Social representations of violence against women for a group of rural elderly.

OBJECTIVE: Understand the social representations of violence against rural women, from the perspective of the elderly, considering how the generation and gender influence this aggravation.

METHODS: Qualitative study, based on the Theory of Social Representations.It was carried out with 12 elderly rural women from a city of Rio Grande do Sul, in July and August of 2013. The data obtained through a projective technique and semi-structured interviews has been analyzed through the reference of the Social Representations and content analysis.

RESULTS: On one hand, the elderly represent violence as distant distress, anchored in extreme acts of aggression. On the other hand, they represent it as present in their relationships, showing themselves vulnerable to the domination of men in the context of life and work.

CONCLUSIONS: It was revealed the invisibility of violence against elderly women in the rural context, where the male figure overlaps with the female.