Roeiende vrouwen. De weg van de sierlijkheid

Samenvatting

Women's Rowing. The Road of Elegance. The history of women's rowing in the Netherlands is surveyed, focusing on the strategies women used to enter the traditionally male world of competitive sports. An outline of the history of women's participation in rowing, 1800s-1900s, shows that rowing was considered a pleasurable leisure activity until around the turn of the century, when it became a high-class male sport. When women became involved, the social definitions of masculinity and femininity required women to travel the "road of elegance," ie, through competition in a physically undemanding variety called "style rowing." After WWI, international influences enabled women to gradually focus on the physical, speed-related aspects of the sport and start their own clubs. This took place through a gradual stretching of the limits of acceptability rather than a radical challenge to the requirement of gracefulness imposed on them. 1 Table, 28 References. Adapted from the source document.