WELCOME TO THE WOMEN AND THEIR BODY CONFERENCE BY RUTH E. Hagengruber, March 16, 2023

I thank Jil Muller for the brilliant idea of organising the series of lectures from which the conference, Women and their body, with hundreds of registrations, has emerged.

What is actually the basis of a worldwide practice – and I point this out explicitly – a practice that is practiced in almost all countries and by ALL RACES, namely the practice of taking away a woman’s right to her body?

How is it possible that there are legal opinions in which a female being can be impregnated by force and yet not have the right to an abortion?

How is it possible that a female being is forced to cover herself so as not to bring others, namely so said weak ones, into a supposed temptation?

Why is the woman temptation? Women never defined themselves as such. What can she do against the violence against her? Nothing at all, it seems because she is ruled not by right but by force.

How is it possible in the 21st century, only gradually and slowly, even in Europe and Western cultures, that bills are gaining acceptance that push back this violence and demand equal rights and protection for them?

In almost all disciplines in which mankind has acquired knowledge, women have played a decisive role. But nonetheless, in most parts of the world, this knowledge is suppressed.

Without women, no medicine is conceivable, no education, and this education of humanity lies at the core of all development for science and survival. Knowledge, or rather the method of dealing with it, the method of human exchange and communication, is decisively determined by women, but yet, institutions have been invented to deprive them from it and also from the institutions of knowledge themselves.

In many countries of the world women are deprived of the means to live their spiritual life, instead their spirituality is pushed down to a controllable body. Instead of celebrating the birth and the hard work of women, women are sent to the stables and fields to give birth.  Though this has not found any opposing outcry in the world, treating women badly is the downfall of nations, the beginning of their own history of violence.

The violence perpetrated against women around the world in many facets, in almost every sphere, be it in terms of deprivation of medical care, physical violence, deprivation of education, subjugation and exploitation, the instrumentalisation of a male and spousal world that turns women into unpaid and abused service providers, even in enlightened societies, all these forms of overt violence thus necessarily also become an evil of society, which thus deprives itself of its own ability to flourish and prosper.

It is impossible to believe that a part of humanity, namely the part that can be physically overpowered, namely women and with them children, are exposed to violence. It is impossible to think this would not have consequences for society as a whole.

For far too long, a part not all of the male guard or what defines itself as such, has imposed violent domination without considering the consequences of this stupid practice. This practice is neither male-ish it is only stupid; this kind of brutality is stupid, it is the lack of understanding and reason. It is the opposite of a knowing practice, that this stupid practice has been able to assert itself for so long and can still assert itself in places today.

But also this conference is a strong sign that the outcry is heard worldwide. A common resistance is going to be realized with this conference, which shows that it will not and cannot go on like this, because it is against all reason and leads to a catastrophe.

We should not be fooled into thinking that what is happening now is only happening in Iran, or in Afghanistan. It pervades worldwide practice.

When Putin began his invasion of Ukraine, he formulated his invasion with an analogy. It was necessary, he said, to bring a woman who was flirting with the enemy to heel. Violence has a sexualized context, no question. There are many people who live sexuality as violence and every person knows that a significant part of war involves sexualized violence. The robbery of women is the trophy of war. All attempts to abolish this – because factually, it seems, it has nothing to do with war – fail. The over-manning of the woman’s body is the conquest of territory. The subjugation of women is celebrated as domination, law and religion. Therefore, the subjugation of women is only the first violent step towards the subjugation of all those who oppose this form. In Iran, everyone has understood that this policy starts with women but affects everyone.

The death of Mahsa Amini has sparked protests from Iranian women and men. Two female journalists reported her death on social media. Both journalists have been imprisoned. The story of women’s bodies and abuse must not be allowed to find publicity.

How can it be that women, the masters of communication, are deprived of all this? The first step is and has been in history to deprive them of this power that is to deprive them of their academic education.

As Rousseau said: girls are already more eager than boys at games; he concluded from this, as practice also showed for a long time in Europe and still today worldwide, that women should be excluded, because otherwise they would quickly surpass the boys.

And something else that is very close to my personal heart and which I have been advocating for years. We need the history of women, of women thinkers. We need the history of their ideas, and we need it institutionalized.

Even in Europe, there is no institution where the history of women’s experiences is documented and the testimonies of their centuries-long resistance are archived. However, this demand is central. We need this history as the subject of our research and to learn lessons from the injustice experienced.

Here in the centre of Europe, too, the teachings of St. Augustine have been repeated at the universities for centuries, showing astonishing similarities with the situation of women in Iran. Augustine’s judgement on the value of women is hardly inferior to the practice of Iranian theocrats: “Woman, he says, is the cause of evil, she is sin and deserves to live in misery and give birth. It was she who seduced Adam and deprived humanity of paradise.” Augustine wants us to believe that Eve ruled over the weak and will-less Adam, replies the bold Isotta Nogarola (c. 1460). But what Augustine writes is nonsense, she says, contradicting herself and the Bible and also everything she had learned from the humanists as morally correct. Augustine, however, claims that Adam was without free will; this, however, contradicts the Bible, which states that God created all men equal and free.

Over the centuries, women thinkers have pointed out the absurdity behind supposedly artful arguments for the subjugation of women. Arcangela Tarabotti‘s ideas (around 1650) ended up on the index of banned books: according to her conviction, religion had long since ceased to exist for faith, but rather served as a functionary of patriarchal despotism. The task of religion and its representatives is to dominate women, to break their will and to abuse them for their own purposes. What sort of religion is preached today in these countries??? Is God like this?

Would our world be a different place if the legacy of women thinkers were part of our culture? Certainly. If we had a European history of women philosophers, if they were part of our institutional doctrine, we might be better equipped to confront incidents such as those now occurring in Iran. If this history is not known, the struggle of women has to be started all over again.

We are on the side of the law for all humans and not on the side of violence executed at will by the violent – we are not helpless.

We can turn our power of right and reason against violence. Violence will become a particular event without meaning if we oppose it with all the power of reason. If we succeed in continuing this movement, we will become very strong and we will also succeed in using our power to control violence and war.

Jil Muller, deeply grounded in the history of philosophy herself, came to the Center for the History of Women Philosophers and Scientists in 2020 to contribute to the endeavour to support the research of the history of women philosophers, an institution that I founded here in 2006, exactly for that reason.

The New Voices format established in 2020 at the Center for the history of women philosophers and scientists, and made to give voice to emerging scholars, became a vehicle for Jil Muller to ask questions about power over the female body. Challenged by events around the world, Jil Muller called for a statement to make a clear mark in academia: The conference Women and their Body is breaking the silence.

How urgent this was, was proofed by the immense response that she received, including responses from countries that have been among the hardest hit.

My special thanks go to Jil Muller for this outstanding work and to Elke Ferner, from UN Germany. My thanks to her as this is the perfect example of what we can achieve when we all work together.

In breaking the silence we will be able to establish women’s power as a decisive factor worldwide. Long live Lysistrate.

Ruth E. Hagengruber über

“Warum wir das Erbe der Philosophinnen brauchen”

Bei De Gruyter erscheint ein Reihe mit Grundlagentexten der Philosophinnen aus aller Welt, Women Philosophers Heritage Collection

Die Geschichte der Philosophie liegt nur zur Hälfte vor uns. Die Stimmen der Frauen, die die Geschichte der Ideen geformt, ja, wichtige Errungenschaften für Freiheit und Gleichheit erkämpft haben, wurden herausgestrichen. Wie sagte doch Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793), die für die Bürgerrechte für alle, nämlich für Frauen und Männer, eingetreten war und dann von Robespierre geköpft wurde: Brüder, Ihr habt unserer Anstrengungen bedurft, um Eure Ketten zu sprengen. Nun, da Ihr frei seid, stoßt ihr eure Schwestern zurück!

Wir kennen nur die Hälfte unserer Kultur- und Wissenschaftsgeschichte. Die halbe Wahrheit ist aber keine Wahrheit. Es ist gerade, als hätte Newton seine Dynamik nur an der Hälfte der Planeten gemessen. Wie soll eine Geschichte richtig sein und wie sollte sich eine Kultur vernünftig entwickeln können, wenn die Ideen der Frauen fehlen, die mit ihrem Nachwuchs für zwei Drittel der Menschheit verantwortlich sind?

Wo ist diese Geschichte, warum ist sie uns nicht bekannt? Weshalb studieren und lehren wir Aristoteles, Rousseau, Fichte, Kant, Russell, aber nicht En Hedu’Anna aus Mesopotamiien, (um 2300 BC), nicht Christine de Pizan (um 1400), nicht Emilie Du Châtelet (1706-1749) oder die Schriften der Pandita Ramabai Saraswati (1858-1922) oder von Elisabeth Constance Jones (1848-1922)?

Weshalb kennen wir diese Geschichte nicht? Gibt es sie überhaupt? Selbst in der europäischen Tradition wird das patriarchale Narrativ der frauenlosen Kulturgeschichte weiter erzählt. Unmöglich sei es, dass es eine solche Geschichte gebe; denn Frauen seien ausgeschlossen aus Schule und Universität gewesen. Dieses Argument überzeugte schon 1745 den „Erfinder“ der Philosophiegeschichte, Jakob Brucker nicht mehr. Die bedeutendsten Denkerinnen seiner Zeit führt er ein mit folgendem Hinweis: Weise Frauen hat es immer und in allen Nationen gegeben. Die Chaldäer, Perser, Inder, Ägypter, Kelten, … hatten keine Skrupel, Frauen einen Platz unter ihren Weisen einzuräumen.

Weshalb kennen wir diese Geschichte nicht? Schon seit Jahrzehnten gibt es verstärkte Anstrengungen, diese Denkerinnen zurück in das Bewusstsein der Kulturen zu bringen. Die Forschung hat gute Argumente dafür, dass Frauen die Philosophie mit entwickelt und die Geschichte der Ideen vorangetrieben haben. Bekannt sind noch heute die Lehrerinnen des Sokrates und das Erbe der antiken Denkerinnen, das wir im „Erkenne Dich selbst“ immer noch repetieren. Du Châtelet’s Ideen finden ihr Echo in Kant und Bertrand Russell muss schließlich eingestehen, dass er wichtige Ideen von E.E.C. Jones „genommen“ habe. Diese „gestohlene Geschichte“ muss zurück gebracht werden in unserer Philosophie- und Wissenschaftstradition. Wir brauchen die Namen der Frauen. Wird sich damit was ändern? In der Tat. Der Einschluss der Frauen wird unsere Morallehre vollständig verändern und alles andere davon ausgehend.

Was also würde anders werden, wie würde sich Philosophie und Wissenschaft verändern? Die Tatsache, dass es weltweit und auch in Europa keine institutionalisierte Geschichte der Ideen der Frauen und Wissenschaftlerinnen gibt, ist selbst als ein Hinweis dafür, dass auch hier bei uns die Entrechtung der Frauen und die frauenlose Geschichte ein akzeptierter Teil unserer Kultur sind. Wider alle Erfahrung scheint das herrschaftsinszenierte Narrativ der „sprachlosen“ Frau auch heute noch zu überzeugen. Dabei zeigt die feministische Theorie die Spuren der Gewalt in Philosophie, Literatur und Wissenschaft, die zur Ausmerzung der Erinnerung an die Frauen und ihre Ideen geführt haben. Das sind Formen der kulturellen Ausgrenzung und der Gewaltanwendung gegen das Erbe der Frauen. Es geht um die Überwindung dieser bislang akzeptierten Gewalt gegen Frauen weltweit. Sie geht über alle Kulturen und alle Rassen und alle Klassen. Sie ist keine Erfindung des Westens. Und sie lebt an vielen Orten fort.

1.     Die Abwertung der Frauen als Zweck der Unterdrückung

Als Putin seinen Überfall auf die Ukraine begann, formulierte er seinen Einmarsch in die Ukraine mit einer Analogie. Es sei notwendig, eine Frau, die mit dem Feind flirte, zur Räson zu bringen. Gewalt hat einen sexualisierten Kontext, keine Frage. Es gibt viele Menschen, die Sexualität als Gewalt leben und jeder Mensch weiß, dass ein wesentlicher Teil des Krieges mit sexualisierter Gewalt einher geht. Der Raub der Frauen ist die Kriegstrophäe. Alle Versuche, dies abzuschaffen – denn faktisch, so scheint es, hat es ja nichts mit dem Krieg zu tun – scheitern. Die Übermannung des Körpers der Frau ist die Eroberung des Territoriums. Die Unterwerfung der Frau wird als Herrschaft, Recht und Religion zelebriert. Daher ist die Unterwerfung der Frauen nur der erste gewaltsame Schritt zur Unterwerfung aller, die sich dieser Form widersetzen. Im Iran haben alle verstanden, dass diese Politik mit den Frauen beginnt, aber alle betrifft.

Der Tod von Mahsa Amini hat Proteste von iranischen Frauen und Männern ausgelöst. Zwei Journalistinnen berichteten in den sozialen Medien über ihren Tod. Beide Journalisten wurden inhaftiert. Die Geschichte der Körper der Frauen und des Missbrauchs darf keine Öffentlichkeit finden. Es darf keine Geschichte der Frauen und ihrer Erfahrungen geben.

Auch in Europa gibt es keine Institution, in der das Unrecht der Erfahrungsgeschichte der Frauen dokumentiert und die Zeugnisse ihres Jahrhunderte langen Widerstandes archiviert werden. Diese Forderung ist jedoch zentral. Wir brauchen diese Geschichte als Gegenstand unserer Forschung und um aus dem erlebten Unrecht Lehren zu ziehen.

Im Gegenteil. Auch hier in der Mitte Europas werden seit Jahrhunderten die Lehren des heiligen Augustinus an den Universitäten repetiert, die erstaunliche Übereinstimmungen mit der Situation der Frauen im Iran zeigen. Augustinus Urteil über den Wert der Frau steht der Praxis der iranischen Theokraten kaum nach: Die Frau sei die Ursache des Bösen, sie sei die Sünde und verdient es, im Elend zu leben und zu gebären. Sie war es, die Adam verführt und die Menschheit um das Paradies gebracht habe. „Augustinus will uns glauben machen, dass Eva den schwachen und willenlosen Adam beherrschte, antwortet die kühne Isotta Nogarola (ca. 1460). Was Augustinus schreibe, sei aber Nonsens, er widerspreche sich und der Bibel und auch allem, was sie von den Humanisten als moralisch richtig gelernt habe. Augustinus aber behauptet, Adam sei ohne freien Willen sei; dies widerspricht jedoch der Bibel, dort stehe, Gott habe alle Menschen gleich und frei geschaffen.

Über Jahrhunderte haben die Denkerinnen den Widersinn hinter vermeintlich kunstfertigen Argumentationen zur Unterwerfung der Frau aufgezeigt. Archangela Tarabottis Ideen (um 1650) landen auf dem Index der verbotenen Bücher: Nach ihrer Überzeugung sei die Religion längst nicht mehr für den Glauben da, sie diene vielmehr als Funktionärin des patriarchalen Despotismus. Die Aufgabe der Religion und ihrer Vertreter sei es, die Frauen zu beherrschen, ihren Willen zu brechen und sie für ihre Zwecke zu missbrauchen.

Wäre unsere Welt eine andere, wenn das Erbe der Denkerinnen Teil unserer Kultur wäre? Sicher. Hätten wir eine europäische Geschichte der Philosophinnen, wären sie Teil unserer institutionellen Lehre, wären wir vielleicht besser gewappnet, Vorkommnissen, wie sie sich nun im Iran wiederholen, entgegen zu treten. Wenn diese Geschichte nicht bekannt ist, muss der Kampf der Frauen immer wieder von vorne begonnen werden.

Wem wird es also nutzen, die Geschichte der Ideen der Frauen endlich zu sammeln?

Es stellt einen bedeutenden Schritt auf dem Weg zur Aufklärung der Menschheit dar, zur Abschaffung des Missbrauchs und der gewaltvollen Unterwerfung. Eine ganze Tradition großartiger Denkerinnen würde unsere Kultur erneuern und unsere Jugend im Dienste der Aufklärung belehren, darin, dass Gewalt noch lange nicht Recht schafft. Es wäre sicherlich kein schlechterer Lehrplan als der herrschende.

Ruth E. Hagengruber on

“Why we need the legacy of women philosophers.”

A series of foundational texts by women philosophers from around the world is being published by De Gruyter, Women Philosophers Heritage Collection:

The history of philosophy is only half laid out. The voices of women who have shaped the history of ideas, who have fought for important achievements for freedom and equality, have been cut out. Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793) who fought for civil rights for women and men, and was then beheaded by Robespierre, rightly said: Brothers, you needed your sisters to break your chains. Now that you are free, you repel us.

We only know half the tradition of our cultural and scientific history. But half-truth is not truth. It is just as if Newton had measured his dynamics by only half the planets. How is a history supposed to be correct and how should a culture be able to develop sensibly if the ideas of women, who with their offspring are responsible for two thirds of humanity, are missing?

Where is this history, why are we not acquainted with it? Why do we teach Aristotle, Rousseau, Fichte, Kant, Russell, and postulate their ideas but not the teachings of En Hedu’Anna from Mesopotamia ( ca. 2300 BC), nor Christine de Pizan (around 1400), nor Emilie Du Châtelet (1706-1749) nor the writings of Pandita Ramabai Saraswati (1858-1922) or Elisabeth Constance Jones (1848-1922)?

Why do we not know this long story? Does it really exist? Even in the European tradition, the patriarchal narrative of a womanless cultural history continues to be told. “It was impossible for such a history to exist; women had been excluded from school and university,” the mainstream holds. This weak argument was not even convincing in 1745, when Jakob Brucker drafted his history of philosophy, in which he introduces female thinkers of his period and reputes his enemies: Wise women have always existed in all nations. The Chaldeans, Persians, Indians, Egyptians, Celts, … had no qualms about giving women a place among their sages.

Why don’t we know this history? For decades, there have been increased efforts to bring these women thinkers back into the cultural consciousness. Research has produced sound arguments showing that women participated in the development of philosophy and advanced the history of ideas. The teachers of Socrates and the legacy of ancient women thinkers,  whose wisdom is repeated in the famous “Know Thyself,” are still well known today. Du Châtelet’s ideas are echoed  in Kant, and Bertrand Russell finally admitted that he “took” important ideas from E.E.C. Jones. This “stolen history” must be brought back into our philosophical and scientific tradition. We need the women’s names. Will this change anything? Indeed. The inclusion of women will completely change our moral ideas and everything else will go from there.

So, what would be different, how would philosophy and science be altered?  The fact that there is no institutionalized history of the ideas of women, worldwide or even in Europe, is itself an indication that the disenfranchisement of women and the womanless history are an accepted part of our culture. Against all experience, the domination-staged narrative of the “speechless” woman still seems to be convincing today. Yet feminist theory shows the traces of violence in philosophy, literature and science that have led to the eradication of the memory of women and their ideas. These are forms of cultural exclusion and violence against  the heritage of women. They transcend all cultures, races and classes. This is not a particular invention of the West, and it still lives on in many places.

1.     The devaluation of women and the purpose of the oppression

When Putin began his assault on Ukraine, he formulated his invasion of Ukraine with an analogy. It was necessary to bring a woman who was flirting with the enemy to reason. Violence has a sexualised context, no question. There are many people who live sexuality as violence and every person knows that a significant part of war involves sexualised violence. The rape of women is the trophy of war. All attempts to eradicate this – because factually, it seems it has nothing to do with war – fail. The over-manning of the woman’s body is the conquest of territory. The subjugation of women is celebrated as domination, law and religion. Therefore, the subjugation of women is only the first violent step towards the subjugation of all who oppose this mould. In Iran, everyone has understood that this policy starts with women but affects everyone.

The death of Mahsa Amini has sparked protests from Iranian women and men. Two female journalists reported her death on social media. Both journalists have been imprisoned. There, the history of women’s bodies and abuse shall not be given publicity. There shall not be a history of the women and their experiences.

In Europe, too, however, there is no institution in which the injustice of women’s history of experience is documented and the testimonies of their centuries-long resistance are archived. However, this demand is central. We need this history as the subject of our research and to learn lessons from the experienced injustices.

On the contrary. Here in the centre of Europe, the teachings of St. Augustine have been repeated at the universities for centuries, presenting his judgments, which are astonishingly similar to those of Iranian theocracy and dominion. Augustine’s judgement on the value of women is hardly inferior to the practice of the Iranian theocrats: Woman, he says, is the root of evil, she is sinful and deserves to live and give birth in pain and misery. She seduced Adam and deprived humanity of paradise.  The bold Isotta Nogarola (c. 1460) takes up the argument: “Augustine wants us to believe that Eve dominated Adam, who was weak and had no will of his own.” But what Augustine writes is nonsense. He is contradicting himself and the Bible and all the morals she had ever learned. Augustine assumes Adam was without free will; this, however, contradicts the Bible, which claims that God created all human beings free and equal.

For centuries, women thinkers have pointed out the absurdity behind supposedly artful argumentations for the subjugation of women. Archangela Tarabotti’s ideas (around 1650) ended up on the index of banned books: according to her conviction, religion had long since ceased to exist for reasons of faith, but rather served as a functionary of patriarchal despotism. The task of religion and its representatives was to dominate women, to break their wills and to abuse them for its own purposes!

Would our world be a different place if the legacy of women thinkers were part of our culture? Certainly. If we had a European history of women philosophers, if they were part of our institutional doctrine, we might be better equipped to confront crimes such as those now being repeated in Iran. As this history is not known, the struggle of women must always start from the beginning.

Who will benefit from finally collecting the history of women’s ideas? It represents a significant step towards the enlightenment of humanity, towards the abolition of abuse and violent subjugation. A whole tradition of great women thinkers would renew our culture and instruct our youth in the service of enlightenment, teaching them that violence does not create justice. Such a curriculum would certainly not be worse than the prevailing one.

Find the Blog Post published at DeGruyter here.

Ruth E. Hagengruber: Podcast Europa neu denken 

ABSTRACT by Ruth E. Hagengruber

Women who are deprived of their histories can be compared to people who have lost their memories. They are unable to build a personal identity. This analogy may be the leading paradigm for my paper, which is primarily dedicated to epistemological questions. Throughout the last 40 years, many scholars have dedicated their endeavors to conserving the writings of women philosophers. Now we have access to valuable sources that show that the history of women philosophers stretches back as far as the history of philosophy itself. Using the history of women philosophers as a methodical approach to philosophy is a unique and indispensable means to widen and to change philosophical insights. Re-reading the history of philosophy and including the ideas of women philosophers, however, does not only add some more narratives but challenges the methodology of philosophy. The history of philosophy that we are traditionally educated in the western world is simply not true to the facts. Thus, I demand a rewriting of the history of philosophy that takes into account the ideas that are incorporated in the writings of women philosophers and that have been denied by the narratives and fabric of sexualized and patriarchally influenced thought.

Reference:

Hagengruber, R.E. (2020). The Stolen History—Retrieving the History of Women Philosophers and its Methodical Implications. In: Thorgeirsdottir, S., Hagengruber, R. (Eds.), Methodological Reflections on Women’s Contribution and Influence in the History of Philosophy. Women in the History of Philosophy and Sciences, vol 3. Springer, Cham.

SA 13, Oct 2019 PHILOSOPHIE Magazin Ruth Hagengruber INTERVIEW Die gestohlene Geschichte

Ruth E. Hagengruber on

“Elizabeth Minnich Reminds the Voice of Hannah Arendt. 75 Years End of the Nazi Regime.”

Natality brings newness into the world and gives us a chance for a fresh start…  the opposite of dictatorship and control … See the interview with Elizabeth Minnich on the occasion of 75 years end of Nazi regime in Germany, recorded May 8, 2020, with R.E. Hagengruber