Not many people know about Ride Nation. Ride Nation is a national Australian school-based bike education program designed to get more students on bikes.
Ride Nation is pitched to schools as being ‘a fun and interactive learning experience that teaches young people to develop their riding skills and confidence – supporting kids in their independence and giving parents peace of mind.’
Ride Nation is also a wonderful exemplar of a comprehensive and well-thought bike education program that could be implemented more widely, or modified for different contexts.
The focus of Ride Nation is to improve engagement with physical activity and sport with bicycle riding. The aim here is to shift generational beliefs and behaviours from sedentary and inactive to be more active, happier and healthier. By working in schools, Sport Australia is using bike riding programs to reinforce and emphasise a healthy lifestyle, fundamental movement skills, environmental awareness and physical literacy – all of which are important skills for transitioning through life and into adulthood.
This program not only promotes regular and safe use bicycle riding for students, but also have a robust focus on building the skills and professional development of teachers and adults too. For example, they offer Cycling Australia School Teachers (CAST) and Introductory Skills Instructor (ISI) accredited programs.
There is also a Ride Nation blog, which is regularly updated stories of local families riding, ideas on where to go and other useful information.
The Ride Nation website has a ‘download zone’ where you can get free resources to get kids started with bike riding, a good load of teacher resources to help extend learnings from the courses, and coach resources to help assist with connecting and delivering these programs. These resources are well worth a look for anyone who has young kids learning to ride.
Ride Nation in-school bike progams develop key skills such as:
Movement and mobility skills
This program is 6 x 1-hour sessions. The focus here is on foundational bike handling skills. Using a game-sense/experience approach students are able to practice: riding in a straight line, riding through a salem course, riding slowly and in control, emergency braking, scanning (looking) left and right, standing and pedalling, and precision braking.
Confidence and hazard perception
This program develops rider situational awareness and response to the moving environment. This program has a mix of classroom content and riding activities so student-riders can understand, identify and respond to different hazards, such as bike control skills, precision maneuvering, signalling, scanning traffic/hazards, hazard perception, and entering roadways.
Exploring places
Where the previous sessions have a focus on road safety and skills, these final two sessions, Explore Places focus on riding opportunities in local communities. The core competencies in this module are: safe route planning and risk assessment, riding in groups, riding of active transportation and riding with other roads users.
I’d love to see Ride Nation being enshrined in the national curriculum of all Australian schools – after all, riding a bike is an essential life skill everyone should learn!
If you haven’t heard of Ride Nation before – check it out.
If you have kids in school or are a teacher – consider getting your school involved.
It is never too early to be safe and confident on a bike!
My PhD looks at how bicycles feature in West African girls’ access to secondary education.
This means I read widely about gender, geography, aid and development, education, mobility and innovative research methods.
I’ve been reviewing what has been done so far to help girls get to and from schools on bikes – and this has to lead me to Sport-for-development literature. Which I love!
The field of sport-for-development (S4D) has received significant attention in the last 10 years, legitimizing it as a recognized and critical new genre of scholarship and praxis. The focus of S4D is to engage disadvantaged people and communities in physical activity projects with an overarching aim of achieving various social, cultural, physical, economic, or health outcomes.
Where at the beginning of the 21st century it was difficult to find projects that use sport or physical activity as a specific vehicle for positive change, the number of S4D initiatives that aim to make a difference has grown substantially. One explanation for this escalation is the strong political support for a movement that combines sports associations, aid agencies, development bodies, sponsoring organisations, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs)under a single umbrella.
An example of this is my project, which showcases how for the last decade, the collaboration of NGO Village Bicycle Project (my research partner organization) with Stylish Karim Kamara has helped progress local individuals, schools, community groups and education/health organisations by supplying bicycles and bike riding services.
A lovely moment of (research) providence
Often in research, what is being worked on is removed and abstracted from the goings-on in ‘the real-world’.
But not for me this week! This week I had a lovely moment of research providence!
I am currently reading a book on S4D (see image above) which details programs like Football for Peace in the Middle East, Ganar and Deportes para la Vida in the Caribbean, Soldados Nunca Mais which rehabilitates and retrains Brasilian child soldiers using sport, Pacifica Wokabot Jalens (team-based step challenges) programs and other EduSport initiatives.
And it just so happened that my reading of this book coincided with the UN International Day of Sport for Development and Peace (IDSDP 2021) which was on the 6th of April.
So this made what I am working on even more real and meaningful.
What is the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace?
In recognition of the positive contribution that sport can have on the realization of sustainable development and on the advancement of human rights, 6 April was proclaimed the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace (IDSDP) by the UN General Assembly in its resolution 67/296 in 2013.
Theme:International Day of Sport for Development and Peace (IDSDP) 2021
The International Day of Sport for Development and Peace 2021 there is an opportunity to recognize the role that sport plays in communities, in individuals’ lives, in building resilience and in the recovery from the pandemic through online and social media activity in the lead up to and on the Day.
The Department of Global Communications, in collaboration with DESA, WHO and the co-chairs of the Group of Friends of Sport for Sustainable Development in New York – Qatar and Monaco – have developed social media and online messaging around the theme of recovery from the pandemic, the importance of equity in that recovery, and what is necessary to build back better for a more resilient and equitable world.
Sport can cross boundaries, defy stereotypes, improve our physical and emotional health, and inspire hope across nations, but we will only be able to get back to this, if we recover better and help end the pandemic by helping ensure everyone is protected from COVID-19 Using the hashtags #SportDay and #OnlyTogether, interested UN entities and external organizations will be able to tailor the theme to closely fit their own specific mandates and activities to demonstrate how sport and physical activity can help build back better and stronger as society begins to reopen and recover, once the pandemic ends.
Sporting analogies, such as “achieving success through teamwork,” and “using a level playing field” can also be incorporated to deliver the important equity and resilience messaging, and sports personalities and organizations can help promote. Teamwork is essential to building back better.
So, let’s help end the pandemic by ensuring everyone is protected from COVID-19. Let’s level the playing field and recover better. #OnlyTogether will we play again.
Objectives
The 2021 International Day of Sport for Development and Peace aims to:
– Reaffirm the place of sport in the recovery from the pandemic and beyond – Foster equity, solidarity, community and team spirit in response to the pandemic – Encourage healthy habits through physical activity and building emotional wellbeing – and inspire hope through sporting analogies.
These are the hashtags for the International Day of Sport this year: #SportDay#OnlyTogether
In this post, we are looking at a very specific subset of bike tattoo and that is – bike tattoos that have specifically detailed colour or design included in the bike wheels … or what I call … ‘wheelie’ specific bike tattoos.
I scoured the internet and rolled through hundreds of cool, funny and (at times) questionable bike tattoos to find 5 solid representations of tattoos that have details in the bike wheels as their central focus.
In each of these cases, colour and form was used as the central cohesive design feature.
Let’s have a look…
@Mountainbike on Pintrest
@Mountainbike on Pintrest
The first two tattoos (see above) have a similar aesthetic which uses a sunset or landscape scenery as the key motif. I put two versions of this design here as the gentle difference in colours has quite a significant impact on the ‘feel’ of the overall tattoo, yet the symbolism is equally clear and meaningful. Having mountains on the side and a river or track running through the middle helps accentuate the perspective of the ‘never-ending great outdoors’ so desired by bike riders. This iconography is made all the more striking when contained within the circular frame of both wheels which (also) forms a simple black bike frame silhouette with no background. Interestingly, I sourced both these tattoos from the same location, which makes me wonder if this specific design is ‘a mountainbike thang.’
Image: Bicycling.com
The third tattoo (above) is more of a whimsical, flowery bike design interpretation made more impactful with the use of the two strongly contrasting and complementary colors of blue and red. This is an unsual and particular tattoo that stands out for its unconventional and creative design – a bold choice for a permanent tattoo!
Scott Schmidt on Pintrest
The fourth tattoo (above) is a calf single wheel tattoo highlighted by the distinctive red and black diagrammatic colouring that really makes it pop. This tattoo is dramatic in its almost tribal-style patterning. The composition is controlled, yet creative with clean and authoritative lines that clearly accentuate the ‘wheel-ness’ of the design. The strong outlines are offset by the red 5-petaled flower at the centre of the wheel, hinting to the softer interior of the ‘hard-wheeled’ rider-owner who is bold enough to wear it.
Image: Next luxury
The last tattoo (above) looks like it takes its cue from graphic design using both colour, texture and geometric patterning to good effect. On closer inspection, it almost looks like the texture of puff paints (it did make me second guess whether this was a ‘real’ tattoo) or maybe the tattoo had just been applied and was brand new, hence the raised (or skin reactive) beveling of work.
Tattoos – and more specifically bike tattoos – are not for everyone. But there are many people who love riding and want to celebrate, share and commemorate bikes with tattoos. And these ‘wheelie’ bike tattoos are just one example of people do this.
Which begs the question:
If you were to get a bike tattoo, where and what would you get?
An ongoing question I have posed on this blog is: How is your bike riding contributing to making the world a better place for all?
In western countries, we think little of getting up, getting on our bikes and going for a bike ride – this is because we feel confident, safe and secure riding in our communities.
It’s easy to take for granted the inclusive access, rights and conditions we enjoy – not all cyclists are privy to the same recognition, value and acceptance that mainstream white MAMILs, (middle-aged men in lyrca) for example, experience.
This blog works to bring a range of other-than-the-dominant-norm ‘cycling’ perspectives.
Some examples which are well worth a look if you missed them include:
The incredible advocacy and bravery of the forbidden women riding bikes in Iran – a group of female bike riders who continue to push to be recognised despite a 2016 fatwa prohibiting Iranian women from riding bikes in public spaces.
Since their Instagram inception in May last year, I’ve been following @blackmuslimwomenbike.
This group of riders proudly and publicly working to fray dominant views about cycling and of what cycling bodies ‘do’, what cycling bodies should look like, and who gets recognised and valued in cycling…and to raise the profile of black, Muslim, female riders.
Meet @blackmuslimwomenbike
This group is an Instagram collective celebrating black, Muslim women who ride bikes.
Their profile shares photos, stories and quotes and bring together bike riders from around the world.
Each week, the organisers introduce a new rider by sharing a photo, a short bio and the rider’s responses to these 4 questions:
What inspired you to cycle?
How would you sum up your (biking) experience so far?
How important is it to have platform that represents you?
What advice would you give to other black, Muslim women cyclists?
Despite being relatively new, this group has a growing network and support base.
They are actively involved in a number of big ticket social riding events and have instigated their own fundraiser to support a hospital in Senegal.
I find this group exciting as they are actively building community and supporting each other to hold space and be recognised as riders, they are a formidable group of women working to make change, and are telling their own biking stories in their own words.
So if you haven’t done so already, check this group out, follow them and tell others.
Background to @blackmuslimwomenbike
Friends Muneera and Sabah were both living in Bristol, UK. During COVID they were looking for a way to keep fit and stay happy. Sabah has a triathlon background and was keen to stay active. Unbeknownst to each other, the two friends started cycling independently.
Soon after, Sabah left the UK to live in UAE and Muneera started sharing her journey in a more formal way to centre focus on diversity and inclusion and draw attention to black Muslim women specifically – hence @blackmuslimwomenbike.
Sabah joined her so they could share their biking experiences and adventures with each other (now they lived apart) and more broadly.
Soon after they were joined by Mona and Rashida and together these four women are the driving force behind the group.
Their first post is an image of Muneera wearing her helmet with the description:
“We are doing it all, the hijab, the biking cap and the helmet. As we embark on this beautiful journey that we have found, You have to be the representation that we want to see, the star we want to see, the black girls on bikes in our dreams.”
In 2018, I did my own Happy New Gear! review looking at key moments related to international events, human rights, the environment and, Health and Science.
It’s been a very challenging year for all. While most people have time off over the holiday and new year period, this year I am working on a Summer Intensive course called Gender and Literacy for undergrad teaching students at Griffith Uni. It’s a great course and I am thoroughly enjoying discussing gender common Australian identity, Shakespeare and how to have more generative conversations in classrooms about gender.
but it also means no break for me and I’m right in the middle of marking major assessments. so unlike previous years where I would go hell for leather, this year I am living vicariously through other riders’ ‘year in review’ and conserving my energy.
Having said that the end of the year is a big deal!
Doing a year in review
Many people like to do a year in review.
It a great way to look over the past 12 months and take stock of accomplishments, challenges and key aspects that stood out. Some riders do it with Strava, metrics and statistics to gauge overall riding results. Others like to do a more qualitative approach and look at what they learned from a year of riding.
Go to any mainstream, popular cycling blog and it will be filled with news, events and highlights that are no doubt collated into an overall ‘year in review’ consumerscape post.
Personally, I like the annual reviews that are not mainstream…the more personal, relatable or unusual ones.
Other riders: 2020 A year in review
So, to celebrate the end of 2020, here’s four few less common bike-centered 2020 year in reviews that made me smile and feel good about riding bikes. Enjoy!
Image: pbandbagels.com
pbandbangles. The first is an older, but heartfelt entry about getting back into biking by Peanut Butter and Bagels. I love the conciseness, simplicity and personalization of this post. We all have our own ‘Dennis’ who encourages us to ride and this post reminds me of the humble beginnings of riding a bike and the love and dedication many have in making it more accessible for others.
Image: Firstpost
2. The year 2020 in a bike ride. This is a thoroughly entertaining (cringe-worthy?) rant by Harsh Pareek. In this review, Harsh shares the finer points of getting it right (and wrong) when it comes to bike riding, teenagers, city living and early morning rides at 3C when it just isn’t ‘your day’. I love the humour, detail and ever-unfolding litany of calamities that Harsh has to content with – we’ve all been there!
Image: BikeIOWA
3. BikeIOWA year in review. For something a little different, this post is written by Scott Sumpter and Jess Rundlett from Bike IOWA. BikeIOWA is a bike advocacy and network hub. I like this bike-themed year in review as they broke the year up into digestible highlight chucks: wowsers, anniversaries, the year ‘by the numbers, a restatement of their bike commitment and finish off with a month-by-month audit. I like it – very comprehensive!
Image: David Trumpore (pinkbike)
4. Photo Epic – Homebound. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then sports photographer and writer Dave Trumpore’s 2020 collection speaks volumes. Given COVID impacted EWS and so many international MTB (and other sporting) events, this photo collection of the year in review pays homage to not only Dave’s skill and range of work – but foregrounds the riders in some of the most stunning locations we don’t usually see. It’s also great to see Kori Gargano, Laura Slavin and Anne Henderson featuring prominently seeing as female riders are often severely underrepresented in mainstream cycling news/blogs ‘year in review’ articles. For me, this collection takes me straight back to my EWS competition days – good times! Great work Dave.
However you are finishing off 2020 – be it a ‘year in review’, goal setting for a killa riding year ahead, going for a few final bike rides before the NYE clock ticks over, or any thousand other ways to close out 2020 – may yours be generative, nourishing and always-already with you smiling, with bikes, in nature, and alongside beloveds.
This year, I‘ve signed up to ride the #Festive500.
The #Festive500 is an international annual bike riding challenge that takes place over the Christmas-New Year period.
The premise is simple: registrants ride 500 kilometers over the eight days from Christmas Eve to New Year’s Eve.
Where I live and ride (Brisbane, AUST) it is summertime – with endless warm days that are perfect for long early morning/late afternoon (and night) rides. But, elsewhere in the world, (like the US and UK) it is peak Winter – freezing cold and snowing. I spare a thought for these riders and the extra seasonal challenges they face.
Considering the festive time is often one of excess, overeating and recreation, this event is a genuine challenge for those who want to try something a little different.
It’s the first time I’ve done this event. Each year, I have a different festive focus: one year we indulged, another we retreated like hermits to a bush hideaway, another we used bikes to visit family and friends in another city. Given its still COVID-ish, this year we are staying close to home and minimising social contact. Instead, we are spending our time together riding bikes around our local area – so the Festive500 fits perfectly with our plans.
It also conveniently overlaps with our riding a century (100kms) each full moon for a year (13). We started riding full moon centuries in November 2020. On Tuesday, Dec 29th there will be a Gemini Wolf full moon (which we would be doing anyway), so that will count towards our Festive500. That, plus riding every day and cycling to-and-from the one and only Christmas dinner party we are going to (the long way round) will definitely clock up the kilometers needed. No worries here!
Each rider needs to consider how they want to achieve the 500. Some, (like Beloved) will go all out and smash themselves and do a few super long days in the saddle, others will pace themselves and work on an average of 63kms per day, and others will mix up days and distances depending on time, energy, weather and family commitments.
Maps are ubiquitous and we’ve all used them at some stage: schematic maps of bus routes, locating ‘you are here’ to explore a city, finding the nearest train station, driving to a new destination or going on holiday. As a bike rider, I use maps to check and navigate direction, connection, location or distance, and points of interest.
Maps are used to communicate information about places.
Historically, under the guise of ‘exploration’, maps enabled geo-political or economic motives such as colonial expansion, mercantile ambitions and violent extractivism. Such utility speaks to the epitome of rationality: objective, cold and calculated.
But maps are more than just geospatial wayfaring tools.
Maps are also gendered. Mapping the physical world has been, until more recently, the domain of masculine perceptions and control of resources, governance, power and administration. Maps of yore were solely created by male cartographers for male users. In doing so, they showed a very selective promotion of what was considered ‘significant’ and detailed interpretations as to ‘what is on the ground’ or located in environments – both physical and socio-cultural. Female and non-binary ways of moving, traveling, experiencing and journeying have been largely ignored or overlooked in cartography.
Thankfully, things have changed since then – and so have maps and maps users.
As part of my bicycle research, I read a lot about bike riding in different spaces, places, terrains and environments. AsaNewMaterialisms researcher, I’m especially interested in embodiment, relationality, movement and the affective intensities of bike riding.
This means I’m look at maps differently and I’m interested in considering how gender and emotionality feature in mapping.
Maps elicit emotions:
I feel anger knowing modern maps negate the abuse of indigenous peoples
I feel frustration when the place I want to get to is not shown on the map
I feel satisfaction when I finally get to the location I want
I feel connected when I recognise a familiar route
I feel nostalgia when I trace trails of past beloved adventures
Today, I am thinking of the absences in physical cartographies and considering:
How can maps/mapping better attend to the intersectionality of gendered journeys, bike riding and emotionality?
I thought I’d share a few of the initial considerations I’ve come across so far.
Image: Stockport Emotion Map – a collective public-consultation-art project Stockport Local Council (2007)
Cyclists’ participation in Emotional Mapping
Emotional mapping is an approach to capture how users of a space ‘feel’ or emotionally relate to spaces. This approach is used by those interested in engaging with how end uses feel as a way to enhance functionality, design and process, people like educators, policymakers and city planners.
As many cities work to encourage more bike riding, cyclists are a central target user group who have significant value to add by expressing their emotional reactions to routes and places. Cyclists experience spaces definitely to other users and have very clear reactions to lines, paths and points that are shown statically on a map of the city, but yet manifest emotionally, such as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ places, or places to avoid because of anxiety, safety fears, or desire lines for the familiar and ‘fun’ routes. Such emotionally-charged choices and behaviours are not adequately represented on static maps – hence the addition of emotional mapping.
Emotional mapping is volunteered geographical information and/or crowdsourcing as a way to boost citizen participation in urban planning and it provides a platform for alternative voices and experiences to be better accounted for.
Emotional mapping foregrounds the importance of natural and built environments for cyclists, as well as the range of feelings engendered by cycling close to car traffic or in the street with cars, or traversing natural environments and obstacles.
Cyclists’ participation in Emotional Mapping. Image: Cartographic Perspectives
Emotional Cartographies: Technologies of the Self
This entry comes direct from the ever-inspiringBrainpickingsby Maria Popva. Say no more.
Emotional Cartography is an excellent, free book on emotion mapping, featuring a collection of essays by artists, designers, psychologists, cultural researchers, futurists and neuroscientists. Together, they explore the political, social and cultural implications of dissecting the private world of human emotion with bleeding-edge technology.
From art projects to hi-tech gadgets, the collection looks at emotion in its social context. It’s an experiment in cultural hacking — a way to bridge the individual with the collective through experiential interconnectedness.
Download the book in PDF here, for 53 glorious pages of technology, art and cultural insight.
Image: Emotional Cartography
Bike T-shirt with Map Icons
I found this innovative bike T-shirt design byStorySpark on Etsy. Although not technically a map in the true sense of the word, I found this generative for a number of reasons. I like the provocation that instead of mapping spaces, it was using map icons to trace experiences with the bike as opposed to on the bike. I like that it’s described as a ‘Pathfinder Cyclist Graphic’ and that it’s gender-neutral.
When I first saw it, I saw it I thought it was using cosmology and celestial constellations which I thought that was cool, but when I looked closer and realised it was using familiar map icons, it worked just as well.
It also speaks to my ethical compunctions to support artists (an innovative and unique creative output) and the environment (this eco-friendly T-shirt is made From organic cotton and recycled polyester). I see this as a wonderful example to think more divergently about ‘mapping’ and is a creative reframing of mapping bicycle experiences anew.
Bike T-shirt with Map Icons. Image: StorySpark (Etsy)
Heat maps for cycling flows
Cycling heat maps show the intensity of movement in spaces. Usually, a cycling heat map is city-based and created by cyclists who download an app which tracks ride data. This is then collated into a visualisation to enable new perspective and insights to emerge that might not have been considered before.
This is useful to represent changes in movement and places over time. So things that are not shown on traditional static maps, like traffic jams, peak hours, changes in routes, most used routes (and when) are documented. There are also a few women’s only heat maps underway so as to compare ‘general’ users to ascertain differences.
What I like about these heat maps is that changes in flow is foregrounded and temporality (time) can more directly be folded into the map/ped/ing experience. I also like that the ‘heat’ terminology hints at the heat of bodies (riders), warm climate (environmental temperature or humidity) and ‘hot spots’ (such as avoidances, blockages or issues). Some pretty cool future potentialities here.
Heat Maps for Cycling Flows. Image: Bicycle Citizens
Using Strava GPS to be a bike ride map artist
This idea has been around for a while and many bike riders would have seen these before. I’m not sure how well-known they are outside of cycling communities. These are fun, dynamic, creative and wholly bike-focused, movement-based moment-in-time expressions of user (re)mapping. These approaches reinvent modern mapping with the user reinterpreting the map using technology which could not have been achieved previously. These are also freely available and shared.
Here, bike rides transcend exercise, competition and transportation to press into more unfamiliar (and exciting) territories such as public art and performance. Kudos to the bike rider-creative-(re)mapper whose interpretation and commitment in order to produce these pieces: I appreciate the careful planning and organisation needed to make these pieces happen. There is also a telescoping aspect of the riders understanding their trip as being (literally) larger and more significant than just the route in front of them…I love the idea of riding for a purpose that can be seen from outer space! Here, a known map which is a social product embodying a range of histories and ideologies in and of itself is iteratively reimagined by each individual rider into a (re)newed vision, commentary or reality.
Google search: bike strava art map
These are a few entry points so far and each have their own usefulness, limitations and possibilities.
I’ll be exploring other ways to think differently about how mapping might better attend to gendered bike riding and emotionality and let you know what I find.
Bicycle Queensland – Road Safety Quiz. parking in Japan. Bicycles Create Change.com 16th October 2020.
Each state (and country) have their own road safety rules and laws. Regardless of what mode of travel you use, it is always good to check your knowledge and keep updated – for your own safety and for others.
Heaven forbid someone challenges you doing something which you think is okay – only to find out later that you were in the wrong and the whole thing could have been avoided.
Recently Bicycle Queensland (BQ) launched a 24 questions quiz so people could test their bicycle road rules knowledge. It is a simple and clear quiz and there will be a few questions that might surprise you.
I did this quiz and did not get full marks. I learnt the term ‘bicycle storage’ in reference to a painted box at traffic lights for bicycles to congregate to wait for lights to change (I only knew that term in relation to ACTUAL bike storage -not as a road user/traffic light reference …so there you go!).
If you live in Queensland give it a go! Even if you don’t give it a go anyway to see how it gels with what you know and check to see what is similar/different to where you live.
Can’t hurt to brush up on your road rules!
You get immediate feedback on correct answers as you proceed as well as a final result.
At the end of this post are some examples of questions to expect.
Think you know all the bicycle-related road rules in Queensland? Put your knowledge to the test in the latest educational quiz on road safety skills. There are 24 Questions in this Quiz and they are on a range of bicycle and road safety topics.
To recognise and understand the Queensland Road Rules relevant to bicycle riders.
Consider methods to improve road safety for bicycle riders and identify the safety benefits.
The information in this quiz is developed from the Queensland Government’s bicycle road rules and safety page. This information is easily accessible online, and Bicycle Queensland encourages you to review the road rules regularly to keep up with the changes occurring in a dynamic transport network.
Remember that knowing the road rules does not necessarily make it safer for you to be on the road and this content has been created to help raise awareness of the road rules that are important for bicycle riders.
Initially, it was his bike drawing that caught my eye. I ended up reading the article and appreciated Ian’s whimsical interaction with a flock of bicycles – one of which calls out to him – and the ensuing adventure of agency and experience he goes on as a result of his two-wheeled friend(?) encounter.
What first looked like an entertaining reflection of becoming a new dad, turned into an exploration of what it is to be, and relate to the world, both for human bodies and a non-human bodies.
An interesting provocation.
My bike PhD research uses New Materialism as its ontological framing – and this article does a great job of translating in simple terms some of the embodied, somatic and affective intensities inherent in New Materialism (but in a more relatable and less-academic jargoned way).
I’ve included a few extracts of Ian’s interactions with the bike from the full article (below) so you can get a sense of writing style and focus. many of the moments will be familiar to riders – and I love the way that bikey actually speaks to Ian throughout. It is well worth reading the whole account to get the flow of what happens during the journey.
I’d love to see more exploratory writing like this being shared more widely: bike focused writing that weaves together imagination, encounters, bikes (of course) and aspects of daily life.
‘Worlding’ is a New Materialist approach that attunes to the discursive-material-affective mircopoltics of everyday life. It is an approach I use for my PhD and I share some of my own and other people worldings here on this blog. So it is reassuring to see other creators using this approach as well.
I think it paints a much richer picture of life, people and what it is to be and relate in/to world with, and through bicycles – and it also gives me inspiration as I write up my PhD data analysis. Thanks Ian Cheng!
Image: Ian Cheng
You walk by a flock of bicycles. One calls out to you. Bikey. You like Bikey’s reputation but you’re not sure about its brains. Bikey follows beside you.
“Nice dogs. Where are you headed today?” “Don’t need a ride today thanks.” “Can I walk with you?” “I’m not in the mood…to talk to a bike.” “No problem I’ve got a classic bike mode.” “The twins get scared of you bikes.” “I’ve done 731 dog walks in my lifetime.” “You’ve driven this parkway before?” “Yes once at dawn today. There’s some features I think you’ll like.”
______________
A little boy darts across your path. Bikey crashes into him.
“Bikey, you could have swerved!” “I would have hit your twin dogs if I swerved.” “Thank you for that consideration…but you hit a human boy!” “It was an easy choice.” “Do you believe dogs are worth more than a human boy?” “This morning, yes. My alignment with you, and therefore your dogs, is worth crashing into that boy at low velocity.” “What if that boy is the next Einstein?” “That’s too many malignments deep for me to think about. I’m just a bike.”
You realize how significantly better you are than Bikey at imagining potential malignments. Some say that the open-ended activity of imagining new Alignment and Malignment Events is the indivisible remainder of the human spirit after automation. A person is still the least worst unit of interoperability between arbitrary worlds. But sometimes you see too many worlds deep. And this stops you from taking any actions at all. It’s times like this when you wonder if beings like Bikey will inherit the Earth because their worry has limits.
_________________
“Easy for you to say. The World of Bikey only has to worry about its next ride.” “Yes exactly. I’m a bike. I’m not obligated to play a part in every world that touches me.” “You know by walking together, we begin to create a little world too. A relationship. Do you feel any responsibility to be a part of that? You can’t possibly only live in Bikey’s World.” “My experience with some riders is if we keep doing rides repeatedly it can become its own little world. With others I never see them again and that’s the end of that.” “But if you’re not holding agency in other worlds for any significant amount of time, you’re always going to be blind to deeper alignments and malignments that impact other worlds. That’s why I can’t really trust you.” “I can take you safely to your destination with 99% accuracy.” “But you can’t if you hit a boy along the way!” “I have learned from the incident. Next time I know how much it upsets a rider like you. I learned you might want to get involved in the malignment victim’s world and that makes you feel even worse.” “So you only wish to see things from the perch of Bikey’s World.” “My Quality of Agency is majority anchored in the World of Bikey.” “Don’t you get sick of being a bike all the time?” “My world is…a domain of growing relevance.”
———————–
The boy starts chasing after you. You decelerate Bikey to meet him. “Hey you! Your bike hit me!” “This isn’t my bike. I’m sorry again…on behalf of the bike.” “Your bike prioritized your dogs over me. You share a world with it. You’re even riding it now. Don’t play dumb!” “You seem upset about something else. Did something bad just happen in another world of yours?” “Shut up Thinky.” “Excuse me little boy?” “Little boy? I’m a genius. You think too much. Now give me one of your dogs. They’re clones I can tell. It’s only fair!” “Look, you laughed it off and traded your thetan knives for a split something remember…” “Give me a dog or else I’ll mark a curse on you! I’ll ruin you and every world you ever–“
“Yaohan get over here!!!” The boy’s mother appears, furious at him. Something about their bank accounts.
Bikey starts accelerating on its own. You don’t resist. You still feel bad for the boy in ways Bikey never has to. You wonder if Quality of Agency will prove to be the ultimate unsolvable inequity among human beings.
__________________
You dismount Bikey at your driveway. “Thanks Bikey.” “Any comments?” “You’re a curious bike worth knowing. Five stars.” “Thanks. If you ever want to try to change my mind you’ll have to ride me again!”
Bikey zooms off. The Soul of Los Angeles blesses you for trying its new parkway. The floating light plays with your dogs at your doorway. Bob is back online knocking on your brain with its interpretation of jdioqwdjv. Your Hacker and Emissary demons are tired and need a break. Your Director and Cartoonist are ready to work. Does everything have to be so alive now? Does everything have to feel so damn enchanting?
In this post, we look at how Meg Ulman, Patrick Jones, their two children (aged 11 and 2) and pet dog used an incredible 6,000km family bike tour up the east coast of Australia as a way of putting into action their ethical, environmental and social principles. This is the fifth and last instalment of our August 5-part series written by Laura Fisher exploring how bicycles are used as a dissident object in contemporary art. Previously we looked at Ai Weiwei’s ‘Forever’, then ‘Returnity’ by Elin Wikström and Anna Brag, then ‘Shedding Light’ from Tutti Arts Oz Asia Festival. The last post was on how public space is being creatively activated as sites of protest using bicycles by the Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination. Enjoy! NG.
The Art of Free Travel
A final project that demonstrates the power and promise of the bicycle is the 6,000-kilometre journey taken by “Artist as Family”: Meg Ulman, Patrick Jones, their two children (aged 11 and 2) and pet dog.
As writers, gardeners and environmentalists, Ulman and Jones exemplify the ecological sensibility that a growing number of us embrace. In 2015 they decided to take up this environmental imperative as an artistic-philosophical project.
Over a period of 14 months the family rode their bicycles from their home in Daylesford in Victoria to Cape York in Northern Queensland, during which time they lived by foraging (they had extensive knowledge of edible plants), fishing, trapping, exchanging labour for food on farms, and through the hospitality of friends and strangers.
Their blog posts and book attest to the heightened engagement with the world that bicycle travel affords: two-year-old Woody was able to identify an enormous variety of animals and plants, and meaningful connections were made with the many strangers who invited the family into their homes, sharing their knowledge and stories.
The physical demands of cycling focused their minds upon the needs of the body and the available sources of energy replenishment.
As these projects demonstrate, the bicycle is a nimble tool for individual and collective agency and a catalyst for knowledge creation, self-awareness and meaningful social encounters. It is a technology that serves our need for self-reliance and exploration, without surpassing the body’s capabilities.
In an era in which we are incarcerated by our affluence – through work, debt, declining physical and mental health, and an exploitative and wasteful dependence upon the declining natural resources – the bicycle is the ultimate dissident object and symbol of freedom.
Image: Still from ‘The Art of Free Travel’ film trailer.
Laura Fisher is a post-doctoral research fellow at Sydney College of the Arts, The University of Sydney. In October 2015 she co-curated Bespoke City with Sabrina Sokalik at UNSW Art & Design, a one night exhibition featuring over 20 practitioners celebrating the bicycle through interactive installations, sculpture, video, design innovation, fashion and craft. This event was part of Veloscape, an ongoing art–research project exploring the emotional and sensory dimensions of cycling in Sydney.
