Description
Book SynopsisBeyond the Gymnasium is the first systematic effort to examine the history of the body in modern Germany. By looking into medical dietetics, walking, dancing, gymnastics, cholera, and classrooms, Heikki Lempa reconstructs the ways the middle-class body became a source of political and social autonomy and a medium of social interaction. During the first two decades of the nineteenth century, German physicians defined the middle class body as qualitatively different from the lower class body. This belief was supported by a contemporary science known as dietetics. Lempa provides a comprehensive history and analysis of this science. Beyond the Gymnasium also analyzes the social implications of court dancing and gymnastics. In the eighteenth century, the French court dances set the standards of upper and middle class conduct. In the 1810s, the gymnastics movement challenged this tradition by propagating vigorous physical exercise and egalitarian social interaction. In 1819, the ban on gymna
Trade ReviewHeikki Lempa provides a close and detailed analysis of the rise of dietetics as an intellectual and social enterprise that affected many bodies in late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth century Germany in heterodox and heterogenous ways. Lempa's eye for historical detail and close reading aid the project tremendously, making Beyond the Gymnasium a very good resource for historians of the more empirical persuasion. * German Studies Review, October 2009 *
Laban's work is a vivid example of the radically liberal yet religious dynamic that characterizes Lempa's discussion of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century dietetics * Dance Research Journal, Winter 2010 *
Table of ContentsChapter 1 Introduction Part 1 Quest For Bodily Autonomy Chapter 3 Dietetics Chapter 4 Restoring the Balance Part 5 Practices of Bodily Education Chapter 6 Gymnastics Chapter 7 Dance Chapter 8 Walking Part 9 The Crises of the 1830s Chapter 10 Cholera Chapter 11 The Überbürdung Debate and Gymnasium Part 12 Conclusion
