Elusive Visibility: Female Athletes in Sololá, Guatemala

Women and their involvement in sports in Latin America represent a vastly understudied realm. My research looks specifically at female athletes in the western highlands of Guatemala and the challenges that embody their existence as women in a traditionally male‐dominated social activity. Inhibitions such as the lack of federal aid, resources, and public support coupled with contradictions in culturally informed concepts of machismo and indigeneity provide the framework for an extremely complex and dynamic reality for women and their interaction with sport. My analysis focuses on the interplay between these various factors and the tensions created within in order to critically expose the underdevelopment of women’s sport participation in Guatemala and, thus, the elusive nature of the female athletes’ visibility.