Textual Analysis for “Throwing Like a Girl”
The article begins by remembering the opening of the World Series on April 4th, 1994. The President at the time, Bill Clinton, threw out the first pitch in Cleveland while his wife First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton threw out the first pitch in Chicago. Mrs. Clinton was the first First Lady in history to throw out a first pitch at a major league baseball game. Instead of writing about this historical event, however, reporters across the country ripped into the First Lady’s form and how she “throws like a girl”. The phrase “throwing like a girl” has become an offensive, almost derogatory term that shames some women and implies they do not possess the same athleticism as men. Fallows suggests that the answer to why they throw so differently must be more than just being a woman. Some people believe a man and a woman's shoulder are hinged differently, and that is the reason for the difference in the way …show more content…
“A successful throw involves an intricate series of actions coordinated among muscle groups, as each link of the chain is timed to interact with the next. Like bike riding or skating, it can be learned by anyone-male or female.” (Fallows 141). By saying that learning to throw a baseball is a mechanic activity that happens the same way in everyone’s body, Fallows discredits the phrase “throwing like a girl”. The phrase in question alludes to the belief that women cannot throw a baseball as well as men, hence the reasoning for diving the genders and saying that one throws like a girl. However, if men and women have the chance to learn to throw the same way, there is no need to separate by gender. One might infer “like a girl” refers to being weak and not knowing the proper form, but if everyone has the chance to learn, we cannot assume that all women have weak throws and use the incorrect