RT Journal Article SR Electronic(1) A1 van Wanrooij, TommieYR 2021 T1 ‘Haar geheele geest ademt deftigheid en waardigheid’ JF Tijdschrift voor Nederlandse Taal- en Letterkunde, VO 137 IS 3 SP 85 OP 106 DO https://doi.org/10.5117/TNTL2021.3.001.WANR PB Amsterdam University Press, SN 2212-0521, AB Abstract Joannes Matthias Schrant (1783-1866) became the first professor of Dutch Language at the University of Ghent from 1818 to 1830 and was appointed professor at the University of Leiden from 1831 to 1853. Several scholars of Dutch studies have discussed Schrant’s scientific work and concluded that he was an unimportant and uninteresting figure, mainly for his insignificant role in the development of Dutch studies, because he only built upon the scientific ideas of Matthijs Siegenbeek and did not offer his own insights on language and literature. In this article, I adjust this negative view of Schrant as an insignificant figure by studying his scholarly work in the context of the ‘cultivation of culture’ (Leerssen 2006). Schrant was a typical cultivator of national culture: his speeches, literary histories, and editorial work show he was an active scholar who disseminated, sustained, and extended existing ideas about national culture. He did not just disseminate these ideas in his function of professor, but also as a member of the literary societies Regat Prudentia Vires and the Maatschappij der Nederlandsche Letterkunde, and as a public intellectual., UL https://www.aup-online.com/content/journals/10.5117/TNTL2021.3.001.WANR