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Newsletter No 32

News From National Committees

DENMARK

PUBLICATIONS
The International Institute of Social History (IISG), domiciled in Amsterdam, has published the first two parts of a digital source-guides for women's history on the Net. This guide provides for the names of more or less well-known socially inspired women from all over the world. They were writer, journalist, nurse or philosopher and dedicated themselves to causes like conditions of employment, better wages, world peace, human rights, sexual reforms, educational improvement, health care and housing reform. In addition to a short biographic and bibliographic description of the women, the guide provides for each name a link to the archive of the IIAV and information on the sources on each of the women that are deposited with the IIAV archive. The information is continuously updated. Address: www.iisg.nl/~womhist/womarc.html

CONFERENCES
In 2002 (February 27 - March 2) the Fourth European Social Science History Conference will take place in The Hague, The Netherlands. All kinds of themes will be brought to the notice, like Ethnicity and Migration, Family and Demography, Government and Politics, Labour, Nations and Nationalism, Oral History, Political Movements, Religion, Sexuality en Social Inequality. All sessions and papers are in English. The conference is organised by the International Institute of Social History (IISG). Information: http://www.iisg.nl/esshc or by mail: IISG, Cruquiusweg 31, 1019 AT Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Tel + 31 20 6685866, Fax + 31 20 6654181, e-mail: esshc@iisg.nl

THE BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF DANISH WOMEN
The first two volumes of a major contribution to Danish women's history, a Biographical Dictionary of Danish Women, were published in the autumn of 2000. Another two volumes will appear this year, to be followed later by an electronic edition of the whole publication. About 450 authors portray just less than 2000 women, 60% of whom appear for the first time in the Danish national biography; the biographies of the other 40% have been rewritten.

Founded in 1887, the second revised edition of the Danish Biographical Dictionary came out 1975-84, just too early for new research on women's history etc. to make its mark on the publication. Around 1990 it was obvious that a revision was needed, and a working group started preparing the Biographical Dictionary of Danish Women. The group introduced the idea of a partial revision of the Danish Biographical Dictionary and obtained financial support from the Ministry of Culture and research foundations. An important inspiration for the editors was the national-biographical dictionary, Notable American Women, 1-4, 1971-80.

The new publication increases women's percentage of the Danish national biography from 5 to 10%, but these figures conceal great variation in different historical periods: For the Middle Ages the number of women has been almost halved, leaving out Danish and Danish born queens unless noted for their own efforts. On the other hand, the number of women from the period 1850-1920 was increased by 3-400 %, reflecting female pioneers paving the way for a modern ideal of gender equality.

In regard to the biographical genre, the most important renewal is that co-habitants of the same sex and their children are included in the introductory biographical data. Moreover, in describing individual careers the biographies underline family networks and support from colleagues, and the general background of women's history is displayed.

Read across individual biographies, the Biographical Dictionary of Danish Women gives an overview of 25 years of research on women, in some fields gathering together research not published elsewhere. For instance, taken together eight new biographies of midwives describe the establishment of the General Danish Association of Midwives. A couple of biographies on kindergarten pioneers already existed, but now the history of public responsibility for the education of pedagogues and for day care institutions has been written. Further information on www.rosinante.dk

-compiled by Anna-Birte Ravn, Jytte Larsen, and Marloes Schoonheim