‘You don’t have to surf in a bikini to be a surfer’: silver female surfers’ resistance to sexist and ageist media constructions

Mediatised representations of beauty in contemporary Western societies are premised on the concepts of youth and fitness, especially in cultural industries promoting action sports, including surfing. Female surfers feel pressure from unrealistic beauty standards mediated through the sexualised image of a ‘Surfer Girl’, as White, bikini-clad, thin and young. To investigate the perceptions of female surfers’ media representations, we analyse 30 audio-recorded interviews with female surfers aged from 51 to 71 years. The participants lament unreasonable demands placed on female surfers to look young and beautiful, amplified by surfing industries and sponsors, that coerce them into wearing revealing swimwear like bikinis. They also note that older women surfers are erased from any media coverage, which renders them ‘invisible’ and non-relevant. However, echoing the ideas of ecofeminism, silver female surfers refuse to accept demeaning stereotypes imposed through industry exploitation, masculine domination, as well as colonial oppression, symbolised by a bikini swimsuit. By rejecting media constructions of women as sexual objects and demanding equal representations based on dignity and respect, older female surfers redefine the meaning of surfing and demonstrate the desire to dismantle the ideology of hyper-masculinity in surfing cultures.