Undressing Tradition: Reflecting on the Sexualization of Women in Sports through Competition Uniforms

A couple of weeks ago, I was mindlessly scrolling through my Instagram ‘Explore’ page when I came across a particular post that caught my eye. The post was a screenshot of a news article featuring Swedish figure skater Josefina Taljegård, who chose to wear pants during one of her performances at the 2022 Beijing Olympics; however, it was the comments underneath the post that particularly struck me. One user’s comment featured a quote from the skater that read “I chose [pants] because it fits the music, and also because I feel very strong and confident in this kind of clothes”. Josefina’s reasoning for wearing what she did got me thinking about the differences in male and female uniforms for sports and the fact that women can be sexualized in sports because of what they wear which often takes away from what they are actually doing. 

In the 2022 Women's Olympic short program, Taljegård was the only female of 30 skaters to wear pants. While women have been permitted to wear pants when skating for a few years, the ballerina aesthetic of flowy skirts, pastel colour schemes, sparkles and glitter continue to dominate alongside the classical music that is synonymous with the traditional look and feel of skating. That being said, a rule change won't necessarily change the cultural expectations of figure skating costumes as people have developed a quite stereotypical image of what female figure skaters should wear which is still largely tied to feminine binaries - skirts or dresses and tight buns in their hair. An interesting aspect that I never thought about was that “while few figure skaters wear pants in competition nearly all skaters wear them during practice sessions” (Ho, 2022). The fact that so many figure skaters wear pants in practice leads me to question why this very feminine expectation of how figure skaters should look still exists in our society and in other sports and why it has taken so long for these types of debates to start.

Once I began to think about this issue further, I found myself being reminded of past occurrences from different sports where female athletes went against typical uniforms. A similar instance occurred at the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo where concerns regarding the bikini uniform worn in women's beach volleyball were brought up and answered with a similar response to Taljegård’s. Several volleyball players felt that “a bikini is the optimal uniform for beach volleyball. It’s sensible, useful attire for being in the sun and the sand”(Myers, 2021). Canadian beach volleyball athlete Brandie Wilkerson also mentioned that “there are lots of sports — no one is asking why you wear a bathing suit if you’re in the swimming pool” ,which reinforces the idea that the most important thing about what athletes wear to compete should be what makes them comfortable. During the same Olympic games, German gymnasts went against traditional uniforms and the sexulization of female athletes by wearing full-body unitards as opposed to leotards which typically “have a high cut above the hip [and] have long been the standard outfit for girls and women in all levels of gymnastics” (Myers, 2021). There have also been more serious issues around this topic like at the 2021 European Beach Handball Championships where a Norwegian team received a large fine for not wearing the mandatory bikini bottoms during the game. The way this situation was handled resulted in large amounts of backlash from people watching and even gained the attention of American singer-songwriter Pink who ended up paying the fine for the team. These occurrences connect back to the issues Taljegård faced in terms of wearing what made her most comfortable despite that clothing possibly going against tradition.

Once I started thinking about the different sports where uniforms and sexualization come into play I started thinking about the uniform and clothing in general that I wear as a track runner. Personally, I like to compete in my singlet (which is similar to a jersey except it is a tank top instead of a t-shirt) and spandex shorts but I also thought about more professional runners who sometimes choose to wear bikini bottoms and a sports bra to compete. While I was thinking about this, it had never occurred to me how the clothes that I wore could be sexualized by other people - something I personally have never felt before. However, something that I do wonder about is if the clothing that I wear when I run contributes to the few times where I do get self conscious about my appearance while competing and the extent to which that impacts other athletes in different sports. 

Regardless of what sport athletes play or how they feel when they do it, we need to move towards normalizing uniforms that break traditions so that all athletes can feel more comfortable and accepted in the world of sports.