When I started HoopGurlz.com, a national Web site about girl’s basketball that’s now part of ESPN, I focused on bringing visual and audio elements to it. I have for the vast majority of my career been a writer, but lately I spend as much time, often more, on photography. I do because I believe girls (and women) are more visually oriented, plus media coverage of the sport, particularly on a national basis, is a pretty new phenomenon, so I believe it’s important to put faces with a lot of the names people are seeing for the first time.

A large part of my mission, I believe, also is trying to show the girls in a light that belies what still are common stereotypes — for example, that they don’t play in the air and aren’t athletic, or that they are not tough or competitive. If any of that was ever true, a lot has changed, believe me. This part of the mission does still pose challenges. I learned that early when girls or female coaches would ask, “Why did you publish that terrible picture of me?” In journalistic terms, those “terrible” pictures actually were very good because, among other things, they showed fire and emotion. But there are limits in this game to how one can portray those qualities. My version of “fire” is a “funny face” to the subject and, instead of a moment to cherish, having the photo shown to a national audience is, instead, embarrassing.
[Read more...]