The Cult of Health and Beauty in Germany: A Social History, 1890-1930From the 1890s to the 1930s, a growing number of Germans began to scrutinize and discipline their bodies in a utopian search for perfect health and beauty. Some became vegetarians, nudists, or bodybuilders, while others turned to alternative medicine or eugenics. In The Cult of Health and Beauty in Germany, Michael Hau demonstrates why so many men and women were drawn to these life reform movements and examines their tremendous impact on German society and medicine. Hau argues that the obsession with personal health and fitness was often rooted in anxieties over professional and economic success, as well as fears that modern industrialized civilization was causing Germany and its people to degenerate. He also examines how different social groups gave different meanings to the same hygienic practices and aesthetic ideals. What results is a penetrating look at class formation in pre-Nazi Germany that will interest historians of Europe and medicine and scholars of culture and gender. |
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The Cult of Health and Beauty in Germany: A Social History, 1890-1930 Michael Hau Limited preview - 2003 |
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According achieve aesthetic alternative appearance argued artist associations authors beauty became become Berlin body cause century chapter character claimed concepts concerns considered constitutional contemporary contrast criticism cultivation culture demanded Deutsche discourse disease Dresden eugenic example exercise exhibition experience expression female feminist FIGURE gender German Günther human hygienic ideal important individuals Jews journal Kuhne lack lead lifestyle lives lower maintained male means measures medicine mental middle classes moral movement natural therapy Nazi Nordic normal norms nude organized percent performance period physical political popular position practices prevent profession propagated proportions race racial reformers regular physicians rejected relations represented Schönheit scientific sense sexual similar social society Stratz Stuttgart success supporters theories tion traditional tried turn Ungewitter University University Press vegetarian Weimar woman women workers
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Bibliographic information
| Title | The Cult of Health and Beauty in Germany: A Social History, 1890-1930 European history The Cult of Health and Beauty in Germany: A Social History, 1890-1930, Michael Hau |
| Author | Michael Hau |
| Edition | illustrated |
| Publisher | University of Chicago Press, 2003 |
| ISBN | 0226319741, 9780226319742 |
| Length | 286 pages |
| Subjects | › › History / Europe / General History / General |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |