{"title":"Value frames in discourse supporting transgender athlete bans","authors":"Kimberly Martin, Elizabeth P. Rahilly","doi":"10.1177/09579265231187058","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"American states began passing legislation that would ban transgender girls from competing on sports teams that match their gender identity in 2020. During legislative debate, supporters of transgender athlete bans adopted rhetoric that framed their arguments in terms of commonly held values. ‘Value frames’ establish connections between people and spoken values and have a powerful effect on the way that opinions about public policy are formed. We conduct a discourse analysis of video and audio footage from committee testimony and chamber debate from 18 US states to identify the major discursive themes used by the bans’ supporters. Themes include gender simplicity, male advantage, protecting women and preventing change. Our discussion and analysis connects these themes to long-standing value frames used by political elites, namely tradition, fairness and equal opportunity. The conclusion addresses the implications of this discourse for shaping the public’s understanding of sex and gender.","PeriodicalId":47965,"journal":{"name":"Discourse & Society","volume":"34 1","pages":"732 - 751"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4000,"publicationDate":"2023-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Discourse & Society","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09579265231187058","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"COMMUNICATION","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
American states began passing legislation that would ban transgender girls from competing on sports teams that match their gender identity in 2020. During legislative debate, supporters of transgender athlete bans adopted rhetoric that framed their arguments in terms of commonly held values. ‘Value frames’ establish connections between people and spoken values and have a powerful effect on the way that opinions about public policy are formed. We conduct a discourse analysis of video and audio footage from committee testimony and chamber debate from 18 US states to identify the major discursive themes used by the bans’ supporters. Themes include gender simplicity, male advantage, protecting women and preventing change. Our discussion and analysis connects these themes to long-standing value frames used by political elites, namely tradition, fairness and equal opportunity. The conclusion addresses the implications of this discourse for shaping the public’s understanding of sex and gender.
期刊介绍:
Discourse & Society is a multidisciplinary peer-reviewed journal whose major aim is to publish outstanding research at the boundaries of discourse analysis and the social sciences. It focuses on explicit theory formation and analysis of the relationships between the structures of text, talk, language use, verbal interaction or communication, on the one hand, and societal, political or cultural micro- and macrostructures and cognitive social representations, on the other hand. That is, D&S studies society through discourse and discourse through an analysis of its socio-political and cultural functions or implications. Its contributions are based on advanced theory formation and methodologies of several disciplines in the humanities and social sciences.