ABSTRACT
This chapter shows why gendering mobility provides new theoretical advances in the construction of spatial concepts and spatial representations by using two studies of student mobility in Europe and on workplace mobility in the Paris metropolitan area. It identifies the reasons behind the difficult relationship between geography and mobility. The chapter focuses on the opportunities and conceptual advances that are generated by the interaction of gender, mobility and geography. It highlights the importance of the gender dimension in the construction of a critical understanding of our spatial concepts, and interpretation of the spatial behaviour of populations. The rapid evolution of mobility behaviours leads the chapter to reassess dominant representations and concepts regarding the relationships between populations and territory. Mobility and networking indeed contribute to deconstruct a perception of territories, and particularly of European urban spaces, structured by distance according to a regular and predictable relationship that reflects a decrease of densities along a gradient from the centre towards the peripheries.
