“Tears, tension, and skill” : elite women climbers in Canadian and UK mainstream media (2020–2025)

This thesis examines how English-language mainstream news media in Canada and the United Kingdom construct the media image of elite women climbers between 2020 and 2025, spanning sport climbing’s Olympic debut at Tokyo 2020 (held in 2021) and the Paris 2024 Games. Drawing on media construction and media dependency theory, framing theory, and critical scholarship on gender and sport media, the study investigates how mainstream news selects and emphasizes attributes of elite women climbers, and how these selections construct a mediated image rather than reflecting an objective reality. A total of 37 articles covering 12 athletes from nine countries were analyzed. The coding scheme integrates narrative dimensions (thematic frames and evaluative stance) and expression-level dimensions (external portrayal, internal qualities, naming practices, and social roles). Findings indicate that mainstream outlets in Canada and the UK generally adopt a favourable tone, emphasizing athletic performance, determination, and athletes’ public and advocacy roles. However, ambivalence in representation persists. Rather than operating primarily at the narrative level, it increasingly appears at the level of expression, including subtle or implicit gender-marked and infantilizing labels embedded within otherwise performance-oriented coverage. In addition, nationalism and results-oriented framing tend to construct non-medalists as “failed” representatives, while privileging champion-centered coverage that marginalizes other athletes. The findings also suggest a postfeminist sensibility in which empowerment and individual achievement are foregrounded with limited attention on structural inequalities. At the same time, race emerges intermittently through comparative framing, where non-Western athletes are positioned relationally in ways that can background their achievements and reinforce uneven hierarchies of recognition.