Periodic Reporting for period 3 - ZARAH (Women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and transnationally, from the age of empires to the late 20th century)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2022-03-01 do 2023-08-31
ZARAH explores the history of women’s labour activism and organizing to improve labour conditions and life circumstances of lower- and working-class women and their communities – moving these women from the margins of labour, gender, and European history to the center of historical study.
ZARAH’s research rationale is rooted in the interest of the interaction of gender, class, and other dimensions of difference (e.g. ethnicity and religion) as forces that shaped women’s activism. It addresses the gender bias in labour history, the class bias in gender history, and the regional bias in European history. ZARAH conceives of women’s labour activism as emerging from the confluence of local, nation-wide, border-crossing, and international initiatives, interactions and networking. It studies this activism in the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires, the post-imperial nation states, and during the Cold War and the years thereafter. Employing a long-term and transregional perspective, ZARAH highlights how a history of numerous social upheavals, and changing borders and political systems shaped the agency of the women studied and examines their contribution to the struggle for socio-economic inclusion and the making of gender, labour, and social policies.
In terms of the forms of women’s labour organizing, ZARAH includes the study of informal collectives, solidarity networks, cooperatives, trade unions, political parties, and religious organizations. ZARAH studies women’s labour activism within both women’s networks and organizations and mixed-sex labour networks and organizations. In terms of the agendas of women’s labour activism, ZARAH takes into account activism addressing agrarian, industrial and office work, income-generating and unpaid work, problematizations of wage justice and ensuing claims, the politics of the double day, equal right to work, social and political rights, demands for better working conditions, and the issue of gender-inclusive trade union and labour education and organizing.
ZARAH is named after Zehra Kosova, a Turkish-Greek labour activist of the interwar period, and Sara Rokon Toth, a poor peasant woman and campaigner for peasant women’s and democratic rights in Hungary under the Habsburg Monarchy.
ZARAH’s research rationale is rooted in the interest of the interaction of gender, class, and other dimensions of difference (e.g. ethnicity and religion) as forces that shaped women’s activism. It addresses the gender bias in labour history, the class bias in gender history, and the regional bias in European history. ZARAH conceives of women’s labour activism as emerging from the confluence of local, nation-wide, border-crossing, and international initiatives, interactions and networking. It studies this activism in the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires, the post-imperial nation states, and during the Cold War and the years thereafter. Employing a long-term and transregional perspective, ZARAH highlights how a history of numerous social upheavals, and changing borders and political systems shaped the agency of the women studied and examines their contribution to the struggle for socio-economic inclusion and the making of gender, labour, and social policies.
In terms of the forms of women’s labour organizing, ZARAH includes the study of informal collectives, solidarity networks, cooperatives, trade unions, political parties, and religious organizations. ZARAH studies women’s labour activism within both women’s networks and organizations and mixed-sex labour networks and organizations. In terms of the agendas of women’s labour activism, ZARAH takes into account activism addressing agrarian, industrial and office work, income-generating and unpaid work, problematizations of wage justice and ensuing claims, the politics of the double day, equal right to work, social and political rights, demands for better working conditions, and the issue of gender-inclusive trade union and labour education and organizing.
ZARAH is named after Zehra Kosova, a Turkish-Greek labour activist of the interwar period, and Sara Rokon Toth, a poor peasant woman and campaigner for peasant women’s and democratic rights in Hungary under the Habsburg Monarchy.
ZARAH comprises, in addition to the PI, an international group of post-doctoral and doctoral researchers at CEU, distinguished by their excellent command of the history and languages of the region. ZARAH is a pioneering project consisting of a web of component and collaborative studies, which include all relevant groups of activists and activisms, span the entire region, and cover the period between the 1880s and the 1990s.
In autumn 2020 and 2021, ZARAH held its 1st and 2nd annual international workshop. During the annual international workshops, the ZARAH team discusses its approach and findings with external experts on the history of women’s labour activism internationally, in the ZARAH region, and in other countries and regions. ZARAH team members present elements of their component studies and the ZARAH collaborative work, and (depending on their preferences) the external experts may present their own work. Furthermore, the ZARAH team discusses core elements of the ZARAH collaborative work during the annual workshops, involving (if applicable) additional specialized experts. On 14-16 October 2021, ZARAH convened an invited contributors’ conference in Vienna. During the conference, which in the ZARAH memory lives as a truly motivating meeting significant for bringing together scholars from many countries and circles who study women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and beyond in the 19th and 20th centuries, the participants discussed more than two dozen papers.
In autumn 2020 and 2021, ZARAH held its 1st and 2nd annual international workshop. During the annual international workshops, the ZARAH team discusses its approach and findings with external experts on the history of women’s labour activism internationally, in the ZARAH region, and in other countries and regions. ZARAH team members present elements of their component studies and the ZARAH collaborative work, and (depending on their preferences) the external experts may present their own work. Furthermore, the ZARAH team discusses core elements of the ZARAH collaborative work during the annual workshops, involving (if applicable) additional specialized experts. On 14-16 October 2021, ZARAH convened an invited contributors’ conference in Vienna. During the conference, which in the ZARAH memory lives as a truly motivating meeting significant for bringing together scholars from many countries and circles who study women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and beyond in the 19th and 20th centuries, the participants discussed more than two dozen papers.
At mid-term, two milestones accomplished by ZARAH can be highlighted.
In July 2021, ZARAH’s open access database ZARAH DB went online. ZARAH DB is a collection of research data and reproductions of original documents, bringing together research data generated by the ZARAH team, and other key sources documenting women’ labour activism internationally and across the large region studied by ZARAH. English-language abstracts and keywords give information about each document. The database is searchable for chronology, events, places, activist individuals, and keywords contained in the metadata and the documents. The metadata and research data give results of the analysis of the documents through the lens of key categories in, and approaches to, the study of the history of women’s labour activism. ZARAH DB will be fed with documents and research data throughout the ZARAH research period (2020-2025). The database will remain online for another five years after the end of the project and be transferred to a scholarly repository upon completion. ZARAH DB forms part of a set of multi-language data assembling and sharing strategies which will strongly contribute to achieving the overall objectives of ZARAH.
The ZARAH publications (already published or under review by summer 2022) change our understanding of the historical development and relevance of labour and women’s movements in relation to the world of politics and the world of labour under vastly different political and economic circumstances. They show that women labour activists in the studied region from the early period onwards collaborated with each other across imperial and national borders, participated in transnational networks and international organizing, and exchanged information within and beyond the region. They revisit inherited chronologies of women’s activism and labour histories that too neatly identify or hastily generalize with regard to “peak moments” in women’s or workers’ organizing. Highlighting the complex repertoires and agendas women labour activists and professionals developed within the spaces available to them, the ZARAH publications constitute a rich historical-empirical and conceptual contribution to overcoming the under-representation of the region studied in European and transnational history and open up many paths for further research that will build and expand creatively on the web of ZARAH-generated scholarship.
ZARAH involves a strong dissemination component. Beyond their individual studies, the ZARAH team will publish a collaborative volume and an edited volume involving other scholars. The collaborative volume will discuss transversal findings and develop an account of long-term tendencies in the history of women’s labour activism in the region and transnationally. ZARAH’s dissemination strategies include a strong public history component. This includes a comprehensive open access volume published in a dozen languages and a public history website, both aimed at making research results available to broader publics, including civil society, women’s and labour organizations and networks concerned with working women’s rights and socio-economic inclusion.
In July 2021, ZARAH’s open access database ZARAH DB went online. ZARAH DB is a collection of research data and reproductions of original documents, bringing together research data generated by the ZARAH team, and other key sources documenting women’ labour activism internationally and across the large region studied by ZARAH. English-language abstracts and keywords give information about each document. The database is searchable for chronology, events, places, activist individuals, and keywords contained in the metadata and the documents. The metadata and research data give results of the analysis of the documents through the lens of key categories in, and approaches to, the study of the history of women’s labour activism. ZARAH DB will be fed with documents and research data throughout the ZARAH research period (2020-2025). The database will remain online for another five years after the end of the project and be transferred to a scholarly repository upon completion. ZARAH DB forms part of a set of multi-language data assembling and sharing strategies which will strongly contribute to achieving the overall objectives of ZARAH.
The ZARAH publications (already published or under review by summer 2022) change our understanding of the historical development and relevance of labour and women’s movements in relation to the world of politics and the world of labour under vastly different political and economic circumstances. They show that women labour activists in the studied region from the early period onwards collaborated with each other across imperial and national borders, participated in transnational networks and international organizing, and exchanged information within and beyond the region. They revisit inherited chronologies of women’s activism and labour histories that too neatly identify or hastily generalize with regard to “peak moments” in women’s or workers’ organizing. Highlighting the complex repertoires and agendas women labour activists and professionals developed within the spaces available to them, the ZARAH publications constitute a rich historical-empirical and conceptual contribution to overcoming the under-representation of the region studied in European and transnational history and open up many paths for further research that will build and expand creatively on the web of ZARAH-generated scholarship.
ZARAH involves a strong dissemination component. Beyond their individual studies, the ZARAH team will publish a collaborative volume and an edited volume involving other scholars. The collaborative volume will discuss transversal findings and develop an account of long-term tendencies in the history of women’s labour activism in the region and transnationally. ZARAH’s dissemination strategies include a strong public history component. This includes a comprehensive open access volume published in a dozen languages and a public history website, both aimed at making research results available to broader publics, including civil society, women’s and labour organizations and networks concerned with working women’s rights and socio-economic inclusion.