Manfred Bierwisch (28 July 1930 – 31 July 2024) was a German linguist in the area of

structuralism Structuralism is an intellectual current and methodological approach, primarily in the social sciences, that interprets elements of human culture by way of their relationship to a broader system. It works to uncover the structural patterns t ...

and

generative linguistics Generative grammar is a research tradition in linguistics that aims to explain the cognition, cognitive basis of language by formulating and testing explicit models of humans' subconscious grammatical knowledge. Generative linguists, or generat ...

, with profound connections to music and cultural theory. Bierwisch is near singular in linguistic-theoretical thought in that he, rooted in

Eastern Germany The new states of Germany () are the five re-established states of the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) that unified with the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) with its 10 "old states" upon German reunification on 3 October 1990. The ...

, combined several intellectual streams in the post-WII period before Wende, maintaining scholarly exchanges in dictatorship East Germany - at times at great personal cost, including jail time in the 1950s-, with West Germany, French and North American scholarship.

Life

Bierwisch studied in Leipzig under . Frings recommended Bierwisch to the Berlin doctoral college but remained his primary PhD supervisor. After an interlude of 10 months in an Eastern German jail for the possession of Western intellectual magazines, Bierwisch was able to join in 1956 the new doctoral college on linguistic structuralism to

Humboldt University The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public university, public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III of Prussia, Frederick W ...

East Berlin East Berlin (; ) was the partially recognised capital city, capital of East Germany (GDR) from 1949 to 1990. From 1945, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet occupation sector of Berlin. The American, British, and French se ...

under the leadership of

Wolfgang Steinitz Wolfgang Steinitz (28 February 1905 – 21 April 1967) was a German linguist and folklorist. Through his rediscovery of hidden social commentary in traditional folk songs, he was an important pioneer of the German folk-revival in both East an ...

, completing his PhD dissertation in 1961. Bierwisch was not the only linguist to be jailed by the East German authorities (see, e.g. ). Frings, as a more traditional structuralist, failed to see the relevance of cognitive processes in linguistic analysis, which would, for a while, become the forté of the budding field of generative linguistics. This would cause issues during Bierwisch's later PhD writing phase, which were resolved by Wolfgang Steinitz as secondary reader taking over primary supervisory responsibilities.

Work

Bierwisch was in the interesting position, both in 1960–61 and in 1989–90 and following, to contribute to linguistic thought at particular junctions. In the early 1960s he may have been one of the first on the continent to develop structuralist grammar into a mentalistic approach, influenced by

Chomsky Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics, political activism, and social criticism. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a ...

's '' Syntactic Structures''. In the 1990s he was one of the few

East German East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from its formation on 7 October 1949 until its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on 3 October 1990. Until 1989, it was generally vie ...

academics who did not only not lose his academic standing but increase it, due to his early adoption of cognitive linguistic approaches. It is worth noting that Bierwisch's considered his research groups, which he led in

GDR East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from its formation on 7 October 1949 until its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on 3 October 1990. Until 1989, it was generally vie ...

times at the (East) Berlin Academy of Sciences, in the 1960s/early 1970s for Structural Grammar (disbanded by the GDR regime in 1973), and in the 1980s/1990s for

Cognitive Linguistics Cognitive linguistics is an interdisciplinary branch of linguistics, combining knowledge and research from cognitive science, cognitive psychology, neuropsychology and linguistics. Models and theoretical accounts of cognitive linguistics are cons ...

, as continuation of structural linguistics, combined with a mentalistic perspective.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bierwisch, Manfred 1930 births 2024 deaths Linguists from Germany