Médecine de la Belle Époque à nos jours dans le Lyonnais

working classes, they soon escaped from the control of headmasters and philanthropists. But did this mean that sport had ceased to be a means of "social control", and had developed as an autonomous working-class phenomenon? The interesting point which is raised by McCrone is how women fitted into this characteristic late nineteenth-century development: was sport for women a step towards feminism and a woman's right to control her own body, or a reinforcement of traditional gender roles? Sport was part of the ethic of the male public schools and universities; what should its role be in the new schools for girls and the women's colleges at Oxbridge? Women's sport at the universities was seen by the men as frivolous and unnatural, and the heads of women's colleges and schools wished to keep it within strict limits, as an adjunct to academic success. The playing of games had to remain "feminine", unlike studies in the lecture hall and class room. The new colleges which produced physical training mistresses were based upon exercise regimes which stressed racial progress, deportment, and regimentation rather than individuality. Sport could, in fact, be used to maintain traditional gender relations. The medical profession came to see the virtue of mild exercise and to move away from the mid-Victorian preception ofthe woman as an invalid. But this was largely in terms of the woman as a potential mother: exercise in moderation was admirable; too active a pursuit of sport would endanger her reproductive system and make her masculine and repugnant. Individual sports were most likely to be accepted, for they accorded with traditional views of womanhood. Team sports were more problematical, for they were intended to create character traits associated with men. Girls might be permitted to play lacrosse or hockey or even cricket at school; persistence in such activities later in life was seen as a threat to the separation of the male and female spheres, and the governing bodies of these sports refused to take any part in the organization of women's activities. Yet sport was not simply another means of enforcing gender divisions: it could also provide a challenge. Women did take part in non-traditional roles, did transgress the image ofthe dependent female, and did alter the image ofthe ideal woman. "The legitimate use ofthe female body through sport was", concludes Kathleen McCrone, "crucial to women's struggle to control their own destiny". Although there had …