In the Company of Cars by Sarah Redshaw

Author:Sarah Redshaw
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing Limited
Published: 2008-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

Reflections on early driving desires

A few of the men reflected on their earlier driving and how that was crucial to their sense of themselves with one recognising the potential consequences. He related his desire for the kind of car that would adequately express combustion masculinity:

I know when I was 17 I was an absolute hoon and I wanted to get myself a VK Commodore, and I had to have a manual car because, you know, I can drive a manual so why drive an automatic ... and I know I would have wrapped myself around a tree because the speedo says you can do 220 k an hour, so I want to see if it can do 200 k an hour! (Shellharbour, 24 years)

A powerful manual car would have allowed him to demonstrate his skill and mastery as a male and would also have facilitated the expression of the ‘natural’ gushing power associated with masculinity. The importance of identifying as a young male with a car like the Commodore was recognised by this young man who later became aware of the enticing danger it presented. The age of seventeen was clearly a crucial stage for him and he appreciated the fact that he was not able to indulge in the desire for a powerful car at the time.

Another 23-year-old man from the Fairfield group referred to the ‘old days’ when he was younger and more into cars:

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.