Associate Professor of German, Hoyt-Reichmann Scholar of German-American Studies, Department of World Languages and Cultures, IUPUI
1962-2013
Passed by the IUPUI Faculty Council at their meeting on October 8, 2013.
The Department of World Languages and Cultures at IUPUI mourns the sudden passing of Dr. Daniel C. Nützel on April 13, 2013.
Daniel C. Nützel joined the faculty of the IU School of Liberal Arts in 2009 as Associate Professor of German, Hoyt-Reichmann Scholar of German-American Studies, and Director of the Max Kade Center for German-American Studies at IUPUI.
A German-American from Cincinnati, Dan Nützel graduated from Xavier University (Cincinnati) with a Bachelor of Arts in Classical Studies and French. He studied at the University of Paris and at the University of Hamburg before he returned to pursue a Masters in German Literature and German-American Studies at the University of Cincinnati. A two-year period as a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Bayreuth and a doctoral degree in German Linguistics from Purdue University in 1998 culminated his academic preparation. His doctoral research made him a specialist on the Franconian dialect of Indiana. His teamwork as a field researcher dialectologist and sociolinguist in the next decade (1998-2009) at the University of Regensburg and the University of Bayreuth (Germany) ) is reflected in the collaborative publication of four linguistic atlases (Atlas of Northeastern Bavaria, Upper Bavaria, Small Bavarian Linguistic Atlas, and Atlas of German Dialects in the Czech Republic). His research participation in the Bavarian dialect atlas was a major undertaking, a 12-year collaborative project for which he received funding from the German equivalent to our National Endowment for the Humanities.
The Atlas of German Dialects in the Czech Republic is one of the largest dialectological projects in the German-speaking world.
Dan Nützel was an internationally known scholar in German language and German-American dialects. He was also an expert in German-American Studies, Sociolinguistics, Dialectology, Historical Linguistics, and Transnational Studies. His publications include two books: The moribund East Franconian dialect of Haysville, Indiana (Regensburg: Edition Vulpes, 2009) and The German-Bohemian dialect remembered (MN: Edinborough Press, 2009), journal articles and book chapters in edited collections on language contact and new dialect formation, paths leading to language extinction, and structural change and loss in dying dialects. His 2009 book on the German dialect of Haysville has been described as the most detailed comparative study in German-American dialectology.
Collaborative research was a hallmark of Dan Nützel’s scholarship. His ability to maintain long- standing working relationships with the University of Bayreuth and the University of Regensburg while embarking in more recent collaborations with research groups at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Penn State speaks volumes of Dan’s high stature as a researcher and commitment to his research projects. His most recent work, in 2012, focused on heritage language syntax and on the morphosyntactic stability of American German. This latest work was the result of a fruitful inter-institutional collaboration on the study of linguistic aspects of Germanic heritage languages, a topic of common interest to German-American Studies scholars, German linguists, and linguists in general.
Daniel Nützel taught courses in German Linguistics and German-American studies. His superb skills as a teacher were often recognized by students, who highlight his motivating teaching style and attention to their individual needs regarding course content and career opportunities. His engagement with students was reflected as well in his supervision of student research projects, sometimes involving service to the community, such as the organization of an exhibit about Germans in Indianapolis. As one German major commented, losing Dr. Nützel is “like having an academic rock taken away from you.”
His tenure at IUPUI was characterized by intense and extraordinary professional service to his professional discipline, the department, school, campus, and local community. Most notably, he served as director of the Max Kade German-American Center at IUPUI, President of the Indiana German Heritage Society, co-director of the publications committee for this Society, and member of the Executive Board for the Society of German American Studies. Internationally, he was linguistics book review editor for Transnational German Studies. In the School of Liberal Arts, he was involved in student scholarship selection and numerous committees. At the department level, Daniel leaves a lasting imprint on the departmental strategic plan, which he helped forge. He was a regular and enthusiastic participant in departmental events. Daniel Nützel was able to manage balanced attention to all aspects of his academic work. We owe him a great deal of gratitude for his commitment to IUPUI in his brief period with us.
Dan Nützel’s passing has left a vacuum in our department, our campus, our community, and the German-speaking communities he worked with, both in the state of Indiana and in Europe. His scholarly legacy, however, stays with us and makes us proud. His passion has sparked in colleagues and students an interest for the preservation and appreciation of German dialects and cultures, and for the impact of German Americans in making this state and this country what it is today.
THUS, BE IT RESOLVED, that this memorial resolution be placed in the minutes of Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis Faculty Council with a moment of silence observed in his honor. A copy of this memorial resolution will be delivered to his sisters.
This resolution is written on behalf of Daniel C. Nützel’s former students and the staff and faculty of the Department of World Languages and Cultures. This resolution was prepared by Marta Antón, Chair of World Languages and Cultures, along with Gabrielle Bersier, Director of the Program in German, and Claudia Grossmann, Interim Director of the Max Kade Center for German-American Studies at IUPUI.