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(CNN) --
This weekend, when the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals take the field on Super Bowl Sunday, it will mark the cheerleaders' return to America's biggest sporting event, after being banned access to the field last year due to pandemic restrictions.
And while today's commercials and halftime show can often generate more conversations online than cheering from the field, what cheerleaders represent — and what they wear — has long been a matter of public interest. , raising questions about gender stereotypes and the fair treatment of cheerleading athletes.
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That has been the case since the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders were broadcast on national television in the 1970s wearing long-sleeved cropped blue tops, white vests and white shorts, an outfit that is now in the Smithsonian collection.
This break from the pleated skirts and modest blouses seen throughout the 1960s lit a fire.
It was "unlike anything seen in professional sports," said Sarah Hepola, author and host of Texas Monthly's "America's Girls" podcast, which examined the cultural influence of the team, which served as an inspiration for all future teams in both style and style. as in routines.
The Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders became "America's Sweethearts" after being broadcast during the Super Bowl in 1976. Their television appearances included "The Osmond Brothers Special" in 1978. Credit: ABC Photo Archives/Getty Images
"(They) definitely had a ripple effect on NFL cheerleaders in particular. I don't think any other team has had the same impact," said Mhkeeba Pate, host of "Pro Cheerleading Podcast: The Truth Behind The Poms," on a telephone interview.
Pate was a Sea Gal for the Seattle Seahawks (the cheerleading squad has since changed its name to the Seahawks Dancers) between 2011 and 2016.
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Pate's own uniform for the Seahawks was in a similar style but with a nautical twist: a low-cut, cropped white blouse with billowing sleeves and a rhinestone-encrusted sailor collar;
little white shorts with a belt;
and white go-go boots.
"When (you have) that uniform, it heightens his whole sense of importance: the way you move and your posture when you're standing on the sidelines," he recalled.
"Everything speaks for you and you have to combine that with the way you carry yourself."
More "toned down" uniforms
The cheerleading uniform varies by division—professional sports, high school sports, and competitive All Stars—and has come to convey many different things: popularity, pride, spirit, gender, determination, courage.
Men may have been the first cheerleaders, donning preppy sweaters and pants (until World War II changed the demographics of the sport).
But since then, the cheerleading uniform has been an enduring if complicated symbol of American femininity in pop culture, ranging from puritanical Sandy in "Grease" to questioning Megan in the LGBTQ+ cult classic "But I'm a Cheerleader."
Some uniforms have become famous: Actress Gabrielle Union and her young daughter went viral in 2019 wearing matching Clovers uniforms from the "Bring it On" franchise, which Union starred in two decades earlier, while model Kendall last year Jenner got her own Navarro uniform from the Netflix docuseries "Cheer" on the Ellen DeGeneres Show.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers cheerleaders in 2016, wearing pirate-themed two-pieces.
Credit: Don Juan Moore/Getty Images
Since then, the Bucs team has introduced sportier outfits with sneakers.
Credit: Andy Lewis/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images
But while academic and All Stars uniforms are often college- and sports-themed, NFL teams have historically focused on glamour, sex appeal and themed looks.
The Denver Broncos cheerleaders have channeled the western style with matching vests and chaps, while the Tampa Bay Buccaneers team for many years opted for the girly pirate style with lace-up bras and ragged miniskirts.
However, changes have been made in recent years, as NFL teams have released more athletic and less revealing looks.
The Buccaneers cheerleaders traded in their miniskirts and bras for tights and crop tops;
the Minnesota Vikings have moved away from their frilly, off-the-shoulder tops and opted for a workout-inspired design;
and this year, the Cincinnati Ben-Gals team also introduced a less revealing, more sporty jersey.
The Cincinnati Bengals cheerleaders retired this style last season and opted for short-sleeved jerseys.
Credit: Ian Johnson/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images
In 2018, the Indianapolis Colts cheerleaders showed off one-piece dresses that resembled ice skater outfits, last season they wore more streamlined crop tops with high necklines.
The newly renamed New Orleans Saints Cheer Krewe (formerly Saintsations) has made a couple of outfit changes for its women's team members since 2018, first ditching their gold two-piece for a 70s-style belted long-sleeved jumpsuit, then adopting a more collegiate looking design with ruffled skirts.
Pate called the trend "a departure from the glamorous uniform".
"It's definitely more toned down," he said.
Some new uniforms were introduced as teams became co-ed and were renamed dance or entertainment teams, but in other cases the changes were made in an effort to overhaul the image of NFL cheerleading.
"This new approach is designed to elevate Colts cheerleading as one of the best cheerleading and dancing teams in the NFL by breaking away from many of the stereotypes often associated with professional cheerleading and redefining what it means to be a cheerleader and an athlete," the Colts told USA Today in 2018.
Pompoms and porn
While recent years have given rise to more conversations about the image and treatment of cheerleaders, the origins of this debate can be found in reactions to the infamous Dallas Cowboys designs of the 1970s.
"While it doesn't sound daring to us, at that point, you have a bare midriff, you have a shirt that ties to your ribcage in a way that emphasizes cleavage," Hepola described in a phone interview.
"You have shorts, go-go boots."
The blue-on-white star details also vaguely invoked the American flag, she noted, adding patriotic appeal.
The Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders have maintained a similar style of uniform for five decades, and there are now two uniforms in the Smithsonian's collection.
Credit: Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images
When the 1976 Super Bowl matchup between the Dallas Cowboys and the Pittsburgh Steelers was broadcast to more than 70 million people, the Texas cheerleading squad rose to fame.
In the years that followed, they made television appearances and sold posters and other merchandise and became the subject of a television movie starring Jane Seymour that drew 48 million viewers.
Dana Adam Shapiro, director of "Daughters of the Sexual Revolution: The Untold Story of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders," characterized the phenomenon in a 2018 ESPN interview, saying, "They were loved and hated alike."
"They were pin-ups, their poster outsold Farrah Fawcett, and they were also targeted by religious groups and feminist groups," Shapiro said.
Other teams followed, trying to achieve the same level of fame.
The uniform "was so popular that (Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders) quickly had to trademark it because so many different teams were imitating them," Hepola said.
But the politics of cheerleading uniforms was taking shape, driven by the question of how
sexy
these women should be and who gets to decide.
The New Orleans Saintsations team in 2016. Credit: Don Juan Moore/Getty Images
The Saintsations wore overalls in 2019 before becoming a mixed team in 2021 and changing their name to the Saints Cheer Krewe.
Credit: Jordon Kelly/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images
In 1978, Playboy tapped into the girl-next-door image that NFL cheerleaders had cultivated and asked women from different teams, as well as five former Dallas Cowboys team members, to pose.
The cover caused a scandal and, in an incident later chronicled by the 2018 documentary "Sidelined," an entire team, the San Diego Chargettes, was fired before the issue even made the news.
The Cowboys uniform was infamously copied for the porn movie "Debbie Does Dallas," which follows a high school cheerleading captain as she tries out for the fictional Texas Cowgirls squad.
Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Inc. (a subsidiary of the Dallas Cowboys football club) sued in 1979 and eventually won a trademark lawsuit against the New York movie theater that did, but the case backfired, Hepola said.
"It's a low-budget porn. No one is really paying attention to it," Hepola said.
"And all of a sudden, this cut-throat porn becomes one of the top five porn of all time due to historic trademark lawsuit."
Tackling the wrong problem
Now, as NFL cheerleading uniforms lean toward more athletic styles, Hepola believes there has been a cultural shift.
"You have to look at your audience. And not just the men, but also the women, who are a big part of the conversation," she said.
"I think the fantasy they want to sell these days has a lot more to do with athleticism and strength than sex appeal and beauty."
But Pate is wary of the motivations for toning down the uniforms.
"There were teams that wanted to distance themselves from the image of a sexy, beautiful cheerleader to focus more on (being) professional athletes, which I can applaud on certain levels, because we are athletes," he said.
A Minnesota Vikings cheerleader in 2013. Credit: Andrew Matthews/PA Images/Getty Images
Since then, the Vikings cheerleaders have introduced new uniforms with leggings and sports jerseys.
Credit: Hannah Foslien/Getty Images
But, pointing to the deeper equity issues that NFL cheerleaders say they have faced, including low pay, discriminatory practices and sexual harassment, Pate worries that the emphasis on uniforms gives too much weight to the wrong problem.
"The solution is to cover them up, to change what they wear, to change the way they dance," Pate said.
"I think he's wrong... (the uniforms) weren't the problems that needed to be fixed."
Last year, the documentary "A Woman's Work: The NFL's Cheerleader Problem" brought to light that, at the time of filming, 10 of the 26 NFL teams with cheerleading squads had been sued for wage theft, working conditions unsafe, sexual harassment and discrimination.
"It's really a microcosm of what all women are facing right now in the workplace, fighting against these stereotypes and these hypocritical standards that we're up against," the documentary's director, Yu Gu, told CNN.
At the time, CNN spoke to former NFL cheerleaders who said their earnings were below minimum wage;
they were not paid for training, team practices, and public appearances;
and they were expected to pay for uniforms and equipment themselves.
The Indianapolis Colts cheerleaders in 2018. Credit: Jeffrey Brown/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images
In 2019, Colts cheerleaders wore sparkly one-piece dresses for one season before introducing varsity-style two-piece uniforms.
Credit: Stacy Revere/Getty Images
Pate said he believes changes to the system are necessary, but they must come through a change in culture or attitudes, not a change in clothing.
"I think if there was a little more respect and understanding of what we do and how hard we work to wear that uniform... I think the criticism (against our outfits) would be much more fair and balanced," he said, emphasizing that the cheerleaders are worthy of respect no matter what they wear.
"Mostly it talks about society in general and the lack of respect for women's bodies and the choices we make around our bodies and how we represent ourselves."
"We have reached the highest level of our sport," he added.
"That's why it means so much to these men and women, because (we) have earned it."
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