author
Diedrich Westermann
1875–1956
A pioneering scholar of African languages, he helped lay the foundations of modern African linguistics while moving beyond some of the older theories he inherited. His work grew out of years of firsthand study in West Africa and a lifelong effort to document languages with care and precision.
1 Audiobook
Die Nutzpflanzen unserer Kolonien und ihre wirtschaftliche Bedeutung für das Mutterland
by Diedrich Westermann
About the author
Born on June 24, 1875, in Baden near Bremen, Diedrich Hermann Westermann was a German missionary, linguist, and Africanist. He first went to Togoland as a missionary teacher, where his close study of Ewe shaped the direction of his career and led him toward the serious documentation of African languages.
Westermann became one of the key early figures in the academic study of African linguistics in Germany. Building on — and in some ways revising — the work of his teacher Carl Meinhof, he is widely associated with the development of modern scholarship on African language families. He later held the chair of African languages at the University of Berlin and also worked on broader questions of African ethnology and culture.
He died on May 31, 1956. Remembered for combining field experience with wide-ranging comparative research, Westermann helped bring African languages into clearer focus for European scholarship at a time when much of the field was still taking shape.