Honour to the “Karajan”
Prof. em. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Herbert Ernst Wiegand, who can also bee seen as the „Karajan“ of lexicography and dictionary research, turned 80 years old on Jan 8th, 2016. Stefan Schierholz, the germanist and dictioary researcher, organized an international workshop to honour him, on Feb. 5th, 2016 at the international centre of lexicography, valency and collocational studies at the university of Erlangen-Nürnberg, with support from the Vincl foundation. Experts from five countries gave top level presenations.
The contributions were published in an anthology called “Wörterbuchforschung und Lexikographie” and adress fundamental questions of lexicographical theory as well as contemporary issues concrning the quality and usage of online dictionaries and the presentation of projects on bilingual, field-specific, general and historical lexicography. The workshop was well visited by students and lecturers from Erlangen and yielded intense discussions and a number of ideas on the future development of dictionaries. “I was especially pleased to have united the two old warhorses of dictionary research, Henning Bergenholtz from Aarhus and Herbert Ernst Wiegand from Heidelberg. I had not succeeded in that endeavour back in 2012 at our big GAL congress in Erlangen”, says Stefan Schierholz who is very pleased with his highly successful event.
Herbert Ernst Wiegand is said to be the most impactful lexicographer of the last 40 years. He has published over 25.000 pages, developed lexicographical theory to the smallest detail, compiled the largest bibliography of German lexicography and istdictionary research, edited some of the most fundamental introductory literature of linguistics, the “Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft”, as well as the biggest linguistic specialist dictionary so far “Wörterbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft”, which is organized in Erlangen, and he has edited significant series and journals in lexicography and German linguistics.
Herbert Ernst Wiegand is an honourary doctor of the Aarhus School of Business (1996), the university of Sofia (2000) and Stellenbosch University (2006). It is always demanding to read, comprehend, follow, confront, contradict or to correct Wiegand, but that is true science, and that is exactly the kind of recognition that will probably bring the most joy to the celebratee.