Abstract
During the final decades of the nineteenth century, historical linguistics rapidly consolidated as an academic field. In particular, the so-called young grammarians developed a paradigm with basic rules for doing comparative linguistic research, along lines that mimicked the natural sciences. Amateur linguists and proponents of speculative theories about human prehistory rejected these strictures. In particular, Helena Blavatsky (1831–1891) and later prophetic figures influenced by Theosophical ideas developed theories regarding the origin and development of language that were both derivative of and in opposition to new developments in linguistics. This chapter presents some of the stages in the emergence of what might be called occult linguistics.
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Notes
- 1.
I wish to thank Karen Swartz for valuable comments on the topic of this chapter and for improving the style and readability of the text.
- 2.
A sizeable literature surveys prescientific speculation on the origins of human speech and on the identity of the first human language, and the reader is referred to relevant works. The article “Language” in the Encyclopedia of Religion (Wheelock 2005 [1987]) presents basic, albeit somewhat outdated information on religious views of language and provides references to the scholarly literature. The substantial literature on Western premodern conceptions of language origins includes the six-volume survey of ancient, medieval, and early modern theories by Arno Borst (1957–1963); theories on the language of Paradise surveyed by Maurice Olender (1989); the quest for the perfect language studied by Umberto Eco (1995); the theory that language reflects reality, as investigated by Gérard Genette (1995) and summarised under the label ‘mimology’; and the many samples of these and other premodern approaches to language found in the contributions in Gessinger and von Rahden (1989).
- 3.
My thumbnail sketch of the early history of comparative linguistics is based on Metcalf 1974.
- 4.
Saussure 1995 [1916], an influential compilation of lecture notes published posthumously.
- 5.
For the history of modern comparative linguistics and the role of the neogrammarians, see Allan 2007: 210–215.
- 6.
For the Turkish nationalist linguistics promoted under Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (1881–1938) and perhaps by him personally, see Laut 2000. Its Hungarian counterpart links Hungarian with Sumerian, the earliest attested written language; see Weaver 2003/2004. Afrocentric linguistics is in particular associated with the Senegalese scholar and politician Cheikh Anta Diop (1923–1986), who wrote a number of books linking West African and Egyptian culture. An important part of his argument was the claim that his native Wolof language was related to ancient Egyptian.
- 7.
- 8.
- 9.
See Shibatani and Bynon 1995 for a brief history of typological approaches to language.
- 10.
For the details on what is summarised here, see Blavatsky 1999, vol. 2: 198–201.
- 11.
The standard reference on this current is Goodrick-Clarke 1985.
- 12.
A collection of Steiner’s statements on language can be found in Steiner 1980.
- 13.
Printed as Vol. 15 of the Gesamtausgabe and available online at multiple sites, e.g.: http://anthroposophie.byu.edu/schriften/015.pdf. Accessed 18 July 2018.
- 14.
The same mimological hypothesis is a repeatedly affirmed constituent of Steiner’s language theory; see, e.g., Steiner 1980: 22–27.
- 15.
Steiner 1911, available at: http://wn.rsarchive.org/Lectures/FromJ2C1973/19111012p01.html. Accessed 18 July 2018.
- 16.
For a brief history of eurythmy, see Zander 2011: 301–307.
- 17.
Printed as Vol. 279 of the Gesamtausgabe and available online at: http://anthroposophie.byu.edu/vortraege/279c.pdf. Accessed 18 July 2018.
- 18.
For the details, see Dubach-Donath 1974: 17–27 (vowels), 81–101 (consonants).
- 19.
Perhaps, because Dubach-Donath (1974: 256) somewhat oddly adds that c corresponds to Libra; like several other writers in the mimological tradition, she does not clearly distinguish the sounds of language from the letters that rather imperfectly represent sounds in written form.
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Hammer, O. (2021). Stages in the Development of an Occult Linguistics. In: Pokorny, L., Winter, F. (eds) The Occult Nineteenth Century. Palgrave Studies in New Religions and Alternative Spiritualities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-55318-0_7
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