 2014 - 2015 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 0621-3245-01 | Gender and War in Europe 1870-1945 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| FACULTY OF HUMANITIES | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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University credit hours: 4.0
Course description
A prominent feature of modern ideas of citizenship has been the link between full civil rights and the willingness to be mobilized during wartime. This link emerged during the revolutionary wars of the late eighteenth century and saw its most widespread implementation in Europe in the years 1870-1945 ( between the unification of Germany and the end of World War II). The rhetoric of the military struggle during that period assumed a division of labor between women and men, while emphasizing that full social and political rights demand a clear contribution to the war effort. However, this rhetoric which sanctified the "male warrior" and the "caring mother," existed in great tension with the actual demands of total war. The wish to wage an effective war meant in many cases that many men and women performed gender roles which were far removed from this dichotomous ideal. This seminar will examine the issue of gender and the military by reading theoretical and empirical works on the subject. We will examine the effects of two world wars on gender and sexual norms, and will discuss in detail the following issues: the employment of women during World War I; Gender representations in film, literature and art; Natalism in the interwar period; non-normative sexualities during wartime; Masculinity and captivity; Mass rape by the Red Army soldiers and more.