Oda Olberg

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Oda Olberg (married Lerda ; also: Oda Olberg-Lerda , born October 2, 1872 in Bremerhaven , † April 11, 1955 in Buenos Aires ) was a social democratic journalist who campaigned for women's emancipation and socialist eugenics .

Life

Oda Olberg was the daughter of a high German naval officer. She spent her youth in Germany. She thought of studying medicine. However, on the advice of his mother, first learned to be a nurse. In Leipzig she attended grammar school and attended lectures in medicine and philosophy.

She was active in the German social democratic movement at an early age, and published her first articles at the age of 17. In 1896, Olberg left the General German Women's Association and switched to the SPD . In the same year she went to Italy for health reasons, probably tuberculosis. There she met her husband, the socialist MP and journalist Giovanni Lerda . The two married in 1896. They had four children. In Italy, Olberg worked as a freelance journalist, was on the editorial staff of the socialist magazine Avanti! a colleague of Benito Mussolini . Even before the First World War, she was active as a correspondent for the Arbeiter-Zeitung and various German newspapers. During the First World War she worked as a nurse, then again as a journalist in Italy. After the fascists came to power, she was subjected to reprisals and her apartment in Rome was vandalized several times. Olberg fled to Vienna. After a stay in South America, she returned to Vienna in 1929. In 1934 she moved to Buenos Aires and did not return to Austria, but continued to work as a journalist. After the Second World War, due to a serious illness, a return was no longer an option. But she continued to deliver newspaper articles. In 1955 Olberg died in Buenos Aires.

plant

In 1897 she published an article on “The Right to Death” in Volume 18 of the Future . She was also an advocate for an abortion right. Her work, Das Weib und der Intellectualismus , published in 1902, was a response to Möbius' theses about the physiological nonsense of women. Olberg provided input for the Arbeiter-Zeitung of Victor Adler and published in organs such as documents of the women , the woman and the malcontents .

In her book The Degeneracy in Her Culture-Relatedness , based on Lombroso , she tried to explain the phenomenon of crime through biological inferiority. In addition, Olberg dealt with the situation of the proletariat and the ragged proletariat in this work . Olberg believed that culture and the lack of natural selection would lead to genetic degradation. Although she stuck to her demand for a racial hygiene policy, Olberg was an opponent of National Socialism : "The so necessary appeal to a racially hygienic awareness of the masses goes unheard today, partly because National Socialism has included this demand in its reactionary warehouse."

Publications

  • The misery in the home-making industry. Leipzig 1896.
  • Bibliography of the Social Sciences. Bibliographie des sciences sociales, Bibliography of social science. Edited in conjunction with: Henry Barrault, Wilhelm Boehmert, David Kinley (etc.), Dresden 1905.
  • Woman and intellectualism. Berlin / Bern 1902.
  • Ettore Ciccotti: The Fall of Slavery in Antiquity. [German from Oda Olburg], Berlin 1910.
  • Fascism in Italy. Jena 1923.
  • Living Marxism: Celebration for the 70th birthday of Karl Kautsky. With contributions from Max Adler, Otto Bauer, [Oda Olberg]. Edited by Otto Jenssen, Jena 1924.
  • The degeneracy in its culture-conditionedness. Munich 1926.
  • National Socialism. Vienna / Leipzig 1932.
  • Man his own enemy. Nest publishing house, Nuremberg 1948.

Secondary literature

  • Obituary in the Arbeiter-Zeitung, April 22, 1955
  • Oda Olberg-Lerda . In: Franz Osterroth : Biographical Lexicon of Socialism . Deceased personalities . Vol. 1. JHW Dietz Nachf., Hanover 1960, p. 235.
  • Fritz Hausjell: Oda Olberg-Lerda - the best socialist journalist. In: Medien & Zeit (1987), 1, pp. 17-21.
  • Use Korotin: Oda Olberg-Lerda (1872–1955). In: Communications from the Institute for Science and Art 50 (1995) 3: Women in the vicinity of Austromarxism, pp. 37–44.
  • Ilse Korotin: “Comments on racial hygiene and socialism” - Oda Olberg-Lerda, the eugenic movement and its reception by the left. In: The revolution of everyday life. Frankfurt am Main [u. a.] 2004, pp. 101-119.
  • Birgit Friedrich: Publicists from Austria in Argentine exile. In: Mitteilungen des Institut für Wissenschaft und Kunst 44 (1989) 3: Österreichischer Journalismus im Exil 1933 / 34–1945, pp. 7–17.
  • Martina Pietsch: Oda Olberg - Life and Work 1872–1955 - a qualitative analysis of your journalistic and journalistic work. Vienna, Univ., Dipl.-Arb., 2005.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Michael Schwartz : Socialist Eugenics. Eugenic social technologies in debates and politics of the German social democracy 1890–1933 , Bonn 1995, p. 53.
  2. ↑ ABDF 5 / II / 4: Protocol book of the General German Women's Association, II (January 7, 1896) cited. based on: Richard J. Evans: Bourgeois feminists and women socialists in Germany 1894–1914: Lost opportunity or inevitable conflict? In: Women's Studies International Quarterly, 3 (1980), p. 361.
  3. ↑ Cf. their critical report Freß Freiheit in Italien , in: Volksrecht. Social democratic body for the working people in South Tyrol. Edition of July 29, 1923, p. 3 (online)
  4. ↑ Cf. Oda Olberg: About degeneration in their culture-conditionedness, p. 84f. Cf. Gudrun Exner: Eugenik in Österreich, in: Rainer Mackensen: Population theory and population policy in the “Third Reich” pp. 337–358, here: p. 347.
  5. ↑ Cf. Oda Olberg: About degeneration in their culture-conditionedness, p. 20 and p. 94, passim. See Michael Schwartz: Socialist Eugenics. Eugenic social technologies in debates and politics of the German social democracy 1890-1933, Bonn 1995, p. 98. Cf. Gudrun Exner, Josef Kytir, Alexander Pinwinkler: Population science in Austria in the interwar period (1918-1938), Vienna, Cologne, Weimar 2004, P. 148.
  6. ↑ Cf. Gudrun Exner, Josef Kytir, Alexander Pinwinkler: Population Science in Austria in the Interwar Period (1918–1938), Vienna, Cologne, Weimar 2004, p. 148.
  7. ↑ Oda Olberg: National Socialism, p. 24. Quoted in: Othmar Plöckinger: History of a book: Adolf Hitler's “Mein Kampf” 1922–1945, Munich 2006, p. 564.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Olberg, Oda
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Olberg-Lerda, Oda
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Social democratic journalist who campaigned for women's emancipation and socialist eugenics
DATE OF BIRTH October 2, 1872
PLACE OF BIRTH Bremerhaven
DATE OF DEATH April 11, 1955
Place of death Buenos Aires