Feminist Activism, Travel and Translation Around 1900: Transnational Practices of Mediation and the Case of Käthe Schirmacher (Translation History)

This open access book takes the biographical case of German feminist Käthe Schirmacher (1865–1930), a multilingual translator, widely travelled writer of fiction and non-fiction, and a disputatious activist to examine the travel and translation of ideas between the women’s movements that emerged in many countries in the late 19th and early 20th century. It discusses practices such as translating, interpreting, and excerpting from journals and books that spawned and supported transnational civic spaces and develops a theoretical framework to analyse these practices. It examines translations of literary, scholarly and political texts and their contexts. The book will be of interest to academics as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students in the fields of modern history, women’s and gender history, cultural studies, transnational and transfer history, translation studies, history and theory of biography. Acknowledgements Praise for Feminist Activism, Travel and Translation Around 1900 Contents Abbreviations List of Figures 1 Introduction: Translating and Mediating Feminisms, Travelling Women’s Movements Praises, Noises, and the Mediator’s Choices Approaches to Transnational Practices of Communication in and among Social Movements Käthe Schirmacher, a Travelling Writer, Translator, Mediator—and Nationalist A Case Study of a Transnational Life Travelling, Living Transnationally, and Connecting Women’s Movements in the West Translating, Activism, and Trust The Language of Translation and the Risk the Transnational Mediator Takes... Notes 2 Become a Translator! Formations of an Im/Possible Persona Gendered Scientific/Scholarly Personae and the Exclusion of Women Danzig 1882: Can I be a Student?23 Paris 1887: An Aspiring Young Woman Negotiates Her Future Gendered Personae in Academia Notes 3 Men, Women and Progress. Literary Translation A Romantic Novel on the ‘Dreadful Woman Question’ and Its Author In a Transnational Community of Woman Teachers Adapting Men, Women and Progress for a German Audience Publication in an Activist Context A Transcultural Literary Exchange Translating for Money Constellations of Translation and Transnational Transfer Notes 4 To America! Transatlantic Mediation Transatlantic Exchanges The Modern Woman Becoming a Mediator Notes 5 Correspondences: Transnational Journalism Journalism as a Profession for Women Letter from Paris Becoming a French Journalist Letter from Germany A Public Exchange on Women Artists and Old Maids A Transnational Journalist Correspondences, Audiences, Epistolary Selves Notes 6 Féminisme: Translations, Transfers, and Transformations Public Interest in Women’s Activism as a Transnational Phenomenon Comparing Constellations and Connecting Activists A Global Perspective Based on Ethnicised and Racialised Differences Useful Information for Activists Transfers and Translations of a Concept Reviews, Receptions, and Reflections Notes 7 Travel as Political Practice and Economic Strategy Apostle Journeys Fishing Hauls Imagining the Other Notes 8 Interpreting and Translating Transnational Activism Suffrage Activism in a Transnational Arena Interpreting at the IWSA Conferences Common Ground and Conflict Zones Covering Conferences, Transferring the Suffrage Cause into National Arenas Media and Means for Transnational Transfer—Jus Suffragii and the Translation Fund Controversies in Translation Notes 9 ‘Suffragettes’ in Germany: Translating Militancy Not Like a Lady Contexts and Controversies Explaining a Militant Movement to a German Audience Excerpt, Transfer, and Transformation ‘Suffragettes’ in the German Women’s Movements Sufrażetki and the New Type of Woman—Reception Across Time and Borders Notes 10 Conclusion: Inside and Outside the Contact Zones of Transnational Women’s Movements of the West ‘Our Alliance as a Teacher of Languages’ ‘Unfair Translations’? Enquiries About a Travelling Slander Ends of Translation and the Case of the Translator Strategical and Methodological Nationalism The Persona of the Modern Woman Mediations and Differences in a Transnational Civil Society of Female Activists Trust and the Continuum of Activist Translation Transnational Journalism and the Travel of Concepts Hierarchies and Divisions Silences The Language of Translation Notes Bibliography Index