Queer Urbanisms in Wilhelmine and Weimar Germany: Of Towns and Villages

For a complete list of my publications (academic and otherwise), scroll further down.

This book explores the queer history of the easternmost provinces of the German Reich—regions that used to be German, but which now mostly belong to Poland—in the first third of the twentieth century, a period roughly corresponding to the duration of Germany's first queer movement (1897-1933). By focusing on middle- and small-sized cities and employing the concept of metronormativity, it deconstructs persistent myths and narratives about rural and urban spaces in order to expose the inadequacy and artificiality of that dichotomy and of the totality of related associations and stereotypes that this distinction entails—liberal/conservative, safe/dangerous, public/private, liberating/stifling and so on. The monograph is one of the very few works to examine queer history—that of spaces, culture, sociability and political groups specifically—from a geographical perspective and therefore follows the path set by groundbreaking works such as George Chauncey’s Gay New York, Matt Houlbrook’s Queer London or Robert Beachy’s Gay Berlin.

Praise for Queer Urbanisms in Wilhelmine and Weimar Germany:

Mathias Foit successfully questions the belief that most queer people gravitated to and prospered in larger cities and metropoles. By contrast, Foit's nuanced study draws attention to the impressive and surprising levels of queer social, cultural, and political organization in the smaller cities and towns of the eastern territories of Imperial and Weimar Germany.  This important monograph not only questions the historiographic emphasis on Germany's largest cities but should also inspire the study of what Foit describes as “historical queer geography.

Robert Beachy, Underwood International College, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea

In this richly detailed, absorbing account of trans*-inclusive queer histories in the Eastern provinces of the German Reich, Mathias Foit gives us craftsmanship at its best, showing us how much there is to gain from a shift in perspective. A must read for anyone interested in thinking about nation, region, and locality beyond Berlin.

Jennifer V. Evans, Carleton University, Canada

Drawing on a rich archive of queer magazines published in the first decades of the twentieth century, Mathias Foit reveals a remarkable picture of flourishing queer life in Eastern Germany at an important historical juncture. Working to critique metronormativity, and zooming in on “temporary sites of queer encounter and pleasure,” this book unearths the queer historical geography of this region and period, with far-reaching implications for rethinking queer geographies.

David Bell, University of Leeds, UK

A welcome addition to our understanding of modern metronormativity and its many discontents. Mathias Foit elegantly extends the scholarly record by looking within and beyond the queer and trans life-worlds of Weimar-era Berlin. Cultural historians across gender and sexuality studies, urban studies, rural studies, German studies, and print culture studies will embrace this book's page-after-page findings for an underexplored period and an eye-popping range of locales.

Scott Herring, Yale University, USA

Mathias Foit’s important study moves modern Germany LGBTQI+ history beyond the metropolis. Taking readers on a journey into the eastern provinces of Wilhelmine and Weimar Germany, it presents a fascinating picture of the richness and complexities of queer life in towns and villages outside of the today much more familiar queer territory of the city.

Heike Bauer, Birkbeck, University of London, UK

Mathias Foit’s study is an invaluable addition to ongoing discourses on queer Weimar studies. Detailed archival research meets extensive engagement with existing scholarship to open up new avenues of study for those interested in non-metropolitan queer urbanisms during the Weimar era.

Ervin Malakaj, The University of British Columbia, Canada

Mathias Foit has assembled a rich alternative archive from the national queer press of the German Reich containing a wealth of information about grassroots queer groups outside of the metropolis. What emerges from this research is a rigorous analysis of a hitherto unknown vibrant social scene existing in large towns but also surprisingly in smaller places, where queer life was often more evident back then than it is even today.

Douglas Pretsell, La Trobe University, Australia | (Click here to read Douglas Pretsell’s full review of my book)

List of publications

  • Work in Progress, Work on Progress: Beiträge kritischer Wissenschaft, Doktorand*innen-Jahrbuch 2022 der Rosa-Luxemburg Stiftung, eds. Baratz et al., Hamburg, VSA- Verlag, 2022.

  • Work in Progress, Work on Progress: Beiträge kritischer Wissenschaft, Doktorand*innen-Jahrbuch 2021 der Rosa-Luxemburg Stiftung, eds. Dalhoff et al., VSA-Verlag, 2021

| Edited collections

  • (forthcoming) “‘Miejsce spotkań homoseksualnie usposobionych mężczyzn po zmroku’. Diachroniczne spojrzenie na publiczną, męsko-męską kulturę seksualną w Breslau/Wrocławiu,” Odmieńczość, obywatelstwo seksualne, archiwum. Europa Środkowa w perspektywie porównawczej, eds. Basiuk et al., Warsaw, WUW, 2024.

  • “‘Manchmal glaubt man, die Hölle hat allen Insassen Urlaub erteilt’: Queere Stadtbilder der Ostgebiete des Deutschen Reichs und die Frage der Metronormativität,” Work in Progress, Work on Progress: Beiträge kritischer Wissenschaft, Doktorand*innen-Jahrbuch 2022 der Rosa-Luxemburg Stiftung, eds. Baratz et al., Hamburg, VSA- Verlag, 2022, pp. 202-217.[M_1] 

  • “‘Czasami zdaje się, że piekło udzieliło swym skazańcom przepustkę’: Odmieńcze pejzaże miejskie w Niemczech weimarskich a kwestia metronormatywności,” Interalia: A Journal of Queer Studies, no. 17 (2022), pp. 102-119.[M_2] 

  • “Recovered, or Not Recovered, That Is the Question, or Whose History Is It? Questions of Ownership and Nationalism in (Queer) History,” Work in Progress, Work on Progress: Beiträge kritischer Wissenschaft, Doktorand*innen-Jahrbuch 2020 der Rosa-Luxemburg Stiftung, eds. Gerbsch et al., Hamburg, VSA-Verlag, 2020, pp. 195-209.

| Academic articles

  • M. Foit et al, “Guaranteeing Green: Urban Sustainability, Citizen Participation And Green Spaces In Cities,” Global Research Academy (2023), Rethinking Sustainability in Urban Areas: São Paulo, London, Berlin. Technical Report RT-MAC-2024-01, Department of Computer Science, University of São Paulo.

| Chapters in books

| Popular historical articles

  • “Whose History is it? The Challenges and Paradoxes of Studying Queer History in a Neoliberal and Nationalist Context,” TRAFO – Blog for Transregional Research, https://trafo.hypotheses.org/33460 (24.2.2022).

| Blog entries

| Reviews

  • The Complete Works of Rosa Luxemburg Volume V: Political Writings 3, On Revolution 1910–1919, eds. Paul Le Blanc and Helen C. Scott, London, Verso Books, 2024[M_1] . (Translation into English of selected articles)

  • The Depiction of Poland and Poles in The Daily Telegraph, 2007-2010 by Dorota Kokowicz, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2019.

| Translations