English summary: How did certain theories and concepts develop from personal research experiences 'in the field'? The biographies of, for example, Margaret Mead, Franz Boas or Claude Levi-Strauss can shed light on this. The book gives account of the conditions that allowed the emergence and the development of ethnology in its specific historical contexts. German description: In den Lebenswegen von Ethnologen und Ethnologinnen zeigt...