Nation, Politik und Geschlecht: Frauenbewegungen und Nationalismus in der Moderne

Research on nationalism has a venerable tradition in German historiography. Only recently, however, have female scholars and a few male scholars raised the question of the gender of the nation, making clear how strongly the project of the nation was and is gendered in connotation. An anthology is now devoted for the first time to the question of "female nationalism". Although, according to the ideas of the producers of national ideology, the democratizing and equalizing impetus of the model of the nation was to be reserved for Christian, white, bourgeois men, the exclusion of women is questionable. In the national ideologemes, willingness to sacrifice for the fatherland and emancipation as a citizen seemed to coincide, which proved to be a point of contact for the participation desires of the female sex. The volume shows that from the late Enlightenment until well into the 20th century, women and women's associations repeatedly referred to nation and fatherland when it came to legitimizing political commitment and public appearance. The evaluation of this finding is, of course, problematic: Is the national commitment of women to be regarded as an expansion of scope for action and thus as an opportunity for emancipation, or as a mere instrumentalization of female auxiliary services under national auspices? This dilemma is addressed and reflected upon by all of the authors in the volume.The contributions are arranged chronologically and cover the late 18th century, the Empire, and the Weimar Republic.