Robert Sedlaczek
Robert Sedlaczek is an Austrian journalist, Germanist, expert for Austrian German, and non-fiction author. He is best known for his works on aspects of the German language. In addition, he writes books and articles on cultural history topics. In his book Die Tante Jolesch und ihre Zeit. Eine Recherche he traced the history of the industrial family of the same name as well as the lawyer, Hugo Sperber. These people are characters in Friedrich Torberg's book Die Tante Jolesch.
Life
Robert Sedlaczek was born 2 April 1952 in Vienna. He studied German Studies, English Studies and Journalism in Vienna, earning a Doctor of Philosophy. From 1973 to 1978, he worked as an editor for the news agency, United Press International. After working as a freelance journalist, among others for the magazine Extrablatt, he became press spokesman for the Austrian Chancellor, Bruno Kreisky in 1980, and, later, for Ferdinand Lacina. From 1986 to 1990, he was a member of the curatorium of the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation or ORF, from 1989 to 2003, he was Managing Director of the Austrian Federal Publishing House,. Since 2005, he has been working as a columnist in the feature section of the Wiener Zeitung, and since 2009 he has written the section "German for Journalists" for the industry magazine Der österreichische Journalist. He writes books for the publishers, Amalthea Signum, for Haymon of Innsbruck, for Edition Atelier of Vienna, and for Ueberreuter, also of Vienna.Sedlaczek has been married to Melita Sedlaczek since 1988, who also supports him as a co-author of his books, and has a stepdaughter, whom he adopted as a child. Sedlaczek lives in Vienna and Neulengbach, a town on the western edge of the Vienna Woods.
In 1994, Sedlaczek and co-author Werner Schima received the Steinfeder Prize for wine journalism from the Vinea Wachau Nobilis Districtus for the Austrian wine guide Unser Wein, which was published several times.
Collaboration with Martin Czapka
Robert Sedlaczek has worked with illustrator, Martin Czapka, since 2016. Czapka runs an advertising studio in Vienna and illustrated the books published by Amalthea: Österreichisch für Anfänger, Österreich für Fortgeschrittene and Österreichisch fia Fuaßboifäns, as well the quiz games Das neue Österreich Quiz and Challenge Austria released by Ferdinand Piatnik & Sons.Austrian German
Sedlaczek is one of the most prominent voices of Austrian German, both as a standard variety of German and as a range of dialects, especially for Viennese and Eastern Austrian dialects, for which he has published widely. His regular column in Wiener Zeitung, "Sedlaczek am Mittwoch", has for over 20 years explored many aspects of Austrian German, e.g. Meidling "L", gender issues and language, Viennese dialects. Since the discontinuation of Wiener Zeitung as a daily newspaper in 2023, Sedlaczek has been publishing his regular language columns as a blog.Sedlaczek is the author of several dictionaries of varieties of Austrian German with Haymon Publishers. These include Wörterbuch des Wienerischen., Haymon Taschenbuchverlag, 2011,, Wörterbuch der Alltagssprache Österreichs, Haymon 2011 or Das große Wörterbuch des Wienerischen, 2023.
One aspect worth mentioning is that Sedlaczek, like the makers of Österreichisches Wörterbuch, writes outside of academically institutionalized Germanistik, who have consistently ignored Standard Austrian German and Austrian German as a stand-alone, legitimate research stance. A fact that has recently led to the formulation of a One Standard German Axiom in academic Germanistik.