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Social Science Gender Studies

Gender and Modernity in Central Europe

The Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and Its Legacy

edited by Agatha Schwartz

Publisher
University of Ottawa Press
Initial publish date
Oct 2010
Category
Gender Studies, General, Social History
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9780776618968
    Publish Date
    Oct 2010
    List Price
    $16.99
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9780776607269
    Publish Date
    May 2010
    List Price
    $34.95

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Description

At the end of the nineteenth century, Austro-Hungarian society was undergoing a significant re-evaluation of gender roles and identities. Debates on these issues revealed deep anxieties within the multi-ethnic empire that did not resolve themselves with its dissolution in 1918. Concepts of gender and modernity as defined by the Habsburg Monarchy were modified by the conservative, liberal, radical right-wing and Communist regimes that ruled the empire’s successor states in the twentieth century. While these values have taken on new dimensions again in the post-Communist period, the Habsburg Monarchy’s influence on gender and modernity in Central Europe is still palpable.

With a truly interdisciplinary approach – drawing on the fields of women’s studies, gender studies, sociology, history, literature, art, and psychoanalysis – that touches on a variety of subjects – gender roles, sexual identities, misogyny, painting, writing, minorities – this volume explores the lasting impact of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in contemporary Central Europe, which is fraught with gender conflict and tension between modernist and anti-modernist forces.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire was a fascinating multi-ethnic society. Its experience and understanding of gender and modernity provides important, relevant lessons for today’s world as it becomes increasingly intercultural and as issues of identity become more and more complex.

About the author

Agatha Schwartz is associate professor, German, University of Ottawa, and co-editor of The Third Shore: Women's Prose from East-Central Europe.

Agatha Schwartz's profile page