Gender and the Talking Stopwatch: A Qualitative Analysis on the Evolution From the “Script Assistant” to “Associate Director” Roles in Sports Broadcasting
Bibliographic record
Abstract
This qualitative research study focuses on hegemonic masculinity in the sports broadcasting industry. A series of oral life history interviews were conducted with 20 participants who have performed or continue to perform the professional role of a script assistant/control room associate director. The study sought to identify: (a) if and how Raewyn Connell’s theoretical framework for hegemonic masculinities applies to the sports broadcasting profession; (b) if the sports broadcasting industry in Canada represents a unique example of hegemonic masculinity; and (c) if sports broadcasting does encompass a form of hegemonic masculinity in this context, then have biographical processes played a part in either supporting, modifying, or opposing and changing it? This research provides a micro level view of a much wider macro issue of gender and masculinity issues in behind-the-scenes sports broadcasting. This dissertation demonstrates this by weaving together a narrative that uses both Connell’s framework around hegemonic masculinities and Peter Alheit’s concept of biographical research. The study investigated a specific occupation—the script assistant/associate director—to establish a clear critique of gender-bias and forms of discrimination in the Canadian sports broadcasting industry. The complexities and narratives discussed throughout this dissertation shed some light on the hegemonic masculine nature of the sports broadcasting profession. The role of coercion and consent, which is central to Connell’s theoretical framework, has been revealed. The study’s major contribution is identifying the slow (often glacial) pace and superficial nature of ongoing change.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.017 | 0.022 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.002 | 0.003 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.019 | 0.027 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.008 | 0.007 |
| Open science | 0.003 | 0.007 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.004 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.005 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".