Submitting Blochmann as a DPhil Proposal

As an undergraduate student, I was once told never to start an essay by stating how difficult it is to write an essay. But I must say that it was very difficult to write my PhD proposal on Elisabeth Blochmann. 

There are several strands in this story and I can never know which one to pull. At face-value, this project is a socio-cultural history and would probably be most at home in the history of gender in 20th century German higher-education. However, it is also an intellectual biography of a scholar in dialogue with the most important minds of the 20th century. The question of her reception (or lack thereof) should be assessed both in terms of her relatively limited creative output as well as the socio-cultural and political realities of the era. Not to mention the added dimension of Blochmann's German-Jewish identity and experience as a refugee in England. In light of this complexity, I found it challenging to summarize Elisabeth Blochmann project in 1,000 words. 

This also deviates significantly from both my previous fields of study. In my undergraduate degree, my thesis concentrated on the development of the 17th century French Provincial Book World (see a summary on French History). I made a leap into the social sciences for my masters' in education and had a cursory introduction to pedagogical theory and philosophy. And I have some experience working with primary sources in a second-language though my German is lacking. Even with the current fashion of 'interdisciplinary', this project is a very awkward sell. 

For posterity, I've included some of the text of my DPhil proposal below. I applied in the Faculty of History at the University of Oxford for 2023 entry. I'm eternally grateful to those who supported my application. 

When Elisabeth Blochmann died in 1972, she was the first and only woman in Germany to hold a chair in education—a position she held for over twenty years. [1] Referred to as ‘The First Lady of Academic Pedagogy’, Blochmann’s scholarship and impact in the field of social pedagogy has been noted by her contemporaries. [2] Yet today, Blochmann is best known as a colleague and companion of the philosopher, Martin Heidegger as well as the biographer of Herman Nohl. [3] The letters between Blochmann and Heidegger, spanning the years 1918 until 1969, offer a unique insight into Heidegger’s political worldview—in particular, his perspective on the role of universities during the rise of National Socialism. [4] Blochmann’s letters are fewer in number and, as is noted in the edition of their correspondence, ‘a lot-if not everything’ is known about Heidegger but ‘only the initiates know of Blochmann.’ [5]

Born in 1892 to an upper-middle class German-Jewish family in Weimar, Blochmann attained a high level of education, earning a doctorate in history in 1923. [6] Dismissed as a Professor of Social Pedagogy at an Academy in Halle due to her Jewish ancestry, Blochmann relied on Heidegger’s reference to begin a new academic career as tutor of German at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. [7] As a refugee, she was involved in the German Educational Reconstruction (GER) movement led by other emigres in England (including Karl Mannheim and Fritz Borinski), despite earlier sympathies for National Socialist interpretations of social pedagogy. [8] In 1947, she naturalized as a British citizen and was subsequently commissioned by her mentor Herman Nohl, to write a comparative study of English and German education, ultimately producing nine articles. [9] Blochmann remained sympathetic towards her native Germany all her life, returning in 1952 as chair of education at the University of Marburg. [10] Heidegger frequently expressed his admiration for Blochmann’s professional accomplishments as a professor of academic pedagogy ‘taking part in shaping the future of the German woman and in overcoming the distress of the children of an unemployed people.’ [11] My thesis will offer the first serious comprehensive assessment of Blochmann’s corpus of literature in the field of social pedagogy (Sozialpädagogik).

Blochmann wrote about and for the education women and children—in particular education as a sine qua non for the formation of the German national psyche (Volksgeist)—across three distinct political eras in her native Germany (Weimar, National Socialist, Post-War West German). This thesis endeavours to present an intellectual biography in the style of recent contemporary scholarship in the field [...] [12]

This thesis will rely on both English and German sources including original primary source material. In October 2022, I discovered a series of letters and personal affects, belonging to Blochmann, in the Bodleian Library Special Collections. These were stored in the archive for the Council for at-Risk Academics (CARA). [13]

I also found material in the archives of Lady Margaret Hall. [14] These documents have not yet been treated in German scholarship. Over the past few months, with the permission of CARA, I have studied, assessed, and digitized these documents, which offer a wealth of insight on modern German social pedagogy and the history of women’s education. In addition to these materials, I have identified the relevant German archives where Blochmann’s writings are featured. [15] 

References

1 Juliane Jacobi, ‘Elisabeth Blochmann Zum 100. Geburtstag’, Neue Sammlung: Vierteljahres-Zeitschrift Für Erziehung Und Gesellschaft 32 (1992): p. 317, https://publishup.uni-potsdam.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/3757.

2 Juliane Jacobi, ‘Elisabeth Blochmann: First-Lady Der Akademischen Padagogik’, in Mütterlichkeit Als Profession? Lebensläufe Deutscher Pädagoginnen in Der Ersten Hälfte Dieses Jahrhundert, ed. Ilse Brehmer (Pfaffenweiler, 1990), p. 256, https://d-nb.info/1218391766/34.

3 J. W. Storck, Martin Heidegger–Elisabeth Blochmann: Briefwechsel, 1918-1969, 1990; Elisabeth Blochmann, ‘Herman Nohl in Der Pädagogischen Bewegung Seiner Zeit. 1879 - 1960’ (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht : Göttingen, 1969), https://doi.org/10.25656/01:5312.

4 Frank H. W. Edler, ‘Heidegger’s Interpretation of the German “Revolution”’, Research in Phenomenology 23 (1993): p. 164, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24654563.

5 Storck, Martin Heidegger–Elisabeth Blochmann: Briefwechsel, 1918-1969., p. 128.

6 Wolfgang Klafki, ‘Elisabeth Blochmann’, in Pädagogisch-Politische Porträts: Herausgegeben Und Eingeleitet von Karl-Heinz Braun, Frauke Stübig Und Heinz Stübig, ed. Wolfgang Klafki (Wiesbaden: Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden, 2020), p. 137, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-26751-3_5.

7 Storck, Martin Heidegger–Elisabeth Blochmann: Briefwechsel, 1918-1969 

8 M. Berger, ‘Elisabeth Blochmann (1892-1972)’, 2012, https://www.kindergartenpaedagogik.de/fachartikel/geschichte-der-kinderbetreuung/manfred-berger-frauen-in-dergeschichte-des-kindergartens/241/.

9 Klafki, ‘Elisabeth Blochmann’, 150.

10 Jacobi, ‘Elisabeth Blochmann Zum 100. Geburtstag’.

11 Frank Edler, ‘Letters to Elisabeth Blochmann (Translated by Frank H. W. Edler)’, Grad. Fac. Philos. J. 14/15, no. 2/1 (1991): p. 570, https://doi.org/10.5840/gfpj199114/152/139.

12 Ann Oakley, A Critical Woman: Barbara Wootton, Social Science and Public Policy in the Twentieth Century (Bloomsbury Academic, 2011), https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=0Jd0OvqSlxsC; Steven Weiland, ‘Biography, Rhetoric, and Intellectual Careers: Writing the Life of Hannah Arendt’, Biography 22, no. 3 (1999): 370–98, http://www.jstor.org/stable/23540035; R. Whatmore, A Companion to Intellectual History A Companion to Intellectual History, ed. Richard Whatmore and Brian Young, Wiley Blackwell Companions to World History (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020).

13 Oxford Bodleian Libraries [MSS. S. P. S. L. 1-578]; ‘CARA’, https://www.cara.ngo/, [Accessed 5 January 2023].

14 ‘The https://www.lmh.ox.ac.uk/about-lmh/history-and-archives/visiting-archives

15 These are the Deutsches Literatur Archiv Marbach < https://www.dla-marbach.de/en/katalogbeta/find/opac/id/PE00056247/?tx_find_find%5Baction%5D=detail&tx_find_find%5Bcontroller%5D=Search&cHa sh=39da2f1ea0facca4547d326d25b48cdd#tx_find.>; Bibliothek für Bildungsgeschichtliche Forschung Archiv, ; Ida Soul Archive Dillingen.