Honorary Professor Acceptance Speech by Hans Gehl

Translated by Nick Tullius
Published at DVHH.org 30 June 2008 by Jody McKim

Esteemed listeners, esteemed dean, esteemed colleagues young and old, dear students!

Today’s date, May 7 2008, is exceptionally important for me. I am receiving today a new diploma, and it is a different one. After 47 years, it finally closes a circle of my biography, that had been opened in June 1961, when I could not stay as assistant in the Department of German of the Pedagogical Institute of Timisoara, after studying there for five years. The reasons were ideological: the personnel office determined that my father, a teacher in the countryside, did not have a “healthy social origin.”

I acquired a few diplomas over the years: one in German-Romanian in 1961, another in pure Romanian in 1969, and a doctorate in philology in 1976. To these is now added a Diploma of Honorary Professor, accorded by a university that is young in years, but with a great future, "Universitatea de Nord" (University of the Nord) of Baia Mare.

1. In Temeswar/Timisoara I was assistant in 1972 and lector in 1976, at the Polytechnic Institute "Traian Vuia."  I taught German as a foreign language and Romanian language to foreign students.

2. I commuted – and I continue to commute – between two worlds. I grew up and lived in a Banat inhabited by numerous ethnic groups and cultures, with its centers of Arad and Temeswar/Timisoara (considered in the past as Little Vienna), which are re-orientating themselves today toward their old economic, cultural, and inter-human connections with their neighboring provinces in Hungary and Serbia.

3. At the Institute for Danube-Swabian History and Ethno-culture in Tübingen, I demonstrated in a one-man show, how to research and describe, in a very short time (only 17 years), the language, inter-ethnic culture, and traditions of a small German ethnic group that lived for a quarter of a millennium in multiethnic and multicultural surroundings (and predominantly multilingual and multi-religious) in eastern central Europe. This effort resulted in a four-volume dictionary (each volume containing 700 pages), a large volume on ethnography, many specialty studies, and two trilingual volumes containing papers presented at sessions of specialty conferences.

4. A four-year-long cooperation (1999-2003) with colleagues in six countries (Germany, Austria, Romania, Hungary, the Ukraine, and Slovakia) in a research project on "Popular cultures in the upper Tisa basin" appeared at first to be a burden, taking me away from my other obligations. But the productive working relationship brought me new experiences, as well as the appreciation of colleagues, and that of higher authorities such as our Ministerial Culture Center in Stuttgart and the Ministry of Culture and Religions in Bucharest/Bucuresti. The cooperation with Dr. Viorel Ciubota and his colleagues in Satu Mare and Cluj-Napoca are continuing, and I believe that they could serve as an example for similar endeavors. 

5. The cooperation with the German Linguistic Atlas of Marburg, and with specialty magazines (in linguistics and ethnography) of Marburg, München, Linz, Vienna, Vezprem, Budapest, Uzhorod, Bucuresti, Iasi, Cluj, and lately Baia Mare, that accept contributions in large-circulation languages, including German. (See “Memoria Ethnologica” and "Buletinul, seria Limbi Straine").

6. It gives me great pleasure to support colleagues and acquaintances in translating some texts into Romanian, because this intensifies our cooperation within the European Union. As you can see, I have not forgotten the Romanian language, because I never stopped using it in my correspondence with old colleagues and acquaintances, and I used it in my reading and writing.

7. Noteworthy would be the appreciation of common activities in the interest of understanding and good neighborhood. Mr. Nicolae Sârbu   director of the regional library of Caras-Severin, considers it an honor to talk about “Our Germans and Their Heimat” (“De o sută de ori Banat", Resita 2004).

Quote: One day, professor Vasile Ionita [once my colleague at the “Politehnica”] came to our library with a bunch of books. He had received them from Dr. Hans Gehl in Tübingen, Germany, another Danube-Swabian who had left. I sent a letter and two magazines to Dr. Gehl. As expected from a German, I received an answer. Polite, accurate, pleased to receive news from the Banat, his Heimat, of which he is continuing to think.

Noteworthy is also that I am named among "the most valuable experts on the material and spiritual culture of the Swabian ethnic group" in a "Dictionary of events and personalities from the historic Banat" published in November 2007, sponsored by a neighborhood project of the European Union: "The historic Banat, its press and culture."

8. Slowly more bilingual volumes on culture and literature are published. The Institute of Romanian Culture” in Vienna presents the books of the poet Dr. Hans Dama, born in Sannicolau Mare, translated from German to Romanian, and Romanian books which he translated into German. Professor Simion Danila, from Belint in the Banat, attracts attention for years with his translations of a few Austrian poets, and also of the not-so-simple philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche which became a purpose of his life. “Three pages a day” has become the goal of this untiring mediator between cultures.

9. I thank you for this exceptional honor which will keep me connected for a long time with the Faculty of Letters of the "University of the North" in Baia Mare and with the cultural life of the Maramures province with its multicultural traditions.

10. I also wish the leadership of the University, the Faculty of Letters, and all its members – professors and students – much enthusiasm and remarkable successes in their didactic and scientific activities.

Thank you for your attention.

Hans Gehl Named Honorary Professor