Golf World Rejoice! We have another first for women’s golf. As you may have read, the December/January 2021 issue of Golf Digest features a cover photo of women, which was taken by a female photographer, and the story written by a woman. I have to admit, I was happy to hear about this trilogy of female dominance in one of the most male dominated publications in golf and really in general. So, I decided to take a look at the cover myself to see what the hubbub was all about. Be sure to take a look at it and see what you think. Then, hold that thought.

On the cover we see an image of two of golf’s best players, Nelly and Jessica Korda. This photo seems fairly harmless, right? Here we have two popular, talented golfers. Simple as that.

While hundreds of studies have confirmed time and time again women are unfairly treated in media, maybe we don’t see this in this cover photo. Are you breathing a sigh of relief yet? We see language which diminishes accomplishments, images which sexualize women’s bodies, and a multitude of other negativity. But, this photo doesn’t seem to have much of that at all. It’s not much more than two golfers, all smiles, in a golf pose looking the way they generally look when we watch them on TV.

But, hold the phone. One academic theory says this photo is part of the reason why women’s golf (and women in the media in general) haven’t made much progress. “How is this possible?” you may be questioning. This is a perfectly innocent image of golfers. There is not even an ounce of negativity oozing from this page, right? Not so fast. Welcome to the theory of Face-ism.

Face-ism is a theoretical framework which describes the degree to which a photograph focuses on the human body versus the focus on the face. The Face-ism effect suggests important aspects of identity are thought to be centered differently anatomically in women and men. One study found when participants were asked to draw a male and a female, the participants drew men with a prominent and detailed face. Women were drawn with a full body and little detail on the face. Another study, (disclosure: this was my study) found men were shown 70.8% of the time and women 29.2% of the time in a sample of online newspapers.

The same study concluded, “published images of women which tend to focus less on their intellect and more on their figures, may over time, contribute to a general cultivation effect among media consumers that tends to symbolically devalue women by cultivating images of them as less powerful than males and less able to serve in intellectual roles.” Other Face-ism studies found facial prominence of men has been much higher than women in many forms of media including television, web sites, and news magazines. It was even found in the 2008 American Presidential election, the female Vice-Presidential nominee was photographed significantly more often in a full body shot than her male opponents/running mate. (I conducted this study, as well, and believe me, it was quite enlightening.)

This brings me back to the magazine cover in question. If we look at it from a Face-ism angle, we see it falls right in line with the other studies. Full body. To be fair, I decided to look at previous Golf Digest covers to see what was there. Did the theory of Face-sim exist on those covers?

I analyzed covers from 2013 until 2021. What I found was of all the years, not counting the most recent Korda cover, only 7 other women graced the cover. (The most recent cover with a woman before the Korda cover was 2016.)

Three of the pics were full body shots, with two of the images showing the golfer engaged in a full power swing. Two images were from the hip up and one was from the knee up. One was even missing her shirt, but I’ll leave that for another day. Clothes (those that were present) were skin-tight and backs were suggestively arched. I was exhausted from the thought of even trying to get in that position. Wow, I contemplated as I stared at the covers. That looks kind of painful.

And how about the rest of the covers? All men with the exception of a few that featured equipment, or some other golf-related image. To be fair, there were numerous full body shots, but not too many backs were arched in a sexy, come-hither manner. Those full body shots were strong in stature and generally powerful in essence. Many covers were regal head shots making golfers look like they were posing for an executive portrait and many were shown in a power swing or super-hero pose. Some were playful images, but many were arms crossed, dominating in tone, and/or body language.

So, to answer the question if Face-ism was still alive, the answer was an unequivocal yes. It lives like that shank shot that is always hidden in your bag waiting for the right moment to appear.

Actually, I am happy to see the Korda sisters on the cover of such a well-known golf outlet. Watching them play is exciting and I am confident a vast number of fans will continue to cheer them on as the continue to take on the golf universe. They posted on social media it was “a dream come true” to be on the cover. No doubt it was, and I do not want to diminish this awesome achievement. They deserve to be on this cover and many others in the future.

However, the fact remains that Face-ism seems to be alive and well in golf media. Is it astonishing to see so few covers with women over a 7-8 year time-span? Is it surprising many of the images they chose to publish are sexualized? Not really. But, what is most disturbing to me is that Face-ism is still so prominent yet is so silent. It screams from the page, but no one hears it. It’s everywhere but goes unseen.

It is time to Face-it.

References

Price, K. and King. J. (2010). Face-ism in the 2008 U.S. Presidential general election: Photo coverage of candidates in news and business magazines. International Academy of Business Disciplines, Business Research Yearbook. Vol. 17, No. 2,570-577.

Price, K. (2001). Male visual dominance continues: A global study of images of women and men in 750 online newspapers is 74 nations (Unpublished master’s thesis). East Tennessee State University.

Image attribution: Images in this article are from Golf Digest magazine Dec. 20/Jan. 21 edition.