Mihaela Petrescu, visiting assistant professor of German, organized the panel "From Femme Fragile to Vamp: Cultural Representations of Women during the Weimar Republic" at the 31st annual German Studies Association, held in San Diego on Oct. 4-7.
Petrescu also presented a paper titled "A Vamp's Favorite Pastime" in which she scrutinizes the role of the Charleston in Alexander Corda's forgotten dance melodrama "Madame wuenscht keine Kinder" (Madam does not want any children, 1927). Petrescu argues that in dance melodramas female protagonists, particularly those who embody the vamp type, have to change their lives to be accepted in society. This change is coded as a domestication process at the outcome of which the vamp becomes fit for matrimony and motherhood only by renouncing the Charleston.
Petrescu also presented a paper titled "A Vamp's Favorite Pastime" in which she scrutinizes the role of the Charleston in Alexander Corda's forgotten dance melodrama "Madame wuenscht keine Kinder" (Madam does not want any children, 1927). Petrescu argues that in dance melodramas female protagonists, particularly those who embody the vamp type, have to change their lives to be accepted in society. This change is coded as a domestication process at the outcome of which the vamp becomes fit for matrimony and motherhood only by renouncing the Charleston.
