Michaela Žáková
PhDr., Ph.D.
Domestic project
Between Independence and Stigma: Single Women in Bourgeois and Noble Society in the Czech Lands (1848–1914)
Provider: The Czech Science Foundation
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Project duration:
2026–2028
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Project ID: GA26-20427S
The project focuses on unmarried women in the Czech lands (1848–1914), examining their life strategies, socio-economic conditions, and opportunities for public engagement. It explores the factors shaping their unmarried status, analyzing to what extent it stemmed from personal choice or was shaped by social constraints and familial strategies. It compares bourgeois and noblewomen in terms of education, careers, and public life, and examines the expectations and social norms that influenced their experiences. The project also investigates contemporary reflections of the status of single women in the press, literature, and ego-documents. By combining demographic analysis, discourse analysis, and case studies, it contributes to a deeper understanding of the gendered aspects of modernization and social mobility in the 19th-century Habsburg Monarchy. The outputs will be a collective monograph and scholarly studies focusing on educated bourgeois women, noblewomen, women in the arts, and other social groups, bringing new perspectives to gender history in the 19th century.
