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Midwives worked at the interface between governmental intervention and the biographical turning points of pregnancy, giving birth, and early parenthood. With the introduction in 1938 of the mandatory enlistment of a midwife for every birth, the National Socialist state monopolized the activities of midwives, reinforcing their position as obstetrics experts. As such, midwives were indispensable for the implementation of Germanization policy for reproduction in Nazi-occupied western Poland during World War II. Recent studies concerning occupied Poland point out the intimate link between occupation and race policy, between Germanization policy and genocide. Yet only a few authors take gender-specific aspects of occupation policy into account or analyse everyday life and interactions between ethnic groups in occupied Poland. Based upon the biographies of three midwives, one German, one Polish and one Jewish, this article takes a closer look at the female space of pregnancy, child birth and early parenthood as a key starting point for biopolitics and Germanization policy. It thus sheds light on gender-specific realizations of occupation policy and its consequences for everyday life. Both Germanization and motherhood mattered to Nazi policy in the annexed Polish territories, and so examining how the roles of German, Polish and Jewish midwives were transformed opens a window onto how racial classifications were enacted within the 'private sphere' of pregnancy and birth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews recent books on the cultural, social and political history of the Weimar Republic. Specific fields of enquiry have included gender history, where work on the history of abortion has challenged established narratives of emancipation. Another strand of research is interested in the idea that the crisis of Weimar was not simply an objective condition, but rather a cultural form which could be used to imagine and reflect upon possible scenarios for a renewal of society. Historians have thus begun to study the semantics of ‘crisis’ in Weimar Germany. A third strand of research is focused on performative politics: the ways in which political violence on the streets or the parliamentary debates in the Reichstag functioned as a stage for the theatrical presentation of competing political ideas. The article suggests that the modernity of metropolitan culture in Berlin, and its significance for Weimar Germany more generally, have been overestimated, and hence concludes that—in cultural terms—Weimar was Weimar: it is best represented by the small town in Thuringia. Some remarks on alternative modes of emplotment for the history of the Weimar Republic conclude the piece. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The text is less a review of the new literature than a reflection on significant and innovative current trends in the historiography on women and gender in the National Socialist era. The first part deals with various women's activities within milieus and professions, including their room for manoeuvre: midwives, social workers, female Nazi functionaries, and female auxiliary workers of the Nazi Wehrmacht. The second part of the article addresses specific features of biopolitics, targeted not only against Jews but also against asocial women, homosexuals and prostitutes. It also looks at visual images of bodies. Although the Nazis tried to create strongly determined binaries to categorize 'we' and 'the others' in the arts and other propaganda material, there existed, in fact, a broad spectrum of body images, especially among media stars. A third trend in the history of the Third Reich deals not only with the politics of exclusion but also of inclusion, as found in the concept of Volksgemeinschaft (national community), a concept that had many facets, such as the Volksfamilie, comradeship and home front. And it was the media that had the task of 'translating' this concept to the people in many appealing ways. The fourth part considers the gendering of memories after 1945 and the dominance of male narratives and points of view. The four parts of the article are intended to contribute to intersectional history and the history of social engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]