Wörter und Sachen
science school of linguistics
Wörter und Sachen (German for words and things) was a philological movement of the early and the middle of the 20th century that was based largely in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
History
The term "wörter und sachen" was first used in 1848 by German linguist Jacob Grimm. It developed into a descriptive research field for linguistic and factual research, which was first presented by Indo-Europeanist R. Meininger in "Wörter und Sachen" in Indogermanische Forschungen 17 (1904/1905). Further results were presented in the cultural-historical journal of the same name (Heidelberg 1909 ff.). Research was later published in English in Th. Bynon, Historical Linguistics. Cambridge 1977.
Arguments
Its proponents argued that the etymology of words should be studied in close association or in parallel with the study of the artefacts and cultural concepts which the words had denoted. The process would, it was argued, enable researchers to study linguistic data more effectively.
For example, a "lamb" in an Arab shepherd's world may be very different from a "lamb" in another context.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Wörter und Sachen” is science school of linguistics. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Wörter, Sachen and science, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “science school of linguistics” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1414878. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1848, 1904, 1905 and 1909.
Official terminology may obscure informal participation, dissent or communities documented only indirectly. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Wörter und Sachen” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.