Ottilie Baaders Memoir Research Paper Essay

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Memoir #Ottilie Baader # Germany

Germany is a recognized industrial powerhouse in the world today. Most of its industrial growth occurred during the industrial revolution in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In her memoir, Ottilie Baader documents what it was like working as a seamstress in Berlin during this period. This text compares the descriptions presented in Baader's memoir with those presented by other scholars to determine whether there any differences and similarities.

Ottilie Baader's Memoir

Germany is a well-recognized industrial powerhouse in the world today. Its industrial development, like that of many countries in Europe, occurred gradually over the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This was made possible by the millions of men and women that gave their labor - those who carried the bricks, printed the books, hacked down the coal, sewed the shirt cuffs and collars, and laid down the railroad ties that facilitated the growth of the industrial sector in Germany. Ottilie Baader was one such woman, forced to work as a seamstress in multiple sewing factories in Berlin to support her siblings and ailing father. The source selected for this analysis is her memoir composed in 1921, in which she details how female workers such as herself were manipulated by Berlin factory owners and how they were forced to work under strenuous conditions at a degrading pay, until they finally learnt to stand up against gender --based oppression at the workplace.

Baader provides crucial insight on three core areas: i) the status of women in the German society; ii) their contribution to industrialization; and iii) the introduction and growth of the concept of unionization among female factory workers in Berlin. Literature presented in various history books and scholarly articles was reviewed to determine what other researcher say about the three areas above, and how those views align with, or differ from those put forth by Baader in her memoir. The review showed that Baader's descriptions about the role and place of the woman in the German society at the time are in fact in line with other available information.

The subsequent sections summarize the results of the conducted review. The first section draws comparisons between the descriptions provided by Baader in her memoir, and those provided by other researchers in relation to the evolving roles of men and women in the German society. The second section compares Baader's descriptions with those of other scholars in regard to the contribution of women in the process of industrialization in Europe. The final section examines what Baader says about unionization and the growth of union activity in Germany, vis-a-vis what other scholars say.

The Evolution of the Status of Women in Europe in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

Baader mentions that women were allowed to work in factories as long as they were unmarried and did not have children. Even when she and her sister were old enough to work for themselves, they had to stay unmarried in order to keep their jobs at the factory. Baader does not explain why this was so; however, a number of researchers have supported the view that this was because the European culture considered the place of women to be in the home.[footnoteRef:2] According to Duiker and Spielvogel, working-class organizations believed that allowing married women to take up roles in the workplace would ruin the physical and moral well-being of families given that women were supposed to stay at home to nurture their children and provide support to their husbands.[footnoteRef:3] [2: William Duiker and Jackson Spielvogel. The Essential World History Volume 2 (Boston, MA: Cengage Learning, 2010), 473.] [3: Ibid.]

Baader mentions that the invention of the sewing machine in 1860 opened up opportunities for more women to increase their participation in the sewing industry by working from home. However, there was a clear sexual division of labor, with the women often allocated secondary roles such as assembly and preparatory roles as the men took care of the main sewing roles. This view is supported by Kramarae and Spender, who posit that women working in European factories were given the lowest paid, semi-skilled and unskilled roles because of three major reasons.[footnoteRef:4] First, these roles were seen as extensions of their domestic tasks (tasks in the home).[footnoteRef:5] Secondly, women lacked training and skill on how to use new technology as such facilities were often reserved for men, who were viewed as the more important workers.[footnoteRef:6] Thirdly, it was feared that allocating women roles that were traditionally meant for men would threaten the position and superiority of the male species.

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[footnoteRef:7] [4: Cheris Kramarae and Dale Spender, Routledge International: Encyclopedia of Women: Global Women's Issues and Knowledge. (Oxon, UK: Routledge, 2004), 457. ] [5: Ibid. ] [6: Ibid.] [7: Ibid.,456. ]

In her book, D. Hafter explains that the secondary status of women in job-related roles in the European community in the 18th century extended even to family workshops and guild workshops.[footnoteRef:8] The men provided direction and management and made all decisions pertaining to the workshop.[footnoteRef:9] The wife and children were left to perform the unskilled, auxiliary duties.[footnoteRef:10] Women had no close connection with the production process.[footnoteRef:11] [8: Daryl Hafter, European Women and Preindustrial Craft (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1995), 43. ] [9: Ibid. ] [10: Ibid. ] [11: Ibid. ]

Baader agrees with other scholars that these roles continued to evolve, and in the course of time, the position of women in factories and in the guild workshop became more prominent.[footnoteRef:12] She mentions in her memoir that after working as a seamstress for some time, she was accorded an opportunity to receive training through a regular apprenticeship program. Moreover, she explains that more and more women began to be employed in sewing roles as opposed to being tied down to preparatory roles alone as had been the case in the eighteenth century and first half of the nineteenth century. [12: Ibid. ]

With the invention of the sewing machine in 1860, women such as Baader were able to use the training that they had received to improve their skill in the complex sewing roles that had traditionally been reserved for men. Women were able to establish their own trades, become bosses of guilds, and even make themselves master of textile crafts.[footnoteRef:13] Their legal status improved considerably.[footnoteRef:14] [13: Ibid., 144.] [14: Ibid.]

In the latter nineteenth century, men in Europe began to feel threatened by the rising status of women, and their continued occupation of traditional male roles. In a bid to enhance their position and control, they developed the 'family wage' concept and constituted trade unions to ensure that women's work remained inferior, and the separation between the public and domestic spheres was maintained. As a result, wage labor opportunities for women in sectors such as agriculture decreased, and most were forced to live in poverty.[footnoteRef:15] [15: Kramarae and Spender, Routledge International, 458. ]

Opportunities for women continued to shrink until the twentieth century, when the Second Revolution opened up new jobs for them.[footnoteRef:16] As Duiker and Spielvogel point out, the expansion of government services and development of larger industrial plants during the Second Revolution created a large number of white-collar jobs.[footnoteRef:17] Owing to the shortage of male workers, women landed opportunities as sales clerks, file clerks, secretaries, typists, telephone operators, teachers and nurses.[footnoteRef:18] [16: Duiker and Spielvogel, The Essential World History, 473. ] [17: Ibid. ] [18: Ibid. ]

The Impact of Women on Industrialization in Europe

One could ask 'did the status of women in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries contribute in any way to the process of industrialization?' In her memoir, Baader mentions that women often worked at a degrading pay, with most having to work as prostitutes at night to make some extra money. This view is supported by Kramarae and Spender, who suggest that women were accorded lower pay than men because they were considered inferior to them and lacking of the requisite skills and knowhow.[footnoteRef:19] With their low pay, women offered better prospects for employers than men, who demanded higher wages owing to the fact that they had a responsibility to support the family. Women thus contributed to industrialization in Europe owing to their low wages and less work-related demands. [19: Kramarae and Spender, Routledge International, 457. ]

This was, however, not the only way through which the status of women contributed to the process of industrialization. In their analysis seeking to establish why companies often preferred to employ women to men, D. Elson and R. Pearson found women to be naturally more docile, nimble-fingered, quick, and more disciplined than men.[footnoteRef:20] The authors attribute these qualities to women's mothering nature and their ability to carry out multiple tasks at the same time.[footnoteRef:21] These biological qualities make them more attractive employees than their male counterparts -- and this nurturing quality is drawn from their position in the home and in the domestic sphere.[footnoteRef:22] [20: Diane Elson and Ruth Pearson, "Nimble Fingers Make Cheap Workers: An Analysis of Women's.....

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