Hallama, Peter (2020). Struggling for a Socialist Fatherhood: “Re-educating” Men in East Germany, 1960-1989. East European Politics and Societies and Cultures, 34(4), pp. 817-836. Sage 10.1177/0888325419891200
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Research on the history of masculinities and fatherhood during state socialism in East Central Europe is still rare. Therefore, scholars in the field of women’s and gender studies sometimes reproduce the idea of men in that region as stable characters across the period of socialist rule. In particular, they insist that “official,” that is, state-sanctioned, representations of masculinity did not change. Yet, as I show, there is evidence that socialist authors, journalists, and even the politburos of the regions’ communist parties did reflect on what they perceived as the need to change the conceptions of men and fathers. They advocated men’s greater participation in housework and child care. In this article, I examine this “struggle for a socialist fatherhood” in the GDR, focusing mainly on the discussions and suggestions of sociologists, educationalists, psychologists, and sexologists active in the study of childhood and adolescence, sex education, or marriage and family. From the 1960s on, experts from these fields as well as communist politicians targeted increasingly men to implement equality in marriage and parenting. In the 1970s and 1980s, their suggestions became more and more concrete. These suggestions as well as the theoretical discussions demonstrate the enduring belief in the socialist society’s ability to overcome traditional gender stereotypes. Even in the late 1980s, they were future directed and contained a utopian element.
Item Type: |
Journal Article (Original Article) |
|---|---|
Division/Institute: |
06 Faculty of Humanities > Department of History and Archaeology > Institute of History 06 Faculty of Humanities > Department of History and Archaeology > Institute of History > Modern and Contemporary History |
UniBE Contributor: |
Hallama, Peter Christian |
Subjects: |
900 History 900 History > 940 History of Europe |
ISSN: |
0888-3254 |
Publisher: |
Sage |
Language: |
English |
Submitter: |
Peter Christian Hallama |
Date Deposited: |
08 Mar 2021 11:34 |
Last Modified: |
05 Dec 2022 15:48 |
Publisher DOI: |
10.1177/0888325419891200 |
BORIS DOI: |
10.48350/153171 |
URI: |
https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/153171 |
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