Eugenie Schwarzwald

Eugenie Schwarzwald, (née Nußbaum) (4 July 1872, in Polupanivka near Zbruch River in Austria-Hungary (now Ternopil Raion, Ukraine)) and died on 7 August 1940, in Zurich, founded the innovative Schwarzwald school. A progressive Austrian philanthropist, writer and pedagogue, she developed education for girls in Austria and was one of the most learned women of her time.[1]

Eugenie Schwarzwald (in the 1920s)

Early life

Eugenie Nußbaum left home in 1895 and studied German and English literature, philosophy and pedagogy at the University of Zurich. She received her doctoral degree in 1900. At that time, women were not allowed to study at Austrian high schools and universities and Eugenie was one of the first academically educated women in Austria-Hungary. In 1900 she married Dr. Hermann Schwarzwald (1871–1939).

Innovative educator

Schwarzwald was known as an innovative educator.[2] In Austria, in 1901 she became head of the Girls' Secondary School and in 1911 of the Girls' College. Her aim was to offer an adequate and motivating secondary education to girls, comparable to that which was accessible to boys. To reach that goal, she engaged many contemporary, prominent artists and scientists to teach the girls. For example, Oskar Kokoschka gave lessons in drawing, Arnold Schönberg taught music and composition and Adolf Loos lectured on architecture. This school became a prototype of so-called Schwarzwald schools (Schwarzwaldschulen), modern schools for girls. She often spoke on gender equality to men at the Wiener Frauen Club. Among the famous students of the Schwarzwald schools were the art historian Emmy Wellesz[3] and the ethnologist Marianne Schmidl, who would become the first woman to receive a doctorate in ethnology from the University of Vienna.[4] During World War I, she devoted herself to caring for ill and elderly people as well as deprived children. She wrote newspaper articles, feuilletons and short essays.

Eugenie Schwarzwald (around 1904)

"Genia" Schwarzwald played an important part in Viennese cultural life and social events.[5] Like many of her contemporaries, she organised a literary salon where she invited Kokoschka, Loos or Schönberg as well as the novelists Elias Canetti and Robert Musil. She and Isadora Duncan inspired the character Ermelinda Tuzzi, "Diotima", in Musil's novel The Man Without Qualities.

Anschluss and Holocaust

In 1938, Schwarzwald was forced to leave Austria due to her Jewish ancestry and emigrated to Switzerland. Her assets were seized by Nazis, the Schwarzwald schools were closed, and many of her students, who were Jewish women, were murdered in the Holocaust.[6] She died in Zurich on 7 August 1940.[7]

See also

References
  1. "Eugenie Schwarzwald". Jewish Women's Archive. Retrieved 20 April 2021. In 1901, Eugenie Schwarzwald purchased a girls' secondary school in the center of Vienna, and founded the "Schwarzwald'sche school." Her students came mainly from rich assimilated Jewish families. Aware of the competition with other Viennese private girls' secondary schools, of which one-third were directed by Jewish women, Schwarzwald raised the flag for equal education for girls. The first round in her battle was to allow her students to enter the university. She initiated two additional advanced programs to the established six- year curriculum customary at secondary schools for girls: a three-year program enabling her students to enter university as auditors and a four-year program concluding with the A-level exams, which enabled them to register as university students. In 1903, she opened a coeducational primary school, later expanding it into a pre-school. In 1905, lacking a teaching diploma for secondary schools, she was forced to appoint an official director, while herself remaining the proprietor of the school. In 1911, Schwarzwald won the second and conclusive round in her battle, by opening an eight-years girls' gymnasium at her school. Aware of the latest European reform trends, Schwarzwald adapted ideas from popular educators such as the Austrian Franz Cižek (1865–1946), Italian Maria Montessori (1870–1952) and the German Hermann Lietz (1868–1919), applying their creative individual education practices. Among the famous teachers at her school were Hans Kelsen (1881–1973) sociology and political economy, Egon Wellesz (1885–1974) music, Otto Rommel (1880–1965) literature, Adolf Loos (1870–1933) modern architecture and Oskar Kokoschka (1886–1980) drawing.
  2. "Schwarzwald, Eugenie (1872–1940) | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 20 April 2021. Eugenie Schwarzwald, who would initiate an educational revolution in Vienna, was born Eugenie Nussbaum in 1872, not in the capital of the multinational Habsburg Empire but in Polupanowka, a small, nondescript town in the forested region of the Austrian province of Galicia
  3. "The long shadow of Emmy Wellesz" (PDF).
  4. Dokumentation, Österreichisches Biographisches Lexikon und biographische (2003). "Schmidl (Schmiedl), (Theresie) Marianne". ISBN 978-3-7001-3213-4 (in German). Retrieved 20 April 2021. Schmidl (Schmiedl) (Theresie) Marianne, Völkerkundlerin und Bibliothekarin. Geb. Berchtesgaden, Bayern (Deutschland), 3. 8. 1890; gest. vor 9. 5. 1945 (amtl. Todeserklärung vom 12. 5. 1950). Jüd. Herkunft, Tochter eines Wr. Hof- und Gerichtsadvokaten; evang. AB. Absolv. die unteren Gymn.Kl. am Schwarzwaldschen Mädchengymn. in Wien, die weiteren Jgg. in Graz. Ab 1910 stud. sie an der Univ. Wien Mathematik und Physik, u. a. bei F. Exner (s. d.) sowie Wilhelm Wirtinger, ab 1913 Ethnographie, Anthropol., Urgeschichte sowie Volkskde., v. a. bei R. Pöch, M. Hoernes und M. Haberlandt (alle s. d.); 1916 Dr. phil.
  5. Holmes, Deborah (2012), Bischof, Günter; Plasser, Fritz; Maltschnig, Eva (eds.), ""Genia" Schwarzwald and Her Viennese "Salon"", Austrian Lives, University of New Orleans Press, vol. 21, pp. 190–211, ISBN 978-1-60801-092-9, JSTOR j.ctt1n2txnx.12, retrieved 20 April 2021
  6. "Eugenie Schwarzwald, A Biography ... - National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism". www.nationalfonds.org. Retrieved 20 April 2021. Eugenie Schwarzwald, née Nussbaum, born on 4th July 1872 in Polupanowka near Tarnopol, Austria-Hungary and died on 7 August 1940 in Zurich, was an Austrian educationalist, social reformist and women's rights activist and is especially known for her pioneering work in the field of girls' education. From 1933, she helped refugees from Germany, from 1934 she also supported persecuted social democrats. In 1938, during a stay in Denmark, she was surprised by the Anschluss; she never returned to Vienna, instead she emigrated to Switzerland. In Austria, her entire assets were aryanized and her school was closed down; most students had to emigrate or were later murdered in the Shoah. Her husband was able to flee Austria to Switzerland in 1938 where he died in 1939.
  7. Haag, John (2002). "Schwarzwald, Eugenie". Women in World History, Vol. 14: Schu-Sui. Waterford, CT: Yorkin Publications. pp. 30–33. ISBN 0-7876-4073-5.


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