The Study of European Ethnology in Austria

Folklore, Dec, 2005 by Gwendolyn Leick

The Study of European Ethnology in Austria. By James R. Dow and Olaf Bockhorn. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004. 302 pp. 55.00 [pounds sterling] (hbk). ISBN 0-7546-1747-5

This book forms part of a series edited by Ullrich Kockel, Progress in European Ethnology, intended to provide a "critical overview of different national/regional traditions in European ethnology and their development." The authors of this volume are from Iowa State University and the University of Vienna, respectively. The title is problematic, as it obscures the true subject of the work, which is folk studies (Volkskunde). "European ethnology," in the Austrian context, is a recent (2000) re-branding of Volkskunde. The term "ethnology" is more generally used in Europe as a synonym for anthropology (Volkerkunde). The authors aim to provide a comprehensive historical account of the discipline of Volkskunde from its beginnings to the early years of the twenty-first century, as practised in Austrian universities and folk museums. There are six chapters, all with German headings, which divide the voluminous material into discrete, chronologically sequenced sections. A generous bibliography and a bilingual index complete the volume.

While in Britain folklore arose in response to rapid urbanisation and the exodus of the rural population from the countryside, it was adopted in Europe for the cause of nationalist and often separatist movements, especially in the multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian Empire. The emergence of a unified German state under Bismarck fostered a considerable interest in all manifestations of German culture. This search for the essence of German cultural identity had both antiquarian (Tacitus was an important source) and ethnographic dimensions, since within the "timeless" traditions of the "simple folk" one could discern the continuity of a truly German character. As competition between the great European powers became more feverish and Germany prepared for the inevitable cataclysm of the Great War, a particularly virulent form of nationalism sought to underpin the notion of the fatherland worth the supreme sacrifice. Following the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the essential question as to who were the Austrians was in part answered by plugging directly into this excessively aggressive German nationalism, then again in full swing following the humiliating defeat in war. Fascism's appeal was broadened in Austria by a seemingly innocuous cultural identification with the rural folk--Hitler Youths donned Lederhosen and Dirndl, and danced around bonfires to folk tunes. The book makes it very clear that the ideological usefulness of folk studies was fostered by some of the scholars active in the 1930s.

Bockhorn and Dow also try to account for the stream of illiberalism, irrationality, and mystic Deutschtumelei (Germanomania) that underpinned much of the scholarly output of Austrian folk studies of the twentieth century. They begin with an analysis of the intellectual forerunners of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, such as pan-German Houston Stuart Chamberlain, Madame Blavatsky, and Guido yon List, who detected Wotanist practices in most German folk traditions.

The largest part of the volume is devoted to what went on in folk studies in Austria during the inter-war period. The authors have decided to deal with each of the main institutions, in Vienna, Innsbruck, Graz, and Salzburg, separately. This leads by necessity to chronological overlaps, as the same individuals crop up in different departments at different times. Prominence is given to Vienna, especially to the main protagonists, Richard Wolfram, Lily Weiser, and Otto Hofler at the university, and Karl von Spieiss and Michael Haberlandt (with his son Arthur) at the Museum fur Volkskunde. There was a great deal of interpersonal rivalry, jealousy, and jockeying for position, as could be found in any underfunded academic discipline. Even the much vaunted clash between different "schools"--Ritualists such as Wolfram versus Mythologists such as Hofler--could be understood as the result of personal animosity. It is frequently difficult to keep track of the diverse characters and the often obscure subjects of their research. A chronologically ordered list of names with their respective positions would have alleviated such problems.

The period from the Anschluss in 1938 to the end of the war is dealt with in a fascinating chapter. Many of the incumbent lecturers and scholars in Vienna and Innsbruck managed to consolidate their positions by pursuing the ideological agenda wholeheartedly, while those who were found wanting in "clarity of world-view" (weltanschauliche Klarheit), such as Viktor von Geramb at Graz, were marginalised. Folklorists were "to develop German Volkskunde scholarship into a fortress for the NS world view." "Mythologists" and "Ritualists" were active on behalf of the research community called "Ancestral Inheritance" (Ahnenerbe), which "supported experiments on concentration camp inmates as well as the transportation of Jews to camps" and promoted an exclusively German culture (Germanentum). The authors also give due credit for the massive ethnographic undertaking of documenting the folk culture of German South Tyrol, which Hitler handed over to Mussolini.