Resumen de Gender, Physical Education and the Biographical Turn. French Perspectives on the History of Female PE Teachers

Loïc Szerdahelyi

• This article seeks to examine the current dynamism of biographical approaches that explore the history of PE teachers in France through the prism of gender. To this end, the first section examines the historiographical filiations of the history of female PE teachers, where it intersects with the history of women and gender, gender in the history of sport, and the history of education, coeducation and female teachers. The second section focuses on the theoretical and methodological shifts brought about by gender within the wider biographical transformation of the history of PE teachers. Here I will discuss the shift from a male profession to a mixed-gender profession, from the study of groups to that of individuals, and from the use of official sources to that of oral sources. This contribution will conclude by considering possible next steps for the social history of female teachers and arguing for a history from below of women in PE.