[Reader-list] The first known lesbian activist/1900s
Shveta
shveta at sarai.net
Wed Jun 21 11:32:43 IST 2006
[October 8, 1904]
"In middle-class circles they believe, oddly enough,
that among them homosexuality has no place, and from these circles
the most annoying enemies recruit each other to oppose the movement
to free Uranian people. I would like to give as an example, that my
father, when by chance he came to speak about homosexuality,
explained with conviction, "nothing of the sort can happen in my
family." The facts prove the opposite. I need to add nothing to that
statement."
With this century-old utterance, Anna Rüling became the first known
Lesbian activist.
http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/uraniamanuscripts/anna.html
May be of interest.
best
shveta
---
Anna Rueling
http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/uraniamanuscripts/anna.html
*Anna Rüling
(Theo Anna Sprüngli)
August 15, 1880 (Hamburg) - May 8, 1953 (Delmenhorst)
First Known Lesbian Activist *
*/100 Years of Lesbian Activism/
by Michael Lombardi-Nash
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index%3Dbooks%26field-author%3DLombardi-Nash%2C%20Michael%20A./102-6850356-3473720>,
Ph.D.
for Paul J. Nash
<http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/uraniamanuscripts/paul.html>*
Lesbian Love "In middle-class circles they believe, oddly enough,
that among them homosexuality has no place, and from these circles
the most annoying enemies recruit each other to oppose the movement
to free Uranian people. I would like to give as an example, that my
father, when by chance he came to speak about homosexuality,
explained with conviction, "nothing of the sort can happen in my
family." The facts prove the opposite. I need to add nothing to that
statement."
With this century-old utterance, Anna Rüling became the first known
Lesbian activist.
Very recently more has become known about Anna Rüling. She gave her
interesting and expressive speech, "What Interest does the Women's
Movement have in Solving the Homosexual Problem?
<http://lesbianalliance.com/content.cfm?cat=legal&sub=legal&file=annaspeech>"
on October 8, 1904, at the Prinz Albrecht Hotel in Berlin. She was
invited to give her address at the annual meeting of the Scientific
Humanitarian Committee. The Committee, the first Gay organization in
world history, was established in Berlin in 1897 by Magnus Hirschfeld.
In her speech, Rüling brought Gay rights and women's rights under
one umbrella. She congratulated the Committee for its support of
women's rights and for including Lesbians in its fight for equal
rights. Such support by men and the inclusion of Lesbians in
homosexual interests, according to Rüling, had been sadly neglected.
Because the involvement of Lesbians in the Women's Movement
continues to be as great an issue a century after the delivery of
Rüling's speech, it is important that people today know what she had
to say.
Sagaris or double axe - an androgynous symbol of all gynocratic
nationsUntil relatively recently, very little had been written about
the Women's Movement, and those writings that did exist concerning
women's issues most often had been authored by men. As it is, there
are few writings that directly treat the subject of the Gay Movement
as it affects the Women's Movement.
On the very outset of her speech Rüling makes the point that women
are considered only as an afterthought even in the fight for equal
rights. Although she is not complaining, she indicates that it is
due to the lack of laws against the practice of sexual acts between
women that has kept them on the sidelines of the fight for sexual
liberty as it concerns the love between women. Rüling uses the terms
"homosexuality," the word coined by Karoly Maria Kertbeny in 1868,
and "Uranism," coined by Karl Heinrich Ulrichs
<http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/celebration2000> in 1862.
It is interesting to see Rüling using the same economic and social
ideas that are current today in the attempt to present the
circumstances which separate men and women in the workplace and in
the home. She speaks about stereotypes and stigmas and which kinds
of jobs are said to be fit for which sex. She denies the
conventional roles in a way that is so totally modern that the
reader would almost believe the speech, written one hundred years
ago, was for presentation to a contemporary audience.
Then, on the other hand, Rüling makes remarks about conjugal unions
between homosexuals and heterosexuals that might be difficult to
accept today. While it is true that such unions may cause misery, as
she says, it is not believed today that the offspring would be any
more unloved or unfortunate or become "... weak-minded, idiotic,
epileptic, chest-diseased degenerates of all sorts..." accompanied
by "unhealthy sexual drives such as sadism and masochism."
Today's readers might question which side Rüling is on at this
point; however, when they understand that many of the physicians and
psychiatrists of her day diagnosed "homosexuality" and "uranism" to
be exactly as Rüling describes the offspring, a morbid brood indeed,
they will see that she is just trying to persuade people from
falling into the trap of marriage for convenience and ones entered
into when giving into the pressures of society.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Read More about Anna!
<http://www.thirdspace.ca/articles/3_2_gerodetti.htm>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Later in the speech, Rüling points to the fact of the inability to
change sexual orientation by force and the inability of parents to
know the sexual orientation of their children. Here is a woman who
already knew the humane treatment of Gay children. Her answer to any
problem concerning the sexuality of children: love and understanding.
One notes that Rüling distinguishes between three individuals. She
says that "men, women, and homosexuals" are different and should
have equal opportunities in education and in the job market. Rüling,
her contemporaries, and her predecessors believed in the existence
of a third sex, a Gay sex.
Yet for all her understanding and importance it is interesting to
note that Rüling is not mentioned in the introduction to Ilse
Kokula's / Weibliche Homosexualität um 1900 in zeitgenössischen
Dokumenten / (Female Homosexuality Around 1900 in Contemporary
Documents), published in 1981, even though Helene Stöcker, the only
leading women in the Women's Movement who was a member of the
Hirschfeld Committee, is mentioned. However, Kokula does reprint
Rüling's speech. On the other hand, Simone de Beauvoir does use
Rüling as a reference in her book, / Le Deuxième Sexe / (The Second
Sex), published in 1949. The only other indication of the importance
of Rüling's speech is the appearance of a second (after mine)
translation of her speech by Lillian Faderman and Brigitte Eriksson.
Unfortunately, Faderman and Eriksson, limiting their comments solely
to her speech, shed no light on the life of Rüling.
As a note of interest, only in a roundabout way can the reader of
Rüling's speech deduce Rüling's sexuality. She says that her father
was wrong in stating that no homosexuality could appear in her
family. The reader can only guess from this statement that she is
admitting to being Lesbian.
Also, nothing is known about Rüling's position in the Women's
Movement. She is not counted among the leadership or even as
belonging to the active membership. Perhaps, in this case, her
position is unimportant. Nevertheless, she does deserve the careful
attention of today's Gay and non-Gay readership, because her idea,
that both the Women's Movement and the Gay Movement together one day
would raise their banners in victory, remains the dream of many Gay
and non-Gay people. Because the Equal Rights Amendment has yet to be
passed, Rüling's enthusiastic speech can still play an active role
in the endless battle against bigotry and sex discrimination in
general and male chauvinism in particular.
Postscript
In a private email, Claude Summers wrote that Rüling published a
volume including short stories in 1906 and that Bonnie
Zimmerman's /Lesbian Histories and Cultures: An Encyclopedia/
(New York: Garland Publishing, 2000), includes an article on
Rüling by Hanna Hacker, an Austrian writer.
Also, Ralf at the Berlin Hirschfeld Society says in an email
that his "colleague Christiane Leidinger has solved the
biographical riddle of Anna Rueling." Leidinger's article is
published in the December 2003 issue of the /Mitteilungen der
Magnus-Hirschfeld-Gesellschaft/
<http://www.hirschfeld.in-berlin.de/mitteilungen.html#nr35>"
(Reports of the Magnus Hirschfeld Society):
Christiane Leidinger, "Theo A[nna] Sprüngli (1880-1953)
alias Anna Rüling/Th. Rüling/Th. A. Rüling - erste
biographische Mosaiksteine zu einer zwiespältigen Ahnin
lesbischer herstory." (The First Biographical Mosaic of a
Conflicted Forebear of Lesbian Herstory).
Bibliography:
Rüling, Anna. /What Interest does the Women's Movement have in
Solving the Homosexual Problem? / 1905; trans. M. Lombardi-Nash.
F 1978; 2nd ed. Jacksonville, Florida: Urania Manuscripts, 2000.
Source of the translation:
Rüling, Anna. "Welches Interesse hat die Frauenbewegung an der
Lösung des homosexuellen Problems? Eine Rede." /Jahrbuch für
sexuelle Zwischenstufen unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der
Homosexualität / (Annual for Sexual Intermediaries with Special
Emphasis on Homosexuality) ed. Magnus Hirschfeld, vol. 7 (1905),
pp. 131-51.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"1904: The First Lesbian Feminist Speaks." /The Gay & Lesbian
Review/ <http://www.glreview.com>, May-June 2004: 31-34.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Other translations:
Faderman, Lillian and Brigitte Eriksson, eds. and transs.
/Lesbian-Feminism in Turn-of-the-Century Germany: Stories and
Autobiographies/. Weatherby Lake, MO: The Naiad Press, Inc.,
1980. Reprinted in Mark Blasius and Shane Phelan, eds., /We Are
Everywhere: A Historical Sourcebook of Gay and Lesbian Politics/
(New York: Routledge, 1997), pp. 143-150.
Fiorentini, Isa. Che interesse ha il movimento delle donne a
risolvere il problema omosessuale? (www.fuorispazio.com), 2003.
Available now!
* Ridinger, Rob. /Speaking for Our Lives: Historic Speeches
and Rhetoric for Gay and Lesbian Rights/1892-2000 /
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1560231742/qid=1074372036/sr=1-4/ref=sr_1_4/104-6787909-4728731?v=glance&s=books>.
New York: Haworth Press, January 2004. [Reprint of
Rüling's speech in English, among other Gay and Lesbian
speeches and rhetoric]
* Anna Rueling's speech online in the original German
version
<http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/uraniamanuscripts/annadt.html>:
"Welches Interesse hat die Frauenbewegung an der Lösung
des homosexuellen Problems?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Anna Rueling's Speech Online!*
Women's Movement activist Irene at undelete.org in Arkansas put
Anna's speech online in English:
What Interest Does the Women's Movement Have in Solving the
Homosexual Problem? <http://www.undelete.org/library/library020.html>
Anna at Fuorispazio (OutSpace), an Italian website, had Isa
Fiorentini translate Anna's speech into Italian:
Che interesse ha il movimento delle donne a risolvere il problema
omosessuale?
<http://www.fuorispazio.net/def_show.php?f=/_archivio/Aprile,Maggio,Giugno_2003/idivita_aruling.html>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friends of Anna Rüling (links)
* MetroG (Southern California).
<http://www.metrog.com/headline/articles03/050103_annaruling.html>
* Lesbian Worlds
<http://www.lesbianworlds.com/features/history.htm>
* Suite 101 <http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/lesbian_issues>
* Lesbian Alliance
<http://lesbianalliance.com/content.cfm?cat=legal&sub=legal>
* Wolfram Setz (Munich)
<http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/celebration2000/setz.html>
* Massimo Consoli (Rome)
<http://www.angelfire.com/fl3/celebration2000/intro.html>
* The Lovely Lesbian
<http://www.angelfire.com/folk/lovelylesbian/essay11.html>
* Acción Violeta
<http://mx.groups.yahoo.com/group/accionvioleta/message/2489>
* Life on Brian's Beat
<http://www.web.apc.org/%7Ejharnick/cemetary.html>
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