COEXISTENCE OF LIBERATION AND SUPPRESSION: THE DEVELOPMENT AND CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN'S SPORTS IN VICTORIAN BRITAIN

Abstract

The study explores the development of women's sports during the Victorian era using literature review and historical analysis methods. The research concludes that the mid-19th century wave of women's liberation prompted women to venture into the field of sports, achieving significant accomplishments in school sports, recreational sports, and competitive sports. Additionally, it reveals the controversial and groundbreaking, familial and social, and moderate and conservative characteristics of women's sports development. The study finds that, while female sports reformers pursued freedom and independence, they still showed compromise and conformity to the patriarchal societal will, reflecting a contradictory state where freedom and restraint, liberation and suppression coexist. Women did not attain true liberation in the realm of sports or in society as a whole. However, the women's sports revolution laid the foundation for the subsequent women's liberation movement, which in turn propelled the former into broader areas.