Re-assembling automobility: bicycle helmets and the risks of cycling in the US, 1970-1995

摘要

Traffic safety conceptions are often analysed as subordinated to automobility, but how this occurs remains vague. I examine the emergence and spread of accounts of the risks of cycling in the US and their domination by head injuries and bicycle helmets, a framing often attributed to automobility. I trace the sociotechnical network producing these accounts using academic and governmental publications, the mass media, and interviews. I demonstrate that the emergence and spread of traffic safety conceptions are non-linear and contingent, highlight the constitutive role of non-humans in these processes, and argue against the use of automobility to explain such developments.