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Summary Gender on a National Level: The case of Germany
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Gender case in Germany: crucial importance of MOTHERHOOD Related to Julia Franck's "The Blindness of the Heart"
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Gender 11/12/15Gender on a National Level
The case of Germany
Poetic step up to gender in Germany : Julia Franck; The Blindness of the
Heart
What does the prologue narrate?
A mother abandons her child. Setted in last phase of WWII. People
were fleeing from the Russian army. Story has a interesting
narrative construction: we see the perspective of the child: 3rd
person narration: child looks at the mother.
What impression do you get? What’s their bond?
Child fondly wants to be with his mother but her reactions seem to
be very cool and distant => cold relationship between mother and
chold is confirmed by the fact that she wil desert her child and
leave.
Tells story of mother who wants to go somewhere else: history of
an individual who lives through traumatic circumstances. What
happens to Helen during and before national socialism to a certain
extent explains why she abandons her child
We can read her movements, but we don’t know her personality.
The child’s perspective offers only the image of a cold mother but
we don’t know what she thinks.
Also suggest the mother’s otherness. The child does the usual
affective thing, but mother doens’t reply: suggests this otherness
Novel then reveals who she is: novel offers an explanation why she
leaves her child! Ends with an epilogie where we see the child
again as almost an adult and his mother visits him again after not
seeing him for a long time.
Deals with motherhood: leitmotif throughout gender thinking in
Germany. In Germany it’s called “woman of the afternoon” => the
term is as inscrutible as the mother in the book: figure of folktales
which turns up in the afternoon when people are harvesting: she is
a threatening figure and you should be aware of it.
Title suggest that there’s a problem with the mother who has a
kind of blindness in her heart. Story which reads the figure as a
mother.
Image of motehrhood you get in this novel starting with a prologue
is everything but romantic => contadiction to the idea that women
have a natural affection for their children. Shows that a mother is a
person which has a persnal history, trauma: whoch can be very
complex and being a mother is not a denial of that personal
difficult history.
In Germany there’s a very strong discourse on motherhood. It’s an
institution that has survived until today in a way that is not
, comparable to Europe. Motherhood as a life duty that is fulfilled
outside society. Being a mother is a duty that also is enacted
outside of society: a sort of enclave or space between a woman
and her child, put outside society. Mother-childbond is the core of
society: beginning of the integration in society and it’s outside
public space.
Barbara Vinken, 2001
Wrote a book on the idea of motherhood in Germany: the myth of
the German mother
Analysis of this idea that mother and child is the most basic
effective bond in society, which is the core of everything and
should be sustained by political and social measures.
Sharp conclusion: ppt : feminism is always talking about
motherhood (how can we protect or improve it..): bio-ethical
course; question of ethics (duty) and something biological (women
as mothers are biological creatures). Even the most revolutionary
feminists will never question the idea of motherhood: motherhood
is not so much having a child but taking care of a child, being there
for a child.
Political debates: how can we protect mothers? How can we make
sure that mothers can return to their work? How can we have
gender equality and still have motherhood? Unique bond between
mother and child is never questioned.
Motherhood in France is that you get a child and you take it to
childcare and go back to work because you need it as part of th
workforce and state in Germany you get a child and you stay at
home at least for 3 years. This idea has remained intact. A child
should be raised within a family, not in public.
Where does this idea of motherhood come from?
The idea of this kind of motherhood comes into being with
Reformation: generally considerend as a form of emancipation.
Women’s emancipation progressed to some extent because it
implies literacy (learning how to read is of importance).
Reformation as a religious movement is seen as a progress in the
history of women’s emancipation but Reformation is the cause of
women getting an important role in society; which is in the family.
Martin Luther had a negative view on women. The idea of spiritual
femininty: put to an end by Luther who gives women a different
role, not as mothers of God or as mediators of the voice of God
new role is being the caring person in the family. Familylife
becomes the corner stone of society! Family has a hierarchical
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