Phiippe-André Schild (1 August 1910 - 13 July 1981) was a Swiss linguist known for his work with

international auxiliary languages An international auxiliary language (sometimes acronymized as IAL or contracted as auxlang) is a language meant for communication between people from different nations, who do not share a common first language. An auxiliary language is primarily a ...

, especially

Interlingua Interlingua (, ) is an international auxiliary language (IAL) developed between 1937 and 1951 by the American International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA). It is a constructed language of the "naturalistic" variety, whose vocabulary, ...

Life

Schild was born on 1 August 1910 in Fontainemelon in the Swiss

canton of Neuchâtel The Republic and Canton of Neuchâtel (; ; ; ) is a mostly French-speaking canton in western Switzerland. In 2007, its population was 169,782, of whom 39,654 (or 23.4%) were foreigners. The capital is Neuchâtel. History County of Neuchâtel ...

. He joined his local Esperantic club in 1925 aged 15, having become interested in the idea of a universal language at a young age. From 1939 to 1940 he was leader of the Esperanto group of Basel, where he had settled in 1929 to work in a

Singer Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define singi ...

sewing machine Diagram of a modern sewing machine Animation of a modern sewing machine as it stitches A sewing machine is a machine used to sew fabric and materials together with thread. Sewing machines were invented during the first Industrial Revolutio ...

factory. While he worked there, he also worked as a teacher of German in a private school. After coming to the conclusion that Esperanto lacked , he left the movement to join

Edgar de Wahl Edgar von Wahl (Interlingue: , born Edgar Alexis Robert von Wahl; 23 August 1867 – 9 March 1948) was a Baltic German mathematics and physics teacher who lived in Tallinn, Estonia. He also used the pseudonym Julian Prorók, and is best know ...

's Occidental; he supported it until 1947, when he proposed his own, again more naturalistic, language. This project, Neolatino, attempted to combine the internationality of

Romance Romance may refer to: Common meanings * Romance (love), emotional attraction towards another person and the courtship behaviors undertaken to express the feelings ** Romantic orientation, the classification of the sex or gender with which a pers ...

roots, while maintaining a grammar that was as regular as possible. However, upon realising that his project had little chance of success, he aligned himself with the

of the

International Auxiliary Language Association The International Auxiliary Language Association, Inc. (IALA) was an American organisation founded in 1924 to "promote widespread study, discussion and publicity of all questions involved in the establishment of an auxiliary language, together wi ...

. Schild thus became an important figure in the international language movement – in 1954, he founded the

Union Mundial pro Interlingua Interlingua (, ) is an international auxiliary language (IAL) developed between 1937 and 1951 by the American International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA). It is a constructed language of the "naturalistic" variety, whose vocabulary, g ...

with French unionist Jean Thersant and British educationalist Donald Morewood; he was its first general secretary from 1955 to 1958. Schild published in interlinguistic newspapers, and organised congresses for supporters of Interlingua. Schild spoke Interlingua with a native-like proficiency, and from 1960 began compiling a German-Interlingua dictionary () – this took him over two decades, and he died only a few pages from its completion (Schild died at the word ''zuschanden'', ''to shame''). Schild died on 13 July 1981 in the University Hospital of Basel after a long period of illness. His dictionary was completed posthumously by Heimut E. Ruhrig of the

University of Freiburg The University of Freiburg (colloquially ), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (), is a public university, public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The university was founded in 1 ...

and published the same year. Schild's library and archives – over 400kg of

interlinguistics Interlinguistics, also known as cosmoglottics, is the science of planned languages that has existed for more than a century. Formalised by Otto Jespersen in 1931 as the science of interlanguages, in more recent times, the field has been more fo ...

-related material – were donated to the

Centre de documentation et d'étude sur la langue internationale The ''Centre de documentation et d'étude sur la langue internationale'' (CDELI; English: Center for Documentation and Study about the International Language) in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland, was founded in 1967 by :eo:Claude Gacond, Claude Gac ...

La Chaux-de-Fonds La Chaux-de-Fonds (; archaic ) is a Swiss city in the canton of Neuchâtel. It is located in the Jura Mountains at an altitude of 992 metres, a few kilometres south of the French border. After Geneva, Lausanne, Biel/Bienne, and Fribourg, ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schild, Andre Interlingua Interlingua speakers Linguists from Switzerland Swiss Esperantists 1910 births 1981 deaths 20th-century linguists Interlingue speakers