Adopting the Electric Vehicle: Racing, Culture, and the Transition to Sustainable Mobility
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Edinburgh
Department Name: College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sci
Abstract
Few technologies have profoundly shaped society as the automobile. Since its widespread adoption in the 20th century, the combustion engine car has reshaped our landscapes, leisure time, and patterns of mobility. The transition to electric vehicles (EVs) is forcing a restructuring of the ethos of the car itself, the gendered performances with which it is associated, and the future of sustainable mobility. This project aims to understand how gendered narratives around driving and the socio-technical identity of the car are changing with regard to the electric vehicle.
Artifacts can provide a focus for gendered performances, and the automobile has represented one of these artifacts for many practices of masculinity. Antithetical to masculinity and technological pursuits, femininity has been linked with nature and environmentalism, especially in early 20th century marketing of the first EVs. Thus, the EV today occupies a space at a crossroads of these conflicting narratives.
Social identities of individuals and artifacts are shaped through practices. In car culture, racing is one such practice, as the pinnacle of venerating car culture. Not only does racing provide an arena in which developers test new mechanical innovations later implemented in street cars, but also represents a strongly gendered space in which masculinities are shaped, enforced, and reproduced. With the emergence of the first environmentally conscious racing initiatives sanctioned by the largest motorsport governing body, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), the Formula E Championship and Extreme E constitute an important frame for studying the transition to electric mobility.
This project will examine the dynamic between top-down and bottom-up approaches to comprehensively understand the construction of the EV's social identity and its materiality. Through interviews with racing industry actors, daily EV drivers, and supported by a document and image analysis, the project will examine how gender identity and automotive identity are coming together around the EV. The two novel racing leagues are the center of this analysis as their efforts to reframe sustainability, gender identity, and the automobile are understood within a wider frame of critical science and technology studies. To understand the social identity of the EV, engaging with the groups impacting its development is vital. I will answer the following research questions with interviews producing first person narratives, supported by a document and image analysis to understand the dynamic interaction between the racing and public realms.
First and foremost: 1) What is the relationship between the EV and existing car culture (in both racing and street vehicles)? 2) What is the role of electric racing in creating the new socio-technical identity of the street EV? 3) What is the relationship between gender and the burgeoning electric car culture? Specifically, is a tension manifesting between the historical association of women with nature as it merges with the masculinized domain of automotive technology?
Artifacts can provide a focus for gendered performances, and the automobile has represented one of these artifacts for many practices of masculinity. Antithetical to masculinity and technological pursuits, femininity has been linked with nature and environmentalism, especially in early 20th century marketing of the first EVs. Thus, the EV today occupies a space at a crossroads of these conflicting narratives.
Social identities of individuals and artifacts are shaped through practices. In car culture, racing is one such practice, as the pinnacle of venerating car culture. Not only does racing provide an arena in which developers test new mechanical innovations later implemented in street cars, but also represents a strongly gendered space in which masculinities are shaped, enforced, and reproduced. With the emergence of the first environmentally conscious racing initiatives sanctioned by the largest motorsport governing body, the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), the Formula E Championship and Extreme E constitute an important frame for studying the transition to electric mobility.
This project will examine the dynamic between top-down and bottom-up approaches to comprehensively understand the construction of the EV's social identity and its materiality. Through interviews with racing industry actors, daily EV drivers, and supported by a document and image analysis, the project will examine how gender identity and automotive identity are coming together around the EV. The two novel racing leagues are the center of this analysis as their efforts to reframe sustainability, gender identity, and the automobile are understood within a wider frame of critical science and technology studies. To understand the social identity of the EV, engaging with the groups impacting its development is vital. I will answer the following research questions with interviews producing first person narratives, supported by a document and image analysis to understand the dynamic interaction between the racing and public realms.
First and foremost: 1) What is the relationship between the EV and existing car culture (in both racing and street vehicles)? 2) What is the role of electric racing in creating the new socio-technical identity of the street EV? 3) What is the relationship between gender and the burgeoning electric car culture? Specifically, is a tension manifesting between the historical association of women with nature as it merges with the masculinized domain of automotive technology?
Organisations
Studentship Projects
| Project Reference | Relationship | Related To | Start | End | Student Name |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ES/P000681/1 | 01/10/2017 | 30/09/2027 | |||
| 2700686 | Studentship | ES/P000681/1 | 01/10/2022 | 30/09/2025 | Eva Gray |