The landscape returns the gaze
Bikescapes and the new economies
This paper looks at bikescapes – and particularly dockless share bikes – with a focus on their rapid proliferation
and subsequent partial demise in Sydney. Four principal themes emerged from this study: first, bikes are an important part of the
cityscape, and studies of urban semiotics need to take greater account of modes of transport. Second, the rise of docked and
dockless share bikes has changed the ways the city is felt and perceived: as bikes circulate within the city, these shifting
bikescapes make visible changes to the physical city environment. The ebb and flow of dockless bikes – from neat alignments to
dispersed arrangements – provide an insight into changing patterns of work, leisure, and mobility, and present entropic rather
than ordered city processes. Third, these bikes became significant discourse markers, material artefacts where discourses of
consumption, convenience, contamination, and co-operation intersect. Dockless share bikes sit at the hub of a tussle over public
and private ownership of space and information, in terms both of their physical incursion into public space and as syphons of
personal information. Finally, they suggest not only that aspects of the cityscape may play an active role in semiotic networks,
but that the semiotic landscape may be returning our gaze.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction: The landscape as a semiotic assemblage
- 2.Methodology: Radical Vélography
- 3.Reading bikes
- 4.Order and disorder
- 5.Bikes as discourse markers
- 6.Data-gathering and city bikes
- 7.Conclusion
- Notes
-
References
References
Bailey, M.
(
2017)
Obike, Reddy Go are more than bike-sharing companies.
Financial Review [URL]
Bennett, J.
(
2010)
Vibrant matter: A political ecology of things. Durham: Duke University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Block, D.
(
2018)
Political economy and sociolinguistics: Neoliberalism, inequality and social class. London: Bloomsbury.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Bordenkircher, B. and O’Neil, R.
(
2018)
Dockless Bikes: Regulation Breakdown. Chicago: Twelve Tone Consulting.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Bridle, J.
(
2018)
New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future. London: Verso.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
China Daily
(
2017)
China’s ‘four great new inventions’ in modern times [URL]
Choo, C.
(
2018)
New licensing regime for bike-sharing operators to kick in from October: MOT.
[URL]
City of Sydney
(
2018)
Guidelines for bikeshare operators.
[URL]
Crommelin, L., Troy, L., Martin, C. and Parkinson, S.
(
2018)
Technological disruption in private housing markets: the case of Airbnb,
AHURI Final Report 305, Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute Limited, Melbourne,
[URL], doi:
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
Dardot, P. and Laval, C.
(
2009)
La nouvelle raison du monde: Essai sur la société néolibérale. Paris: Éditions La Découverte.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F.
(
1980)
Mille plateaux. Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Donohue, R.
(
2017)
Breaking the cycle.
The Saturday Paper,
November 11 2017
[URL]
Eddie, R.
(
2018)
Dockless share bikes impounded from Sydney beaches.
[URL]
Farivar, C.
(
2018)
Habeas data: Privacy versus the rise of surveillance tech. New York: Melville House.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Farrelly, E.
(
2018)
Data harvesters take us for a sinister ride.
The Sydney Morning Herald, News Review,
March 10–11, p.30.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Fishman, E., Washington, S. and Haworth, N.
(
2013)
Bike Share: A Synthesis of the Literature,
Transport Reviews, 33(2): 148–165.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Fiske, J., Turner, G. and Hodge, B.
(
1987)
Myths of Oz: reading Australian popular culture. Sydney, New South Wales: Allen & Unwin.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Flubacher, M.-C. and Del Percio, A.
(Eds.) (
2018)
Language, Education and Neoliberalism: Marketization, dispossession, and subversion. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Gorrey, M.
(
2018)
Bump in the road as bike share operators Reddy Go, ofo quit Sydney.
[URL]
Gottdiener, M.
(
1983)
Urban semiotics. In
S. Pipkin,
M. La Gory, and
J. Blau (Eds)
Remaking the city: Social science perspectives on urban design (pp. 101–114). Albany: State University of New York Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Hamilton, L. and Taylor, N.
(
2017)
Ethnography after humanism: Power, politics and method in multi-species research. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Han Sun Sheng
(
2017)
Bike sharing schemes might seem like a waste of space but the economics makes sense.
[URL]
Hardt, M., and Negri, A.
(
2017)
Assembly. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Harvey, D.
(
2005)
A brief history of neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Hiramoto, M.
(
2015)
Inked nostalgia: displaying identity through tattoos as Hawaii local practice,
Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 36 (2): 107–123.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Holborow, M.
(
2015)
The Language of Neoliberalism. London: Routledge.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Hu, W.
(
2017)
More New Yorkers opting for life in the bike lane.
New York Times,
July 30th 2017
[URL]
Igo, S.
(
2018)
The Known Citizen: A History of Privacy in Modern America. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Karlander, D.
(
2018)
Backjumps: writing, watching, erasing train graffiti,
Social Semiotics, 28(1) 41–59.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Kell, C.
(
2015)
“Making people happen”: materiality and movement in meaning-making trajectories.
Social Semiotics, 25 (4): 423–445.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Kitis, E. D. and Milani, T.
Kramsch, C.
(
2014)
A researcher’s auto-socioanalysis: making space for the personal. In
B. Spolsky,
Inbar-Lourie and
M. Tannenbaum (Eds.),
Challenges for language education and policy: making space for people (pp. 235–244). New York: Routledge.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Karaçor, E. K.
(
2016)
Public vs. Private: The evaluation of different space types in terms of publicness dimension.
European Journal of Sustainable Development (2016), 5(3): 51–58.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Larmer, B.
(
2017)
China’s Revealing Spin on the ‘Sharing Economy’
[URL]
Makoni, S. and Makoni, B.
(
2010)
Multilingual discourses on wheels and public English in Africa: A case for ‘vague linguistique’. In
J. Maybin &
J. Swann (Eds.),
The Routledge Companion to English Language Studies (pp. 258–270). London: Routledge.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
May, S.
(
2019)
Negotiating the multilingual turn in SLA.
The Modern Language Journal, 1031: 122–129.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Nemeth, J.
(
2009)
Defining a public: The management of privately owned public space.
Urban Studies, 46(11): 2463–2490.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Newens, C.
(
2017)
Véliberté, egalité, fraternité: is Paris’s seminal bike share scheme out of date? [URL]
Palin, M.
(
2017)
Dockless rental bikes to burst onto the scene in Australian cities.
[URL]
Peck, A. and Stroud, C.
(
2015)
Skinscapes.
Linguistic Landscape, 1(1/2): 133–151.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A.
(
2009)
Linguistic landscapes and the transgressive semiotics of graffiti. In
Elana Shohamy and
Durk Gorter (Eds.),
Linguistic Landscape: Expanding the Scenery, edited (pp. 302–312). Abingdon: Routledge.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A.
(
2010)
Spatial narrations: Graffscapes and city souls. In
A. Jaworski and
C. Thurlow (Eds)
Semiotic Landscapes: Language, Image, Space, (pp. 137–150). London: Continuum.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A.
(
2012)
Language and mobility: Unexpected places. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A.
(
2017)
Translanguaging and semiotic assemblages.
International Journal of Multilingualism, 14(3): 269–282.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A.
(
2018)
Posthumanist Applied Linguistics. London: Routledge.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A. and Otsuji, E.
(
2015a)
Metrolingualism: Language and the city. London: Routledge.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Pennycook, A. and Otsuji, E.
Pennycook, A. and Otsuji, E.
(
2017)
Fish, phone cards and semiotic assemblages in two Bangladeshi shops in Sydney and Tokyo,
Social Semiotics, 27(4): 434–450.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Ravelli, L. and McMurtrie, R.
(
2016)
Multimodality in the built environment: Spatial discourse analysis. London: Routledge.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Schiffrin, D.
(
1988)
Discourse Markers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Scholz, T.
(
2016)
Uberworked and underpaid: How workers are disrupting the digital economy. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Schor, J. B. and Attwood-Charles, W.
(
2017)
The “sharing” economy: labor, inequality and sociability on for-profit platforms.
Sociology Compass, 2017, 11, e12493.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Schor, J. B., & Fitzmaurice, C. J.
(
2015)
Collaborating and Connecting: The emergence of the sharing economy. In
L. Reisch and
J. Thogersen, (Eds.),
Handbook of Research on Sustainable Consumption (pp. 410–425). Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shaheen, S., Guzman, S., & Zhang, H.
(
2010)
Bikesharing in Europe, the Americas, and Asia: Past, present, and future.
Transportation Research Record 21431, 159–167.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shaw, B.
(
2017)
Posthuman urbanism: Mapping bodies in contemporary city space. New York: Routledge.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shohamy, A. and Ben-Rafael, E.
(
2015)
Introduction: Linguistic landscape, a new journal.
Linguistic Landscape, 1(1/2): 1–5.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Slee, T.
(
2015)
What’s yours is mine: Against the sharing economy. New York; London: OR Books.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Small, A.
(
2018)
Ofo Beats a Retreat From the Dockless Bikesharing Battle [URL]
Standing, G.
(
2011)
The precariat: the new dangerous class. London: Bloomsbury.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Stephany, A.
(
2015)
The Business of Sharing. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Sumpter, D.
(
2018)
Outnumbered: Exploring the Algorithms that Control Our Lives. London: Bloomsbury.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Sundararajan, A.
(
2016)
The Sharing Economy: The End of Employment and the Rise of Crowd-Based Capitalism, Cambridge: MIT Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Taylor, A.
(
2018)
The Bike-Share Oversupply in China: Huge Piles of Abandoned and Broken Bicycles.
[URL]
Thurlow, C.
(
2016)
Queering critical discourse studies or/and performing ‘post-class’ ideologies.
Critical Discourse Studies, 13(5), 485–514.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Yang, Y.
(
2018)
Singapore requires ‘geofencing’ for all bike-sharing operators in the city by the end of this year.
[URL]
Zuboff, S.
(
2019)
The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The fight for a human future at the new frontier of power. London: Profile Books.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cited by
Cited by 1 other publications
Pennycook, Alastair
2023.
Toward the total semiotic fact.
Chinese Semiotic Studies 19:4
► pp. 595 ff.
![DOI logo](//benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 4 june 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.