Towards south - south comparative feminist inquiry: ‘Patriarchal varieties’ and women's subversive strategies in/through sports in Fiji and Brazil

Kanemasu, Yoko and Knijnik, Jorge (2025) Towards south - south comparative feminist inquiry: ‘Patriarchal varieties’ and women's subversive strategies in/through sports in Fiji and Brazil. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, NA . NA. ISSN 1012-6902

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Abstract

Research into women's sporting experiences in the Global South has grown significantly in recent decades, with North-South asymmetries as an overarching reference point. The present article is an exploratory attempt to shift the focus of inquiry in this literature by considering the value of feminist South-South comparison. Guided by Gwen Hunnicutt's theorisation of ‘varieties of patriarchy’, we examine the historical and socio-political dynamics of two very different postcolonial societies, Fiji and Brazil, and how these impact the subversive strategies and resources available to women in pursuing sports against (hetero)patriarchal barriers. Our case studies of women's rugby in Fiji and women's football in Brazil reveal that Fijian and Brazilian women claim their nation's most privileged masculine sport in considerably differential contexts and with differential approaches. Fijian women rugby players engage in counter-hegemonic struggle marked by an ‘implicit’ feminism largely outside of formal political activism, while Brazilian women footballers have practiced an ‘explicit’ sporting feminism, increasingly aligned with the country's successful feminist movements. The difference is considered through the prism of (hetero)patriarchal configurations mediating the conditions and potentials of Fijian/Brazilian women's sporting practices, with particular attention to four interrelated points of comparison: cultural traditionalism, violence, political activism and nationalism. We conclude that comparative analysis of Southern regions can contribute meaningfully to feminist sport scholarship by shedding light on how sports intersect with various forms and spaces of gendered power dynamics.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Divisions:	School of Law and Social Sciences (SoLaSS)
Depositing User:	Yoko Kanemasu
Date Deposited:	16 Jun 2025 01:00
Last Modified:	16 Jun 2025 01:00
URI:	https://repository.usp.ac.fj/id/eprint/14997

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