Klicktipp: Finding Women in the Sources: Women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and transnationally (ZARAH-Weblog) – new postings online

ZARAH: Women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and transnationally (Web)

In February 2020, the ERC-advanced-grant-project ZARAH project started. ZARAH explores the history of women’s labour activism and organizing – from the age of empires to the late 20th century. The aim is to present the working conditions and living conditions of lower class and working class women and their communities and to move these women from the margins of labour and gender studies and European history to the centre of historical research. The Austrian part of this histories is worked out by Veronika Helfert. Read more … (Web).

ZARAH weblog

In September 2020, the ZARAH weblog started. The first blog series were „Finding Women in the Sources“, „Putting Activists Centre Stage“ and „Transnational Links“. The first post in the ZARAH Guest Blog Series went online in November 2022 (Web):

Series IV: Through the Lens of Women’s Work and Activism: ZARAH Guest Blog Series

  • Selin Çağatay and Jelena Tešija: Through the Lens of Women’s Work and Activism: Introducing the ZARAH Guest Blog Series
  • Jessica Richter: “Bitter Years of Exploitation”: Domestic Workers’ (Un)organized Labour Struggles (1890s-1938)
  • Minja Bujaković: Establishing the Communist Women’s Movement in the 1920s: Individual Activism and the Activist Networks
  • Doreen Blake: The representations of work in the Catholic women’s press in Austria (1918-1934)
  • Ivana Mihaela Žimbrek: Women’s Organizing and Household Work in Socialist Yugoslavia (1950s-1960s)
  • Adela Hîncu: The “Feminization of Agriculture”: Rural Women, Family Structures, and the Political Economy of State Socialist Romania
  • Isidora Grubački: Kaja’s Path and Milka Žicina’s Path: The Uses of Literary Works for Labour and Intellectual History
  • Adrienn Kácsor: Conditions of Invisibility: Jolán Szilágyi’s Communist Artmaking Between the Two World Wars
  • Clara Vlessing: Socialist-Suffragette, Suffragette-Socialist: Intersecting Struggles in Sylvia Pankhurst’s Life and Memory
  • Ivana Hadjievska: Women’s emancipation through a planned economy. Representations from the socialist magazine “Makedonka” (1947-1951)
  • Sára Bagdi: Beyond Trade Unions: Labour Activism Among Women Workers of the Újpest Jute Factory in the 1900s

Series III: Transnational Links and the History of Women’s Labour Activism

  • Alexandra Ghit, Olga Gnydiuk, and Eszter Varsar: An Introduction
  • Selin Çağatay: Tracing Transnational Connections in Trade Union Women’s Education: The ICFTU Women’s Committee in Turkey
  • Eszter Varsar: Gender, Anarchist Thought and Women in the Agrarian Socialist Movement in Hungary and Internationally
  • Olga Gnydiuk: In the Web of a Male-dominated Trade Union International: Women and the World Federation of Trade Unions
  • Ivelina Masheva: Exchange and Cooperation between Bulgarian Communist Women and the International Women’s Secretariat of the Comintern in the early 1920s
  • Alexandra Ghit: Solidarity and Inequality: European Socialist Women’s International Organizing in the Interwar Period

Series II: Putting Activists Centre Stage

  • Zhanna Popova and Veronika Helfert: An Introduction
  • Alexandra Ghit: Tatiana Grigorovici: Ambiguities of a Social Democrat’s Career
  • Zhanna Popova: Halina Krahelska: Multifaceted Activist Legacy
  • Ivelina Masheva: Ana Maimunkova: Trials and Tribulations of a Communist Activist
  • Veronika Helfert: Gabriele Proft: A century of Labour Related and Political Activism

Series I: Finding Women in the Sources

  • Veronika Helfert and Zhanna Popova: An Introduction
  • Susan Zimmermann: Female trade unionists and women workers in state-socialist Hungary
  • Alexandra Ghit: Re-reading local sources: Finding gendered trade unionism in a Transylvanian factory newspaper
  • Zhanna Popova: The invisible women: Zyrardów strike of 1883
  • Ivelina Masheva: Strike bulletins as sources: women workers in the 1931 Tundzha strike in Bulgaria: Strike bulletins as sources: women workers in the 1931 Tundzha strike in Bulgaria
  • Veronika Helfert: What do police records reveal? Looking for striking women workers in October 1950, Austria

Description: „The aim of ZARAH is to research women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe in its variety and complexity, and bring women activists that were often placed at the margins of labour, gender, and European history to the centre of historical inquiry. In the course of the study, we encounter precious sources that give a glimpse into the experiences of these women, experiences that were unknown, disregarded, or omitted before. The research agenda of ZARAH also includes making such sources available to the scholarly community and interested public via an online database. In order to showcase research in progress, we would like to share here some illuminating sources that we have encountered so far here, on the website of ZARAH. Sources such as these form the indispensable springboard for the thoughtful analysis of the history of women’s labor activism.“ Read more … (Web).