ABSTRACT
The topic of companionship has been explored both by social scientists as well as historians and cultural and literary scholars. Functioning as a reflection of the mobilising processes that characterise and deeply influence modern societies both spatially as well as socially, ever since its beginnings in the 1990s the mobility turn in the social sciences has created a strong academic interest in the various ways in which individuals interact with each other while en route. The mobility of women seems to have been very strictly regulated since time immemorial. They were supposed to lead domestic lives, limited to the private sphere, as “angels of the hearth”. This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book presents a case study from the interwar period by Babs Boter. She examines the ways in which the Dutch “business girl” Mary Pos presented her travelling self in various texts.
