| Born: | 05-27-1879 |
| Faculty: | Philosophical School |
| Category: | Expelled teacher |
Karl BUEHLER (born on May 27th, 1879 in Meckesheim near Heidelberg/Germany, died on October 24th, 1963 in Los Angeles/USA), husband of ao. Univ.-Prof. Charlotte Buehler (university professor), was o. Prof. for Philosophy at the Philosophical School of the University of Vienna in 1938.
After he had graduated from high school ('Katholisches Gymnasium') in Tauberbischofsheim, he began to study medicine and philosophy at the University of Freiburg in 1899 and graduated there in on August 4th, 1903 with the academic degree 'Dr. med.', and on September 9th, 1905 – after studying in at the universities at Strasbourg, Berlin and Bonn – with the academic degree 'Dr. phil.' in Straßburg.
From 1906 to 1909 Buehler was lecturer ('Assistent') at the Psychological Department in Wuerzburg, where he was promoted 'Privatdozent' in 1907. In 1909 he moved to the University of Bonn and in 1913 to the University of Munich, where he worked as a lecturer ('Assistant'). In 1915 he was appointed 'nichtbeamteter' ao. Prof. in Munich. During World War I he temporarily served as 'Stabsarzt' at the army, carried out aptitude tests with drivers and pilots and took care for patients who have suffered injuries to the brain. In 1918 he became o. Prof. of Philosophy and Pedagogics at the Technical University in Dresden.
In 1922 Karl Buehler was promoted o. Prof. at the University of Vienna, where he built up ad headed the Psychological Department. In 1927/28 he was guest professor at the universities Stanford, Johns Hopkins and Harvard in the USA, in 1929 in Chicago.
Buehler was persecuted in times of Nazism because of his political orientation, lost his position and was thrown out of the university in May 1938 (his pension was cancelled in 1939).
He was arrested in spring 1938 for several months, but was able to emigrate to Los Angeles/USA via Oslo/Norway in 1939. In 1940 he received the American citizenship and was appointed Professor of Psychology am St. Scholastica College in Duluth, Minnesota and lecturer at College of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota. In 1945 he moved to the Medical School of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles as Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry. Subsequently, he became Consulting Psychologist at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles for two years.
Lit.: MÜHLBERGER 1993, 38; Archive for the History of Sociology in Austria; Achim ESCHBACH, Karl Bühler, Tübingen 2006; Gedenkbuch für die Opfer des Nationalsozialismus an der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften; GEUTER 1986, 150f.; Thomas SCHREIBER, Karl Bühler. Sein Leben und Werk, 2009.
Katharina Kniefacz
