Elite female cricketers' uses and perceptions of media (in)visibility: A case study on the everyday and the 2020 T20 World Cup

这项研究的重点是体育、性别和社交媒体之间的关系，旨在推进当前关于女性体育以及精英运动员如何使用和回应社交媒体的辩论。通过拉夫堡大学（Loughborough University）的ECB表演中心，持续接触英格兰女子板球队，为了解专业运动员使用社交媒体和回应他人评论的方式提供了无与伦比的原创机会。在澳大利亚举办的2020年板球世界杯（CWC）将被用作案例研究，因为它代表了一个独特的时期，媒体将广泛讨论女子体育，随后捕捉女子体育的历史时刻，并为收集现场数据提供关键时刻，因为它是由运动员，支持人员，记者和球迷产生的。因此，我要调查为什么人们使用和回应媒体，通过使用我的优秀网络与关键利益相关者进行采访；比赛期间的球员、球迷和媒体。利用我对这次媒体活动的内部访问，我将能够在比赛中收集到大量关于CWC各方面的数据，这将提供实时的洞察力，而不是在比赛结束后采访，因为依赖记忆和接触球迷可能会很困难。我计划在澳大利亚的比赛中亲自收集这些数据，前往比赛现场采访利益相关者，同时用我自己的现场笔记捕捉经验。我将能够在比赛现场看到媒体和球迷如何与运动员互动，同时也能够看到并记录在线交流。这将是一个与球迷和运动员谈论数字媒体在比赛中的作用的独特机会，如果没有参加比赛，我将无法做到这一点。此外，虽然关于大型体育赛事的学术研究在过去二十年中有所增长，但许多研究都集中在奥运会或男子锦标赛上，很少有研究全球性的女子锦标赛。此外，从“赛事内部”进行的工作相对较少，因此我的出席将提供一个独特的视角，了解一系列参与者，特别是精英运动员、支持人员和粉丝在这样一个赛事中参与和（重新）展示他们的活动的方式。这种海外实地考察的元素将使我的工作超越媒体和传播学者常规制作和复制的媒体表现的标准工作。回到拉夫堡大学后，我将分析从澳大利亚锦标赛收集的这些数据，但我也会对比赛进行反思，并在比赛期间使用CDA分析社交媒体资料和与在线用户的互动，更广泛地研究运动员和球迷的在线互动。它将提供一个机会来研究运动员如何在网上展示他们的“自我”和他们的运动成就，以及粉丝和媒体观众如何看待和讨论这些成就。这种混合方法旨在全面了解精英运动员如何在数字时代协商自己的身份，同时了解任何更广泛的压力，并试图回答以下研究问题：1)职业女运动员如何使用社交媒体在运动中展示自己？2)社交媒体辩论对职业女运动员的态度和经历有什么影响？3)网络用户如何理解和回应女性运动员的身份、表征和成功？4)运动员在重大赛事期间如何看待社交媒体与日常媒体的使用？5)在重大赛事期间，球迷如何与数字媒体互动？在这项研究中，我将主要关注Instagram和Twitter这两个最受欢迎的社交网络平台，同时利用澳大利亚CWC的实地调查来了解球迷和运动员如何与数字时代互动。

This study focuses on the relationship between sport, gender and social media and aims to advance current debates regarding women's sports and how elite athletes use and respond to social media. Ongoing access to the England Women's cricket team through the ECB performance centre at Loughborough University provides an unrivalled and original opportunity to make sense of the way professional athletes use social media & respond to comments made by others. The 2020 Cricket World Cup (CWC) hosted in Australia will be used as a case study as it represents a unique period when the media will extensively be discussing women`s sport, subsequently capturing a historical moment in women's sport and providing a key moment to collect data in the field as it is generated by athletes, support staff, journalists and fans. As a result, I am to investigate why people are using and responding to media by using my excellent networks to conduct interviews with key stakeholders; players, fans and the media during the event itself. Using my insider access to this media event, I will be able to collect a wealth of data on all aspects of the CWC at the tournament which provides real-time insight rather than interviewing post-tournament where the reliance on memory and access to fans could be difficult.I plan to collect this data in person at the tournament in Australia travelling to the matches interviewing the stakeholders whilst capturing the experience with my own fieldnotes. I will be able to see how the media and fans engage with athletes during the competition at the live matches whilst also being able to see, and record, the online exchanges. It will be a unique opportunity to talk to fans and athletes about the role of digital media during the tournament which I would not be able to achieve without being at the tournament. Plus, while scholarship on mega sporting events has grown over the last two decades, many of these studies focus on the Olympics or men's tournaments with few examining a global women's tournament. Furthermore, there has been relatively little work conducted from 'inside the event' therefore my attendance will provide a unique insight into the ways in which a range of participants, especially elite athletes, support staff and fans engage with and (re)present their activities at such an event. This overseas fieldwork element will allow my work to go beyond the standard work on media representations that is routinely produced and reproduced by media and communications scholars. On return to Loughborough University I will analyse this data collected from the tournament in Australia but I will also reflect on the tournament and look more extensively at the online interactions of athletes and fans during the tournament period employing CDA to analyse social media profiles and interactions with online users. It will provide an opportunity to examine how athletes present their online 'self' and their athletic achievements as well as how such achievements are perceived and discussed by fans and media audiences.This mixed method approach aims to provide a rounded understanding of how elite athletes negotiate their identity in the digital era whilst understanding any wider pressures, and seeks to answer the following research questions:1) How do professional female athletes use social media to present themselves in sport?2) What impact does social media debates have on the attitudes and experiences of professional female athletes?3) How do online users understand and respond to female athletic identity, representations and success?4) How do athletes perceive social media during major tournaments versus day-to-day media use?5) How do fans engage with digital media during major tournaments?For this study I will primarily focus on Instagram & Twitter as 2 of the most popular social networking platforms whilst using fieldwork from Australia CWC to understand how both fans and athletes engage with the digital era.