Meinhof, Carl

Meinhof, Carl
born July 23, 1857, Barzwitz, near Schlawe, Pomerania, Prussia
died Feb. 10, 1944, Greifswald, Ger.

German scholar of African languages.

A specialist in the Bantu languages who also studied Khoisan and other African language families, he was one of the first to treat African languages in terms of phonetics and morphology. His books include Outline of the Phonetics of the Bantu Languages (1899) and Principles of the Comparative Grammar of the Bantu Languages (1906).

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▪ German Africanist
born July 23, 1857, Barzwitz, near Schlawe, Pomerania, Prussia [now in Pol.]
died Feb. 10, 1944, Greifswald, Ger.

      German scholar of African languages and one of the first to give them scientific treatment. He studied primarily the Bantu languages but also Hottentot, Bushman, and Hamitic. Alice Werner published a popularization of his ideas in The Language-Families of Africa (1915).

      Meinhof was first a secondary school teacher, then for 17 years a pastor at Zizow, when his meetings with African natives on missions sparked his interest in African languages. When a Duala man came to him for tutoring in German, he was convinced instead to teach the Duala language to Meinhof. In 1899 Meinhof published Grundriss einer Lautlehre der Bantusprachen (“Outline of the Phonetics of the Bantu Languages”), detailing the sound-shifting laws of six modern Bantu languages and postulating a Proto-Bantu that was their predecessor. In 1902 Meinhof went to Zanzibar on a government stipend, and from 1903 to 1909 he taught at the Seminar für Orientalische Sprachen in Berlin. His second principal publication appeared in 1906, Grundzüge einer vergleichenden Grammatik der Bantusprachen (“Principles of the Comparative Grammar of the Bantu Languages”), a study of the morphology of the Bantu languages. From 1909 until his death Meinhof was on the staff of the Kolonial-institut in Hamburg.

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  • Carl — ► (1895 1982) Compositor, director de orquesta y profesor alemán. Obras: Carmina Burana (1937), Catulli Carmina, El triunfo de Afrodita (1951) y Comoedia de Christi resurrectione (1955). * * * (as used in expressions) Andre, Carl Bach, Carl… …   Enciclopedia Universal

  • Carl Meinhof — Carl Friedrich Michael Meinhof (July 23, 1857 ndash; February 11, 1944) was a German linguist and one of the first linguists to study African languages. Early years and career Meinhof was born in Barzwitz near Rügenwalde in the Province of… …   Wikipedia

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  • Carl Adolf Senff — (* 17. März 1785 in Halle (Saale); † 21. März 1863 in Ostrau) war ein deutscher Maler der Biedermeierzeit und war das 13. und jüngste Kind von Carl Friedrich Senff, Konsistorialrat an der Moritzkirche in Halle (Saale) und der Rosina Dorothea… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

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