Maidens and Man-kads: gendering cricket scholarship in the 21st century

Abstract

In CLR James’ Beyond a Boundary he opined: ‘What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?’ One might add: ‘What do they know of cricket who only men’s cricket know?’ This article reviews the current global historical and sociological literature on female participation in cricket, female spectatorship and fandom, and cricketing masculinities, concluding that these subjects are still in their infancy – a fact which should concern all scholars of cricket. I argue that the key problem with current scholarship is that women’s and men’s cricket are examined as separate entities: fully gendering cricket scholarship requires a more integrated approach. Here I offer 3 strategies to achieve this: a restructuring of our work; a more interdisciplinary approach, with historians and sociologists working closely together; and the need to bring intersectionality into the heart of our work, to ensure the experiences of non-white female cricketers are more fully understood.

Keywords:

• Women
• gender
• cricket
• masculinity
• CLR James

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 An example would be Dominic Malcolm, who argues that cricket is a ‘male preserve’ and that it is therefore unnecessary to consider female sporting experiences when writing about the sport’s development (2013, 11).