Klara Marie Faßbinder Visiting Pro­fes­sorship

Dr. Hannah Fitsch held the international and interdisciplinary Klara Marie Faßbinder Visiting Professorship for Women's and Gender Studies at Mainz University of Applied Sciences in the 2022/2023 winter semester. As part of the visiting professorship and in cooperation with Prof. Dr. Julia König from JGU Mainz, she organized the queer-feminist festival DE/LUXE: Who decides what is seen as normal? at the LUX Pavilion of Mainz University of Applied Sciences. It ran from Oct. 18-27, 2022, and included her inaugural lecture Seductive siren or a pylon to the rescue? A look at sexuality in the digital (socialization) space from a communication technology perspective. Students of the university and JGU had the opportunity to take her seminar Who decides what is seen as normal? Sexuality in the digital (socialization) space. 

Hannah Fitsch is a feminist science and technology sociologist with a focus on neuroscience, image studies/image practices, aesthetics, and feminist theory. In addition to her theoretical research, she always chooses to work with different formats of expression and mediation, such as in museums, theater, video, audio, and/or visual works. In 2022 she received the Emma Goldmann Snowball Award. Julia König is an assistant professor at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and a recognized expert in questions of child sexuality, generational difference in sexual development, and historical sexuality research.

The visiting professorship

The Visiting Professorship has been funded by the Ministry of Education, Science, Further Education and Culture of Rhineland-Palatinate (today: Ministry of Science and Health) since the winter semester of 2001/2002, and rotates on a semester basis among the state’s universities of applied sciences. Its aim is to provide impetus for women's and gender studies in Rhineland-Palatinate, to improve the range of classes offered in the field of women's and gender studies, and to strengthen the reputation of this forward-looking area of research and teaching.

The professorship’s namesake Klara Marie Faßbinder was born in Trier in 1890 and is considered one of the most important activists of the German women’s and peace movement. In addition to her work as a professor at the Pädagogische Akademie Bonn, she also worked as a French translator. Throughout her life, however, she was always a political woman: during the Cold War, for example, she campaigned for an East-West reconciliation, was one of the co-founders of the West German women’s peace movement, and was also involved in party politics in the Christian-Pacifist-oriented Gesamtdeutscher Volkspartei.

Previous visiting professors at Mainz University of Applied Sciences

In the 20017/2018 winter semester, the university hosted the Klara Marie Faßbinder Visiting Professorship for the first time with Prof. Dr. Mary Pepchinski. The architect and urbanist offered a seminar on Lucy Hillebrand during her time at Mainz University of Applied Sciences and was the academic director of the Frau_Architekt exhibition at the Frankfurt Architecture Museum.