This study is centered on women and bicycles. The historical-archival analysis of primary and secondary sources reveals the patterns of discrimination of women, their disqualification from participation in public sphere as well as professional sport.
This work displays how the newly invented bicycle was perceived as a threat to traditional gender roles and obtained a name of “social revolutionizer.” Through the analysis of textual and visual publications I examine how the bicycle was re-contextualized in Lithuania and “gendered” within the popular discourse of mass media from the time of its emergence until its appropriation for women.
The results of my research prove the assumption that the shift in discourses actually means only the alteration of form. The institutionalized mechanisms of discipline became institutionally unbound, dispersed power embodied in self-surveillance and beauty practices.