Dalton Myers | Madden making her mark

The Press Association of Jamaica (PAJ) announced their top journalists in various categories a week ago at their Annual Awards Ceremony. While I was interested in all ­categories, obviously, my focus would have been the Sports Journalist of the Year. I must congratulate the winners – The Jamaica Observer’s Sherdon Cowan and RJRGLEANER Communications Group’s Karen Madden, who copped the prestigious Hugh Crosskill/Raymond Sharpe Award for Sports in the print and electronic ­category, respectively.

While both awards are equally weighted and I am impressed with Cowan’s body of work, I want to focus a bit on Karen Madden because it is significant to girls and women in sport. Madden’s body of work helped her cop an award in what is ­considered a male-­dominated space.

Karen Madden has been ­working in journalism for two decades and recently received long-­service award from the RJRGLEANER Communications Group. However, she only switched from news to sports in 2014 and has been progressing since. Karen not only won the Crosskill/Sharpe Award but was also shortlisted for Journalist of the Year.

IMPORTANT ISSUES

The three bodies of work that were submitted to the judges included pieces titled: ‘Gender Inequity in Sports’, ‘Sex and Physical Abuse in Sport’ and ‘Reggae Girlz Journey in France’. All three are important because they focus on girls and women in sport and sought to highlight issues of discrimination in the sporting industry, violence against girls and women in sport and the overall success of females playing sport for Jamaica.

Karen’s ascension to the top of the journalism pile is important because she can be seen as an inspiration for other girls and women who are either in sports or want to become involved in journalism. I interviewed Karen on The Drive Phase Podcast a few weeks ago. She made some great observations about women in sport and used the platform, as she has done behind other microphones, to look at issues of gender inequality and make a general push for more support for girls in sport.

In the said podcast episode, Karen talked about the importance of parents supporting their girls who want to play sport. She is a big fan of her own daughter, Shaquille Laing. ‘Keely’, as she is affectionately called, currently plays for Arnett Gardens women football team, but has played for the national team. That kind of support is crucial. The Sports Journalist of the Year also co-hosts ‘The Girls Sports Club’ on Hitz 92FM with Trishana McGowan. The one-hour show not only focuses on women, but since its establishment on January 2017, has used the airways to highlight many ­success stories in Jamaica.

What many may not know is that Karen also did her MA dissertation on sports. Her thesis ‘Interrogating Notions of Gender and Hegemonic Masculinity in Jamaica: The Case of the Woman Ballers!’ is important in our current landscape and is probably something she should continue developing for more academic interrogation. She is also an adjunct lecturer at The UWI, delivering the course ‘De-constructing the Culture of Sport’ in the Institute of Caribbean Studies.

Journalism is not the easiest profession as there are a lot of negative feedback, and additionally, the lack of resources is an issue for many journalists, which can even turn off talented youngsters who may want to go into the profession. Sport journalism has another dynamic as it is a male-dominated space, and in Jamaica, while there are no physical barriers to entry for women, patriarchy itself can be a huge challenge. Karen’s role here is not just to bring the sports to our living rooms, TVs, tablets, and so on, but also to be a role model to other women and other journalists in general. I don’t always agree with her, and very often, I am critical of the work of our local sports journalists. However, while there is Karen Madden, Denise Walters, Trishanna McGowan in electronic, you will struggle to find female sport journalists in print media in our two major newspapers and very few venture into blogs. There is work there to be done.

This year has been a good one for Karen. She has produced some good work and apart from those submissions to the judging panel, I think her overall body of work will be impactful not just for women in sport, but the sporting landscape in general.

Dalton Myers is a sports consultant and host of The Drive Phase Podcast. Email feedback to daltonsmyers@gmail.com or tweet @daltonsmyers