On the occasion of the German Diversity Day the University of Applied Sciences Schmalkalden hosts the exhibition "Women in Divided Germany" by the Federal Foundation for the Study of the Communist Dictatorship in Germany. The English version of the exhibition is on display at the WORT office (Auer Gasse 12, Schmalkalden) during office hours. The German version can be seen at the campus library (building I).

What is the exhibition about?

The division of Germany has been history for over three decades. Nevertheless, there are still many clichés that are attributed to women from East and West Germany. The western woman is often described as either a house mom or a tough career woman. The East German woman, on the other hand, stands her ground in coal mining. She is described as tough or as a callous mother because she puts her children in a nursery. Eastern women are sometimes seen as losers, sometimes as winners of German unity. The list of attributions is long. Although some of them are grotesquely contradictory, they all testify to the conviction that we all seem to know the specifics of THE Eastern woman and THE Western woman. Where do these attributions come from? And what is true about them? The exhibition “Women in Divided Germany” aims to answer these questions. The aim of the exhibition is to make the diverse experiences of women visible and to show the similarities and differences between their German-German lives. At the same time, the exhibition raises the question of whether women in the two German states shared a common striving for self-determination in a male-dominated society, despite the different political and social conditions.