Eine Grenzgängerin auf einer Spritztour

The subject of this review article is the Festschrift „Grenzgänge: Eine Spritztour durch Text-, Stil- und Zeichengefilde“ (Border Crossings: A Journey through Textual, Stylistic and Significant Fields), edited by Bettina M. Bock, Steffen Pappert and Tanja Škerlavaj, published by Frank & Timme, Berlin, on the occasion of Ulla Fix‘s eightieth birthday. Based on the thesis formulated in the title of the Festschrift, the essence of the philological-scientific contribution of the jubilarian is reflected upon against the background of the model of the linguistic sign and the terminological considerations. The short contributions collected in the Festschrift present fields of research by Ulla Fix. These fields of research are thematised, reflected upon and thought about further. They are not rambling analyses, but succinct, apt brushstrokes to the research questions Ulla Fix opened up and worked on. The construction of the Festschrift and the contributions presented in it can be read as a model representation of the linguistic sign. The contributions provide the semantic equipment for what the naming signalled in the title contains. They are the imagined, thematised, reflected content, concept of what the name Grenzgängerin essentially means. This method of reading the contributions corresponds epistemologically with the anti-essentialist approach to meaning-making opened up by Karl Popper in opposition to Aristotle‘s naïve method and intuitive conception of knowledge. Thus, the jubilarian‘s border crossings become synonymous with the epistemological search for truth in the sense of classical, traditionally grounded and forward-looking philological research. The contributions are also forward-looking in their message - communicative, but above all stimulating and inspiring for every lover of language - for experienced scholars and for those who want to become one.