Catherine Phipps
Women’s football fandom and stadium attendance in Iran: a form of everyday resistance?
Phipps, Catherine; Afrouzeh, Ali; Pope, Stacey; Pourkiani, Mohammad; Boroumand, Mohammad Reza
Authors
Ali Afrouzeh
Professor Stacey Pope stacey.pope@durham.ac.uk
Professor
Mohammad Pourkiani
Mohammad Reza Boroumand
Abstract
To date, there is a scarcity of research examining women’s leisure lives in Iran, particularly their football fandom. In this study, we examine the development and negotiation of women’s fan identities, their experience of stadium attendance and alternative forms of fandom, as well as the extent to which their fandom is a form of everyday resistance. To do so, we draw on semi-structured interview data with ten women who attended matches at Azadi Stadium in Tehran. Utilizing identity theory and concepts of everyday resistance, we found women have highly salient fan identities, developed through various forms of fandom. This is despite gender and other factors such as geographical location acting as identity constraints. Due to historic restrictions in women attending stadiums, interviewees used alternative fandom as types of everyday resistance, opposing gender norms in subtle ways. Moreover, stadium attendance in itself symbolizes everyday resistance for women, a means to challenge others’ opposition to their fandom, and resist cultural expectations including ideas about “appropriate” gender norms. The significance of this article is demonstrated by the potential for women’s football fandom to contest gender inequality in Iranian society and we suggest it is both a form of activism and a leisure activity.
Citation
Phipps, C., Afrouzeh, A., Pope, S., Pourkiani, M., & Boroumand, M. R. (online). Women’s football fandom and stadium attendance in Iran: a form of everyday resistance?. World Leisure Journal, https://doi.org/10.1080/16078055.2024.2406487
Journal Article Type | Article |
---|---|
Acceptance Date | Sep 16, 2024 |
Online Publication Date | Sep 23, 2024 |
Deposit Date | Oct 4, 2024 |
Publicly Available Date | Oct 4, 2024 |
Journal | World Leisure Journal |
Print ISSN | 1607-8055 |
Electronic ISSN | 2333-4509 |
Publisher | Taylor and Francis Group |
Peer Reviewed | Peer Reviewed |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1080/16078055.2024.2406487 |
Public URL | https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2944946 |
Files
Accepted Journal Article
(457 Kb)
PDF
You might also like
Women’s football fandom and growing the ‘Beautiful’ game
(2022)
Journal Article
Downloadable Citations
About Durham Research Online (DRO)
Administrator e-mail: dro.admin@durham.ac.uk
This application uses the following open-source libraries:
SheetJS Community Edition
Apache License Version 2.0 (http://www.apache.org/licenses/)
PDF.js
Apache License Version 2.0 (http://www.apache.org/licenses/)
Font Awesome
SIL OFL 1.1 (http://scripts.sil.org/OFL)
MIT License (http://opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.html)
CC BY 3.0 ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/)
Powered by Worktribe © 2025
Advanced Search