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113Critical Thinking for Sports StudentsSport, Ethics and Philosophy 5 (4). 2011.Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, Volume 5, Issue 4, Page 459-462, November 2011
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60The Woman in Black: Exposing Sexist Beliefs About Female Officials in Elite Men’s FootballSport, Ethics and Philosophy 7 (2): 202-216. 2013.In this paper, we argue that there are important differences between playing and non-playing roles in sport. The relevance of sex differences poses genuine philosophical and ethical difficulties for feminism in the context of playing sport. In the case of non-playing roles in general, and officiating in particular, we argue that reference to essential differences between men and women is irrelevant. Officiating elite men?s football is not a role for which ?essential? (psychological and biologica…Read more
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51Is it defensible for women to play fewer sets than men in grand slam tennis?Journal of the Philosophy of Sport 44 (3): 388-407. 2017.Lacking in the philosophy of sport is discussion of the gendered numbers of sets played in Grand Slam tennis. We argue that the practice is indefensible. It can be upheld only through false beliefs about women or repressive femininity ideals. It treats male tennis players unfairly in forcing them to play more sets because of their sex. Its ideological consequences are pernicious, since it reinforces the respective identifications of the female and male with physical limitation and heroism. Both …Read more
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44Ideational Social Capital and the Civic Culture: Extricating Putnam’s Legacy from the Social Capital DebatesSocial Epistemology 23 (2). 2009.Robert Putnam's work was a double-edged sword for social capital scholars. It brought unprecedented attention to the research agenda but also created conceptual confusion. Many scholars have tried to disentangle Coleman's concept of social capital from what some described as Putnam's “fuzzy psychological notion” of civic culture values. Despite the rigour of these efforts, Putnam's influence remains, because scholars and policy makers are drawn to the benefits his work promised. This article tak…Read more
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43A soft gynocentric critique of the practice of modern sportSport, Ethics and Philosophy 1 (3). 2007.In this article we propose a philosophical critique of two general, but not exhaustive, approaches to gender studies in sport, namely gynocentric feminism and humanist feminism. We argue that both approaches are problematic because they fail clearly to distinguish or articulate their epistemological and ideological commitments. In particular, humanist feminists articulate the human condition using the sex/gender dichotomy, which fails to account adequately for gendered subjectivity. For them gen…Read more
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37Challenging sex segregation: A philosophical evaluation of the football association’s rules on mixed footballSport, Ethics and Philosophy 9 (4): 389-400. 2015.The Football Association has been under pressure to allow girls to play in mixed teams since 1978, following 12-year old Theresa Bennett’s application to play with boys in a local league. In 1991, over a decade after Bennett’s legal challenge, the FA agreed to remove its ban on mixed football and introduced Rule C4 in order to permit males and females to play together in competitive matches under the age of 11. More recently, following a campaign by parents, coaches, local Members of Parliament …Read more
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37The new IOC and IAAF policies on female eligibility: old Emperor, new clothes?Sport, Ethics and Philosophy 8 (1): 44-56. 2014.The Caster Semenya debacle touched off by the 2009 Berlin World Athletics Championships resulted finally in IOC and IAAF abandonment of sex testing, which gave way to procedures that make female competition eligibility dependent upon the level of serum testosterone, which must be below the male range or instrumentally countered by androgen resistance. We argue that the new policy is unsustainable because (i) the testosterone-performance connection it posits is uncompelling; (ii) testosterone-ind…Read more
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37Philosophical Perspectives on Gender in Sport and Physical ActivitySport, Ethics and Philosophy 4 (3): 355-359. 2010.
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12Future law: emerging technology, regulation and ethics (edited book)Edinburgh University Press. 2020.How can law ethically regulate a future of fast-changing technologies? From recent inventions to science fiction, Future Law explores how law, ethics and regulation must respond to new technologies that challenge the boundaries of our ethics.
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11Derby Girls’ Parodic Self-Sexualizations: Autonomy, Articulacy and AmbiguitySport, Ethics and Philosophy 17 (1): 3-20. 2021.When behaviours or character traits match sociocultural expectation, heteronomy is a natural suspicion. A further natural suspicion is that the behaviours or character traits are unhealthy for the agent or for objectives of social justice and liberation. Second Wave feminism therefore includes a robust narrative of unease about female self-sexualisation. Third Wave feminism has more upbeat narratives of the latter, in terms of confidence and empowerment. The preceding tension is refracted throug…Read more
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8Derby Girls’ Parodic Self-Sexualizations: Autonomy, Articulacy and AmbiguitySport, Ethics and Philosophy 17 (1): 3-20. 2021.When behaviours or character traits match sociocultural expectation, heteronomy is a natural suspicion. A further natural suspicion is that the behaviours or character traits are unhealthy for the agent or for objectives of social justice and liberation. Second Wave feminism therefore includes a robust narrative of unease about female self-sexualisation. Third Wave feminism has more upbeat narratives of the latter, in terms of confidence and empowerment. The preceding tension is refracted throug…Read more