Hellmut Geissner

Hellmut Geissner (March 7, 1926 in Darmstadt, Germany – August 19, 2012 in Lausanne, Switzerland) was a German scholar of speech and rhetoric.

Biography
Geissner began his career at the Johann W. Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main, before teaching at the Saarland University in Saarbrücken. His last appointed position was as full professor at the University of Koblenz-Landau, where he held the chair for "Sprechwissenschaft" (Speech).

After his retirement he continued to teach at various institutions, including the University of Zürich and the University of Vienna. Because of his influence in founding and forming the field, he continues to be considered one of the three most important representatives of the academic study of speech as communication.

Geissner has distinguished himself with numerous publications on speech and its sub-fields, speech training and rhetoric. In addition he developed the five-theorem theory (Fünfsatztheorie) of Argumentation and the situation model of communication.

For many years he held seminars and conducted training sessions for large companies and media concerns, and he is co-founder of the Academic Advisory Committee of the German Society for Speech Communication and Speech Training (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Sprechwissenschaft und Sprecherziehung - DGSS). He also founded the Institute for Rhetoric (IRM) at the European Academy of Otzenhausen (EAO) and, together with Prof. Fred L. Casmir, of the International Colloquium for Communication (ICC).

Geissner has written a "history of speech training ("Geschichte der Sprecherziehung").

Geissner's theory of rhetorical communication is most fully laid out in Rhetorik und politische Bildung ("Rhetoric and Political Education). This theory was the basis of a 13-part television series, Reden und reden lassen ("To Speak and Let Speak"), which won an Adolf Grimme Award, the German equivalent of an Emmy.

Hellmut Geissner lived in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Honors

 * Honorary member of the German Society for Speech and Communication Deutschen Gesellschaft für Sprechwissenschaft und Sprecherziehung (DGSS) e. V.
 * Honorary Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Institute for Rhetoric and Methodology (Institut für Rhetorik und Methodik) at the European Academy in Otzenhausen.
 * Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, Service Cross (Bundesverdienstkreuz am Bande)
 * Honorary Silver Medal of the Martin-Luther University at Halle-Wittenberg
 * Distinguished Recognition by the National Communication Association, für "Outstanding Scholarly and Research Contributions to the Study of International and Intercultural Communication"