Michael Homberg, Christopher Neumaier
Conference and publication project (2020-2023)
The research project was devoted to the changes in couple relationships between the 1950s and 1990s in the Federal Republic and the GDR. It investigates the dating culture and its ways of initiating relationships as well as the various practices of living together and the patterns of separation. With that, it aimed to develop new perspectives on couple relationships as dynamic life constellations in East and West Germany after 1945, examining the normative settings and changes in love conventions in order to analyze how the ideal and everyday lives of singles and unmarried and married couples evolved. To this end, the project explored relationship dynamics and intimate lives of married and unmarried couples and singles in East and West Germany from cultural, social, and socio-historical perspectives. Here, historical patterns of partnering and relationship design, which shape the diverging attitudes in East and West toward cohabitation, marriage, and divorce, but also different practices of partnership and family behavior to this day, were of particular interest.
A conference on the topic was held in 2021 under the title "Revolution der Paarbeziehungen? Der Wandel des Beziehungslebens in Bundesrepublik und DDR" at the ZZF Potsdam. Selected contributions were published in a special issue of "Geschichte & Gesellschaft":
Michael Homberg (Hrsg.), Christopher Neumaier (Hrsg.), Geschichte und Gesellschaft: Paarbeziehungen in Deutschland nach 1945, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2023.
