Frustration over discrimination and sexist structures at universities led a group of female instructors at Freie Universität Berlin to organize a Summer University for Women from 1976 through 1983. To mark the 50th anniversary of the series, FU will host a public discussion on Tuesday (July 7) revisiting the project.
Students from the Otto-Suhr Institute for Political Science and their lecturer Friederike Beier will discuss with contemporary witnesses and representatives from civil society and pop culture about the origins of the Summer University and the current challenges and prospects of feminist politics and science. Unlike back then, men are warmly invited, Beier, who coordinates the FU Master in Gender, Intersektionality and Politics, told the German press agency.
“Most rooms on campus were men’s spaces”
In the 1970s, female lecturers were underrepresented, professorships were rarely filled by women, and sexualized violence had become normalized, explains the gender researcher. “Most rooms on campus were men’s spaces.” The male allies from the 1968 movement had indeed spoken of freedom from hierarchy, but not about gender relations. “That is something students and female lecturers would no longer tolerate.”
In total, Beier says, there were seven Summer Universities. The program, according to her, was also explicitly aimed at non-academic women. For the first edition, 3,000 women from across Germany attended; later editions drew between 7,000 and 8,000 women. Alice Schwarzer was there as well at the time.
Berlin’s education administration saw a “latent threat to morality”
The Summer University was recognized as educational leave — except for the seventh and final edition in 1982. Berlin’s education authorities seriously argued that a “latent threat to morality” could not be ruled out, as increasing numbers of lesbian women participated and the topics sometimes centered on lesbian issues. Topics such as “vaginal self-examination” or “bisexual awareness” the administration did not deem suitable for young people.
What does Beier think today about the position of women at universities? There are many setbacks, anti-feminism and misogyny are on the rise, and gender researchers are being attacked. But there are improvements as well, for example the establishment of points of contact for sexualized violence. Professorships have recently been 30 percent held by women. “That’s a huge step forward, but still not enough.” (mize)
