”Warum noch länger die demütige Magd, die ihrem Herrn die Füße wäscht?“

Mathilde Franziska Anneke’s Feminist Manifest Das Weib im Conflict mit den socialen Verhältnissen (1847)

Abstract

Mathilde Franziska Anneke (1817-1884) was one of few women who have shaped German immigrant life in America during the second half of the 19th century. The Forty-Eighter, writer, and educator founded the first German-language Frauenzeitung in the U.S., and her network of correspondents included Susan B. Anthony.  

The article sheds light on Mathilde Anneke as a “new woman” who broke with traditional norms of gender and sexuality. She divorced her first and abusive husband at the age of 20, raising her daughter alone before marrying Fritz Anneke with whom she had more children. This paper focuses on Mathilde's feminist essay Das Weib im Conflict mit den socialen Verhältnissen (1847). This text is a testament to her ideals and values, most of all her life-long fight for women’s rights. In this manifest, Mathilde envisions the “new woman” who would break out of the cage of male supremacy and demand equal rights. While Mathilde Anneke did not live to see the suffragist movement succeed, she made significant contributions to the early feminist movement, and she did so through her writing.