Higher Goals

<p><b>Offers a fascinating ethnography of physicality and gender relations in women's team contact sports.</b></p><p><b>Winner of the 2001 North American Society for the Sociology of Sport Book Award </b></p><p>The most extensive treatment to date of women's experiences in team sports Higher Goals provides an ethnographic account of the Blades a Canadian team that plays at the highest levels of women's hockey. With a vivid depiction of life on the Blades the book follows the team over two seasons tracing their journey to a national championship. Key issues in the sociology of sport and gender studies are explored including the construction of community among women athletes; the feminine apologetic and pressures on athletes to conform to feminine ideals; homophobia and the experiences of lesbian athletes; and physicality and women's experience in contact sports.</p>