Football, lesbianism and feminism in Brazil: subversive acts

ABSTRACT

Feminist voices supporting women’s football in Brazil date back to 1924, and to journalist Cléo de Galsan. But the sport was never central to the feminist agenda in the country, and a law prohibited women from playing football from 1941 to 1979. This exclusion was internalized by many women, including feminists, who expressed little interest in the world of Brazilian football. This disinterest is paradoxical, not only because of the importance of football in the national imaginary, but also because women’s sports involve fundamental dimensions in gender relations and feminist activism. The article asks why Brazilian feminism displayed little interest in this sport and concludes that part of the response lies in the social distance between feminists and footballers and in the predominance of lesbians among the athletes, while practice of football by women could be a fundamental subversive act for gender transformation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Elsey and Nadel, Futboleta, 9.

2. We use “football practiced by women” to refer to what is commonly designated as “women’s football”. Football is the same sport (with the same rules, gestures and objectives), whether it is practiced by men, trans, gays, or women. To call it ‘women’s football’– at the same time in which it reserves the term “football” without qualification to designate the football practiced by men, given that “men’s football” is rarely said – would be to accept the football practiced by men as all encompassing (Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus) and that practiced by women as encompassed in a dubious hierarchy. And it would accept that the sports gestures change depending on the gender/sex/sexual condition of the person playing.

3. A dictatorship instituted by Getúlio Vargas between 1937 and 1945.

4. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the world system”.

5. The ethnography includes direct contact with more than ten women athletes, conversations in various situations, included recorded interviews, and informal conversations at lunches, cocktails, barbeques, football games, political participations, participations in social projects and lectures, observation of work activities, games, practices, and other activities, such as leisure encounters, and on social networks, especially Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram. We maintained the anonymity of the interlocutors, even those who allowed us to reveal their name, using the real name only for items found on social networks and in newspapers.

6. Alabarces, História Mínima del fútbol.

7. Giulianotti, Sociologia do futebol.

8. Bonfim, “Football feminino entre festas esportivas, circos e campos suburbanos”; Elsey and Nadel, Futbolera; Rial, “Memória do Futebol”.

9. Almeida, “Mulheres futebolistas”.

10. Rigo et al., “Notas futebol feminino”.

11. Almeida, “Mulheres futebolistas”.

12. The Federation was created under the bases of the Liga da EmancipaçãoIntelectual da Mulher, of 1919. It included women of the elite and intellectuals, such as Bertha Lutz, Júlia Lopes de Almeida and Jerônima de Mesquita.

13. In this context, sex and gender are considered nearly as synonyms. Besse, Modernizado a desigualdade.

14. After participation in the conference, Catt was invited to participate in the founding of the Liga FemininaPaulista (LFP) in São Paulo. For more information: Palcos e Salões. A Gazeta (SP), n. 5116, p. 5, jan/1923.

15. She wrote for the sports journal A Gazeta de São Paulo in 1924 and 1925.Cléo de Galsan was the pseudonym of Maria Conceição Rehder Galvão, the older sister of Patrícia Rehder Galvão, known as Pagu, who was a well-known feminist intellectual in Brazil. Galsan was an acronym of the names Conceição Galvão and Leopoldo Sant’ Anna – who was her husband and editor in the sports section. The period in which Conceição wrote for the paper coincided with Patrícia’s first publications.

16. Galsan, “As melindrosas”.

17. Teresa de Lauretissaid: ‘the construction of gender now occurs by means of various gender technologies (film for example) and institutional discourses (theory for example), with power to control, produce, and “implant” gender representations. Lauretis, “Tecnologia do Gênero”, 228.

18. Butler, “Performative Acts”, 519.

19. Galsan, “As melindrosas”, 3.

20. Galsan,“A mulher e o esporte”, 3.

21. Franzini, ‘Futebol é “coisa para macho?”; Rigo et al., “Notas futebol feminino”; Bonfim, “Football feminino entre festas esportivas, circos e campos suburbanos”; Elsey and Nadel. Futbolera; Almeida, “Mulheres futebolistas”.

22. The open letter was written by José Fuzeira, an author of books about Brazilian social behaviour, to the then Brazilian president. In it, Fuzeira condemns the practice of football by women and demands action by the state to prohibit “women’s football”.

23. Newsham, League of their own!

24. Rial, “A memória do Futebol Praticado por Mulheres – semelhantes trajetórias no Brasil e na França?”.

25. We would like to thank Mariane Pisani for the reminder.

26. Carneiro et al., Mulher negra.

27. In the 1970’s, Lélia González emphasized the political backwardness of Brazilian feminist movements because their leaders were formed by white middle class women, and particularly their need to deny racism, by not recognizing that the liberation of white women has been at the cost of exploitation of black women.

28. Bourdieu, La domination.

29. Lever, Soccer Madness.

30. Despite the ban, women never stopped playing football in Brazil. Rigo et al. “Notas futebol feminino”; Elsey e Joshua, Futbolera.

31. Appadurai refers to another sport played in India, cricket, but we can apply her thinking to Brazilian football stadiums. Appadurai, Modernity at Large,11.

32. Rial, “Marta better”.

33. Da Matta, Universo do futebol, 60.

34. Idem, 27.

35. Yuval-Davis and Anthias, Women-Nation-State.

36. Two of these are short unsigned notes (Mulherio: “Esporte, reduto masculino” in 1981 and “For a de campo” in 1982) and the third, signed by Adélia Borges (“De Atenas a Los Angeles” in 1984), although it occupies more space, concerns mainly Olympic sports.

37. An article about football players in the newspaper Mulherio can be mentioned, but it is about men and the case of collective rape by Brazilian athletes in Switzerland. Rial and Grossi, “Estupradores viraram heróis”.

38. Almeida, “Boas de bola”.

39. GALF, “Mulher de Chuteira”.

40. Pacheco e Chaves, “Anésia. Arte Feminina?”.The writer Clarice Lispector also consecrated her art by writing about sport. She said that she had a “passionate ignorance for football”, yet dedicated a chronicle (1968) to football (to football practiced by men that is) and two interviews, with the coach of the Brazilian national squad. Lispector, “Interview with Zagalo”; Lispector, “Antes da Copa”.

41. Almeida, “Boas de bola”.

42. Rial, “Memória do Futebol”.

43. Goellner shows that this is not a new fear because the concern that physical activities could masculinize a woman has been discussed at least since the nineteenth century. About this, see: Almeida, “Boas de bola”; Almeida, “Mulheres futebolista”; Pisani, “Poderosas do Foz”; Pisani, “Sou feita de chuva, sol e barro”; Rial, “Marta better Kaká”; Goellner, “Conhecer para reconhecer”.

44. Mello, “Histórias e casos de sedução no futebol feminino”.

45. Ibid.

46. Goellner, “Mulheres fortes”; Almeida, “Boas de Bola”.

47. Sedgwick, “Epistemologia do armário”.

48. Pisani, “Sou feita de chuva, sol e barro”.

49. In the sense used by Wittig, lesbians are not women – women compose a social class that is oppressed by the patriarchal system, while lesbians are outside of this system because they do not require the presence of men. Wittig, Straight mind.

50. Our analysis of the feminist newspapers of the 1980s shows that the main issues did not approach sports. The most recurring themes in Mulherio were women at work, labour rights of women, domestic democracy, decriminalization of work and sexuality, and others.

51. Almeida, “Boas de bola”; Elsey and Nadel, Futbolera.

52. In 2016, FIFA included gender equality in its regulations, and required immediate compliance by the national confederations and federations. In that year, Conmebol, made it mandatory for the clubs participating in the tournaments governed by the institution to have women’s teams (even on the teams for developing players). The CBF has also promoted actions to strengthen the category “Women’s Football”, such as the organization of a national championship and tournaments in divisions to determine access, as well as inclusion of women on the directorates and in technical positions.

53. Interview with Robinho. UOL, “Infelizmente, existe esse movimento feminista”. Available at: https://www.uol.com.br/esporte/videos/2020/10/17/robinho-infelizmente-existe-esse-movimento-feminista.htm.

54. Sandra Pfläfi, accompanied by two youth, knocked on the door of the room where the athletes from Grêmio, Eduardo and Fernando were staying, to ask for an autograph or a jersey as a memento. They had her enter, sent the boys accompanying her outside, and let two other players in, Henrique and Alexi Stival – known as Cuca – who were walking down the hall.

Henrique and Cuca had complete intercourse with the girl, the others submitted her to libidinous acts, according to an article in the magazine Veja from 12 August 1987. Jailed for a few weeks, they faced 20 years in prison, but were released shortly afterwards, despite all the evidence. Rial and Grossi, “Estupradores viraram heróis”.

55. Brito, “Enunciações de masculinidade em narrativas de jovens atletas de voleibol”; Kesller,São tudo sapatão; Anjos and Silva Júnior, Recusando armários; Camargo, “Circulando entre práticas esportivas e sexuais”.

56. Rial, “New Frontiers”; Pisani, “Poderosas do Foz”; Almeida, “Do sonho ao possível”.

57. Rial, “New Frontiers”; Agergaard and Tiesler, Women soccer.

58. See the excellent survey of the Anglo-Saxon sociological literature about sports and LGBT+ by King “What’s Queer About”.

59. Biiicha (fag) is what fans shout at a rival goalkeeper during a goal kick. It is an insult invented by former Spanish colonialists in South America that spread quickly in Brazil, and was widely heard in stadiums until FIFA began to threaten reprisals. But other homophobic shouts are common. It is impossible not to see a relationship between this homophobia and the fact that Brazil has more assassinations of transgender people than any country in the world, or to recall that homophobia is not criminalized under a specific statute in Brazil (while racism is). But this is changing: [https://brasil.elpais.com/brasil/2019/06/14/actualidad/1560496365_764572.html]

60. Roncolato, “Como leis brasileiras”.

61. Brake, Getting in the Game, 3.

62. Wolf, A Room of Own’s One.