The “History of Science” task area is one of the many long-term project activities that are bundled together at the ACDH-CH within the Dictionary of Historical Bavarian dialects in Austria and South Tyrol (WBÖ) project cluster.
This task area aims to reconstruct the history of the data material and the resulting dictionary articles and language maps regarding historical developments at the time, especially in the first half of the 20th century. The aim is to shed light on the scientific and (university) political connections of the individual protagonists as well as the data material itself, which is not only a linguistic-historical document but also a social contemporary witness due to its level of detail.
The summary of the key data on the history of the WBÖ project is based primarily on project descriptions that have previously been published, with additional information from contemporary academy reports and archive materials. This overview also incorporates further findings from scientific work carried out in recent years.
A history of science classification and reflection of the WBÖ serves to contextualize the long-term project. Significant parts of the knowledge gained for this purpose are compiled as part of the project “History and Philosophy of Linguistic Research on the German Language in Austria”. This is and has been discussed at various events, such as the Institute's conference on “Cultural Heritage in the Digital Age” or the workshop “Dialectological and Folkloristic Research in the German-speaking World of the 20th Century” that was organized by the WBÖ team.
In addition, an overview of the Material Collection provides an insight into the scope and the contexts of origin of the heterogeneous data that were collected as part of this project.