Despite feminist concerns about the asymmetrical distribution of power in martial arts and combat sports (MACS), sport psychology research has overlooked issues of inequality and socio-cultural difference, as well as their effects on athletes’ experiences and identity negotiation. The present doctoral dissertation explores the intersection of gender, culture, and identity in judo through the lens of cultural praxis and feminist poststructuralist frameworks. The aim was to explore in what ways the cultural context shapes the experiences and identities of female judoka (judo athletes). Two specific objectives were set: to trace the discourses (systems of knowledge) through which female judoka articulate and make sense of their experiences, and to develop a theoretically informed analytical understanding of how they construct their identities through the negotiation of sociocultural beliefs and gender stereotypes. An ethnographic approach was employed, and data were gathered during fieldwork in Greece and Finland. In conjunction with participant-observation, semi-structured interviews with 10 female judoka ages 17-40 were conducted in Greece, and nine semi-structured interviews with female judoka ages 20-49 were conducted in Finland.
A discursive analytic procedure revealed several discourses as relevant to the ways that female judoka make sense of themselves and their experiences, namely, a female biological inferiority discourse, discourses of ideal femininity, a patriarchal discourse of gender roles, a discourse of gender equality, and discourses of athletic performance and elite and mass sport. In this dissertation, I discuss the different and similar ways in which Greek and Finnish athletes are subjected to these discourses. In relation to the subject positions offered to them within these discourses, female judoka strategically construct multiple (and often conflicting) identities, each serving different purposes. I de-construct the successful and feminine athlete and the natural-born fighter to show how the repetition of certain identities assists in the reproduction of gender hierarchies and inequalities. I conclude that there is a need for discursive interventions to move toward gender equity in MACS.