Gender and War in Twentieth-Century Eastern Europe / Edition 1

by Nancy M. Wingfield, Maria Bucur-Deckard

Overview

This volume explores the role of gender on both the home and fighting fronts in eastern Europe during World Wars I and II. By using gender as a category of analysis, the authors seek to arrive at a more nuanced understanding of the subjective nature of wartime experience and its representations. While historians have long equated the fighting front with the masculine and the home front with the feminine, the contributors challenge these dichotomies, demonstrating that they are based on culturally embedded assumptions
about heroism and sacrifice. Major themes include the ways in which wartime experiences challenge traditional gender roles; postwar restoration of gender order; collaboration and resistance; the body; and memory and commemoration.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253218445
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	05/09/2006
Series:	Indiana-Michigan Series in Russian and East European Studies
Pages:	264
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Nancy M. Wingfield is Associate Professor of History at Northern Illinois University. She is co-author of Return to Diversity: A Political History of East Central Europe since World War II and co-editor (with Maria Bucur) of Staging the Past: The Politics of Commemoration in Habsburg Central Europe, 1848 to the Present.

Maria Bucur is John W. Hill Associate Professor of History at Indiana University and author of Eugenics and Modernization in Interwar Romania.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

1. Introduction: Gender and War in Twentieth-Century Eastern EuropeNancy M. Wingfield and Maria Bucur
Part I. Challenging Gender Roles/Restoring Order
2. "Female Generals" and "Siberian Angels": Aristocratic Nurses and the Austro-Hungarian POW ReliefAlon Rachamimov
3. Civilizing the Soldier in Postwar AustriaMaureen Healy
4. Between Red Army and White Guard: Women in Budapest, 1919Eliza Ablovatski
Part II. Gendered Collaborating and Resisting
5. Dumplings and Domesticity: Women, Collaboration, and Resistance in the Protectorate of Bohemia and MoraviaMelissa Feinberg
6. Denouncers and Fraternizers: Gender, Collaboration, and Retribution in Bohemia and Moravia during World War II and AfterBenjamin Frommer
7. Family, Gender, and Ideology in World War II LatviaMara Lazda
Part III. Remembering War: Gendered Bodies, Gendered Stories
8. Kosovo Maiden(s): Serbian Women Commemorate the Wars of National Liberation, 1912–1918Melissa Bokovoy
9. Women's Stories as Sites of Memory: Gender and Remembering Romania's World WarsMaria Bucur
10. The Nation's Pain and Women's Shame: Polish Women and Wartime ViolenceKatherine R. Jolluck
11. "The Alienated Body": Gender Identity and the Memory of the Siege of LeningradLisa A. Kirschenbaum

Select Bibliography
Contributors
Index

What People are Saying About This

Laurie Stoff

"This volume is an impressive collection of articles that will appeal to those interested in the history of eastern Europe, war and the war experience, both world wars, and gender and women's studies. The articles successfully reassess the traditional dichotomy of war historiography that separates male and female experiences based on front line and home front divisions, respectively. Thus, the contributors to this collection aspire to do more than just "gender the front" but to gender the entire war experience. This is an important task for general understanding of war, especially in Eastern Europe, where there is a significant dearth of such scholarship."--(Laurie Stoff, Assistant Professor of History, Louisiana Tech University)

From the Publisher

The anthology is an exceptionally rich collection of diverse texts since it brings together the knowledge of different cultural contexts, from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the remnants of the Ottoman Empire; specific historical frameworks; sometimes opposing ideological backgrounds; and many local resources using different languages spoken in the countries whose painful experiences of the two world wars the book explores.

Malgorzata Fidelis

"[E]ngaging read . . . a remarkable scholarly accomplishment . . . a marvelous job . . . a pioneering study . . . essential reading . . . excellent text for undergraduate and graduate classes."--(Malgorzata Fidelis, Department of History, University of Illinois at Chicago)

HABSBURG

. . . an engaging read and a remarkable scholarly accomplishment. . . . The authors do a marvelous job of situating their findings within broader historical contexts and current historiographical debates. . . . [T]his is a pioneering study that should open a broader discussion of gender and war on the eastern front. . . . This book is essential reading for anyone interested in how war affects society. It is an excellent text for undergraduate and especially graduate classes. By reading this collection, scholars and students can discover multifaceted methodologies and diverse sources useful for approaching issues of gender and war in any historical context.

Editorial Reviews

"This collection of high-quality essays is designed to explore little-known aspects of the two world wars in Eastern Europe. The contributions have been grouped thematically in three sections devoted to gender roles, gender and occupation, and the gendered commemoration of war. The result is a coherent volume that will be of particular interest to social and cultural historians of modern Europe."—The Journal of Military History 71.4, 2007

"[This book] is a . . . welcome addition to the literature on gender in Europe during a particularly violent century. Oct. 2008"—Slavonic & East European Review

". . . an exceptionally rich collection of diverse texts. . . . [A] significant contribution in the interdisciplinary field of gender studies. . ."—Signs

"This volume is an impressive collection of articles that will appeal to those interested in the history of eastern Europe, war and the war experience, both world wars, and gender and women's studies."—Laurie Stoff, russian-front.com

". . . thoughtful, fascinating . . . . this fine volume is notable for its unified presentation of complex and engaging issues. It provides an introduction to the most significant recent historiography in gender studies and military history, as well as an overview of some of the most stimulating new research being done in an important field. March 2009"—Andrea Orzoff, H-Ideas, H-Net

". . . this fine volume is notable for its unified presentation of complex and engaging issues. It provides an introduction to the most significant recent historiography in gender studies and military history, as well as an overview of some of the most stimulating new research being done in an important field. . . . Rarely are compilations like this one so consistently well written and intriguing.March, 2009"—Andrea Orzoff, H-Ideas, H-Net

"This excellent collection of 11 articles advances the thriving English-language historiography on gender, wars and the military into the too often neglected territories of twentieth-century Eastern Europe.Vol. 39.4 2009"—Anders Ahlback, European History Quarterly

"The anthology is an exceptionally rich collection of diverse texts since it brings together the knowledge of different cultural contexts, from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the remnants of the Ottoman Empire; specific historical frameworks; sometimes opposing ideological backgrounds; and many local resources using different languages spoken in the countries whose painful experiences of the two world wars the book explores."—

"Although in disciplinary terms it is represented as a history project the collection also enters into sociology, anthropology, and literature, and is a significant contribution in the interdisciplinary field of gender studies. . ."—

". . . an engaging read and a remarkable scholarly accomplishment. . . . The authors do a marvelous job of situating their findings within broader historical contexts and current historiographical debates. . . . [T]his is a pioneering study that should open a broader discussion of gender and war on the eastern front. . . . This book is essential reading for anyone interested in how war affects society. It is an excellent text for undergraduate and especially graduate classes. By reading this collection, scholars and students can discover multifaceted methodologies and diverse sources useful for approaching issues of gender and war in any historical context."—HABSBURG

From the Publisher

[This book] is a . . . welcome addition to the literature on gender in Europe during a particularly violent century. Oct. 2008

Slavonic & East European Review

This volume is an impressive collection of articles that will appeal to those interested in the history of eastern Europe, war and the war experience, both world wars, and gender and women's studies.

russian-front.com - Laurie Stoff

This excellent collection of 11 articles advances the thriving English-language historiography on gender, wars and the military into the too often neglected territories of twentieth-century Eastern Europe.Vol. 39.4 2009

European History Quarterly - Anders Ahlback

. . . an exceptionally rich collection of diverse texts. . . . [A] significant contribution in the interdisciplinary field of gender studies. . .

Signs

This collection of high-quality essays is designed to explore little-known aspects of the two world wars in Eastern Europe. The contributions have been grouped thematically in three sections devoted to gender roles, gender and occupation, and the gendered commemoration of war. The result is a coherent volume that will be of particular interest to social and cultural historians of modern Europe.

2007 The Journal of Military History 71.4

. . . thoughtful, fascinating . . . . this fine volume is notable for its unified presentation of complex and engaging issues. It provides an introduction to the most significant recent historiography in gender studies and military history, as well as an overview of some of the most stimulating new research being done in an important field. March 2009

H-Ideas, H-Net - Andrea Orzoff

"This excellent collection of 11 articles advances the thriving English-language historiography on gender, wars and the military into the too often neglected territories of twentieth-century Eastern Europe." —Anders Ahlback, European History Quarterly, Vol. 39.4 2009

— Anders Ahlback

European History Quarterly

"This volume is an impressive collection of articles that will appeal to those interested in the history of eastern Europe, war and the war experience, both world wars, and gender and women’s studies." —Laurie Stoff, russian-front.com

— Laurie Stoff

www.russian-front.com