The Meaning and the Role of Literary-Pedagogical Essays Written by German Woman Authors in the First Decades of the 20th Century

Abstract

This paper deals with the meaning and role of literary – pedagogic essays written by German woman authors in the first three decades of the 20th century. This is an era when significant changes are taking place in the field of women’s education, so the aforementioned essays discuss different segments of that issue. While some authors deal with the question of abolishing celibacy for women teachers and the question of their salaries, others deal with the importance of equal educational conditions for boys and girls, as well as the creation of preconditions for specific training. The essays we deal with in this article, are the continuation of the tradition of writing such texts that began in Germany in the 17th century. They are getting interesting outlines in the first decades of the 20th century, taking even the form of autobiography. The analysed essays represent interesting examples of the genre connecting two seemingly incompatible areas, the area of literatures and the area of pedagogy.