Sodomites and Urnings : Homosexual Representations in Classic German Journals

M. Lombardi-Nash

The future of the gay movement is best understood by searching its past. Sodomites and Urnings: Homosexual Representations in Classic German Journals provides a valuable glimpse into the past by presenting some of the most important seminal articles on homosexuality, translated with precision from the German language. This single resource provides readers with an inexpensive way to get previously unknown research and discussion of homosexuality's roots in Germany by gay movement pioneers like Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, Karl Westphal, and lesbian activist Anna Rüling. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Germany was the center of much of the research and discussion about homosexuality. This book explores the persecution and prosecution of homosexuals for the past two centuries as well as the path to decriminalization. Libraries, educators, and historians will discover the first known coming-out letters in world history, a speech by the first known lesbian activist, the first medical article to stigmatize homosexuality as a disease, and the first article to use the word "homosexual."