From Pleasure Rows and Plashing Sculls to Amateur Oarswomanship: The Evolution of Women’s Amateur Rowing in Britain |
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| Authors: | Lisa Taylor |
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| Institution: | 1. Manchester Metropolitan University, Crewe Green Road, Crewe, UK;2. River &3. Rowing Museum, Mill Meadows, Henley-on-Thames, UKLisa.j.taylor@stu.mmu.ac.uk |
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| Abstract: | AbstractThis paper considers the emergence of amateur women’s rowing between the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, in light of contemporaneous social norms relating to gender and sport. It does not seek to identify a foundational point for women’s rowing, nor does it offer a comprehensive survey of the development of the sport over this period. Instead, it considers women’s rowing in three key contexts: women’s university colleges, at the end of the nineteenth century; the first women-only rowing club on the Thames, established in 1896 by Dr Frederick Furnivall; and the formation of a governing body for the women’s sport in 1923. Analysis of the conditions within the sport in these environments, and their implications, leads to more nuanced consideration of the women’s sport, and of gender as a normative social construct more widely. Discussion focuses on gendered influences on sporting behaviour, manifested in institutional regulation and hegemonic authority, and the intersection of class and gender. |
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| Keywords: | Sport history rowing women’s sport gender history women’s rowing |
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