About

Cori Schumacher: world champion surfer, social justice advocate, author, and former American politician.

As a three-time world champion surfer, I used my platform to work toward greater justice, diversity, and inclusion for women, BIPOC, and LGBTQI people in surfing. In 2010, I won my third world title and became the first openly gay world surfing champion. I was featured in OUT in the Line-Up (2014), a film about the challenges of being LGBTQI in the world of surfing. In 2011, I stopped surfing competitively and focused on researching and publishing about the gender inequities in professional surfing, the lack of visibility and representation of LGBTQI and BIPOC surfers, and the manufacturing and labor practices of the surf industry in China, India, Bangladesh, and beyond.

In 2012, I co-founded the Inspire Initiative and the History of Women’s Surfing project, an online archive of women’s surfing “in our own words.” In 2013, I launched a successful international campaign challenging the hyper-sexualization of elite female professional surfers, while highlighting the extreme gender pay gap in competitive surfing. This effort informed my work with a California Assemblymember in the development of California’s “Equal Pay for Equal Play Act”, which Governor Newsom signed into law in 2019.

I was elected to the Carlsbad City Council in 2016 and served as the city’s first LGBTQI City Councilmember until 2021. While on council, I spearheaded projects including a regional municipal-owned community choice energy initiative to ensure participating cities reach 100% clean energy by 2035; Carlsbad’s first ocean lifeguard program; Carlsbad’s first ethics ordinance; a comprehensive municipal code and council policy update; and Carlsbad City Council’s standing committee governance structure. In addition, I served on regional boards and commissions developing and implementing public policy addressing transportation, inclusive and sustainable labor practices, land use, watershed restoration, and water quality.
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Recently published work:

August 2024

“Ocean Matters: Surfing as Posthuman Political Praxis” in Roll and Flow: The Cultural Politics of Skateboarding and Surfing, (San Diego, CA: San Diego State University Press), 365-389.

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CV available here.