Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Monday, February 26, 2007
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
History of the party!
I didn't want to be one of those serious, bummer grad students who teach summer classes on mass murder and all that in unairconditioned rooms. I wanted to be fun and hip. I wanted my dissertation to be, like, the history of the party.
Happy times!
Like, "In the 18th Century, parties were considered to be universal, but then in the 19th C with the rise of the new "science" partyology, parties were thought to be biologically based but, with the invention of making out and the cocktail, began to totally rock!" Etc.
You know, dancing naked nuns. Yeah?
Anyway, but now I am reading all this stuff on a bummer topic. Yes, it's sterilization. "Voluntary" sterilization. When you are talking about "voluntary" sterilization with the word 'voluntary' in quotation marks, that is no party man. People say, 'what are you up to?' and I get all agitated telling about "voluntary" sterilization. With 'voluntary' in quotation marks. Hand-signal quotation marks. Yikes.
Happy times!
Like, "In the 18th Century, parties were considered to be universal, but then in the 19th C with the rise of the new "science" partyology, parties were thought to be biologically based but, with the invention of making out and the cocktail, began to totally rock!" Etc.
You know, dancing naked nuns. Yeah?
Anyway, but now I am reading all this stuff on a bummer topic. Yes, it's sterilization. "Voluntary" sterilization. When you are talking about "voluntary" sterilization with the word 'voluntary' in quotation marks, that is no party man. People say, 'what are you up to?' and I get all agitated telling about "voluntary" sterilization. With 'voluntary' in quotation marks. Hand-signal quotation marks. Yikes.
Friday, February 9, 2007
The Nun
12 March 1920. Berlin Club for Fighting Public Immorality, (Berliner Verein zur Bekaempfung der oeffentlichen Unsittlichkeit), writing to the Prussian Justice Minister.
We’re fighting “shamelessness” and “perversity” in public, which is the “order of the day” in Berlin and increasingly brings us to international attention…from Berlin the filth flows “over the whole of Germany.”
...we have already complained about Celly de Rheidt. The “naked nun” dance has been forbidden by the police, but the “scandal of the naked dance” continues to be tolerated. Now she’s filmed her dance. Via the film, it will be disseminated “throughout all of Germany and beyond.” This is a big problem, causing us “great pain.” Isn’t there any government agency that will take steps to prevent this?
29 April 1920.
Same club writing to complain about the “scandal” of Celly de Rheidt performance: "why isn’t this scandal being brought quickly to an end?”
24 Aug. 1920. Prosecutor's office, preliminary investigation/proceedings against Celly de Rheidt.
Her dance as a nun is just an excuse for nudity. The environment of the club where the performance takes place makes the offensiveness even stronger—it is cabaret seats 100 people the club charges high prices, champagne is served there, clearly the audience is not there to view art.
District Court (Landgericht) I, Berlin. Decision 21 Jan. 1922 to convict de Rheidt, her husband/manager and sundry other people of spreading obscenity.
“Die Nonne.” A young nun, (played by Celly de Rheidt) is accused of breaking her vow of chastity. She’s to be tossed out of the convent. She flees into the church. A Virgin Mary statue (portrayed by a dancer) comes alive and she dances with it. She finally removes her clothes and stands fully naked in front of the statue, which raises its hand to bless her. Then the nun turns around and the viewer can see her completely naked body from the front...“she sinks, in her nudity, in front of the alter,” clinging to a crucifix…Viewer’s gaze is drawn to her navel, breasts and uncovered crotch (Scham)….this film aroused ire in many religious circles.
In most dances in the film, upper bodies of dancers are naked or barely clad; breasts “clearly recognizable"….no artistic value in film…the film is as obscene as the ballet on the stage.
De Rheidt was fined 21,000 Marks; her fine was reduced significantly on appeal.
[GStAPK I. HA Rep. 84 a Justiziministerium Nr. 8100]
We’re fighting “shamelessness” and “perversity” in public, which is the “order of the day” in Berlin and increasingly brings us to international attention…from Berlin the filth flows “over the whole of Germany.”
...we have already complained about Celly de Rheidt. The “naked nun” dance has been forbidden by the police, but the “scandal of the naked dance” continues to be tolerated. Now she’s filmed her dance. Via the film, it will be disseminated “throughout all of Germany and beyond.” This is a big problem, causing us “great pain.” Isn’t there any government agency that will take steps to prevent this?
29 April 1920.
Same club writing to complain about the “scandal” of Celly de Rheidt performance: "why isn’t this scandal being brought quickly to an end?”
24 Aug. 1920. Prosecutor's office, preliminary investigation/proceedings against Celly de Rheidt.
Her dance as a nun is just an excuse for nudity. The environment of the club where the performance takes place makes the offensiveness even stronger—it is cabaret seats 100 people the club charges high prices, champagne is served there, clearly the audience is not there to view art.
District Court (Landgericht) I, Berlin. Decision 21 Jan. 1922 to convict de Rheidt, her husband/manager and sundry other people of spreading obscenity.“Die Nonne.” A young nun, (played by Celly de Rheidt) is accused of breaking her vow of chastity. She’s to be tossed out of the convent. She flees into the church. A Virgin Mary statue (portrayed by a dancer) comes alive and she dances with it. She finally removes her clothes and stands fully naked in front of the statue, which raises its hand to bless her. Then the nun turns around and the viewer can see her completely naked body from the front...“she sinks, in her nudity, in front of the alter,” clinging to a crucifix…Viewer’s gaze is drawn to her navel, breasts and uncovered crotch (Scham)….this film aroused ire in many religious circles.
In most dances in the film, upper bodies of dancers are naked or barely clad; breasts “clearly recognizable"….no artistic value in film…the film is as obscene as the ballet on the stage.
De Rheidt was fined 21,000 Marks; her fine was reduced significantly on appeal.
[GStAPK I. HA Rep. 84 a Justiziministerium Nr. 8100]
Monday, February 5, 2007
Thursday, February 1, 2007
Another application
Your Small American
Application to the 2007-2008 ____________
Communities, Research, Action, and Community Research/Action in Berlin, 1918-1933
My project for the 2007-2008 X$#%* seminar will investigate the seminar’s theme of “Communities: Research and Action” through the lens of my dissertation project, which is an analysis of communities of sexually unorthodox people, their research, their action, and what I argue was their “research/action” in Berlin during the Weimar Republic. My dissertation asks, “What is community?” and answers that question by examining two key components of community: research and action. For example, members of Berlin’s lesbian, gay and transvestite communities engaged in research that led to action. This, I argue, was “research/action.” Activists such as Magnus Hirschfeld, German homosexual celebrity, renowned in Europe and North American(1) as a sex scientist, founder of his own research institute in the Tiergarten and swingin’ transvestite, researched the sexuality of other people and then took action by dressing up as women. The police thought Hirschfeld was running a brothel(2) but he was actually running a research institute. My dissertation asks “and why is that so often the case??” and you will too, when you read my seminar project, “Communities, Research, Action, and Community Research-Action.”
I would be an upstanding member of this seminar because I have participated in many seminars, as well as in communities, in research, and naturally also in action. My deep interest in receiving the $5,000 stipend for participating in this seminar will allow me to bring to the seminar an interdisciplinary perspective on communities, research and action, and also to buy milk frother. My new milk frother will, indeed, bring to the seminar its interdisciplinary perspective on the actions of milk frothing and coffee drinking in the formation of communities of lesbians, gay men and transvestites in Berlin and elsewhere. I am sincerely committed to the concept of receiving $5,000, thereby putting my research into the action of buying clothing, food and, indeed, a milk frother, and look forward to participating in the important work of the seminar, which will contribute a new perspective to scholarship on communities, their research and their action.
1 By which I mean, North American except for Mexico and probably not most of Canada, but maybe Toronto.
2 Really!
Application to the 2007-2008 ____________
Communities, Research, Action, and Community Research/Action in Berlin, 1918-1933
My project for the 2007-2008 X$#%* seminar will investigate the seminar’s theme of “Communities: Research and Action” through the lens of my dissertation project, which is an analysis of communities of sexually unorthodox people, their research, their action, and what I argue was their “research/action” in Berlin during the Weimar Republic. My dissertation asks, “What is community?” and answers that question by examining two key components of community: research and action. For example, members of Berlin’s lesbian, gay and transvestite communities engaged in research that led to action. This, I argue, was “research/action.” Activists such as Magnus Hirschfeld, German homosexual celebrity, renowned in Europe and North American(1) as a sex scientist, founder of his own research institute in the Tiergarten and swingin’ transvestite, researched the sexuality of other people and then took action by dressing up as women. The police thought Hirschfeld was running a brothel(2) but he was actually running a research institute. My dissertation asks “and why is that so often the case??” and you will too, when you read my seminar project, “Communities, Research, Action, and Community Research-Action.”
I would be an upstanding member of this seminar because I have participated in many seminars, as well as in communities, in research, and naturally also in action. My deep interest in receiving the $5,000 stipend for participating in this seminar will allow me to bring to the seminar an interdisciplinary perspective on communities, research and action, and also to buy milk frother. My new milk frother will, indeed, bring to the seminar its interdisciplinary perspective on the actions of milk frothing and coffee drinking in the formation of communities of lesbians, gay men and transvestites in Berlin and elsewhere. I am sincerely committed to the concept of receiving $5,000, thereby putting my research into the action of buying clothing, food and, indeed, a milk frother, and look forward to participating in the important work of the seminar, which will contribute a new perspective to scholarship on communities, their research and their action.
1 By which I mean, North American except for Mexico and probably not most of Canada, but maybe Toronto.
2 Really!
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