Martin voters

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Martin voter (born May 6, 1889 in Orlamünde , † June 3, 1953 in Berlin ) was a German folklorist . He represented the racist idea of ​​a permanent national and tribal character rooted in race and habitat.

Life and meaning

Martin Wahler studied classical philology, history, ev. Theologian and philosophy up to his doctorate in Jena in 1912 with a dissertation on Marcus Terentius Varro , which he still wrote in Latin. He initially worked as a teacher and university lecturer in Erfurt . From 1929 to 1932 he was professor of folklore at the Pedagogical Academy in Erfurt , which was closed again in 1932, after which he was briefly seconded to the Pedagogical Academy in Halle (Saale) . Voter was active in many historical associations in Erfurt and became a member of the Academy of Charitable Sciences in Erfurt .

After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists , voters openly showed his closeness to Nazi ideology. For example, in 1934 he published an anti-Semitic article in the Zeitschrift für Deutschkunde : “Most of the songs among the National Socialists give ways to carry out the program, to gain power. The way is as revolutionary as the goal. The National Socialist song ›We are Hitler's brown army, heia, hoho! We empty bonz armchairs ... ', later expanded to:' This is how the storm columns stand - ready for race war ... '".

After the closure of the PA Halle, voters returned to school service, but in 1934 was again appointed professor of folklore at the Frankfurt (Oder) College for Teacher Training . In 1935 he became a professor and deputy. Director at the University for Teacher Training in Hanover . In 1937 he joined the NSDAP and the NS Lecturer Association . After the conversion of the HfL into a teacher training institute, he was transferred to the University of Leipzig . In 1942 he received a chair at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main as a representative of Heinrich Harmjanz .

After the end of the Second World War he was again a teacher in Erfurt. In 1950 he moved to West Berlin, where he briefly became an adjunct professor of folklore and died in 1953.

Voter was one of the most prominent folklorists of the 1920s to 1950s. "The German People's Character" (1937) and "Thuringian Folklore" (1940) were considered standard works. Here, the strong influence of folk ideas since the First World War 1914/18 and the ideological proximity to National Socialism cannot be overlooked. This prominent representative of folklore clearly shows the tension between the understanding of science and ethnic ideology as well as National Socialism.

Fonts (selection)

  • De varronis rerum rusticarum fontibus quaestiones selectae , dissertation Jena 1912
  • Thuringian church history. Quelle & Meyer, Leipzig 1926.
  • Symbolism in the popular life of the present and its meaning for the national community . In: Folklore gifts. John Meier offered on his seventieth birthday , Berlin: de Gruyter 1934, pp. 282–292.
  • The German national character. An essential lore of the German tribes and popular strikes. Diederichs, Jena 1937.
  • Thuringian folklore. Diederichs, Jena 1940.

literature

  • Steffen Raßloff : Folklore in the 19th and 20th centuries. Erfurt 2003. (Thuringia. Regional studies sheets 32)
  • Steffen Raßloff: "The Thuringian tribal character". Martin voter and folklore from a folkish spirit. In: Journal of the Association for Thuringian History 57 (2003). Pp. 177-204.
  • Steffen Raßloff: Martin Wahler (1889–1953). Folklorist in the field of tension between science and ethnic ideology. In: Zeitschrift für Volkskunde 102 (2006). Pp. 195-219.
  • Alexander Hesse: The professors and lecturers of the Prussian educational academies (1926-1933) and colleges for teacher training (1933-1941) . Deutscher Studien-Verlag, Weinheim 1995, ISBN 3-89271-588-2 ( limited preview in Google book search).
  • Ernst Klee : The cultural lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-10-039326-5 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Ernst Klee: The culture lexicon for the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 635.
  2. ↑ a b c CV .
  3. ↑ Complete quote from Ernst Klee: Das Kulturlexikon zum Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 635.
personal data
SURNAME Voter, Martin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German folklorist
DATE OF BIRTH May 6, 1889
PLACE OF BIRTH Orlamünde
DATE OF DEATH June 3, 1953
Place of death Berlin