Gender and Intellectual History in Serbian and Slovenian Periodical Press in the 20th Century

The project focuses on analyzing the relationship between gender, as a culturally and socially constructed phenomenon, and intellectual history in Serbian and Slovenian periodicals of the 20th century. Historiography to date has paid little attention to women’s involvement in intellectual currents, as the patriarchal socio-political context of the two Yugoslav states often did not allow for formal and institutional recognition of their knowledge and contributions. The project will, therefore, address two fundamental questions: Whether and how does our understanding of intellectual history change when we analyze texts written by women or texts about women and gender relations? What are the similarities and differences in attitudes towards gender and intellectual history in Serbian and Slovenian periodicals published in the two Yugoslavias?

An interdisciplinary group of historians and literary theorists will use discursive, contextual, and interpretative analyses of Slovenian and Serbian periodicals to shed comparative light on the formation of national identities and attitudes towards the state from the perspective of gender. They will address the legitimation of power relations between genders in different historical and ideological contexts, examine the influence of foreign, especially Anglo-American, feminisms in the Yugoslav context, and explore the relationship between gender and pacifism. By focusing on women’s intellectual thought as a subject of historical study, the project will contribute to a shift in the research paradigm from the history of educated women to women’s intellectual history.