Books in the Women, Gender and Sexuality in German Literature and Culture series

The figure of the «Muslim» woman or girl performs a crucial role in far-reaching socio-political debates in Germany. Indeed, such figures challenge the boundaries of gender equality and secularism and contest notions of tolerance and integration. The (in)visibility of Muslim women¿s bodies and their apparent position in Islam function as ostensible indicators of their oppression and of Islam¿s supposed incompatibility with western values.This book investigates representations of «Muslim» women and girls in German popular culture from 1990 to 2015. The study analyses the discursive function of such figures in German popular culture via three key research questions: what representational practices surround the figure of the Muslim woman or girl in German life writing, young adult literature and film? How do such representations function to produce «non-Muslim» subject positions? What is the function of this figure within narratives of feminism and assertions of gender equality? This study understands itself as an intervention into contemporary racist discourses in Germany and operates within a transdisciplinary framework of intersectional feminism and cultural and German studies. Ultimately, the book aims to make visible and interrogatethe underlying hierarchies and agendas that drive representations of Muslim women and girls.This book was the winner of the of the 2017 Early Career Researcher Prize in German Studies, a collaboration between the Institute for German Studies at the University of Birmingham and Peter Lang.

Clementine Kramer, who is relatively unknown today, was a prolific German Jewish writer and leader of the women's movement who experienced at first hand the First World War and the rise to power of the National Socialists. This book makes an important contribution to the scholarship by revealing a fresh perspective on this tumultuous time.

The popular romance novels of nineteenth-century German writer E. Marlitt are examined against the backdrop of the social and political developments in the German Empire. Marlitt is shown to use the conventions of the romance genre to advance educational and professional opportunities for middle-class women of the time.

With an eye to the way these roles are influenced by and connected to domestic space, the author examines the desire for intimacy and connection that motivates Franck's characters. She argues that Franck creates these identities as mutable and changeable, in effect opening up women's roles for resignification in an age of renewed feminist inquiry.

Enlightened Reactions

The domestic sphere, the ideological as well as physical context of female life during the nineteenth century, featured prominently in German women's writing of the period. Women writers, such as Fanny Lewald, Ida von Hahn-Hahn and E. Marlitt, who had begun to dominate Germany's book market, addressed domestic life and female gender roles through a variety of genres. At the same time, activists such as Helene Lange and Henriette Schrader-Breymann let their vision of female gender roles shape the kindergartens and girls' secondary schools they founded. This book discusses issues of female gender role formation and examines the ways in which women's writing and activism contributed to the process. As a result, a rich tapestry of female social discourse is uncovered, exhibiting women's strong commitment to shaping their destinies within a largely misogynistic political and legal national framework.

Discovering Women's History brings to light the work of a selection of German-speaking women journalists from the first half of the twentieth century who made significant contributions to German life and culture, yet are barely known today. The volume raises awareness regarding the range of viewpoints represented by women journalists of the time.

'Was ist eine Witwe mehr als ... ein aufgewarmtes Essen?' According to politician and statesman Theodor Gottlieb von Hippel (1741-1796), widows were superfluous beings and second-hand goods, but they were also perceived by theologians and moralists of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as a threat due to their sexual experience and supposedly ungovernable lust. This book analyses the overwhelmingly negative portrayal of the widow in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century German fiction. Male writers in the works discussed repeat the theory that, once deprived of their husbands, widows become sexually voracious. Indeed, the widow is often presented as a dangerous sexual predator who is prone to violence. Female authors, however, highlight the invisibility of the widow and portray her as a figure alienated from society and her family because she has internalized the ideas propounded by Hippel. The widow is depicted throughout as a figure to be at best re-educated and at worst to be feared and guarded against.

This first book-length biography with discussions of select writings by Luise Büchner (1821-1877) draws on her commentary of events available in letters and writings. A close reading of Büchner¿s fictional writings reveals that she both entertained and educated her readers. Her pedagogical messages correspond to ideas she promoted in her work on the «woman question». This in-depth study properly situates her in the changing cultural climate and socio-political developments that led to unification of the German states in 1871. Büchner tested and revised her thoughts on the «woman question» in the course of her practical work as a co-founder of local women¿s associations and as a member of two competing «national» bourgeois women¿s organizations. Her «voice» and temperament, as reflected in letters and articles not consulted by previous biographers, lead to surprising discoveries about a single woman whose life had more to offer than the narrowly prescribed roles assigned to middle-class women of her day.

This book analyses the depiction and function of politically active women in novels by six female authors from the margins of the democratic revolution of 1848 and the first German women's movement: Louise Aston, Malwida von Meysenbug, Mathilde Franziska Anneke, Fanny Lewald, Louise Otto-Peters, and Hedwig Dohm. What was their political stance in relation to democratic developments and women's rights? How did they render their political convictions into literary form? Which literary images did they use, criticise, or invent in order to depict politically active women in their novels in a positive light? Which narrative strategies were employed to 'smuggle' politically and socially radical ideas into what were sometimes ostensibly conventional plots? These authors wrote before modern feminist theory was established; however, their proto-feminist observations, demands, and discursive tactics contributed much to the formation and institutionalisation of feminist thought. This book contextualises the authors' works in their historical and social environment in order to evaluate what can be considered radical and political in the period 1845-1919.

How was it possible for a well-educated nation to support a regime that made it a crime to think for yourself? This was the key question for the Stuttgart-based author Anna Haag (1888-1982), the democratic feminist whose anti-Nazi diaries are analysed in this book. Like Victor Klemperer, she deconstructed German political propaganda day by day, giving her critique a gendered focus by challenging the ethos of masculinity that sustained the Nazi regime. This pioneering study interprets her diaries, secretly written in twenty notebooks now preserved at the Stuttgart City Archive, as a fascinating source for the study of everyday life in the Third Reich. The opening sections sketch the paradigms that shaped Haag's creativity, analysing the impact of the First World War and the feminist and pacifist commitments that influenced her literary and journalistic writings. Extensive quotations from the diaries are provided, with English translations, to illustrate her responses to the cataclysms that followed the rise of Hitler, from the military conquests and Jewish deportations to the devastation of strategic bombing. The book concludes with a chapter that traces the links between Haag's critique of military tyranny and her contribution to post-war reconstruction.

This book is a study of women's involvement in occult practices in Weimar Germany. The book examines reports of women engaging in actual occult practices (expressive dance, mediumism, witchcraft) as well as various fictional depictions of women as demonic or as possessing supernatural powers (ghosts, vampires, monsters).