DFG-Project (2001-2004)

 

Marianne Schmidl and her unpublished manuscript on ‘Semi-woven Baskets in Africa’
An ethnologist persecuted as a Jew in the first half of the 20th century

 

Marianne Schmidl was the first woman in a German-speaking country to receive a doctorate in ethnology from the University of Vienna, earning her degree in 1916 with her dissertation „Zahl und Zählen in Afrika“ (Numbers and Counting in Africa) (1915). After working at museums in Vienna, Berlin, Stuttgart, and Weimar, she was unable to secure a position at an ethnological institution despite numerous positive references from renowned ethnologists; men were demonstrably favoured in the appointment process. Nevertheless, alongside the full-time position she eventually obtained at the Austrian National Library, she continued her ethnological research. She conducted fieldwork in Bulgaria, delivered lectures, contributed to commemorative volumes, and published further articles, some of which attracted considerable attention. Her principal interest, however, lay in a cultural-historical study of African basketry. In 1926, Fritz Krause of Leipzig confirmed that the Saxon State Research Institute for Ethnology would provide her with indefinite financial support for this project.

While continuing her work at the National Library, Schmidl devoted herself to the study of African basketry in numerous Western European museums, exchanged ideas with colleagues in Vienna, and participated in scholarly associations such as the Vienna Working Group for African Cultural History. Having been academically trained by scholars representing a wide range of, and at times contrasting, perspectives (including Michael Haberlandt, Rudolf Pöch, and Bernhard Ankermann), Schmidl moved away from the rigid diffusionist approach, which often rested on the assumption of one-way cultural transfer. Instead, she emphasised the reciprocal nature of cultural influences and regarded such exchanges positively. However, she was unable, on her own and within a reasonable timeframe, to realise her ambitious plan of researching the history of every African community as part of her basketry study.

Following the “Anschluss” of Austria to the German Reich, Marianne Schmidl was dismissed from her position at the National Library because of her Jewish heritage. Otto Reche, who had served as director of the Saxon State Research Institute for Ethnology since 1927, compelled her to surrender her unfinished scholarly manuscript on African basketry. Schmidl did not survive the Nazi regime. She was deported to Izbica in 1942 and was murdered there or in one of the extermination camps at Sobibór or Bełżec. Despite expert assessments by Fritz Krause and Johannes Lehmann describing her work as highly valuable, her study of African basketry was never published. As part of a project funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), a scholarly biography of Marianne Schmidl was compiled, and her manuscript was prepared for publication.

 

 

 

Publications:

  • Marianne Schmidl (1890–1942). In: Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 127 (2002): 269–300.

 

  • Marianne Schmidl (1890–1942). Das unvollendete Leben und Werk einer Ethnologin. Enthält das unvollendete Manuskript von Marianne Schmidl „Afrikanische Spiralwulstkörbe“ (Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Ethnologie der Universität Leipzig, Reihe Fachgeschichte, Band 3). Leipzig 2005.

 

  • Jüdische Lebenslinien in der Wiener Völkerkunde vor 1938: Das Beispiel Marianne Schmidl. In: A.Gingrich, P. Rohrbacher (Hrsg.), Völkerkunde zur NS-Zeit aus Wien (1938-1945), Institutionen, Praktiken und Biographie-zentrierte Netzwerke. Wien: Verlag der ÖAW 2021.

 

  • Verfolgung, Deportation und Ermordung – Die letzten Lebensjahre von Marianne Schmidl. In: A. Gingrich, P. Rohrbacher (Hrsg.), Völkerkunde zur NS-Zeit aus Wien (1938-1945), Institutionen, Praktiken und Biographie-zentrierte Netzwerke. Wien: Verlag der ÖAW 2021.

 

 

 

 

 

Memorial stone for Marianne Schmidl

In 2017, on the initiative of Katja Geisenhainer and with financial support from the Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Vienna, the Institute for Social Anthropology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, and the Anthropological Society of Vienna, a memorial stone was installed at Marianne Schmidl’s last place of residence (Eichendorffgasse 7, Vienna).