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I think that this image is POV. So what if they built another church? Nobody is forcing the Hungarians to change from Catholicism to Orthodoxy... bogdan 15:25, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
Hi Bogdan, Building a Romanian monument next to a Hungarian historical site can be considered to be the romanianisation of the Transylvanian landscape. What do you think? Would you suggest a different text?
This may also be means of assimilation, or at least to hide the results of it, this is the intention of the builders, isn't it? KIDB
Yes, you may be right, if Romanianization is a defined to be a government action, this photo should be included in the description of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Who defined Romanianization to be a government action? Are you sure this expression can't refer to non-governmental activities of Romanians trying to eleiminate the proofs of Hungarian existence in Transylvania?
I do not really want to argue, the picture [above] speaks for itself. By the way, Bogdan, a photo can not be a POW, only the interpretation of the photo. The interpretation is: SOME ethnic Romanians (whatever their religion is) do not respect and have not respected the historical heritage of middle-age Transylvania, rather they would like to hide it. This is one aspect of the Romanianization of Transylvania and goes parallel with other actions, like assimilating of the Saxonian and Hungarian minorities. 21 November 2005 KIDB
"as a results of many years of humiliating disconsiderations of human rights when Romanians were not allowed to settle into the majority of the Transylvanian cities."
Could you cite any sources on this? I don't know about any such regulations, at least not from the beginning of the 19th century onwards. I mean, in 1848 already, cities such as Sibiu, Brasov, Târgu Mures and Cluj had thousands of Romanian inhabitants, Orthodox and Greek Catholic churches etc. Avram Iancu went to school in Cluj, worked as a lawyer in Targu Mures, all this before 1848. I wonder if we should have this very strong statement in the article in the absence of any sources corroborating it.-- Tamas 18:44, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
I still can't agree with the new text, I think most of it should be deleted: 1. "rural regions were overwhelmingly Romanian" this is not true, I wouldn't use this phrase for the whole area of Transyvania, especially not for the middle ages, where we have no statistical data from. 2. "As a result of many years of disconsiderations of human rights aimed at maintaining the social status-quo of Transylvania, the large majority of the Romanians remained serfs and were not allowed to move from their villages. This meant that they could not play an active part in the urbanization process that took place before 1850" What is the connection between the life of Romanian (Vlach) serfs in the middle ages and Romanianization policy in the 20th century? Why is the very slow urbanisation process in medieval times important in this article? 3. "when the Austrian authorities abolished the Union of Three Nations and granted citizenship and land to the serfs." This should be dealt with in the History of Transilvania Article, not here.
I think these should not be part of the article on romanianization, beacause these statements have no direct connection, or proved connection to romanianization. It is like explaining in the Magyarizartion Article the historical background and claiming that Wallachians replaced Hungarians in medieval Transylvania by immigrating into rural areas... -- KIDB 14:28, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
"Rural regions were overwhelmingly Romanian" is a fact for the 19th century (there are good censuses for that period. The article does not anywhere state that this was the case in the Middle Ages. "Overwhelmingly" here just emphasises the fact that in the rural regions Romanians formed the majority while in the urban areas they were just a disproportionately small minority, for historical reasons. The important point is that in the industrial age the cities started with an ethnical composition which could not be sustained once unrestricted migration from rural areas (which had a different ethnical balance) was allowed. The cities did grow, end they had to grow for economic reasons (it may be even argued that they did not grow enough, when compared with developed contries). In any industrial period, as a rule of thumb, the cities mainly grow by immigration, not by natural growth. The end result is that today, in general, the ethnic composition of the cities is pretty much the same as that of their county/region or the surrounding countryside.
Algos
15:43, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
http://www.mek.iif.hu/porta/szint/egyeb/terkep/census/census.gif http://lazarus.elte.hu/hun/maps/1910/nepek.gif http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/92/Austria_hungary_1911.jpg
As you can see, Saxon zones were not as compact as you imply...And not even the Székely Land is not as compact as areas from Pannonia. As for the Germans, to find out what really happened (after 1944), a material written by one of their historians could help... http://www.sibiweb.de/geschi/7b-history.htm Algos 13:36, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
I have brought the following over to the talk page (intact) because it is written like an essay, not like a Wikipedia article. The statistics on Romanian urbanization clearly belong somewhere in Wikipedia (I'm not sure whether this is the right article for them), but much of the rest of this is inappropriately polemical: "However, if one wants to have an objective view, one should…", "We observe that there was indeed…", "Therefore, many argue that this data prove in a very objective way…", "They were in fact…", "It is also true that…", etc. It is possible that this can be rewritten in an appropriate manner; that would include some citation of sources for the case being made, not weasel words like "many argue". -- Jmabel | Talk 05:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
[start cut section]
==Urbanization==
The intention of a romanianization policy may or may not be true and there certainly are different divergent opinions on this matter. The urbanization in 20th century Romania is often regarded as a tool employed by the Romanian authorities. However, if one wants to have an objective view, one should investigate the change in population in several cities from all-over Romania. Data from 7 censuses between 1912 and 1992 are presented below:
Transylvania
(1912) | (1930) | (1948) | (1956) | (1966) | (1977) | (1992) | increase 1912-1992 | |
Alba Iulia | 11,616 | 12,282 | 14,420 | 14,776 | 22,215 | 41,199 | 71,168 | 6.4 times |
Arad | 63,166 | 77,181 | 87,291 | 106,460 | 126,000 | 171,193 | 190,114 | 3 |
Braşov | 41,056 | 59,232 | 82,984 | 123,834 | 163,345 | 256,475 | 323,736 | 7.8 |
Cluj-Napoca | 60,808 | 100,844 | 117,915 | 154,723 | 185,663 | 262,858 | 328,602 | 5.4 |
Miecurea Ciuc | 3,701 | 4,807 | 6,143 | 11,996 | 15,329 | 30,936 | 46,228 | 12.5 |
Oradea | 64,169 | 82,687 | 82,282 | 98,950 | 122,534 | 170,531 | 222,741 | 3.5 |
Satu Mare | 34,892 | 51,495 | 46,519 | 52,096 | 68,246 | 103,544 | 131,987 | 3.8 |
Sfântu Gheorghe | 8,665 | 10,818 | 14,224 | 17,638 | 20,768 | 40,804 | 68,359 | 8 |
Sibiu | 33,489 | 49,345 | 60,602 | 90,475 | 109,515 | 151,137 | 169,656 | 5.1 |
Târgu Mureş | 25,517 | 38,517 | 47,043 | 65,194 | 86,464 | 130,076 | 164,445 | 6.4 |
Timişoara | 72,555 | 91,580 | 111,987 | 142,257 | 174,243 | 269,353 | 334,115 | 4.6 |
Moldova
(1912) | (1930) | (1948) | (1956) | (1966) | (1977) | (1992) | increase 1912-1992 | |
Bacǎu | 18,846 | 31,138 | 34,461 | 54,138 | 73,414 | 127,299 | 205,029 | 11.3 times |
Galaţi | 71,641 | 100,611 | 80,411 | 95,646 | 151,412 | 238,292 | 326,141 | 4.6 |
Iaşi | 75,229 | 102,872 | 94,075 | 112,977 | 161,023 | 265,002 | 344,425 | 4.6 |
Piatra Neamţ | 18,965 | 29,827 | 26,303 | 32,648 | 45,852 | 77,812 | 123,360 | 6.5 |
Suceava | 11,229 | 17,028 | 10,123 | 20,949 | 37,697 | 62,715 | 114,462 | 10.2 |
Muntenia
(1912) | (1930) | (1948) | (1956) | (1966) | (1977) | (1992) | increase 1912-1992 | |
Bucharest | 341,321 | 639,040 | 1,041,807 | 1,177,661 | 1,366,684 | 1,807,239 | 2,067,545 | 6 times |
Constanţa | 27,201 | 59,164 | 78,586 | 99,676 | 150,276 | 256,978 | 350,581 | 13 |
Craiova | 51,404 | 63,215 | 84,574 | 96,897 | 148,711 | 221,261 | 303,959 | 6 |
Piteşti | 19,722 | 19,532 | 29,007 | 38,330 | 60,113 | 123,735 | 179,337 | 9.4 |
Ploieşti | 56,460 | 79,149 | 95,632 | 114,544 | 146,922 | 199,699 | 252,715 | 4.5 |
Slatina | 9,825 | 11,243 | 13,136 | 13,381 | 19,250 | 44,892 | 85,168 | 8.7 |
We observe that there was indeed quite a large increase in the population of the Romanian cities over the 20th century. The total population (both rural and urban) in the territory of today's Romania increased by a factor of almost 2. However, it can be seen that the cities have experienced a much more significant increase, which is however not unusual for the European demographics in the 20th century.
From the data presented above, it can be seen that the urbanization was applied in a less efficient manner in places with an ethnically diverse community. The highest increase factors were much larger in the overwhelming ethnic Romanian cities, e.g. 13 ( Constanţa), 11.3 ( Bacǎu), 10.2 ( Suceava), 9.4 ( Piteşti), 8.7 ( Slatina), or in the overwhelming ethnic Hungarian cities, e.g. 12.5 ( Miercurea Ciuc), 8 ( Sfântu Gheorghe). In the ethnically diverse cities from Transylvania, these increase factors were significantly lower, e.g. 3 ( Arad), 5.4 ( Cluj-Napoca), 3.5 ( Oradea), 3.8 ( Satu Mare), 6.4 ( Târgu-Mureş), 4.6 ( Timişoara).
Therefore, many argue that this data prove in a very objective way that there was no link between the urbanization and the so-called romanianization policies in Romania. It is true however, that the ethnically diverse cities from Transylvania have experience some increase in population in the 20th century, but these increases were not larger than in many other European cities. They were in fact significantly lower than in other Romanian cities, as showed above. It is also true that these increases meant that more Romanians came into these cities from the rural regions outside them. But this was just a natural phenomenon as the rural regions were overwhelmingly Romanian, as opposed to the urban settlements. As a result of many years of disconsiderations of human rights aimed at maintaining the social status-quo of Transylvania, the large majority of the Romanians remained serfs and were not allowed to move from their villages. This meant that they could not play an active part in the urbanization process that took place before 1850, when the Austrian authorities abolished the Union of Three Nations and granted citizenship and land to the serfs.
Critics of this argument argue that while the process of urbanization was indeed a natural one, there has been an element of planned Romanization added to it: they point to the fact that many of the new city-dwellers did not actually come from neighbouring rural areas, but from faraway regions of Romania. The above argument also fails to account for the fact that cities situated in regions with an overwhelmingly ethnic Hungarian population, such as
Miercurea Ciuc and
Targu Secuiesc, saw the share of their ethnic Hungarian inhabitants fall by almost 20% in the period between 1920 and 1990.
[end cut section]
I wonder if the role of local authorities in romanianisation in cities/towns can be described in an objective manner. I know about examples of policemen banning Hungarians from speaking in Hungarian in the streets in the Ceausescu period... We remember that bringing Hungarian books into Romania was considered smuggling by customs officers... And we know about the recent example of Mr. Funar and some other local leaders surrounding Hungarian historical monuments with Romanian flags and everybody can imagine, how these actions emotionally effected ethnic Hungarians. I suppose, this situation contributed to assimilation in towns, or to emigration to Hungary where they could freely use their mother tongue, and where nobody calls them "bozgor" (intruder), in a town, where they ancestors lived for hundreds of years. -- KIDB 08:34, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
I have cut the following, because it is the sort of thing that clearly requires citation, and there was none. If this can be attributed to an appropriate source, it would be fine (or basically fine: I will always remove "however, it should be noted"; all it means is "one of the writers wanted to single this out"):
-- Jmabel | Talk 07:35, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
The article
I see the point of some authors of this article, but they didn't prove it yet. This article is basically a translation of some popular Magyar media. -- Vasile 16:24, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
I hope fellow wikipedians will have nothing against including in the article a topic on romanization of one more national minority - Ukrainian. Due to excess of some disputed data in Ukraine/Romania related articles we decided to address some questions in more details here. I'm sure, we will have fruitful collaboration. Isn't it, Mr. Vasile? user:Bryndza
Removed intro sentence: The process of Rumanization directed against ethnic Ukrainians in Bukovina and Bessarabia, is said to begin in time of medieval principality of Moldova. More intense became this policy after 1564, when the capital of Moldova was moved from Suceava to Iaşi. as it is both unsubstantiated and nonsense. Dmaftei 16:15, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Removed intro sentence, as per argument above. Please engage in a discussion if you disagree, I'm more than willing to listen to counterarguments. Dmaftei 15:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
This happened to the Romanian Greek Catholics, too, who were ten times more. It was not directed against the Ukrainians, but against the Catholics of all ethnicities. Also, this was ordered from the Soviet Union, as Romania was under Soviet occupation in 1948. Well, maybe this belongs to an article about religious persecution of Catholics, but not in an article about Romanianization. bogdan 15:06, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
Now I see that the role of the orthodox Romanian church should be more elaborated, because there were similar intentions behind their actions to those of the government. The central government, local authorities, policemen, the Orthodox Church - these all contributed to Romanianization. -- KIDB 15:58, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
The great majority of Greek-Catholics (and of the clergy too) were Romanians not Ukrianians. While the majority of Ukrainians of Maramures were Greek-Catholics, that was not the case for the Ukrainians of Bukowina. I am not able to see any corelation between Rumanisation and political opression of Greek-Catholics. Please present the reason of that political opression. -- Vasile 12:20, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
This article doesn't provide any reference (not even form Corvinus Library) of the urban resettlement as being called "Romanianization". Meanwhile there are several authors using the term of "Rumanization" (Karoly Kocsis and Eszter Kocsis-Hodosi, Orest Subtelny) as repression of national minorities in Romania by the government. -- Vasile 15:15, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
The point is that the term Rumanization is used in the English Language literature regarding the policies of Romania in Bukovina. I saw it in Subtelny and Britannica. I can only guess that the reasons include the fact that the state itself is usually called Rumania in the history works related to the interbellum and WW2 and that the term which sounds more modern (Romanization) means something totally different. As such, I would have preferred to see the article under the Rumanization name. OTOH, I have no idea what term is used in English language works devoted to the Hungarian history. So, I simply added the frequently used academic term and didn't raise the issue of moving the article. Please cite, academic usage of Romanianization", if possible. In any case, this is the minor issue and the point is to have a balanced article which is very difficult for a controvercial topic. -- Irpen 17:47, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
It seems that a number of contributors just want to see written their personal opinions no matter how substantiated are their popular assertion. If this is the case then a tag
This article needs additional citations for
verification. (July 2007) |
would simplify the life for everybody. -- Vasile 00:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I ended up commenting this out as I explained that in the edit summary. My point is that this is an importnat but a narrow historic issue and belongs to the history and not to the intro. There are several other important things connected with the main issue and we cannot have them all in the intro. OTOH, I don't object to this being mentioned in the text.
It is actually a not uncommon in WP pattern for editors to put things that are the closest to their heart to the intro. We should try to avoid this. When I restored the suppression of UGCC, I restored it back to the history section, not to the intro although for many Ukrainians persecution of UGCC was the most important thing of the time. I supplied a good faith edit summary to each of my edits. -- Irpen 01:52, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
The use of the term is related with the discontent produced by the realization of
Greater Romania after the World War I. The interwar period Romanian governments inability to assimilate the Magyar and Ukrainian minorities, the simple perpetuation of those minorities were further pretexts for Romanian territorial losses in
Transylvania and
Moldova, in time of "policy of force"
[1].
What is the problem with paragraph? -- Vasile 02:35, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
WHatever you say, but neither Hilter's quote, nor what this quote actually contains doesn't belong to the intro. Intro simply states what the article is about. That Rumanization was used by the powers to justify territorial claims to Romania is just one of historical issues it brought. It does not belong to intro. I will comment it out and please find a place for this inside the article. -- Irpen 18:40, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
Can it be that the dramatic fall of the Ukrainian population between 1930 and 1992 is due to the annexation of Bukovina and Bessarabia? Is it possible to use the census data to deduce the number of Ukrainians on the current territory of Romania? Or maybe a few points in the middle would help to separate the effect of territorial changes and the effect of the assimilation? abakharev 04:33, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
Currently there are:
So, currently 1,283,000 Ukrainians living in the territory of the ex-Greater Romania. That's 222% of the 1930 figure, so, I think this should be used as evidence for Ukrainianization rather than for Romanianization. :-) bogdan 12:13, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
to opress in order to assimilate This is not NPOV. If you are talking about ethnic discrimination, it's factual (even if I may argue about it), but opress seems a bit exagerated and POV. Someone claiming discrimination, please edit. Dpotop 16:14, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I beg you to bring references for all your further edits or rv tags. -- Vasile 19:15, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
I think the article should say something on the mixed Romanian-Hungarian families (their number is around 100,000), where children often speak natively both languages, but are more likely to considered themselves Romanians rather than Hungarians. There were some statistics that said that only 25% of the children in such families chose the "Hungarian" identity. bogdan 22:50, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
The goal of those policies was national uniformisation. While the problem of minorities was pretext for territorial losses of 1940, I think this should be mentioned, as a failure of the interbellic measures of uniformisation. I don't know how the migration of Germans in the 1980s could be considered national uniformisation. (citations needed).
Still need
The assertion "Romanianization also includes the differentiation of Romania from other East Bloc countries during the Cold War era." is dubious since similar uniformisation policies were in place in other Socialist republics. -- Vasile 02:01, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Whatever was the stated goal of those policies, their reality brought oppression of national minorities and ethnic dicrimination. your edit totally changed the meaning of the article and I will restore the info. -- Irpen 03:13, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
I am trying to guess the mind of everyone using this word. There is another article ( Saxon people) including the word : "Most (of Germans) have left since World War II, many of them during the 1970s and 1980s due to the Romanianisation policies of the Ceauşescu regime." Maybe it means that Germans had little political influence at the top of the regime and subsequent to the rest of the society. The actual definition is trying to extract the essence of those new sources included and of the text already inserted in the article. The uniformisation is a form of opression. The industrialization and Romanian education were uniformisation not discriminatory policies. -- Vasile 20:57, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Romanianization also includes the differentiation of Romania from other East Bloc countries during the Cold War era. ( Gheorghiu-Dej's Defiance of Khrushchev, 1989, Country Studies Series by Federal Research Division of the United States Library of Congress.)
That's nonsense, it's a total misunderstanding of the source. Dmaftei 19:38, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
"Romanianization or Rumanization is the term used to describe a number of ethnic assimilation policies implemented by the Romanian authorities during the 20th century." Now:
Hi. I've noticed that the first sentence of the results section about Transylvanian Romanianisation states that "According to census data, the Hungarian population of Transylvania decreased from 34% in 1910 to 26% in 1930 and 20% in 2005." There was no census in 2005; the most recent was in 2002. Does anyone have any exact figure about the percentage of Hungarians in Transylvania according to the 2002 census? It should be around 20%, I'm not arguing about that.
Ronline
✉
22:06, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
Whoever added that reference has neither read the article nor understood what its title is about. The abstract of the article is available on the internet (I have referenced it on the Alexandru Averescu page), and I find no mention of Romanianization. Go to The Nation archive, type "averescu" in "search", and read the abstract yourselves (second link from the top). Averescu was a populist and an admirer of Mussolini - not an ethnic cleanser! In fact, go and read the wiki article about him, and you'll see my translation of his party's program (found in Romanian in one of the external links provided): you will read words like "minority representation" and "de-centralization" - both of them where used by Averescu's party and almost no other at the time. And this is just one of the major POV problems with this article (don't get me wrong, much of it goes for the Magyarization one, since both where created by people with agendas, but with little understanding of the world beyond what their respective uncles taught them when they were growing up). Dahn 00:51, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
So how does this work? You do a google search for "Rumanisation" + "Jews" and voila: a new reference for a wikipedia article. Next time read more than the title, ok? Here`s how the [quote]ethnic assimilation policies[end of quote] took place:
from the pdf claimed as "reference" for "ethnic assimilation":
The first law to frame the new legal status of Jews in Romania and express integral nationalism and Nazi-style political racism was signed on August 8, 1940, by King Carol II, Ion Gigurtu, president of the Council of Ministers, and I.V. Gruia, minister of Justice and law professor at the University of Bucharest.6 This decree-law excluded the Jews from many of the benefits of citizenship granted to them by the 1923 Constitution by legally and politically distinguishing between “Romanians by blood” (romani de sange) and “Romanian citizens.” Emphasizing the significance of “blood” and “race” to the nation and state was a basic principle of the Nazi worldview.7 According to this first law, “The concept of the nation can now be construed less as a legal or political community and more as an organic, cultural community based on the law of blood, from which an entire hierarchy of political rights emerges; for the law of blood contains all cultural, spiritual and ethical opportunities…The defense of Romanian blood constitutes the moral guarantee for the acknowledgement of supreme political rights.”8 In the Romanian context, the “laws of blood” referred to ethical, spiritual, and cultural characteristics, rather than to physical characteristics.
All Jews were prohibited from taking Romanian names.11 Jewish religion and spiritual life were not considered to be integrated into the Romanian religious and spiritual community to which Jews were ordered to pay respect.12 The law defined Jews by merging—in the spirit of the Nuremberg laws—the dual criteria of ritual and ancestry: a person was considered to be a Jew if he or she practiced Judaism or was born to parents of the Judaic faith, even if the same person had converted to Christianity or was an atheist. One could be considered Christian only if his or her parents had converted prior to the birth of the child.13
For example, the new regime decreed that a person with even one Jewish parent, irrespective of whether that parent had converted to Christianity before the child’s birth, would be considered a Jew, as “the mystery of baptism could not change the destiny of Jewish blood.”14
Under Antonescu, every law included a special article on the definition of a Jew, and the criteria varied from one law to the next. The criterion of having at least one Jewish parent (regardless of whether one or both parents were Christians at the time of the child’s birth) was preserved in the law nationalizing urban buildings and Jewish rural property.
from the August 8, 1940, law, which held that Jews were those born to Jewish parents or a Jewish father, while the decree-law annulling apprenticeship contracts deemed a person Jewish simply by virtue of having only one Jewish grandparent—either maternal or paternal (i.e., the grandparent practiced Judaism or married into a family that did).
Accordingly, the government adopted measures to exclude Jews from Romanian society and defend the “Romanian blood.” In order to ensure that this “defense” would have a real effect, the Antonescu regimes prohibited marriage between “Romanians by blood” and those whom it defined as “Jews.” Also, Jews were prohibited from conversion to the Christian faith. These measures were taken because “the ethnic being of the Romanian nation must be protected against mixing with Jewish blood.”15 The same motivation was used to prohibit Jews from hiring Romanian servants.16
etc...
So this is how jews were "Romanianised"??? greier 20:39, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
From this which is claimed to be a source on how Ukrainains were ethnically assimilated. Again, read before posting s##t!!! The only mention of Romanianisation: In 1918–40 Chernivtsi University was Romanianized: the Ukrainian departments were dissolved, and the Ukrainian professors dismissed. If when you change the proffesors of an Univeristy with other, is that called "ethnic assimilation"? That belongs to Anti-Ukrainian article. Removed. greier 20:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Hence, that whole paragraph is unourced and irrelevant as claim of "ethnic assimilation". greier 20:46, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Also, not only faculty was changed but Ukrainians faced obstacles in enrolling as seen from the enroll,memt figures, also deleted by Greiger. I am indeed less certain about the anti-Semitism material. Isolation or assimilation, however, this policy had the same goal, to have a state of Romanians with other cultures absent or suppressed. -- Irpen 19:03, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
let's just separate the facts from interpretations. The "Romanians who forgot their native language" term was in fact used, it is referenced and should be kept. We can rephrase the details though. I agree that the intro needs modified in order to match the article but not vice versa. The whole purpose of the intro is to summarize the article rather than the goal of the artcile being to elaborate on the intro. Standards of time is a good point. This was indeed not unique for the central Europe. We take no position in the article in respect to how moral or immoral these policies were. We just describe them. Also, please replace the global tag with more specific "fact" templates near the statement you want to see referenced. I will try my best to answer them. See, eg. Polonization article, which is currently somewhat better developed. -- Irpen 21:40, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Investigation into the inter-war period should perhaps also include references to this little thing: Programs of all the ethnic minority parties in inter-war Romania and relevant fragments of laws in the period. Note this for primary education, and look into the policy of any nation-state of not continuing such ventures beyond the 8th grade:
I shall translate later on, I have something to do right now. Note that this is in 1934 - check out what the 1940 law on Jews says (referenced by Greier above), and inform yourself on what had changed in-between. Dahn 22:02, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Translation:
Primary education in state schools will be carried out in the Romanian language. In the communes with a population with a native language other than Romanian, the Ministry of Public Education will establish schools functioning in the language of the respective population, in the same proportion as in Romanian communes. In these schools the study of the Romanian language will be mandatory with the number of hours established by legislation. In localities with minority populations, with a significant number of children whose native language is Romanian, of school age, a Romanian-language school will be established. TSO1D 22:11, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
But let's also indicate the provisions of the law and the exceptional, not by any means less deplorable, case this constituted. The reason for this was, I guess, was the fact that Bukovina had a relative Ukrainian majority in the period, and thus the ideological construct supported by the Liberals could not have applied (although, as a side debate, I think that Ukranian representatives initially resigned, as it was ultimately a pick between "Brătianu's Byzantium" and the Soviet Union...) However, as I have indicated, the situation in higher learning needs to take in the drives of centralism (which, if not clear by now, I do not support), and not be included in an ethnic policy. Dahn 23:59, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Again, as Bogdan proved, the teritory in question (the term "Romania" in irelevant, Romania of today is not the Romania of the interbelic time) witnessed an increase in the number of Ukranians. Plus, even so, I fail to see how demographic fall is considered "ethnic assimialtion". The number of Romanians also fell. Did we auto-assimilate? In fact, as only the number of Roma has grown, this belongs to Romanysation. greier 20:55, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Greier, we need to reach a consensus on each of these issues. For now, the tag will do.
Dahn
13:09, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
I see that this is marked "totally disputed". For those of us who would rather not wade through the entire lengthy talk page, and since factual issues should take priority over POV matters (and are far easier to solve with research), could someone please sum up succinctly what factual matters in the article are disputed? - Jmabel | Talk 00:20, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
Note to Irpen: do not remove all tags, please. You well know that some info in there is questionable and/or irrelevant. It also needs to include some Romanian sources - especially since serious Romanian historians do not reject either the term or its application (see sections above). I promise I will contribute more in the future. Dahn 19:31, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Dahn, by all means go ahead and add sourced info. However, we can't just have the article sitting for months with tags attached and doing nothing. -- Irpen 19:33, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Dahn, at least the Ukrainian part seems properly referenced. If you dispute the Hungarian part, tag the section, not the whole article. If you think Ukrainian part needs balansing by adding the info from the Romanian sources, do so by all means. But if the facts are true, the tag has no place. -- Irpen 21:08, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't know how those were counted. The statistics is referred to the academic source. The info of the University renaming was indeed out of place. I removed it. What else is disputed in the section? -- Irpen 21:31, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Oh,btw: what about Dobruja, and especially Southern Dobruja? That is the textbook example of Romanianization (attempted or successful). Will do. Dahn 21:41, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
The grammar problems may warrant the tl:cleanup but not the neutrality tags. That Nistor viewed Bukovina as Romanian ethnic territory is not disputed (or is it?). So, what other two? -- Irpen 21:56, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Sorry. I have not checked the sources. I did since, and note that the text (a respectable one) did say how many students enrolled in all, and did give some other interesting info which the text obscures: "In 1920 there were 239 Ukrainians in a student body of 1,671. In 1933 the body of 3,247 students consisted of 2,117 Romanians, 679 Jews, 199 Germans, 155 Ukrainians, 57 Poles, and 40 of other nationalities." A drop in numbers from 239 to 155 does not really illustrate a policy (it may even be demography), and does not implicate the rise in numbers of Romanian in any way: the percentage may have increased, but so did the student body (from 1,671 to 3,247!). And,again, I fail to see how the source counted the Ukrainians. Dahn 22:14, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
So, the situation at the university is not, in fact, "ethnic assimilation" (per the definition given in the open line of this article). The number of Ukrainians, if true, decreased from a quite reduced sum by an insignificant amount. The source is blatently misinterpreted. Furthermore, even if the source does speak of a Romanianization, it specifically refers to an Austrian institution having turned into a Romanian institution. I'm sure many Ukrainians find that concept problematic, but the argument, much like Nistor's, would include a certain POV on Bukovina's history, and certain expectations which this article should not have. In itself, the process was arguably normal and to be expected with any change in masters. Dahn 22:54, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
It has to do with cultural suppression. -- Irpen 23:48, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
I disagree. The cultural suppression of the Ukrainian culture is closely related to the assimilationist policy and has the place in the article. -- Irpen 00:15, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
I replaced the pecentage with the numbers as per source. -- Irpen 00:32, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
On University, decrease in Ukrainian enrollment is combined with expulsion of the Ukrainian faculty and elimination of the Ukrainian department. All these are related events directed by the anti-Ukrainian educational policies. The assault on the cultural elite is the most important part of any such policies directed against a specific nation. -- Irpen
With the table, I agree that apples has to be compared to apples and oranges to oranges. 1919 data can be compared to the 1930 data. 1992 data can be compared to 2002 data. Comparison accross the pairs makes no sense. Perhaps it may be made more clearer by reformatting the table or splitting it into two. -- Irpen 01:36, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
Assimilation is not necessarily forced. The moderate pace assimilation is natural for any non-titular minority. But those numbers do not represent any alarming pace indeed and do not speak badly of Romania. However, the comparison of the total population in 1992 to that in 1932 in relative percentage was indeed out of place. I removed it. -- Irpen 02:17, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
I would have preferred to alter the lead to make it clear that the phenomenon is not restricted to the forced assimilationist polices, while the latter were often part of it. But fine, if you insist, go ahead and remove the 90s columns. Note, however, that charges of the undercounting of Ukrainians in Romanians census are relevant. They should be presented as charges raised by the Ukrainian community, not the established facts. I think this should be treated similarly to similar complaints in Romanian language publications over the Ukrainian census. The existence of complaints should be noted but, as they are isolated and allegations are unproven, they should not be given too much weight. -- Irpen
While we're at it, are the Hutsuls relevant here? Given that, unlike Slavic ethnic Ukrainians, they are generally thought to in fact be Slavicised Romanians, they may be. Biruitorul 06:14, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
1) People have multiple levels of identity, and often feel much closer to their region or village than to a nation. I imagine that this was especially the case in 1930 Bucovina, whose citizens had just 12 years earlier been Austro-Hungarian subjects (and were counted as "Ruthenians" in the imperial census) and for whom the concept of "Ukraine" might have been unknown, given the relatively late nation-building undergone by Ukraine and its very brief existence as a state. If you take a look at p. 106 of
this recent Eurobarometer, you'll see what I'm trying to say. For instance, if a Hungarian felt no attachment to his country but very strong European identity, but had all the other characteristics of a typical Hungarian (name, language, Hungarian family members, Catholic or Calvinist, etc.), should he be put down as a "European"? Or what if a Romanian identified as a Dacian (as some have done)? At some point, certain lines need to be drawn, or else people will fall into thousands of categories, rendering results meaningless.
2) I don't know how true this was in Bucovina in 1930, but I've heard that in some pre-national/pre-literate societies, people would identify as 'creştini' or 'oamenii de aici'. Assuming for argument's sake that this was the case in a few villages in 1930, again, the census-taker would have been wise to apply religion, language, customs, physiognomy, etc. to help classify these people. Plus, if people were illiterate and couldn't understand the questions being asked, then the government would basically be forced to put them in some category. But if they were literate, and there was a deliberate practice of changing a clear response of x to y, then I would be against that.
3) Censuses don't generally allow people of mixed parentage to select two options, and this might have been a factor in the multi-ethnic, overall Greek Catholic(?) Bucovina of the time.
Biruitorul
04:53, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
A comment on topic. "Romanians in N. Bukovina have to deal with the issue of Moldovans in N. Bukovina". I've seen the census forms. I can even dig out an online image of it. The ethnicity question was to be answered by a write in response, not a pick from pre-selected choices that would have included "Romanian" and "Moldavian" and as such, by the presense of two separate option to triger the complaints of the oponents of the Moldovanism concept. As such, the census questions are immaculate. A separate issue would arise if one brought about any sourced allegations that the responders were pressured to respond "Moldovans" or that they answered "Romanians" but census takers wrote in "Moldovan" or that there was a counting fraud. I have not seen such allegations in connection with the Romanian/Moldovan issue. -- Irpen
As for the usage of Rumanization, this term is used in every English langauage source I've seen that writes about the interwar policies in Romania. I understand that Romanianizations means the same, but we should be consistent with the scholarly usage. Modern scholars still use it. I specifically inquired at RO-board a while ago whether the term is offensive. Once I was assured that it was not (just seems archaic to some) I started using it. I think scholarly usage is a strong enough argument to use it in Wikipedia. -- Irpen 03:05, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't think that scholars owe us any explanation. Our duty is to follow them. Britannica article on Bukovina uses Romania but Rumanization, not Romanianization or Rumanianization in the text. -- Irpen 03:33, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
Given that the English-speaking world has switched over rather completely to writing "Romania" rather than "Roumania" or "Rumania", I think "Romanianization" is clearer. At least it should exist as a redirect.
I don't feel like doing research on this but, Irpen, are you sure that scholarly work after, say, 1992 is still routinely using "Rumanization"? - Jmabel | Talk 04:15, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 |
I think that this image is POV. So what if they built another church? Nobody is forcing the Hungarians to change from Catholicism to Orthodoxy... bogdan 15:25, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
Hi Bogdan, Building a Romanian monument next to a Hungarian historical site can be considered to be the romanianisation of the Transylvanian landscape. What do you think? Would you suggest a different text?
This may also be means of assimilation, or at least to hide the results of it, this is the intention of the builders, isn't it? KIDB
Yes, you may be right, if Romanianization is a defined to be a government action, this photo should be included in the description of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Who defined Romanianization to be a government action? Are you sure this expression can't refer to non-governmental activities of Romanians trying to eleiminate the proofs of Hungarian existence in Transylvania?
I do not really want to argue, the picture [above] speaks for itself. By the way, Bogdan, a photo can not be a POW, only the interpretation of the photo. The interpretation is: SOME ethnic Romanians (whatever their religion is) do not respect and have not respected the historical heritage of middle-age Transylvania, rather they would like to hide it. This is one aspect of the Romanianization of Transylvania and goes parallel with other actions, like assimilating of the Saxonian and Hungarian minorities. 21 November 2005 KIDB
"as a results of many years of humiliating disconsiderations of human rights when Romanians were not allowed to settle into the majority of the Transylvanian cities."
Could you cite any sources on this? I don't know about any such regulations, at least not from the beginning of the 19th century onwards. I mean, in 1848 already, cities such as Sibiu, Brasov, Târgu Mures and Cluj had thousands of Romanian inhabitants, Orthodox and Greek Catholic churches etc. Avram Iancu went to school in Cluj, worked as a lawyer in Targu Mures, all this before 1848. I wonder if we should have this very strong statement in the article in the absence of any sources corroborating it.-- Tamas 18:44, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
I still can't agree with the new text, I think most of it should be deleted: 1. "rural regions were overwhelmingly Romanian" this is not true, I wouldn't use this phrase for the whole area of Transyvania, especially not for the middle ages, where we have no statistical data from. 2. "As a result of many years of disconsiderations of human rights aimed at maintaining the social status-quo of Transylvania, the large majority of the Romanians remained serfs and were not allowed to move from their villages. This meant that they could not play an active part in the urbanization process that took place before 1850" What is the connection between the life of Romanian (Vlach) serfs in the middle ages and Romanianization policy in the 20th century? Why is the very slow urbanisation process in medieval times important in this article? 3. "when the Austrian authorities abolished the Union of Three Nations and granted citizenship and land to the serfs." This should be dealt with in the History of Transilvania Article, not here.
I think these should not be part of the article on romanianization, beacause these statements have no direct connection, or proved connection to romanianization. It is like explaining in the Magyarizartion Article the historical background and claiming that Wallachians replaced Hungarians in medieval Transylvania by immigrating into rural areas... -- KIDB 14:28, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
"Rural regions were overwhelmingly Romanian" is a fact for the 19th century (there are good censuses for that period. The article does not anywhere state that this was the case in the Middle Ages. "Overwhelmingly" here just emphasises the fact that in the rural regions Romanians formed the majority while in the urban areas they were just a disproportionately small minority, for historical reasons. The important point is that in the industrial age the cities started with an ethnical composition which could not be sustained once unrestricted migration from rural areas (which had a different ethnical balance) was allowed. The cities did grow, end they had to grow for economic reasons (it may be even argued that they did not grow enough, when compared with developed contries). In any industrial period, as a rule of thumb, the cities mainly grow by immigration, not by natural growth. The end result is that today, in general, the ethnic composition of the cities is pretty much the same as that of their county/region or the surrounding countryside.
Algos
15:43, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
http://www.mek.iif.hu/porta/szint/egyeb/terkep/census/census.gif http://lazarus.elte.hu/hun/maps/1910/nepek.gif http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/92/Austria_hungary_1911.jpg
As you can see, Saxon zones were not as compact as you imply...And not even the Székely Land is not as compact as areas from Pannonia. As for the Germans, to find out what really happened (after 1944), a material written by one of their historians could help... http://www.sibiweb.de/geschi/7b-history.htm Algos 13:36, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
I have brought the following over to the talk page (intact) because it is written like an essay, not like a Wikipedia article. The statistics on Romanian urbanization clearly belong somewhere in Wikipedia (I'm not sure whether this is the right article for them), but much of the rest of this is inappropriately polemical: "However, if one wants to have an objective view, one should…", "We observe that there was indeed…", "Therefore, many argue that this data prove in a very objective way…", "They were in fact…", "It is also true that…", etc. It is possible that this can be rewritten in an appropriate manner; that would include some citation of sources for the case being made, not weasel words like "many argue". -- Jmabel | Talk 05:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
[start cut section]
==Urbanization==
The intention of a romanianization policy may or may not be true and there certainly are different divergent opinions on this matter. The urbanization in 20th century Romania is often regarded as a tool employed by the Romanian authorities. However, if one wants to have an objective view, one should investigate the change in population in several cities from all-over Romania. Data from 7 censuses between 1912 and 1992 are presented below:
Transylvania
(1912) | (1930) | (1948) | (1956) | (1966) | (1977) | (1992) | increase 1912-1992 | |
Alba Iulia | 11,616 | 12,282 | 14,420 | 14,776 | 22,215 | 41,199 | 71,168 | 6.4 times |
Arad | 63,166 | 77,181 | 87,291 | 106,460 | 126,000 | 171,193 | 190,114 | 3 |
Braşov | 41,056 | 59,232 | 82,984 | 123,834 | 163,345 | 256,475 | 323,736 | 7.8 |
Cluj-Napoca | 60,808 | 100,844 | 117,915 | 154,723 | 185,663 | 262,858 | 328,602 | 5.4 |
Miecurea Ciuc | 3,701 | 4,807 | 6,143 | 11,996 | 15,329 | 30,936 | 46,228 | 12.5 |
Oradea | 64,169 | 82,687 | 82,282 | 98,950 | 122,534 | 170,531 | 222,741 | 3.5 |
Satu Mare | 34,892 | 51,495 | 46,519 | 52,096 | 68,246 | 103,544 | 131,987 | 3.8 |
Sfântu Gheorghe | 8,665 | 10,818 | 14,224 | 17,638 | 20,768 | 40,804 | 68,359 | 8 |
Sibiu | 33,489 | 49,345 | 60,602 | 90,475 | 109,515 | 151,137 | 169,656 | 5.1 |
Târgu Mureş | 25,517 | 38,517 | 47,043 | 65,194 | 86,464 | 130,076 | 164,445 | 6.4 |
Timişoara | 72,555 | 91,580 | 111,987 | 142,257 | 174,243 | 269,353 | 334,115 | 4.6 |
Moldova
(1912) | (1930) | (1948) | (1956) | (1966) | (1977) | (1992) | increase 1912-1992 | |
Bacǎu | 18,846 | 31,138 | 34,461 | 54,138 | 73,414 | 127,299 | 205,029 | 11.3 times |
Galaţi | 71,641 | 100,611 | 80,411 | 95,646 | 151,412 | 238,292 | 326,141 | 4.6 |
Iaşi | 75,229 | 102,872 | 94,075 | 112,977 | 161,023 | 265,002 | 344,425 | 4.6 |
Piatra Neamţ | 18,965 | 29,827 | 26,303 | 32,648 | 45,852 | 77,812 | 123,360 | 6.5 |
Suceava | 11,229 | 17,028 | 10,123 | 20,949 | 37,697 | 62,715 | 114,462 | 10.2 |
Muntenia
(1912) | (1930) | (1948) | (1956) | (1966) | (1977) | (1992) | increase 1912-1992 | |
Bucharest | 341,321 | 639,040 | 1,041,807 | 1,177,661 | 1,366,684 | 1,807,239 | 2,067,545 | 6 times |
Constanţa | 27,201 | 59,164 | 78,586 | 99,676 | 150,276 | 256,978 | 350,581 | 13 |
Craiova | 51,404 | 63,215 | 84,574 | 96,897 | 148,711 | 221,261 | 303,959 | 6 |
Piteşti | 19,722 | 19,532 | 29,007 | 38,330 | 60,113 | 123,735 | 179,337 | 9.4 |
Ploieşti | 56,460 | 79,149 | 95,632 | 114,544 | 146,922 | 199,699 | 252,715 | 4.5 |
Slatina | 9,825 | 11,243 | 13,136 | 13,381 | 19,250 | 44,892 | 85,168 | 8.7 |
We observe that there was indeed quite a large increase in the population of the Romanian cities over the 20th century. The total population (both rural and urban) in the territory of today's Romania increased by a factor of almost 2. However, it can be seen that the cities have experienced a much more significant increase, which is however not unusual for the European demographics in the 20th century.
From the data presented above, it can be seen that the urbanization was applied in a less efficient manner in places with an ethnically diverse community. The highest increase factors were much larger in the overwhelming ethnic Romanian cities, e.g. 13 ( Constanţa), 11.3 ( Bacǎu), 10.2 ( Suceava), 9.4 ( Piteşti), 8.7 ( Slatina), or in the overwhelming ethnic Hungarian cities, e.g. 12.5 ( Miercurea Ciuc), 8 ( Sfântu Gheorghe). In the ethnically diverse cities from Transylvania, these increase factors were significantly lower, e.g. 3 ( Arad), 5.4 ( Cluj-Napoca), 3.5 ( Oradea), 3.8 ( Satu Mare), 6.4 ( Târgu-Mureş), 4.6 ( Timişoara).
Therefore, many argue that this data prove in a very objective way that there was no link between the urbanization and the so-called romanianization policies in Romania. It is true however, that the ethnically diverse cities from Transylvania have experience some increase in population in the 20th century, but these increases were not larger than in many other European cities. They were in fact significantly lower than in other Romanian cities, as showed above. It is also true that these increases meant that more Romanians came into these cities from the rural regions outside them. But this was just a natural phenomenon as the rural regions were overwhelmingly Romanian, as opposed to the urban settlements. As a result of many years of disconsiderations of human rights aimed at maintaining the social status-quo of Transylvania, the large majority of the Romanians remained serfs and were not allowed to move from their villages. This meant that they could not play an active part in the urbanization process that took place before 1850, when the Austrian authorities abolished the Union of Three Nations and granted citizenship and land to the serfs.
Critics of this argument argue that while the process of urbanization was indeed a natural one, there has been an element of planned Romanization added to it: they point to the fact that many of the new city-dwellers did not actually come from neighbouring rural areas, but from faraway regions of Romania. The above argument also fails to account for the fact that cities situated in regions with an overwhelmingly ethnic Hungarian population, such as
Miercurea Ciuc and
Targu Secuiesc, saw the share of their ethnic Hungarian inhabitants fall by almost 20% in the period between 1920 and 1990.
[end cut section]
I wonder if the role of local authorities in romanianisation in cities/towns can be described in an objective manner. I know about examples of policemen banning Hungarians from speaking in Hungarian in the streets in the Ceausescu period... We remember that bringing Hungarian books into Romania was considered smuggling by customs officers... And we know about the recent example of Mr. Funar and some other local leaders surrounding Hungarian historical monuments with Romanian flags and everybody can imagine, how these actions emotionally effected ethnic Hungarians. I suppose, this situation contributed to assimilation in towns, or to emigration to Hungary where they could freely use their mother tongue, and where nobody calls them "bozgor" (intruder), in a town, where they ancestors lived for hundreds of years. -- KIDB 08:34, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
I have cut the following, because it is the sort of thing that clearly requires citation, and there was none. If this can be attributed to an appropriate source, it would be fine (or basically fine: I will always remove "however, it should be noted"; all it means is "one of the writers wanted to single this out"):
-- Jmabel | Talk 07:35, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
The article
I see the point of some authors of this article, but they didn't prove it yet. This article is basically a translation of some popular Magyar media. -- Vasile 16:24, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
I hope fellow wikipedians will have nothing against including in the article a topic on romanization of one more national minority - Ukrainian. Due to excess of some disputed data in Ukraine/Romania related articles we decided to address some questions in more details here. I'm sure, we will have fruitful collaboration. Isn't it, Mr. Vasile? user:Bryndza
Removed intro sentence: The process of Rumanization directed against ethnic Ukrainians in Bukovina and Bessarabia, is said to begin in time of medieval principality of Moldova. More intense became this policy after 1564, when the capital of Moldova was moved from Suceava to Iaşi. as it is both unsubstantiated and nonsense. Dmaftei 16:15, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Removed intro sentence, as per argument above. Please engage in a discussion if you disagree, I'm more than willing to listen to counterarguments. Dmaftei 15:46, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
This happened to the Romanian Greek Catholics, too, who were ten times more. It was not directed against the Ukrainians, but against the Catholics of all ethnicities. Also, this was ordered from the Soviet Union, as Romania was under Soviet occupation in 1948. Well, maybe this belongs to an article about religious persecution of Catholics, but not in an article about Romanianization. bogdan 15:06, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
Now I see that the role of the orthodox Romanian church should be more elaborated, because there were similar intentions behind their actions to those of the government. The central government, local authorities, policemen, the Orthodox Church - these all contributed to Romanianization. -- KIDB 15:58, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
The great majority of Greek-Catholics (and of the clergy too) were Romanians not Ukrianians. While the majority of Ukrainians of Maramures were Greek-Catholics, that was not the case for the Ukrainians of Bukowina. I am not able to see any corelation between Rumanisation and political opression of Greek-Catholics. Please present the reason of that political opression. -- Vasile 12:20, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
This article doesn't provide any reference (not even form Corvinus Library) of the urban resettlement as being called "Romanianization". Meanwhile there are several authors using the term of "Rumanization" (Karoly Kocsis and Eszter Kocsis-Hodosi, Orest Subtelny) as repression of national minorities in Romania by the government. -- Vasile 15:15, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
The point is that the term Rumanization is used in the English Language literature regarding the policies of Romania in Bukovina. I saw it in Subtelny and Britannica. I can only guess that the reasons include the fact that the state itself is usually called Rumania in the history works related to the interbellum and WW2 and that the term which sounds more modern (Romanization) means something totally different. As such, I would have preferred to see the article under the Rumanization name. OTOH, I have no idea what term is used in English language works devoted to the Hungarian history. So, I simply added the frequently used academic term and didn't raise the issue of moving the article. Please cite, academic usage of Romanianization", if possible. In any case, this is the minor issue and the point is to have a balanced article which is very difficult for a controvercial topic. -- Irpen 17:47, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
It seems that a number of contributors just want to see written their personal opinions no matter how substantiated are their popular assertion. If this is the case then a tag
This article needs additional citations for
verification. (July 2007) |
would simplify the life for everybody. -- Vasile 00:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I ended up commenting this out as I explained that in the edit summary. My point is that this is an importnat but a narrow historic issue and belongs to the history and not to the intro. There are several other important things connected with the main issue and we cannot have them all in the intro. OTOH, I don't object to this being mentioned in the text.
It is actually a not uncommon in WP pattern for editors to put things that are the closest to their heart to the intro. We should try to avoid this. When I restored the suppression of UGCC, I restored it back to the history section, not to the intro although for many Ukrainians persecution of UGCC was the most important thing of the time. I supplied a good faith edit summary to each of my edits. -- Irpen 01:52, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
The use of the term is related with the discontent produced by the realization of
Greater Romania after the World War I. The interwar period Romanian governments inability to assimilate the Magyar and Ukrainian minorities, the simple perpetuation of those minorities were further pretexts for Romanian territorial losses in
Transylvania and
Moldova, in time of "policy of force"
[1].
What is the problem with paragraph? -- Vasile 02:35, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
WHatever you say, but neither Hilter's quote, nor what this quote actually contains doesn't belong to the intro. Intro simply states what the article is about. That Rumanization was used by the powers to justify territorial claims to Romania is just one of historical issues it brought. It does not belong to intro. I will comment it out and please find a place for this inside the article. -- Irpen 18:40, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
Can it be that the dramatic fall of the Ukrainian population between 1930 and 1992 is due to the annexation of Bukovina and Bessarabia? Is it possible to use the census data to deduce the number of Ukrainians on the current territory of Romania? Or maybe a few points in the middle would help to separate the effect of territorial changes and the effect of the assimilation? abakharev 04:33, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
Currently there are:
So, currently 1,283,000 Ukrainians living in the territory of the ex-Greater Romania. That's 222% of the 1930 figure, so, I think this should be used as evidence for Ukrainianization rather than for Romanianization. :-) bogdan 12:13, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
to opress in order to assimilate This is not NPOV. If you are talking about ethnic discrimination, it's factual (even if I may argue about it), but opress seems a bit exagerated and POV. Someone claiming discrimination, please edit. Dpotop 16:14, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I beg you to bring references for all your further edits or rv tags. -- Vasile 19:15, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
I think the article should say something on the mixed Romanian-Hungarian families (their number is around 100,000), where children often speak natively both languages, but are more likely to considered themselves Romanians rather than Hungarians. There were some statistics that said that only 25% of the children in such families chose the "Hungarian" identity. bogdan 22:50, 13 February 2006 (UTC)
The goal of those policies was national uniformisation. While the problem of minorities was pretext for territorial losses of 1940, I think this should be mentioned, as a failure of the interbellic measures of uniformisation. I don't know how the migration of Germans in the 1980s could be considered national uniformisation. (citations needed).
Still need
The assertion "Romanianization also includes the differentiation of Romania from other East Bloc countries during the Cold War era." is dubious since similar uniformisation policies were in place in other Socialist republics. -- Vasile 02:01, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Whatever was the stated goal of those policies, their reality brought oppression of national minorities and ethnic dicrimination. your edit totally changed the meaning of the article and I will restore the info. -- Irpen 03:13, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
I am trying to guess the mind of everyone using this word. There is another article ( Saxon people) including the word : "Most (of Germans) have left since World War II, many of them during the 1970s and 1980s due to the Romanianisation policies of the Ceauşescu regime." Maybe it means that Germans had little political influence at the top of the regime and subsequent to the rest of the society. The actual definition is trying to extract the essence of those new sources included and of the text already inserted in the article. The uniformisation is a form of opression. The industrialization and Romanian education were uniformisation not discriminatory policies. -- Vasile 20:57, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Romanianization also includes the differentiation of Romania from other East Bloc countries during the Cold War era. ( Gheorghiu-Dej's Defiance of Khrushchev, 1989, Country Studies Series by Federal Research Division of the United States Library of Congress.)
That's nonsense, it's a total misunderstanding of the source. Dmaftei 19:38, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
"Romanianization or Rumanization is the term used to describe a number of ethnic assimilation policies implemented by the Romanian authorities during the 20th century." Now:
Hi. I've noticed that the first sentence of the results section about Transylvanian Romanianisation states that "According to census data, the Hungarian population of Transylvania decreased from 34% in 1910 to 26% in 1930 and 20% in 2005." There was no census in 2005; the most recent was in 2002. Does anyone have any exact figure about the percentage of Hungarians in Transylvania according to the 2002 census? It should be around 20%, I'm not arguing about that.
Ronline
✉
22:06, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
Whoever added that reference has neither read the article nor understood what its title is about. The abstract of the article is available on the internet (I have referenced it on the Alexandru Averescu page), and I find no mention of Romanianization. Go to The Nation archive, type "averescu" in "search", and read the abstract yourselves (second link from the top). Averescu was a populist and an admirer of Mussolini - not an ethnic cleanser! In fact, go and read the wiki article about him, and you'll see my translation of his party's program (found in Romanian in one of the external links provided): you will read words like "minority representation" and "de-centralization" - both of them where used by Averescu's party and almost no other at the time. And this is just one of the major POV problems with this article (don't get me wrong, much of it goes for the Magyarization one, since both where created by people with agendas, but with little understanding of the world beyond what their respective uncles taught them when they were growing up). Dahn 00:51, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
So how does this work? You do a google search for "Rumanisation" + "Jews" and voila: a new reference for a wikipedia article. Next time read more than the title, ok? Here`s how the [quote]ethnic assimilation policies[end of quote] took place:
from the pdf claimed as "reference" for "ethnic assimilation":
The first law to frame the new legal status of Jews in Romania and express integral nationalism and Nazi-style political racism was signed on August 8, 1940, by King Carol II, Ion Gigurtu, president of the Council of Ministers, and I.V. Gruia, minister of Justice and law professor at the University of Bucharest.6 This decree-law excluded the Jews from many of the benefits of citizenship granted to them by the 1923 Constitution by legally and politically distinguishing between “Romanians by blood” (romani de sange) and “Romanian citizens.” Emphasizing the significance of “blood” and “race” to the nation and state was a basic principle of the Nazi worldview.7 According to this first law, “The concept of the nation can now be construed less as a legal or political community and more as an organic, cultural community based on the law of blood, from which an entire hierarchy of political rights emerges; for the law of blood contains all cultural, spiritual and ethical opportunities…The defense of Romanian blood constitutes the moral guarantee for the acknowledgement of supreme political rights.”8 In the Romanian context, the “laws of blood” referred to ethical, spiritual, and cultural characteristics, rather than to physical characteristics.
All Jews were prohibited from taking Romanian names.11 Jewish religion and spiritual life were not considered to be integrated into the Romanian religious and spiritual community to which Jews were ordered to pay respect.12 The law defined Jews by merging—in the spirit of the Nuremberg laws—the dual criteria of ritual and ancestry: a person was considered to be a Jew if he or she practiced Judaism or was born to parents of the Judaic faith, even if the same person had converted to Christianity or was an atheist. One could be considered Christian only if his or her parents had converted prior to the birth of the child.13
For example, the new regime decreed that a person with even one Jewish parent, irrespective of whether that parent had converted to Christianity before the child’s birth, would be considered a Jew, as “the mystery of baptism could not change the destiny of Jewish blood.”14
Under Antonescu, every law included a special article on the definition of a Jew, and the criteria varied from one law to the next. The criterion of having at least one Jewish parent (regardless of whether one or both parents were Christians at the time of the child’s birth) was preserved in the law nationalizing urban buildings and Jewish rural property.
from the August 8, 1940, law, which held that Jews were those born to Jewish parents or a Jewish father, while the decree-law annulling apprenticeship contracts deemed a person Jewish simply by virtue of having only one Jewish grandparent—either maternal or paternal (i.e., the grandparent practiced Judaism or married into a family that did).
Accordingly, the government adopted measures to exclude Jews from Romanian society and defend the “Romanian blood.” In order to ensure that this “defense” would have a real effect, the Antonescu regimes prohibited marriage between “Romanians by blood” and those whom it defined as “Jews.” Also, Jews were prohibited from conversion to the Christian faith. These measures were taken because “the ethnic being of the Romanian nation must be protected against mixing with Jewish blood.”15 The same motivation was used to prohibit Jews from hiring Romanian servants.16
etc...
So this is how jews were "Romanianised"??? greier 20:39, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
From this which is claimed to be a source on how Ukrainains were ethnically assimilated. Again, read before posting s##t!!! The only mention of Romanianisation: In 1918–40 Chernivtsi University was Romanianized: the Ukrainian departments were dissolved, and the Ukrainian professors dismissed. If when you change the proffesors of an Univeristy with other, is that called "ethnic assimilation"? That belongs to Anti-Ukrainian article. Removed. greier 20:45, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Hence, that whole paragraph is unourced and irrelevant as claim of "ethnic assimilation". greier 20:46, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Also, not only faculty was changed but Ukrainians faced obstacles in enrolling as seen from the enroll,memt figures, also deleted by Greiger. I am indeed less certain about the anti-Semitism material. Isolation or assimilation, however, this policy had the same goal, to have a state of Romanians with other cultures absent or suppressed. -- Irpen 19:03, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
let's just separate the facts from interpretations. The "Romanians who forgot their native language" term was in fact used, it is referenced and should be kept. We can rephrase the details though. I agree that the intro needs modified in order to match the article but not vice versa. The whole purpose of the intro is to summarize the article rather than the goal of the artcile being to elaborate on the intro. Standards of time is a good point. This was indeed not unique for the central Europe. We take no position in the article in respect to how moral or immoral these policies were. We just describe them. Also, please replace the global tag with more specific "fact" templates near the statement you want to see referenced. I will try my best to answer them. See, eg. Polonization article, which is currently somewhat better developed. -- Irpen 21:40, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Investigation into the inter-war period should perhaps also include references to this little thing: Programs of all the ethnic minority parties in inter-war Romania and relevant fragments of laws in the period. Note this for primary education, and look into the policy of any nation-state of not continuing such ventures beyond the 8th grade:
I shall translate later on, I have something to do right now. Note that this is in 1934 - check out what the 1940 law on Jews says (referenced by Greier above), and inform yourself on what had changed in-between. Dahn 22:02, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Translation:
Primary education in state schools will be carried out in the Romanian language. In the communes with a population with a native language other than Romanian, the Ministry of Public Education will establish schools functioning in the language of the respective population, in the same proportion as in Romanian communes. In these schools the study of the Romanian language will be mandatory with the number of hours established by legislation. In localities with minority populations, with a significant number of children whose native language is Romanian, of school age, a Romanian-language school will be established. TSO1D 22:11, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
But let's also indicate the provisions of the law and the exceptional, not by any means less deplorable, case this constituted. The reason for this was, I guess, was the fact that Bukovina had a relative Ukrainian majority in the period, and thus the ideological construct supported by the Liberals could not have applied (although, as a side debate, I think that Ukranian representatives initially resigned, as it was ultimately a pick between "Brătianu's Byzantium" and the Soviet Union...) However, as I have indicated, the situation in higher learning needs to take in the drives of centralism (which, if not clear by now, I do not support), and not be included in an ethnic policy. Dahn 23:59, 19 June 2006 (UTC)
Again, as Bogdan proved, the teritory in question (the term "Romania" in irelevant, Romania of today is not the Romania of the interbelic time) witnessed an increase in the number of Ukranians. Plus, even so, I fail to see how demographic fall is considered "ethnic assimialtion". The number of Romanians also fell. Did we auto-assimilate? In fact, as only the number of Roma has grown, this belongs to Romanysation. greier 20:55, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Greier, we need to reach a consensus on each of these issues. For now, the tag will do.
Dahn
13:09, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
I see that this is marked "totally disputed". For those of us who would rather not wade through the entire lengthy talk page, and since factual issues should take priority over POV matters (and are far easier to solve with research), could someone please sum up succinctly what factual matters in the article are disputed? - Jmabel | Talk 00:20, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
Note to Irpen: do not remove all tags, please. You well know that some info in there is questionable and/or irrelevant. It also needs to include some Romanian sources - especially since serious Romanian historians do not reject either the term or its application (see sections above). I promise I will contribute more in the future. Dahn 19:31, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Dahn, by all means go ahead and add sourced info. However, we can't just have the article sitting for months with tags attached and doing nothing. -- Irpen 19:33, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Dahn, at least the Ukrainian part seems properly referenced. If you dispute the Hungarian part, tag the section, not the whole article. If you think Ukrainian part needs balansing by adding the info from the Romanian sources, do so by all means. But if the facts are true, the tag has no place. -- Irpen 21:08, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't know how those were counted. The statistics is referred to the academic source. The info of the University renaming was indeed out of place. I removed it. What else is disputed in the section? -- Irpen 21:31, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Oh,btw: what about Dobruja, and especially Southern Dobruja? That is the textbook example of Romanianization (attempted or successful). Will do. Dahn 21:41, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
The grammar problems may warrant the tl:cleanup but not the neutrality tags. That Nistor viewed Bukovina as Romanian ethnic territory is not disputed (or is it?). So, what other two? -- Irpen 21:56, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Sorry. I have not checked the sources. I did since, and note that the text (a respectable one) did say how many students enrolled in all, and did give some other interesting info which the text obscures: "In 1920 there were 239 Ukrainians in a student body of 1,671. In 1933 the body of 3,247 students consisted of 2,117 Romanians, 679 Jews, 199 Germans, 155 Ukrainians, 57 Poles, and 40 of other nationalities." A drop in numbers from 239 to 155 does not really illustrate a policy (it may even be demography), and does not implicate the rise in numbers of Romanian in any way: the percentage may have increased, but so did the student body (from 1,671 to 3,247!). And,again, I fail to see how the source counted the Ukrainians. Dahn 22:14, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
So, the situation at the university is not, in fact, "ethnic assimilation" (per the definition given in the open line of this article). The number of Ukrainians, if true, decreased from a quite reduced sum by an insignificant amount. The source is blatently misinterpreted. Furthermore, even if the source does speak of a Romanianization, it specifically refers to an Austrian institution having turned into a Romanian institution. I'm sure many Ukrainians find that concept problematic, but the argument, much like Nistor's, would include a certain POV on Bukovina's history, and certain expectations which this article should not have. In itself, the process was arguably normal and to be expected with any change in masters. Dahn 22:54, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
It has to do with cultural suppression. -- Irpen 23:48, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
I disagree. The cultural suppression of the Ukrainian culture is closely related to the assimilationist policy and has the place in the article. -- Irpen 00:15, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
I replaced the pecentage with the numbers as per source. -- Irpen 00:32, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
On University, decrease in Ukrainian enrollment is combined with expulsion of the Ukrainian faculty and elimination of the Ukrainian department. All these are related events directed by the anti-Ukrainian educational policies. The assault on the cultural elite is the most important part of any such policies directed against a specific nation. -- Irpen
With the table, I agree that apples has to be compared to apples and oranges to oranges. 1919 data can be compared to the 1930 data. 1992 data can be compared to 2002 data. Comparison accross the pairs makes no sense. Perhaps it may be made more clearer by reformatting the table or splitting it into two. -- Irpen 01:36, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
Assimilation is not necessarily forced. The moderate pace assimilation is natural for any non-titular minority. But those numbers do not represent any alarming pace indeed and do not speak badly of Romania. However, the comparison of the total population in 1992 to that in 1932 in relative percentage was indeed out of place. I removed it. -- Irpen 02:17, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
I would have preferred to alter the lead to make it clear that the phenomenon is not restricted to the forced assimilationist polices, while the latter were often part of it. But fine, if you insist, go ahead and remove the 90s columns. Note, however, that charges of the undercounting of Ukrainians in Romanians census are relevant. They should be presented as charges raised by the Ukrainian community, not the established facts. I think this should be treated similarly to similar complaints in Romanian language publications over the Ukrainian census. The existence of complaints should be noted but, as they are isolated and allegations are unproven, they should not be given too much weight. -- Irpen
While we're at it, are the Hutsuls relevant here? Given that, unlike Slavic ethnic Ukrainians, they are generally thought to in fact be Slavicised Romanians, they may be. Biruitorul 06:14, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
1) People have multiple levels of identity, and often feel much closer to their region or village than to a nation. I imagine that this was especially the case in 1930 Bucovina, whose citizens had just 12 years earlier been Austro-Hungarian subjects (and were counted as "Ruthenians" in the imperial census) and for whom the concept of "Ukraine" might have been unknown, given the relatively late nation-building undergone by Ukraine and its very brief existence as a state. If you take a look at p. 106 of
this recent Eurobarometer, you'll see what I'm trying to say. For instance, if a Hungarian felt no attachment to his country but very strong European identity, but had all the other characteristics of a typical Hungarian (name, language, Hungarian family members, Catholic or Calvinist, etc.), should he be put down as a "European"? Or what if a Romanian identified as a Dacian (as some have done)? At some point, certain lines need to be drawn, or else people will fall into thousands of categories, rendering results meaningless.
2) I don't know how true this was in Bucovina in 1930, but I've heard that in some pre-national/pre-literate societies, people would identify as 'creştini' or 'oamenii de aici'. Assuming for argument's sake that this was the case in a few villages in 1930, again, the census-taker would have been wise to apply religion, language, customs, physiognomy, etc. to help classify these people. Plus, if people were illiterate and couldn't understand the questions being asked, then the government would basically be forced to put them in some category. But if they were literate, and there was a deliberate practice of changing a clear response of x to y, then I would be against that.
3) Censuses don't generally allow people of mixed parentage to select two options, and this might have been a factor in the multi-ethnic, overall Greek Catholic(?) Bucovina of the time.
Biruitorul
04:53, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
A comment on topic. "Romanians in N. Bukovina have to deal with the issue of Moldovans in N. Bukovina". I've seen the census forms. I can even dig out an online image of it. The ethnicity question was to be answered by a write in response, not a pick from pre-selected choices that would have included "Romanian" and "Moldavian" and as such, by the presense of two separate option to triger the complaints of the oponents of the Moldovanism concept. As such, the census questions are immaculate. A separate issue would arise if one brought about any sourced allegations that the responders were pressured to respond "Moldovans" or that they answered "Romanians" but census takers wrote in "Moldovan" or that there was a counting fraud. I have not seen such allegations in connection with the Romanian/Moldovan issue. -- Irpen
As for the usage of Rumanization, this term is used in every English langauage source I've seen that writes about the interwar policies in Romania. I understand that Romanianizations means the same, but we should be consistent with the scholarly usage. Modern scholars still use it. I specifically inquired at RO-board a while ago whether the term is offensive. Once I was assured that it was not (just seems archaic to some) I started using it. I think scholarly usage is a strong enough argument to use it in Wikipedia. -- Irpen 03:05, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't think that scholars owe us any explanation. Our duty is to follow them. Britannica article on Bukovina uses Romania but Rumanization, not Romanianization or Rumanianization in the text. -- Irpen 03:33, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
Given that the English-speaking world has switched over rather completely to writing "Romania" rather than "Roumania" or "Rumania", I think "Romanianization" is clearer. At least it should exist as a redirect.
I don't feel like doing research on this but, Irpen, are you sure that scholarly work after, say, 1992 is still routinely using "Rumanization"? - Jmabel | Talk 04:15, 17 October 2006 (UTC)