Georg Dinges

Georg Dinges ( Russian Георгий Генрихович Дингес , transliteration Georgy Genrikhovich thing ; * the 30th November 1891 in Blumenfeld on the Volga , Nowousenski Ujesd, Samara Governorate , Russian Empire , now Zwetotschnoje, Rajon Staraya Poltawka , Volgograd Oblast , † July 1932 in Kolpashevo , Oblast Tomsk , USSR ) was a Soviet Germanist who devoted himself mainly to researching the Volga German dialects.

Life

Georg Dinges was born as the son of the wealthy landowner Heinrich Dinges. He studied in Moscow , and graduated in 1917.

He then went to the Chernyshevsky University in Saratov , where he was first lecturer for German, from 1921 lecturer for Germanic philology and from 1923 professor at the chair for Western European languages ​​and literatures. During this time he also met Wiktor Schirmunski , whose interest in the Russian-German dialects can be traced back not least to Dinges.

Dinges initially dealt with the Russian influence on the German Volga dialects. The great work of the language survey of Volga German varieties was done by Dinges - together with his colleagues and his wife Emma (née Schlotthauer) - especially in the years 1925 to 1929, when he emigrated all Volga German mother colonies for the purpose of language surveys. During this time he maintained regular contact with the well-known Marburg dialectological school in Germany, whose method of “translating” the so-called “ Wenker's sentences ” he adopted. These are "test sentences", designed by the founder of the German Linguistic Atlas , Georg Wenker , according to linguistic criteria, which are translated into the local dialect by sources and the linguistic features "hidden" in them that distinguish between Upper German, Central German and Low German Made dialects possible, then transferred to maps.

The new mixture of these characteristics brought about by the close coexistence in the Russian-German language islands, which did not appear in any internal German dialect, was of great interest to dialectologists in the Soviet Union as well as in Germany, as it allowed conclusions to be drawn about the mechanisms of language balance, such as For example, he had also created the high-level languages ​​and traffic varieties in Europe. It was this gain in knowledge that Viktor Schirmunski had in mind when he described the Russian-German linguistic islands as a “large-scale experiment in the history of language” and a “linguistic laboratory”, “in which we can use historical evidence in a short period of time from 100 to 150 Years of being able to follow developments that must have taken place in the motherland over several centuries ”(Schirmunski (1930), p. 113 f.).

Because of his preoccupation with the German language and folklore in the Soviet Union, Dinges saw himself increasingly exposed to the accusation of “ nationalism ” in the late 1920s , which at that time was still cautiously raised. With the approaching end of the " Korenisazija ", the movement to root and strengthen the nationalities and their languages ​​in the Soviet multi-ethnic state, Dinges' interest in the Volga German language and culture and its connections to Germany became undoing. Before the start of the large-scale persecution of the so-called "nationalists", Dinges was arrested in January 1930 after a dispute over the invitation of Reich German linguists on the occasion of the opening of the German Pedagogical University in Engels . Dinges was arrested on charges of "counter-revolutionary activities", "nationalist propaganda" and links to a "foreign espionage center". In the interrogations it was always about the contacts to Germany, about his alleged nationalism, which was expressed for example in book orders from Germany, in seminars on the history of the Volga Germans and in courses in German, as well as the connection to Peter Sinner, who had also dealt with the German language on the Volga and was even more of a target for accusations of nationalism. Although the espionage allegations were finally dropped, Dinges was sentenced to three years' exile in Western Siberia on February 1, 1932, by order of the GPU . Indictment: "for espionage". Sinner and Anatolij Konstantinowitsch Synopalow, another lecturer at the Pedagogical University, received the same sentence. After two years of pre-trial detention, he was taken to Kolpashevo in the north of the Tomsk region and worked there for some time as a paramedic in the local hospital, where he contracted typhus .

After his death, some of his materials were burned because of the risk of infection; others, including his survey materials for the Volga German Language Atlas, he was able to hand over to his successor, Andreas Dulson . Much, however, remained lost.

The judgments against Dinges, Sinner and Synopalow were overturned on September 21, 1964 by the Saratov regional court.

Sources and web links

• Viktor Krieger: Alexander Spack: Proceedings against Volga German intellectuals. in: People on the way. Year 2006, issue 4, pp. 16–17 , issue 5, pages 10 and p. 11–12
• History of the Russian Germans : 2.8.6.1 Georg Dinges (accessed June 2, 2012)
• Center of Volga German Studies at Concordia University: Georg Dinges (English, accessed June 2, 2012)
• Georg Dinges: About our dialects (accessed June 2, 2012)
• http://lists.memo.ru/index5.htm = Bank data "Victims of political terror in the USSR" as "Дингес Георгий Генрихович" (Russian)
• http://wolgadeutsche.ru/lexikon/_Dinges.htm = Encyclopedia of the Volga Germans (Russian)
• К изучению поволжско-немецких говоров (результаты, задачи, методы), "Ученые записко-немецких говоров". 19 4, в. 3; A new map of our area (обозрение карт территории немцев Поволжья с середины 18 в до наших дней и критический разбор карты А. Маттерна.) "Our Economy", 1923, № 9; About our dialects - with language map of the Volga German mother colonies, contributions, in: Zur Heimatkunde des deutschen Volga region, Pokrovsk, 1923; For research into the Volga German dialects (results and tasks), "Teuthonista", (Berlin-Lpz.), № 1, 1925; Proposal for the creation of a normal vocal system on gramophone records, ibid; Scientific dialect research in the Autonomous Republic of the Volga Germans, "Weekly Report of the Society for Cultural Connection of the Soviet Union with Foreign Countries", 1927, № 11-12; Tasks of the ethnographic (folklore) department of our central museum, "Maistube", 1925, № 36, 37; Volga German folk songs with pictures and ways (Ed. With the support of the German Academy and the German Folk Song Archive by G. Dinges), Berlin-Lpz., 1932.