Deakin University student Sophie Francis is the successful candidate for our latest intern intake through our Deakin work integrated learning partnership.
Through the Deakin University X Siren Sport Work Integrated Learning placement program we give interns the opportunity to develop skills in interviewing, writing and editing, as well as learning brand management through social media and marketing. Upon completion of a 100-hour program, students will have not only learned some new skills, they will have developed a portfolio of work to add to their resume as they look to enter the workforce.
We’d like to introduce our new intern, Sophie Francis, to our Siren community so you can learn more about her, the passion she has for the women in sports space, and what we’ll be looking to give to support her higher education journey and her career goals.
We’re looking forward to working with Sophie and sharing her work with you all!
What Degree are you studying at Deakin University?
I’m finishing up my Post Graduate Diploma of Journalism, having completed a Bachelor of International Studies in 2022.
What was it about the opportunity to intern with Siren that made you want to apply for this position?
Admittedly, my interests span politics and arts more than it does sport, however, I love any opportunity to scrutinise how politics are embedded in our culture and the implications this has on our societal attitudes at large. Siren’s all-women focus entirely appeals to my fascination (and fury) with gender bias and patriarchy. With sport being so central to Australia’s culture, it will be fascinating to interrogate how these politics are reinforced and replicated in sporting contexts, and legitimises a toxic, hyper-masculine brand of misogyny in its fan-bases and broader Australian culture.
What are you most keen to learn while at Siren to assist with your degree and what you’d like to do in the future?
Above all, I am thrilled to be immersed into the world of professional journalism, keen to learn from, connect with and observe how key players (particularly women!) navigate the industry’s evolving forms and constraints. I am passionate about creative storytelling, and am excited to use this internship as an opportunity to sink my teeth into various storytelling mediums. I want to trial how to effectively engage disengaged audiences and capture attention within a dense and inundated social media environment. As an arts lover, I particularly enjoy exploring the intersections between various worlds—fashion and sports, art and sports, film and sports and so on. I understand the value that these intersections can have in bridging understanding between diverse communities, and I hope I am able to explore some of these connections during my time at Siren! Long term, I want to develop stories that inspire progress over resistance, and capture the concern of a culture being swayed towards hyper-individualism and anti-intellectualism.
What is it about women’s sports that you are passionate about?
Barriers for women in sports is one of the most ubiquitous and accessible examples of sexism in motion, legitimising misogyny and toxic masculinity within sports fandoms and broader male spaces. With sport being so central to Australian culture, I am passionate about understanding how true, structural gender equality in sports can have meaningful impact beyond industry confines and shift gender politics at a larger scale.
In similar vein, (and piggybacking off previous intern, Brielle Quigley’s reflections), women’s sport is possibly one of the only depictions of positive and reciprocal female friendship – a dynamic that is not supported by the deeply misogynistic codes and tropes that ‘explain’ everyday women’s relationships. We are taught to find danger in one another (with ‘bitch’ and ‘drama queen’ becoming everyday descriptors), and as we internalise these tropes, we can freely assign these labels and at times, might act out these roles. As political discourse fractures along the alt-right, anti-women line, amplifying the examples of women in sport defying these stereotypes could offer a lesson for what’s possible in women’s relationships beyond team sports, emboldening us to abandon the ‘male gaze’, choose each other and emancipate ourselves from the internalised misogynies that keep us convinced of our ‘drama’.
What would you like to see change about women’s sports and sports media?
As alt-right discourse alarmingly reverberates online, it will be interesting to see if a similar chauvinism reappears in the sporting world and begins to subtly constrain gender equality efforts. Even on my own (social media) timelines, there has been a revival of ‘supply and demand’ rhetoric that rationalises women’s inequality in sport – that women in sport don’t inherently attract as much attention as men, and therefore should not be paid or platformed equally. Though this has long been debunked by the countless women and non-binary athletes that have found both professional and cultural prominence in their sport, the conservative ‘sportsman’ archetype prevails. I’m hopeful that sporting culture will be able to shift from one of patriarchy and meritocracy (dictated by men and narrow definitions of achievement) to conscious inclusion – prioritising the impact made by platforming marginalised groups over the supposed integrity of its all-male (hetero) archetype.