Polisemy seen in interpretation of texts and Self-formation process of gender-opposing characteristics:
Case study of the newspaper coverage of a female athlete

Takako Iida　
（Tezukayama Gakuin University）

Abstract

　　　This study is based on an analysis of newspaper coverage of a woman judo athlete. That athlete is Ms. Noriko Narazaki, a bronze medalist at the　Atlanta Olympics, the first place winner in the World Judo Championships,　and the silver medalist at the Sydney Olympics. In order to investigate the reactions to the content of these media reports, interviews were conducted with the audience with varying backgrounds such as gender, age and other social properties. The interviews were analyzed and responses were divided into three positions based on gender, i.e., the dominant position, the negotiative position, and the oppositional position.
The results of these analyses are as follows:
　　1) There is a wide diversity in the audience's interpretations of the texts. This diversity derives from different ways of decoding based on their own "lived experiences"
　　2)Most of the audience are found to have accepted (and re-produced) the gender dominant code of the texts by taking the "negotiated position" toward the texts. The dominant code here included the discourse of patriarchy, heterosexism, current sexual division, and women as sport epigone.
　　3)In the case of the oppositional reading (interpretation) of the texts, two elements are found to be relevant. One is broad knowledge of gender studies. The other is a working experience in an environment where one is always referred to as the first female worker ever taking the post.
　　4) The number of the audience holding the oppositional reading increased in the course of the interview. This suggests that the audience has acquired "media literacy" through action of careful reading a series of articles and discussion in the group or with the interviewer. That further led to "gender-opposing self-formation" by each member of the audience.


Keywords: Audience, Polysemy, Gender, Newspaper coverage, Encording


Journal of Sport and Gender Studies, 3: 4-17, 2005.