Contribution to Research of Girlhood after the First World War: an example of Girls with Mental Disorders from rural areas of Continental Croatia

Rad propituje neke aspekte odrastanja djevojaka sa psihičkim smetnjama u ruralnim krajevima kontinentalne Hrvatske u prvom desetljeću nakon završetka Prvog svjetskog rata. Pritom se misli na djevojke u fazi sred¬nje i kasne adolescencije liječene u Zavodu za umobolne u Stenjevcu, danas Klinici za psihijatriju Vrapče. U radu se iz kulturnoantropološkog rakursa analiziraju izdvojena pojedinačna iskustva njihovih neostvarljivih ljubavnih veza s muškarcima u odnosu na tradicionalna očekivanja o (ne)prihvatljivoj femininosti. Također, sagledava se zavodska svakodnevica djevojaka sa psi¬hičkim smetnjama u kontekstu njihovih aktivnosti organiziranih u sklopu radne terapije. Prema dosadašnjem istraživanju, pretpostavlja se da su znako¬vi emocionalne nestabilnosti i (auto)destruktivna ponašanja razmatrane po¬pulacije bila izazvana njihovim neznanjem o procesima spolnog sazrijevanja i posljedicama uzrokovanim iskustvom neostvarljivih ljubavnih veza te nemo¬gućnošću ulaska u brak. Rad je baziran na analizi povijesti bolesti djevojaka i liječničkih svjedodžbi koje datiraju od 1919. do 1929. godine a pohranjene su u fundusu Arhiva Klinike za psihijatriju Vrapče.The paper discusses some aspects of the growing up of girls with mental disorders in rural areasof continental Croatia in the first decade af¬ter the end of the First World War. This includes girls in the middle and late adolescent phase treated at the Stenjevec Psychiatric Hospital, now Vrapče University Psychiatric Hospital. The paper analyzes their individual expe¬riences of unfulfilled love with men in relation to traditional expectations of (non)acceptable femininity from the cultural anthropological perspecti¬ve. In addition, this paper looks at the hospital’s everyday life of girls with mental disorders in the context of their activities organized under work therapy. According to the current research, signs of emotional instability and (auto)destructive behavior of the examined population are assumed to be due to their ignorance of the process of sexual maturation and the con¬sequences caused by the experience of unattainable love relationships and the inability to get married. The work is based on the analysis of the girls’ psychiatric files and medical certificates dating from 1919 to 1929 stored in the Archives of the University Psychiatric Hospital Vrapče