Defending the (Gender)Order

Girls’ apprenticeship and labour in the course of corrective training at the public youth reformatory St. Martin in Schwaz 1945–1990

Abstract

This article presents the initial findings of a research project undertaken by the University of Innsbruck concerning St. Martin, a care home for teenage girls in Schwaz (Tyrol, Austria). The impact of the early history of the institution as workhouse and correctional center as well as the impact of decisive gender ideas on the very effective educational ideas and practices are highlighted, while the arrangement of professional qualification an work inside the institute is examined. To achieve this, in addition to documents originating from the regional public institutions, interviews with contemporary witnesses are considered for analysis. The authors’ principal thesis states that education measures within this institution consisted mainly of gender-specific work tasks aimed at achieving the desired attitude to work. The educational model applied was rooted in middle-class work ethics and sexual morals as well as in a scientifically established discourse on waywardness, which was occasionally completed with a medical curative pedagogy.