A biographical sketch of prof. dr Grete Henry-Hermann (1901–1984)

Inge Hansen-Schaberg

pp. 3-16

in: Elise Crull, Guido Bacciagaluppi (eds), Grete Hermann, Berlin, Springer, 2016

Abstract

Grete Henry-Hermann was born in Bremen in 1901. After a doctorate in mathematics with Emmy Noether in Göttingen, she became first a pupil, then personal assistant of the neo-Kantian philosopher Leonard Nelson , and continued his philosophical and political work with Minna Specht after his death. In the 1930s, Hermann worked on the foundations of quantum mechanics in close contact with Werner Heisenberg and Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker , as well as continuing her political work against the Nazi regime. She lived in exile 1934–1946, mainly in Denmark and England. After the war she returned to Germany and spent most of her career there at the Pädagogische Hochschule in Bremen. She contributed to cultural and educational policies in post-war Germany and worked on the critique and further development of Nelson's ethics. She died in Bremen in 1984. This biographical sketch of Grete Hermann was originally published in German in the Zeitschrift für Museum und Bildung.

Cited authors

Kant Immanuel

Heisenberg Werner

Nelson Leonard

Henry-Hermann Grete

Friedrich Carl