Uno Lindelöf came from a family which had a strong tradition in mathematics. His father was Professor of Mathematics Lorenz Lindelöf and his older brother Ernst Lindelöf became a professor in mathematics too. Uno, however, was interested in the English language from a young age and when writing his matriculation exam in 1885 he wrote English, which was not taught in schools at the time, as an extra subject.

Uno Lindelöf’s studies at the University of Helsinki began with Latin, Greek and Sanskrit, from which he earned a bachelor’s degree with the highest honours in 1888. After completing his degree, however, he decided to specialise in English and German, so he headed to England to study for a summer, then to Berlin for a year and finally to Paris for another year.

After studying abroad for two years, Lindelöf returned to Helsinki and began studying modern philology under Werner Söderhjelm. In the spring of 1890 he defended his dissertation and two years later he was appointed docent in Germanic Philology. In addition to that post, he worked as a Latin and German teacher at the Nya svenska läroverket (‘New Swedish Secondary School’). The Saksan kielioppi (‘German Grammar’, 1895) book, which he wrote with Johannes Öhquist, resulted from his teaching experience and it was still being used in the 1930s.

The English language was in a peripheral position in schools before the Second World War and Lindelöf recognized that his students’ language skills were weak. Because of this, he prepared and published a book on the history of the English language in 1895. It was originally written in Swedish and its German version was in the degree requirements for the University of Helsinki for a long time. A comparable work by a native researcher would not be seen until the second half of the century.

Lindelöf became the University of Helsinki’s first full Professor of English Philology in 1921. He had, however, already been serving as an extraordinary professor in the subject since 1907. Altogether he was a professor in English Philology for over 30 years, when, upon retiring in 1936, he offered to be the acting professor for another two years.

Lindelöf was respected as both a teacher and a researcher, a fact which is shown by the portrait that his students donated in 1928 as well as the Modern Language Society’s Festschrift in his honour which featured articles by the leading foreign and domestic language scholars. His forethought and pioneering work with English underscored his inaugural lecture on the subject, Englanti maailmankielenä (‘English as a world language’)

Sources:

• S. Nevanlinna, Lindelöf, Uno (1868–1944), Kansallisbiografia, Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Hämtad 10.7.2015.
• Lindelöf Uno Lorenz, Helsingin yliopiston opettaja- ja virkamiesmatrikkeli 1640–1917. Hämtad 10.7.2015.
• Uno Lindelöf, Entiset kansanedustajat 1907–2014. Hämtad 10.7.2015.
• Uno Lindelöf, Wikipedia. Hämtad 10.7.2015.
• 160 Years of English Studies, engelska filologins historia vid Helsingfors universitet. Hämtad 10.7.2015.