Dominik Schröder

Who is Dominik Schröder?

Dominik Schröder was an ethnologist and Mongolist. He was born in Eiweiler, in the Nohfelden municipality of the Saarland. He worked as a missionary in China from 1938 to 1949. He obtained an MA from Fujen University in Beijing in 1945.

He was active in the Anthropos-Institut in Fribourg, and undertook research on the Kham people, and the oral poetry of the Monguor people. He translated the chapter on Folklore from the Xīkāng Tújīng, a work by the Chinese scholar Rèn Nǎiqiáng who pioneered studies on the Gesar epic. From 1946 to 1949 he resided among the Huzhu Monguor people. He returned to Europe in 1949 to pursue his studies in anthropology at both Fribourg and Frankfurt, and obtained a doctorate in 1951. His inaugural dissertation, "Zur Religion der Tujen des Sininggebietes," published in 1953 was an important addition to a little-known field of ethnology.

He was appointed professor of ethnology at Nanzan University in Nagoya in 1960, a position he held until 1969. While in Japan, he made several trips to Taiwan to conduct fieldwork among the shamanizing ‘poringao’ women of the aboriginal Puyuma people. His research notes were edited and published posthumously by Anton Quack.