This collected volume contains chapters on different generations of scholars and various academic institutions (universities, Academy of Sciences, National Research and Memorial Sites of Classical German Literature in Weimar, German Studies abroad). Differentiated revisions of research achievements in linguistic and literary studies and in the teaching of literature are complemented with studies of the functioning of academic institutions and the way they were shaped by the power structures of the state. Thus a multi-facetted balance is drawn up which reveals an overall picture of an extremely pluralistic academic history in all its many perspectives and aspects.