The Lives of Jewish Women: Der Vayber-bunt

Our conception of Jewish women on the threshold of modernity is generally forged by the intellectual and social fame of Jewish Salonières. The flamboyancy of individuals like the romantic writer Dorothea Mendelssohn/Veit/Schlegel and Esther Gad/Bernard/Domeier (also known as the German Wollstonecraft), Rahel Levin/Varnhagen and Henriette de Lemos/Herz (whose salons were instrumental in spreading Goethe’s fame throughout Germany), or Fanny Itzig/von Arnstein (who hosted high ranking diplomats during the Congress of Vienna, 1814-15) overshadows the lives and achievements of other Jewish women. While most Salonières sought fame and recognition in non-Jewish society, other women aspired to realize their ambitions in the language of traditional Jewry. The memoirs of the Jewish merchant Glikl of Hameln (1746/47-1724) will serve as our starting point in the quest for female role models in Jewish society through three centuries. The Jewish feminist and social worker Bertha Pappenheim (1859-1936), better known as Freud’s patient “Anna O.”, helps us to bridge the cultural gap with her translations of traditional Yiddish literature into German.

This course traces the lives of Jewish women in central Europe from 1700 until the Holocaust. Starting from different role models that Jewish society/societies ascribed to women during this period, we will discuss possibilities and limitations of female self-assertion. The actual and written biographies of Jewish women will therefore be contrasted with authoritative texts of traditional, enlightened and bourgeois Jewish society, respectively. The course thus combines Jewish cultural history and Gender Studies.

The course is given in collaboration with the Center for Jewish Cultural History, Paris Lodron University, Salzburg and Paideia – The European Institute for Jewish Studies in Sweden.

Prior knowledge

No prior knowledge about the subject is needed.

To apply for this course, you need basic computer skills and knowledge of how to use the digital platform Zoom. The school offers Zoom manuals and a training opportunity before the start of the course.

Course material

All course material is not included in the cost for this course. You will receive information regarding which course books to purchase on your own, if you get accepted to the course.

About the teacher

Louise Hecht was recently the Lilli and Michael Sommerfreund guest professor at the Hochschule für Jüdische Studien in Heidelberg, Germany. She studied Judaic Studies, German and Spanish literature at the University Vienna, Austria. She holds a PhD in Jewish History from The Hebrew University, Jerusalem (summa cum laude) and a habilitation in Jewish Cultural History from the Paris Lodron University of Salzburg. Her teaching and research focus on cultural and intellectual history, gender studies, printing culture and popular culture in Israel. 

Photo: Bertha Pappenheim (1859-1936) dressed as der Glikl bas Judah Leib. Leopold Pilichowski, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.