From Lawn Tennis to Eugenics: A History of Women and Sneakers
Since the invention of sneakers in the middle of the nineteenth century, women have been significant in both their production and consumption. 1 Despite this long history, women's relationship with sneakers has been complicated by larger issues ranging from dissonance between female athleticism and ideals of female desirability to issues of exclusion related to the overt hyper-masculinity embedded in modern sneaker culture. This article will focus on the sociological forces at play in the relationship between women and sneakers, predominantly in the United States and Britain, from the popularization of lawn tennis in the 1870s through to the start of the Second World War, a period in which exercise, morality and ideal femininity became redefined through the lens of ‘fitness’, by which was often meant preparedness for motherhood or attractiveness to men.