Herstory

The BEGINE was founded in 1986 as a café and cultural centre by female squatters who occupied and reconstructed a house in Berlin-Schöneberg.

"Working and living together" was the squatter projects' motto during the 80's, the decade of women's movement. The participating women reconstructed the ramshackle old building very much by personal contribution, created living space for women and children, founded a girl's sharing communitiy, and gave room for all sorts of women's projects. They also reopened the café in the front part of the house and arranged cultural events.

The reference of the name to the beguines is almost self-evident: this medieval laity order offered women the possibility to live and work together, independently from men.

Heretical, independent and insubordinate they were, those eponyms of the BEGINE - Meeting point and Culture for Women. Their order preached of the freedom of worldly statutes and norms, therefore being watched mistrustfully by the church. The Beginen founded working and living communities during the medieval solely for women. There were settled Beginen, who worked as teachers, nurses, craftswomen or did the mortuary washing, and vagrant Beginen, who had to make their living as beggars or prostitutes. At the beginning of the 14th century the church began fighting the Beginen immensely - the movement of the Beginen ended on the stake.