Rebecca Steele

Education

Ph.D. Rutgers University
M.A. Rutgers University
Betriebswirt, Leibniz-Akademie

 

Biography

Professor Steele specializes in the construction of femininity, female androgyny, and women's emancipation in late 18th and 19th century German-language literature. Her forthcoming articles include an essay on the misinterpretation of rape and sexual desire in Hebbel’s Judith, an article on the mythologizing of woman in Schiller’s Maria Stuart, and a study of the concept of the long-suffering wife in the medieval German courtly romance, Erec by Hartmann von Aue. Steele is currently rewriting and expanding her award-winning dissertation material into a book manuscript (Women in German Dissertation Prize 2010), which investigates the representation of the androgynous woman in male- and female-authored texts in early 19th century German-language literature.

 

Research Interests

18th and 19th century German language literature. Representations of monsters, women, gender, and sexuality from the Enlightenment to Realism; modern and post-modern women authors.

 

Teaching

German language, literature, and culture courses

 

Awards

2023 Ray Verzasconi Northwest Postsecondary Language Educator of the Year

 

Publications

Pedagogy

 Deutsch im Alltag series by Dr. Rebecca Steele and Stephanie Schottel. 

 

Literature

“Deception and Displacement in Charlotte von Stein’s Die zwey Emilien (1803)”. Feminist German Studies 38.2 (2022): 1-25.

 

"Revealing the Anatomy of the Seductive Unknown: German Sirens of the 19th Century.” Ed. Diego Compagna, Stefanie Steinhart. Monster, Monstrosities, and the Monstrous in Culture and Society. Wilmington, Vernon Press, 2019. 5-28.

 

“The Class-Bending Love Affair with the Factory Girl: Rejecting Western Capitalist Fantasy in Clara Viebig’s “The Cigar Factory Girl” and “Margret’s Pilgrimage.” Gender and Work: Intersectionality, Resistance, and Identity. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2016.

 

 “Vergewaltigung, Abtreibung und Selbstmord – Die Konsequenzen der weiblichen Sexualität? Eine tragikomische Deutung Hebbels Maria Magdalena.” Hebbel-Jahrbuch 69 (2014): 118-143.

 

“The Great Cover-Up: The Double Containment of Woman in Friedrich Schiller’s Maria Stuart.” Seminar 49.4: (2013): 365-384.

 

“Does a Girl Have to Say No? – Rape and Sexual Discontentment in Friedrich Hebbel’s Judith.” Hebbel-Jahrbuch 67 (2012): 77-102.

 

“Reinterpreting Enite: Hartmann’s Story of the Patient Wife in Erec.” Germanisch-Romanische Monatsschrift 61.4 (2011): 379-94.