Creating a Marxist-Leninist Cultural Identity: Women's Memories of the German Democratic Republic's Friedensfahrt

Abstract

Sport constituted an integral part of the GDR's ideology. One particularly important event, in both the sporting and ideological senses, was the Friedensfahrt cycle race. This article considers, through memories of the Friedensfahrt, the views of some women members of Germany's Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS). A brief consideration of the theoretical context of German Marxist-Feminism prefaces a discussion of sport and ideology in the GDR, followed by an analysis of interviews that indicates a relationship between levels of expressed enthusiasm for the Friedensfahrt, affection for the GDR and an internalization of Marxism-Leninism. The Friedensfahrt may be regarded as a metaphor for the passivity of GDR women in the context of what was an essentially masculine formation of Marxist ideology.