 2 hours Meeting Schedule: 7:00pm - 7:10pm: Girls arrive, find seats and grab drinks and snacks 7:10pm - 7:15pm: Recap of PhotoVoice purpose and goal. Collect assent and consent forms 7:15pm - 8:00pm: Photography ethics, safety and legal issues • Distribute safety forms, photo release forms and project brochure • Explain purpose of forms (to make sure people know they are being photographed, to obtain permission to take someone’s photograph, to know how to be safe when taking pictures and avoiding risky situations) • What is an acceptable way to approach someone to take their picture? • What to not take pictures of (dangerous, embarrassing or unsafe activities) 8:00 - 8:10pm: Break 8:10pm - 8:25pm: Handout cameras, memory cards and explain different parts of the camera 8:25pm - 8:55pm: Photography 101 • Basic instructions on how to take good photos • Posed vs. un-posed shots • Framing • Lighting, color and composition 8:55pm - 9:00pm: Wrap-up, distribute phot reflection sheets and answer questions 153 APPENDIX H - Participant Ethics and Safety Handout2 v Putting yourself in a dangerous situation in order to get the “great picture” v Taking pictures of people who may display behaviors they don't want made public v Being considered “part of” the event/situation (like illegal activities or embarrassing What puts you at risk? situations) in your photos Staying Safe v Identify yourself as a student working on a PhotoVoice project v Think about who and what you are taking pictures of o Explain the purpose of your photo if asked o Ask yourself: Would I be embarrassed by this? (IF YES, don’t take this photo!) if in doubt do not v Practice Shooting Smart: o Never put yourself in an unsafe place § Don’t trespass § Don’t go to unsafe places o Never take a photo of criminal activity danger § Be creative § Your personal safety is the highest priority, no photo is worth personal v If people are in your photos • There are always abstract ways to present an idea, or tell a story! o Explain the purpose of the photo and the project (give them a copy of the “What o Get a signed Photo Release form! is PhotoVoice” brochure) before you take the photo § You MUST receive a signed form from EVERY person that can be identified in a photo § Photos cannot be used in the exhibit, digital stories, or posted to a website if we do not have a signed Photo Release form. 2 From (Foster-Fishman, Law, Lichty, & Aoun, 2010) 154 APPENDIX I - Photo Reflection Sheet First Name: ____________________________________ Last Initial: ______ Framing Question:______________________________________________________________ Brief description of photo (what you see): I want to share this photo because… What is important for people to understand about this photo? What does this photo say about my school/community/sport/team? 155 Session Goals APPENDIX J - Schedule of Discussion Sessions • Present individual photos • Engage in critical group discussion about selected photos Total session time: 2 hours Session Schedule 7:00pm - 7:15pm: Girls arrive and find seats, grab drinks and snacks • Girls bring selected individual photos to primary researcher to be saved and printed • Time to fill out individual reflection sheet if girls forgot 7:15pm - 7:25pm: Re-cap of PhotoVoice purpose and current week’s photo prompt 7:25pm - 8:00pm: Presentation of individual photos (~5 minutes each) 8:00pm - 8:05pm: Break 8:05pm - 8:10pm: Vote on individual pictures to select one to discuss 8:10pm - 8:55pm: Group discussion of photos (~25 minutes for each photo) 8:55pm - 9:00pm: Wrap-up 156 APPENDIX K - Candy Sorting Game The first game is the Candy Sorting Game, which introduces the idea of thematic analysis, both lower order and higher order clustering.3 Materials needed: • A mixture of different types of candy for each group o ~20 pieces per group • Notecards • Markers Process 1. Tell participants they are opening a candy store in five minutes and they need to organize the candy so customers can easily shop in their store. 2. Ask participants to sort their candy into 5 to 7 shelves in a way that makes sense to them (e.g. plain chocolate candy, chocolate with nuts, fruity candy, chewy candy are common shelves that participants come up with). This is lower order analysis. 3. Give each shelf a name. 4. Connect this to the data analysis process they will be doing. This will be similar to identifying similar key messages in the PhotoVoice narratives, grouping them, and labeling them. 5. Next, tell participants that 2 of their shelves broke and they now have to reorganize their candy into fewer shelves. This is higher order analysis and demonstrates the idea of aggregating ideas into higher order themes. 6. Connect this to the data analysis process, explaining that once they’ve grouped similar messages, they will go through a process of combing similar groups to help make sense of all of the data and identify important messages to share with the community. 3 Adapted from Foster-Fishman et al. (2013) 157 APPENDIX L - Newspaper Editor Game The purpose of this game is to identify the key messages in a narrative, label them with a headline, and then work through a process of grouping similar headlines together.4 Materials: • Printed copies of PhotoVoice narratives • Pens/marker/highlighters • White notecards • Colored notecards • Tape/push pins Process 1. Tell participants that they are newspaper editors and their job is to create headlines to share the key messages from the PhotoVoice narratives the group created. 2. Work on one narrative together as a large group to demonstrate the process. a. Ask participants to identify important messages and suggest headlines. 3. Participants work individually on the same narrative to identify key messages by underlining or highlighting them and giving them a headline. a. Headlines are written on White notecards and labeled with photo ID number. 4. Next participants work on different posts individually to identify key messages and create headlines. a. Headlines are written on White notecards and labeled with photo ID number. 5. Participants work in small groups to share the headlines they created and sort those headlines together, labeling the piles with ‘mega headlines’. a. Mega Headlines are written on colored notecards and labeled with group number/name. 6. Once all mega headlines are created, they are taped to the wall with the group of headlines in a column below them. 4 Adapted from Foster-Fishman et al. (2013) 158 APPENDIX M - Message Scavenger Hunt Game Once all of the small groups have created their Mega Headlines, the next step is to group similar mega headlines across groups. From here, a coding framework will be created that encompasses all of the major ideas that were identified across the PhotoVoice narratives. Materials • Mega Headlines on colored notecards from Newspaper Editor game • Large White notecards • Markers • Tape/push pins Process 1. Each participant selects a few mega headlines from their small group 2. Participants look for similar mega headlines across groups 3. Take cards to the facilitator a. Participants make a case for why the mega headline pair matches 4. Matches are put on the wall in a single column 5. Unique ideas get their own column 6. After all matches are made, the group works to reorganize the columns (combining similar columns into a single column) and give the columns names a. These final headlines make up the coding framework for the PhotoVoice narratives 159 APPENDIX N - Photo Release Form PhotoVoice is a part of the Girls’ Sport Storytelling project, organized by Lauren Szczygiel of Michigan State University and Ramona Cox of Detroit Police Athletic League. PhotoVoice participants are using photographs to tell the stories of their lives in Detroit for the purpose of educating and promoting awareness of girls’ experiences in sport. By signing this form, you consent to have your photograph taken and give permission to the photographer to publish these photographs. These images may be published electronically or in print. Furthermore, you will agree for the photos to be used for any lawful purpose, including exhibition, and publication for academic release. Questions? Please contact Lauren Szczygiel (517) 303-8734. Photo subject’s full name (Please print):_____________________________________________ Address:______________________________________________________________________ City:_______________________________ State:__________ Zip code:__________________ I affirm that I am more than 18 years of age and competent to sign this contract on my own behalf. I have read this release and fully understand its contents. ________________________________________ _________________________________ Adult Signature Date ________________________________________ ___________________________________ Photographer Signature Parent/guardian Consent (if photo subject is under 18 years of age) I am the parent or guardian of the minor named above and have legal authority to execute this release. I consent to use of said photographs based on the contents of this release. _______________________________________ _____________________________________ Parent/Guardian Name (Please print) Relationship to minor _______________________________________ _____________________________________ Parent/Guardian Signature Date Date 160 APPENDIX O - Study Information Brochure 161 APPENDIX P - Youth Authorship Release Form As a part of the Girls’ Sport Storytelling Project, you will be using photos and stories to share your sport experiences in Detroit. The project leader, Lauren Szczygiel, may want to use photos and quotes that you have provided during discussion sessions. Your amazing ideas, posts, pictures and text will be used as a part of her dissertation project and will be published and may be shared across the country inspiring other educators, sport coaches and researchers. 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