Milica Ninković (30 January 1854 – 18 November 1881) was a Serbian

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

, translator and editor.

Life

Milica Ninković was born on 30 January 1854

Újvidék Novi Sad ( sr-Cyrl, Нови Сад, ; hu, Újvidék, ; german: Neusatz; see below for other names) is the second largest city in Serbia and the capital of the autonomous province of Vojvodina. It is located in the southern portion of the Pan ...

, in the

Kingdom of Hungary The Kingdom of Hungary was a monarchy in Central Europe that existed for nearly a millennium, from the Middle Ages into the 20th century. The Principality of Hungary emerged as a Christian kingdom upon the coronation of the first king Stephen ...

(now Novi Sad,

Serbia Serbia (, ; Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe, Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Bas ...

). She attended the School of

Pedagogy Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken as ...

of the

University of Zurich The University of Zürich (UZH, german: Universität Zürich) is a public research university located in the city of Zürich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with its 28,000 enrolled students. It was founded in 1833 f ...

from 1872 to 1874 with her sister Anka. Upon leaving Switzerland in 1874, they decided to establish a private high school for girls in

Kragujevac Kragujevac ( sr-Cyrl, Крагујевац, ) is the fourth largest city in Serbia and the administrative centre of the Šumadija District. It is the historical centre of the geographical region of Šumadija in central Serbia, and is situated on ...

, Serbia, but permission was not granted by the government and they were threatened with expulsion from Serbia. Ninković avoided this by marrying the journalist and future politician Pera Todorović. During the Serbian–Ottoman War of 1876–78, she volunteered as a nurse. After the war, she worked for the British

Legation A legation was a diplomatic representative office of lower rank than an embassy. Where an embassy was headed by an ambassador, a legation was headed by a Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary, minister. Ambassadors diplomatic rank, out ...

in Belgrade, Serbia, until pressure from the Serbian government forced the British to fire her. Ninković then left the country to study medicine abroad, but caught

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease usually caused by '' Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms, in ...

and died in Kragujevac on 18 November 1881.Pantelić, pp. 370–71

Activities

Shortly after their marriage, Ninković and her husband founded the newspaper ''Old Liberation'' (''Staro Oslobođenje'') and edited and she edited its supplement. She also worked as a translator, among other translating

Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the great ...

's ''

The History of a Crime ''The History of a Crime'' (french: Histoire d'un crime, 1877) is an essay by Victor Hugo about Napoleon III Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon ...

'' (french: link=no, Histoire d'un crime) into Serbian and

Svetozar Marković Svetozar Marković ( sr-Cyrl, Светозар Марковић, ; 9 September 1846 – 26 February 1875) was a Serbian political activist, literary critic and socialist philosopher. He developed an activistic anthropological philosophy w ...

's ''Serbia in the East'' (''Srbija na istoku'') into Russian. Upon her return from abroad in 1880, Ninković established one of the first feminist organizations of Serbs in Újvidék.

Notes

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ninkovic, Milica 1854 births 1881 deaths Serbian feminists Serbian women's rights activists University of Zurich alumni 19th-century deaths from tuberculosis Tuberculosis deaths in Serbia