Women and Philosophy in Eighteenth-Century Germany

Women and Philosophy in Eighteenth-Century Germany showcases the vibrant and diverse contributions on the part of women in eighteenth-century Germany and explores their under-appreciated influence upon philosophical debate in Germany in this period. Among the women profiled in this volume are Sophie of Hanover, Dorothea Christiane Erxleben, Johanna Charlotte Unzer, Wilhelmina of Bayreuth, Amalia Holst, Henriette Herz, Elise Reimarus, and Maria von Herbert. Their contributions span the range of philosophical topics in metaphysics, logic, and aesthetics, to moral and political philosophy, and pertain to the main philosophical movements in the period. They engage controversial issues of the day, such as atheism and materialism, but also women's struggle for access to education and for recognition of their civic entitlements, and they display a range of strategies for intellectual engagement in doing so. This collection vigorously contests the presumption that the history of German philosophy in the eighteenth century can be told without attending to the important roles that women played in the signature debates of the period.

1 - Sophie of Hanover on the Soul-Body Relationship
2 - A Modern Diotima: Johanna Charlotte Unzer on Wolffianism and Aesthetics
3 - On Prejudice and the Limits to Learnedness: Dorothea Christiane Erxleben and the Querelle des Femmes
4 - A Mere Skeleton of the Sciences? Amalia Holst's Critique of Basedow and Campe
5 - Wilhelmine of Bayreuth and the German Enlightenment
6 - Elise Reimarus: Reason, Religion, and Enlightenment
7 - Solace or Counsel for Death: Kant and Maria von Herbert
8 - Theodor Gottlieb von Hippel on the Status of Women in the State
9 - Dorothea Schlegel and the Challenges of Female Authorship and Identity
10 - The Role of Writing and Sociability in the Establishment of a Persona: Henriette Herz, Rahel Levin Varnhagen, and Bettina von Arnim
11 - Is She not an Unusual Woman? Say More: Germaine de Staël and Lydia Maria Child on Progress, Art, and Abolition

Corey W. Dyck is Professor of Philosophy and Faculty Scholar for Arts and Humanities at Western University. He is the author of Kant and Rational Psychology (Oxford University Press, 2014) and is the translator and editor of the collection Early Modern German Philosophy: 1690-1750 (Oxford University Press, 2019). He has held visiting positions at Oxford University, Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, and at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg, where he was also recently an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow.