»Volkhafte Sprachforschung«

Against the background of the 'crisis of the humanities' in the Weimar Republic, the present volume examines representative linguistic topics and concepts prevalent in the period in question. In so doing, it demonstrates how the radical change in the public perception of language problems after 1918 was involved in the moral decline of German academic research on modern languages and on comparative historical linguistics. This decline led to a serious loss of reputation and the establishment of a species of linguistic research informed by political motivations and geared almost exclusively to the rallying concept of Volk (people/nation/race). After 1933, however, the expectations placed in the new regime by this 'ethnicized' form of linguistic research were quickly and thoroughly disappointed.

"Il libro è uno strumento d'informazione critica di notevole valore."
R. G. in: Incontri Linguistici 30/2007

"Das differenzierte und materialreiche Buch macht [...] mit erschreckender Deutlichkeit klar, wie sehr die deutsche Sprachwissenschaft der Zwischenkriegszeit dem nationalistischen Zeitgeist verhaftet war."
Heinrich Weber in: Germanistik Nr. 48, 2007

"In der inzwischen beträchtlich angewachsenen Literatur zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte im NS darf das Buch paradigmatischen Charakter beanspruchen; es sollte auch dort zu Rate gezogen werden, wo die Sprachwissenschaften nicht im Zentrum stehen."
Peter Jehle in: Das Argument, Nr. 275 (2008)