Talk:Romanianization/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Architecture

File:Aranyosgerend.jpg

Orthodox Romanian church being built in the neighborhood of a 750-year old Hungarian Church in Luncani/Aranyosgerend, Transylvania, 2004

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?

Hi.

I agree that it's not a nice thing they have done, but this article is about the linguistic/ethnic assimilation, not about nasty things Romanians do to Hungarians in Transylvania... bogdan 15:49, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

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

Probably the intention of the builders is simply "Keeping up with the Joneses": 'the Hungarians have a church here and we don't'. :-)

Anyway, this is not the policy of the Romanian state, but of the local Romanian community and/or Orthodox Church in Transylvania. The church is most likely funded by private donations. bogdan 16:16, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

Your are right. This is not an official policy of the state. Governments don't adopt such official policies. They try to oppress minorites silently, or simply officially deny the obvious. But a significant fraction of Romanians would feel better if there weren't people of any other nationalities in Romania. What do you think, why is that the average wages are the lowest in Hungarian populated territories in Romania? Why is that the more succesful companies (with headquarters in Bucharest) often hire almost only Romanians in areas where the majority of the population is not Romanian? Why do people often get irritated when I publicly talk in Hungarian (eg. on the bus)? Why does it happen that Steua supporters start to chant "kill all Hungarians" with no apparent reason and go on to find an innocent victim to pour their hatred on? It's not ONLY about an (denied or undenied) OFFICIAL policy, it's about the people and their irresponsible leaders who often (more or less directly) encourage this kind of behaviour!—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 193.231.19.6 (talk • contribs) 27 April 2006.

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 don't see how they're trying to eliminate the proofs of Hungarian existance as long as the Hungarian monuments still stand and the Hungarians still live in Transylvania. bogdan 17:09, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

I think this argument is pointless! Orthodoxism does not equal Romanian nationality! This article is called Romanianization not Orthodoxization. Many Romanians are atheists, or members of non-Orthodox churches. Many Hungarians are Orthodox. The Orthodox Church is not the national church of Romania. Therefore, all the construction of the church is doing is perhaps saying that the Orthodox Church is trying to convert members of the Catholic Church to Orthodoxism. It's got absolutely nothing to do with nationality and ethnicity. We have to look at it this way - there is no such thing as a "Romanian church" and a "Hungarian church". There are only religious denominations. Ronline 10:28, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

That's your opinion, and may be legally correct, but many people do believe that the Orthodox Church is somehow the national church of Romania. I agree that the main function of a church is to be a place of worship, but churches (and other religious buildings and monuments) often serve as historic and cultural, and political landmarks (just like statues, plaques, streetnames etc). I mean, look at Alba Iulia: the first thing the Romanian government did after 1920 there was to erect a huge Orthodox cathedral next to the Catholic one, with a somewhat higher tower.:) Do you seriously believe this had no symbolic meaning? Nationalism and religion are often entangled, unfortunately. In many cases, the intention of church-builders is no doubt good; but in many other cases, they seem to be primarily interested in artificially changing the cultural landscape of Transylvania. That said, I also believe that this picture is not really suitable for this article: it illustrates only one aspect (and probably not the most important) of Romanianization.--Tamas 00:20, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

File:Catedrala.jpg

Catedrala Ortodoxa Romana, Targu Mures

You can find similar examples to Gyulafehérvár/Alba Iulia in very many places in Transylvania. Eg. in Marosvásárhely/Targu Mures the town center is completely dominated by a huge Romanian church built in the 1920s. In that time period Romanians were a relatively small minority in the town. Of course, this building could not have been "erected" without the active support of the government.

If you have never experienced it yourself, it is hard to imagine how minorities are effected when they are forced to use another language in the town of their ancestors. I think these kind of pictures are good to illustrate, how a different way of thinking, a different culture starts to dominate over a traditional landscape, or town center. --KIDB 07:58, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

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

Romanians not allowed to settle in cities?

"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 have reformulated the phrase that you cited. Hopefully it is now clearer and it does not leave room for personal interpretations.--Alexrap, 29 November 2005

Thanks. --Tamas 07:58, 30 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)

In my opinion, the urbanisation in the 20th century Romania was not at all used as a romanianisation tool. It was a natural urbanisation process that was required by the economic development of the country. As the data from the Censuses shows, the urbanisation was stronger outside Transylvania (regions that were less developed from an economical point of view), and not in Transylvania as it should have been if romanianisation had been something aimed by the authorities. And in Transylvania, it was stronger in the majority Hungarian small cities of Miecurea Ciuc and Sfântu Gheorghe (where the large majority of the population is Hungarian even nowadays, so the urbanisation there used ethnic Hungarians).

The urbanisation in 20th century Transylvania was, as I said, required by the economic development process. This meant that new plants needed new workers. Who is more likely to be such a new worker? I guess it is natural to be someone from the rural parts surrounding that city. Well, this is what happened and most of them were Romanians (appart from the Miercurea Ciuc and Sfântu Gheorghe cases).

Why were most of them ethnic Romanians? Romanians were a majority in Transylvania, but they were not a majority in the cities. This meant that they were an overwhelming majority in the rural parts.

Why were they not a majority in the cities, if they were a majority in Transylvania? Because their social status (and the long lasting disconsideration of human rights aimed at maintaining the social status-quo of Transylvania) did not allowed them to move into cities.

I think that this is the connection between all the elements from the text that I added. I think it helps to understand why the Hungarian population lost their majority in almost all Transylvanian cities. It was a natural process, not something aimed at artificially achieving this. --Alexrap, 30 November 2005

1. I don't think that the urbanisation process can be described as a natural process in a centrally planned economy, it shows, however, some similar patterns to the urbanisation of market economies. Of course, it was originally not aimed at romanianisation, its basic target was to build up the heavy industry in a predominantly agrarian country. During the execution of the policy, however, ethnic considerations were also taken into account.

2. I suppose, the reason behind the moderate expansion of Transylvanian towns is that the region was already more urbanised than Walachia or Moldavia in 1912, when your first data are from.

3. It is true that Romanians are in majority in Transylvania, however, there were a lot of Hungarians in the Northern part, in the rural areas, too. (There is discussion about ethnic Hungarians having been over or below 50% in Northern Transylvania when it was returned to Hungary in 1940.) How did Romanians become a clear majority in all major towns in the North (except Marosvásárhely/Targu Mures where the process started from a lower number of Romanians, or the smaller and less industrialised tows you mentioned within the compact Székely areas)? --KIDB 08:34, 2 December 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)

Dear Alex and Algos: you are right that urbanization and the ensuing changes in ethnic composition were basically natural processes. However, there was also an element of planned Romanization. How could you otherwise explain the fact that proportion of ethnic Hungarians in cities like Miercurea Ciuc and Sfantu Gheorghe sank by almost 20%? So there were two processes going on at the same time: one natural and another political.--Tamas 18:04, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

OK, but Harghita county has some 14% Romanians - mainly in the North, near Toplita - and Covasna have even more, more than 23% today - mainly in the south, near Brasov county (these two areas are relatively compact Romanian - no recent migration here...).

Do you mean the former Saxonian towns in Southern Covasna? --KIDB 08:34, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

No, i mean Romanian villages a bit to the East of Brasov city . And Romanians were living in many villages in the proper Saxon Lands. Look a bit to this map from 1992: http://sebok1.adatbank.transindex.ro/legbelso.php3?nev=KozEu Also, Sfantu Gheorghe is quite close to the compact Romanian zones Algos 23:32, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, this map shows what the situation was in 1990, after 70 years of Romanian rule. Almost no German minority in the areas with 800 years of Saxonian tradition... Do you have a similar, detailed map from 1910? --KIDB 10:17, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I have some, though not as detailed:

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)

Sure it can be argued that today the county borders are not what they used to be 100 years ago, especially for Covasna. Maybe is not that strange that some people moved into the cities from these areas. Varga's paper also says that Covasna and Harghita are net economic emigration zone - Hungarians from here moved to Mures, Cluj, etc. Is not quite realistic to expect that a town should grow only by atracting people from suburbs or near villages. Is also true that in the communist period migration was not a "free" process: moving residence into a city needed party/official aproval (anywhere in Romania, not only in those "sensitive" areas) - so this could have been used to direct/restrict migration. But some cities like Odorheiul Secuiesc (Székelyudvarhely) are even today 97% Hungarian. In any case, Romanians are not over-represented in the urban areas of these 2 counties, when compared to the county ethnic structure. In the future (not quite tomorrow, though) the economic migrants will probably have to come from abroad - as today it is looking like we (Romanians and Hungarians) are sadly heading towards a demographic colapse... Algos 05:00, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

I commented on this because the proposed text was not about the middle of the 19th century, where we have data from, but about the period before that (When peasants were not allowed to settle in some cities). --KIDB 08:34, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not an op-ed page

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)

I agree that the section below (Urbanization) might not look as a Wikipedia article. It is probably also too long for this article. It is fine with me if we keep the statistics only on this discussion page for future reference and we only add to the article their conclusions. Therefore I propose to add to the existing paragraph:

Things changed during Nicolae Ceauşescu's rule, when his industrialization of towns made the number of inhabitants in some urban areas to double or even triple, most of the workers brought being ethnic Romanians from the rural areas. The urbanization policy was followed throughout Romania, including in areas inhabited by minorities, where it changed the ethnic breakdown.

the following phrases: This was however just a natural phenomenon as the urbanization was required by the economic development and by the intention of transforming the predominantly agrarian country into an industrialized one. In fact, the urbanization was much less significant in the ethnically diverse cities from Transylvania which were more developed from an economical point of view than the other regions. However, even this less significant urbanization led to a chanke in the ethnic breakdown, as the new workers came in most cases from the rural regions where the ethnic Romanians were an overwhelming majority. --Alexrap, 3 December 2005

[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

I`ve corrected region name Wallachia with Muntenia.the person who wrote this doesn`t seem to know the difference between a state name and a region name.Wallachia = Romania

it`s like saying Deutchland is a region of Germany . JE

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.52.225.123 (talk) 04:44, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

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]

Another factor important to mention is that traditional Hungarian cities in Transylvania were so-called "closed towns" during the Ceausescu regime which means that it was highly difficult (or rather impossible) for Hungarians to get residence permits there. The most likely scenario for new Hungarian graduates was that they had to resettle in Romanian-speaking territories like Moldva or Wallachia. This was also a factor contributing to ethnic homogenization. Árpád 04:23, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Authorities, local governments

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)

Presumably, people have written about this: memoirs, etc. Those should be citable. It will be anecdotal, but that's better than nothing. -- Jmabel | Talk 19:24, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

"Probably"

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"):

"(As far as census data are concerned, however, it should be noted that the 1910 census probably overestimated the proportion of Hungarians, and the one in 1930 probably underestimated it.)"

-- Jmabel | Talk 07:35, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

I'll look for a source. (In the meantime: it is well known that both censuses were biased: in 1910, the Hungarian government was interested in inflating the number of Hungarians, in 1930, the Romanian gov't was likewise intrested in pushing the number of Hungarians down. At those times, censuses were not anonymous, so there it was entirely possible to apply various degrees of administrative pressure. Also, there were many families of an unstable ethnic identity, who identified themselves as Hungarians while citizens of Hungary and Romanians while citizens of Romania. Also, in the 1910 census, most of the Jews living in Transylvania identified themselves as Hungarians by ethnicity, Jewish by religion. In 1930, all people who were Jewish by religion were automatically classified as Jewish by ethnicity, which decreased the number of ethnic Hungarians in the census.)--Tamas 20:36, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

You are certainly correct on the Jews; Hungarian Jews were probably the only minority that embraced Magyarization during the years of the Dual Momarchy. -- Jmabel | Talk 18:40, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Interestingly enough, many Germans did too (not the Saxons in Transylvania to be sure, but they were rather an exception in this regard). In the beginning of the 20th century, the majority of the Hungarian middle class were of either German or Jewish origin.--Tamas 11:08, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Interesting, and remarkable given that the other half of that Dual Monarchy was basically German. Do you have some citation for that? If so, it belongs at Magyarization; I have a cited statement about the Hungarian Jews there. -- Jmabel | Talk 00:19, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, the history of my own ancestors is a living example for this, but I will try and find some more orthodox evidence :) --Tamas 18:15, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

This is from the (Kingdom of) Hungary article in the 1911 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica: "The Jews in 1900 numbered 851,378, not counting the very great number who have become Christians, who are reckoned as Magyars. Their importance is out of all proportion to their number, since they monopolize a large portion of the trade; are with the Germans the chief employers of labor" --KIDB 17:39, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

KIDB, An interesting fact, but what is the relevance to this article? - Jmabel | Talk 01:49, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

No relevance at all. I just read it and recalled you had the above question to Tamás. --KIDB 08:29, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Cultural assimilation

The article

• missed to prove any kind of "cultural assimiliation";
• completely ignored the Romanian legislation of Greater Romania;
• Ceausescu inherited some social processes.

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)

Could you then please point out the Hungarian texts this article is "basically a translation of"? Also, don't forget that this page has been worked on by many people for many months (many of whom are actually Romanians: e.g. bogdan, Ronline, Alexrap), so it is quite preposterous to start unilaterally deleting stuff from it. Also, why did you delete the sentence on the Hungarian Autonomous Province? Do you think it did not exist or something?--Tamas 17:42, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I've never knew those enumarated users are working in a team. If is not basically translation from popular media, could you provide the name of the inventor (the observer) of this R thing? --Vasile 02:04, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Romanization of Ukrainian minority

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

Do you need my permission? --Vasile 15:15, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

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)

I restored well referenced information back. Please do not remove stuff from articles purely because it is not to your liking. Read don't be reckless guideline. It warnds explicitly against deletions. --Irpen 18:24, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Irpen, speaking about guidelines, I suggest you try to adopt a civil tone. I removed that sentence not because it is not to my liking, but because:

1. it is unsubstantiated: the reference does not talk about the romanization of Ukranians. The paragraph you probably think about is The Rumanianization of Moldavia, where the Ukrainians played an important role and literary Ukrainian was the official language, and of Bukovyna became more intense after 1564, when the capital of Moldavia was moved from Suceava in Bukovyna to Iaşi. That's about the romanization of Moldova, not about the romanization of Ukrainians...
2. it is nonsense: Romanization is defined as ethnic assimilation policies implemented by the Romanian authorities. To begin with, there were no Romanian authorities in the 14th century, now were they? Besides, no historian I'm aware of talks about romanization, magyarization, ukrainification, name_your_own_ation in the 1500s for the simple reason that whatever authorities were at that time couldn't care less about ethnic assimilation policies.

As a Romanian, I dislike the fact that Romania, at various times in its history, had implemented romanization policies; that, however, doesn't prevent me from acknowledging the existence of such policies, and the need to document them. To that end, please note that I didn't change anything in the rest of the section, which covers the inter-bellum period. That being said, I urge you to cool off and rethink your decision to revert my edit. I'll be waiting for your reply before reverting your revert. Dmaftei 20:14, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

BTW, I also object to the comment accompanying your revert: rv blanking. I did not blank anything; my edit is merely removal of unsubstantiated information. Dmaftei 20:36, 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)

Greek Catholics

Majority of Ukrainians in Austro-Hungary belonged to Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. The oppression of Greek Catholics started in 1920[citation needed] and continued until 1948 when this religion was completely banned by communist government (in Ukraine SSR it was banned as well). All Ukrainian churches were expropriated, priests prosecuted and Ukrainians had no choice but to accept the forced conversion into Eastern Orthodoxy or practice their Eastern Rite faith underground. Representatives of religious groups that sought recognition after 1990 alleged that the registration process was arbitrary and unduly influenced by the Romanian Orthodox Church (from [1]).

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)

Bogdan, I wish you were as bold in deleting stuff when I posted Anti-Romanian discrimination for deletion. You defended it saying that bad stuff is better than no stuff. Now we see that it was just a POV-pushing sham. --Ghirla | talk 15:24, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with other things in the Ukrainian section, but this is the one paragraph that is off-topic. Because this is not Romanianization. If it was, then the Soviets who did the same thing in Ukraine were agents of Romanianization, too. :-) bogdan 15:36, 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)

Then elaborate if you know something. --Vasile 12:24, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Suppression of Ukrainian national church and trying to assimilated it by the Romanian Orthodox Church is not off-topic. Similar sentiments is commonly cited as examples of Russification when hte UGCC was being absorbed by the Russian Orthodox Church in the post WW2 times. --Irpen 18:04, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be fair to write that the suppression was ordered by the Soviets (who thought that the Catholics were agents of the Capitalist West) and that it was even implemented with the help of our friends, the Soviet occupation forces, who stayed in Romania until 1958. bogdan 21:32, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Just because opression of Greek-Catholics in Ukraine is considered a method of Russification, it doesn't mean automatically that the similar phenomenon in Romania was a method of Rumanisation while the great majority of Greek-Catholics were Romanians. --Vasile 12:24, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

I am second. I have inserted the note that the Uniates were persecuted in the Ukarinian SSR as well, but probably this idea should be stated strongly and clearer. BTW I am surprised, but it seems that there is no article on the Lviv Synod and the aftermath abakharev 02:30, 24 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)

The term

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)

I agree. I would have started the article under the Rumanization name but since this one already existed, I just added the alt term here. I would not object to the article's renaming. --Irpen 16:00, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I don't agree. The word "Rumanization" sounds very weird. First, keep in mind that the word Rumanian is used rarely today, the standard form is Romanian. Consider these Google search results:

Rumanian(1 460 000) Romanian(26 500 000), i.e., a ratio of about 1 to 18.

Even if we used the word Rumanian as a base, Rumanianization would be a more regular derivation. I mean: Italian -> Italianization, German -> Germanization, Rumanian -> Rumanianization. How do you get Rumanization? Ruman -> Rumanization? There is no such word in English as Ruman. Since Rumanization redirects here, there is no danger of those who know that particular term getting lost. So I would suggest that we keep Romanianization.--Tamas 17:21, 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)

• Irpen: which edition of Britannica? The current one, or something older? Until now, I'd never run across "Rumanization". I have to say, as a native English speaker, I'd expect "Romanianization", just along standard patterns of word formation. - Jmabel | Talk 06:51, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

The current (2004-05) Btitannica uses Rumanization in "Bukovina" article. The quote is at talk:Bukovina (maybe in its archives). Also Subtelny's, UA-history book is a modern one. --Irpen 17:56, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

If you run a Google search, you get 352 hits for Romanianization vs. 139 for Rumanization. The term Romanianization is used on sites such as: http://countrystudies.us/, http://muse.jhu.edu/journals, http://www.jamestown.org, http://www.bukovinasociety.org/Welisch-2002-1.html etc. Rumanization too is used on "prestigeous" sites, so it seems that both terms are used by scholars, but Romanianization is used more frequently.--Tamas 21:39, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Did you find any formal definition on these sites or other book you read? --Vasile 23:41, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

First of all, Romanization did not end in 1940. It is continuing. This is why I reverted renaming. Second, the two sentences on oppression of Ukrainian greek catolics are given here in order to communicate to the reader pre-history and explain following sentence "Representatives of religious groups that sought recognition after 1990 alleged that the registration process was arbitrary and unduly influenced by the Romanian Orthodox Church".--Bryndza 20:57, 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

would simplify the life for everybody. --Vasile 00:18, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Editing the introduction

Irpen, this edit changes the meaning of the whole meaning of the introduction, instead of just reorganizing it. bogdan 01:34, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Hitler actually meant that since the Romanian government did not assimilated the minorities, the Romanian state was unstable and could no longer hold them for much longer. bogdan 01:37, 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)

• I see not a waste of memory space to write in a paranthesis the actual name of University.

• The Greek-Catholic anti-Ukrainian policy conotation is merely a speculation since the majority of Greek-Catholic in Romania were Romanians. Let's write a few names of Ukrainian priest opressed.
• I would like to have the exact reference about that "many Ukrainians pursued by the authorities". --Vasile 02:23, 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)

The problem is its placement in the intro. I am fine with it further down in the text in the history section. --Irpen 04:03, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with that if the article would be better referenced. Meanwhile, that quoted guy wrote something very authoritative (as he was in control of the Europe in July 1940) about the assimilation of minorities in Romania. In order to keep a balance, I would not oppose to include a phrase or two about political debate in the Soviet Union, regarding the subject. --Vasile 15:46, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Guys, do we really need to quote Adolf Hitler, of all people, in the very first paragraph of this article!? --Tamas 15:06, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Bring some other people (names, not sites, not rumours). Admiral Horthy said something on this matter? What about Magyar politicians of inter-war or Communist Romania? Do you know serious historian work on this subject? --Vasile 15:46, 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)

I agree with Vasile. There is absolutely no need to quote someone in the first paragraph. Not Hitler, not Admiral Horthy, nor anyone else. The first paragraph should concisely describe what's in the article. References, quotes etc. should be included in the main text.--Tamas 19:52, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Census results

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)

Of course. Most of the Ukrainians in Romania lived in Northern Bukovina and Bessarabia. That table is misleading.

Currently there are:

• 689,000 Ukr. in Chernvitsi region
• 248,000 in Southern Bessarabia (part of Odessa region)
• 285,000 in the Republic of Moldova (excluding Transnistria)
• 61,000 in Romania

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)

NPOV?!

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)

= Citations

• citation for terms - otherwise this is political folklore;
• citation for the definition of the term - the same
• ethnic makeup was also due to the Hungarian Nazi authorities;
• do not repeat severeal times the same external link -one time is enough;
• citation for R. as reason of Tg-Mures Mar 1990;
• citation for R. document in Tg-Mures Dec 1989;

I beg you to bring references for all your further edits or rv tags. --Vasile 19:15, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Mixed families

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

• citation for R. as reason of Tg-Mures Mar 1990;

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)

What was the "meaning" of the article? This idea of "meaning" for an article sounds odd to me.

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)

rm nonsense definition

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)

This was removed as "nonsense", despite a clear citation from a rather authoritative source:

The citation was Gheorghiu-Dej's Defiance of Khrushchev, 1989, Country Studies Series by Federal Research Division of the United States Library of Congress. Accessed 11 Feb 2006.

Usually the U.S. gov't country studies are considered pretty authoritative sources. Yes, it is a mlidly different sense of the word, but it seems to me that it should be mentioned. And it is certainly not nonsense. You claim I am misinterpreting; here is the passage: "Gheorghiu-Dej ordered "de-Russification" and nationalistic "Romanianization" measures to drum up mass support for his defiance of Moscow and deflect criticism of his own harsh domestic economic policies. Bucharest's Institute for Russian Studies metamorphosed into a foreign-languages institute, and Russian-language instruction disappeared from Romanian curricula. To promote Romanian culture, official historians resurrected Romanian heroes; the PMR published an anti-Russian anthology of Karl Marx's articles denouncing tsarist Russia's encroachments on Romania and backing Romania's claim to Bessarabia; workmen stripped Russian names from street signs and buildings. Cultural exchanges with the West multiplied; jamming of foreign radio broadcasts ceased; and Romania began siding against the Soviet Union in United Nations (UN) votes. The Romanianization campaign also ended political and cultural concessions granted to the Hungarian minority during early communist rule; subsequently Hungarians suffered extensive discrimination." Sounds clearly like a closely related phenomenon. - Jmabel | Talk 03:06, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

"Nonsense" was too strong, sorry about that, I didn't mean to offend you. However I stand by what I said that you misinterpreted the source, since what the paper describes is the process of "de-sovietisation" carried out by Gheorghiu-Dej, not some kind of "Romanianization" with a slightly different meaning. I'll grant you that "de-sovietisation in Romania" and "Romanianization" could be viewed as closely related phenomena, but I don't see how from this one draws the conclusion that "Romanianization also includes the differentiation of Romania from other East Bloc countries during the Cold War era." And I don't disagree at all with the paper; I disagree with your conclusion. Dmaftei 15:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

So pushing off Russian hegemony, systematically resurrecting the reputations of Romanian national heroes, pushing Romania's claim to Bessarabia, and cutting such cultural concessions to the Hungarians as the Autonomous Region are not Romanianization? What would you then call them? - Jmabel | Talk 06:26, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, they were not Romanianization at the time. It was dangerous. Romania did not force the Russians to go out, but rather persuaded them. Just after the retreat of the Red Army the human rights situation actually worsened for a time, to show the russians there are no problems.

So, you can call it Romanianization, but you're doing original research unless you cite an existing source. :) Dpotop 09:07, 8 March 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:

• pushing off Russian hegemony is not an ethnic assimilation policy, so it's not Romanianization.
• systematically resurrecting the reputations of Romanian national heroes is not an ethnic assimilation policy, so it's not Romanianization.
• pushing Romania's claim to Bessarabia is not an ethnic assimilation policy, so it's not Romanianization.
• cutting such cultural concessions to the Hungarians as the Autonomous Region. Strictly speaking, cutting concessions is not an ethnic assimilation policy. The problem is that on the heals of the "concession cutting" came ething assimilation policies, and yes, that is Romanianization. Dmaftei 14:38, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Hungarian minority in 2005

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)

According to the census in 2002, Transylvania has a population of 7,221,733 persons, with a large Romanian majority (74.69%). In addition, there are also sizable Hungarian (19.60%), Roma (3.39%) and German (0.73%) communities. --Alex, 21:46, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Is the 2002 census published online somewhere? Dmaftei 10:39, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes. Go to www.insse.ro . Then, take on the top menu the "Recensaminte tab", and click on the link "Recensamantul populatiei si locuintelor (2002)". Dpotop 14:12, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Also, http://www.recensamant.ro/ ... and many other places. --Alex, 17:41, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Averescu

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)

I had added the citation, and I believe I had the article (not the abstract) in front of me at the time I added it. But I don't have it now, so I cannot verify. I may try to follow this up later, but there seems to be pretty adequate citation for the term without this, so it doesn't seem like a priority. - Jmabel | Talk 00:46, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Got hold of it. The term is, indeed, in the article, but does not refer to Averescu's own politics. The relevant sentence is "Under a regime of universal suffrage the Rumanian peasants of the new provinces gravitated politically toward an interracial opposition bloc, in two directions: They struck hands with the peasant war veterans of the Old Kingdom and with the victims of forcible Rumanization in their own provinces." I can provide a photocopy of the article to anyone needs to see more context and hasn't got access to a good library, but since it is under copyright, I don't feel it would be appropriate to post it to the Web. I am restoring the citation. - Jmabel | Talk 06:10, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I see. Sorry. Could you please add a sentence to the note clarifying the exact relation between Averescu and the reference to Romanianization - kinda like "an analysis of the rise of populism in early 1920s Romania, indicating the ideology's appeal with minorities threatened by Romanianization"? Averescu might have been pretty stupid, but his memory deserves to have this ambiguity clarified. I would also like to point out that, while Bratianu's centralism might be interpreted as and partly was Romanianization, it is quite obvious that it was not a priority at the time: consider that Averescu's movement was opposing the Bratianu gvt., and grouped the two distinct forces mentioned by the Nation together with some of the most racist persons in Romania (such as A. C. Cuza); at the same time, it looks to me that the anti-Romanianization forces (which included the Romanian politicians in Transylvania) became quite successful in the following years (in 1927, they were in government), and effectively blocked any ultra-centralist policies - be they Romanianizing or not. Dahn 17:27, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I have clarified it myself. Dahn 20:20, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

From "reference"...

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)

This is weird... I actually agree with Greier here... How on Earth is anti-Semitism "assimilation"? The last I have checked, it is anything but. Dahn 21:10, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

So either change the definition of Rumanianisation, or either remove from the article these part (or the third variant: a new article about the policies of the Romanian goverment regarding national minorities (jews in particular) during WW2). greier 13:12, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

In that pdf, Rumanisation doesn`t mean "ethnic assimilation", but rather ethnic cleansing of the administration, industry, commerce, etc greier 13:14, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Precisely. The process that was referred to in that period as Romanianization was something entirely different than the topic of this article: it was the turning over of certain functions exclusively to those who were deemed to be "Romanian" which, according to the government of the time, the Romanian Jews were not. Certainly deserves discussion somewhere, though. Maybe we need a Romanianization (disambiguation)?- Jmabel | Talk 00:31, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Another reference

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)

Thoroughly replacing the faculty that leads to a totally different ethnic composition is relevant to the policy directed at suppression of the minorities and their culture. The piece is relevant and referenced. Restored. --Irpen 18:40, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Irpen, I am confused, the faculty changes can be argued to be part of Romanization as students would be exposed to more Romanian professors and thus be integrated more into Romanian culture/society. I am, however, confused as to why you reverted the section about Anti-Semitism. I do not see how that can be construed as Romanization. The goal of the policies was not to bring Jews into Romanian society, but rather to isolate them from it. TSO1D 18:55, 19 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)

Two observations:

While I do tend to agree that a cultural assimilation of Ukrainians had been attempted (note the word "attempted"), and the case of the university may be cited as proof of cultural assimilation, it was more in line with centralism. Centralism is not cultural assimilation, as much as it is enforcing a single culture. One may be outraged about the fact that no culture was allowed to have a full voice in Romanian culture of the inter-war (no parallel universities, no secondary teaching, no regional status), but let us not forget that this was not demanded by the standard of the time (with the exception of Sudetenland or Tyrol - which international laws recognized and protected, that which was not the case here), and that a centralist state will have specific demands (wanting a single form of higher learning in a single language - a minority language was of no use to anyone in Romania, considering the laws in place). Furthermore, as I have made it clear, centralism was also opposed by all Romanian political movements other than the National Liberal Party (see for now Alexandru Averescu and Peasants' Party (Romania), as well as the Averescu issue on this very page) - a new constitutional agreement was never reached, but that is only becuause of successful Liberal maneuvers and the fact that Romania plunged into chaos in the earliest 1930s. Aslo note that Hitler's letter referenced in this article indicates that Romania has actually failed at "Romanianizing" - thus justifing the Vienna Diktat in terms that Hitler himself indicates he would not have used in other circumstances.

"Isolation or assimilation, however, this policy had the same goal, to have a state of Romanians with other cultures absent or suppressed" - this statement is rather POV. How do you know it was like that? Analysing the context leads to a different conclusion: from the late 1800s, it has been poited out that all Jewish persons targeted by such measures were in fact those liable to be the least distinct. It would make sense, after all: if the argument was that "the Jew was taking food off from the Romanian's table", it would be implied that that person was actually present in social, cultural, and political life (because there would be no competition with Romanians over religious education or employment as hakhams). Consequently, Romanians de-Romanianised the integrated and non-religious Jews, defining them as a race and placing them on the margin of the law. The two processes described have nothing in common, and actually seem opposed to one another.

Add to this: i would be very interested to know about the context of the claim about "Ukrainians being called de-Romanianised Romanians". I know such bullshit was imposed by Ion Antonescu, but where is it implied it had been carried out before? The article as it is leaves room to believe that it had been an ongoing policy characteristic to inter-war Romania - all my info tells me it was not, and I know that Ukrainians were represented in Parliament (although I believe that a distinction was made by the community itself, which was devided over self-definition as Ruthenians or self-definition as Ukrainians - I am not sure about this, however). Dahn 21:27, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

It's just that the introduction defines Romanization as: "the term used to describe a number of ethnic assimilation policies." The body of the text, however, uses a more broad definition of the word and I am not sure what is correct. I agree that the goal of some Romanian policies during this era was to emphasize Romanian culture and exclude others, however I am not sure that all of this pertains to this specific article. Perhaps the header should be changed to explain that Romanization refers to "the sum of Romanian policies aimed at increasing the role of Romanian culture in the culture while limiting others," but I am not sure if that is a correct definition of the concept. Perhaps someone can find another source that defines the word. TSO1D 19:19, 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)

The "Romanians who forgot their native language" term was in fact used, it is referenced and should be kept. When and where? And where is the reference for it?

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. I certainly did not mean that. First of all, it was not applied "in Cenral Europe", but "in Europe" - see France. I did not reflect on how moral it was; I had questioned how centralisation on (roughly) the French model and cultural assimilation can be argued to mean the same thing (hence my reference to oppositions inside Romania). I did not compare on the basis of the puerile "but they did it as well", I questioned whether anyone would have even considered having upper-level education in minority languages as "wrong" in a country that had complied to the nation-state model (which was, by all means, if not "the norm", then one of the norms possible and legitimate).

Also, please replace the global tag with more specific "fact" templates near the statement you want to see referenced. Not yet, Irpen. There is a lot of sophistry in this article, and I want it cleared out. That is to say: the problem is not as much "of facts", but of, shall we say, "hidden tracks" (things linked to each other which have no logical connection). Dahn 21:50, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I remember reading the term "Romanians who forgot their language" in Istoria Basarabiei by Nistor. He argued that the bulk of the Ukrainian immigrants who came into Moldavia settled into the interior and were assimilated, whereas most people speaking Ukrainian at the fringes of the state were Romanians who forgot their language as they were surrounded by Ruthenians, and that (in his own words), the other Romanians should display kindness and benevolence to them and teach them how to be Romanians again. TSO1D 22:05, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I have read that too. The book is written in 1940-41, and tends to make my point about the fact that this was not official policy until the Antonescu period: Nistor speaks of regions which should "again become Romanian" (and were in the process of "becoming" that in the period he wrote), specifically Transnistria, and indicates that this had not been the case before (hence the "reproach", which is also in line with Hitler's message to Carol) - it couldn't have, in any case, been done before 1941 in Transnistria, right? Dahn 22:42, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

No, apparently Istoria Basarabiei was written in 1923 according to this. TSO1D 23:33, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

It was reviewed and partly rewritten in 1940. That is, very likely, the published version we both read (published in the early 1990s). In any case, Nistor's idiocies need not have passed into official dogma - they arguably didn't since we were bound by the Treaty of Paris (and not by Nistor's embelishments). Dahn 23:37, 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:

Învăţământul primar în şcoalele statului se predă în limba română.

În comunele cu populaţie de altă limbă decât limba română Ministerul Instrucţiunii Publice va înfiinţa şcoale primare cu limba de predare a populaţiei respective, în aceeaşi proporţie ca şi în comunele româneşti. În aceste şcoale studiul limbii române va fi obligatoriu în numărul de ore stabilit prin regulament. [...]

65. În localităţile cu populaţiuni minoritare, în care se va găsi un număr apreciabil de copii de origine română, în vârstă de şcoală, se va înfiinţa o şcoală cu limba de predare română.

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)

Thanks, dude. Now, let us also note that public education (emphasis on "public") in a nation-state trains for specific purposes, and aims to create generations of somethings (teachers, public officials, lawyers etc.) which would imply adequate and standardized training in a specific area, and foremost in Romanian. I am not saying that this model is in any way perfect or even necessary: it just happened to be both one of the universal standards of the time and became non-partisan traditional standard in Romania as a nation-state. In fact, its limits as such had been tested in precisely another way: since this was the main requirement to which minorities would confirm, Romanian xenophobes rioted against the gvt. in 1919 for allowing citizens other then ethnic Romanians access to higher learning in a universal framework (that is how the Iron Guard began its revolutionary politics). This, in turn, implies that the system had positive connotations: where minorities (especially Jews) had been banned on principle, this was the first momenyt when, if they complied to a minimal standard, they couldn't be barred from expressing themselves as Romanian citizens. Getting to this point (which may seem surpassable if one has a POV on how education should be) implied a lot of confrontation between the European requirements and Romanian con-artistry: the drive to leave minorities out of society was ended by the very Treaty of Paris this article tends to indicate was a source for evil.

I would also like to point out that the law quoted above indicates that Romanian schools may just as well be the exception to the rule, unlike minority-language schools. ("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.") Dahn 22:37, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Whaoa, wait a minute. It seems that minority languages were also being taught in secondary education as well! Note the requirement for non-Romanian teachers: "Actualii membri ai corpului didactic ai şcoalelor secundare de stat, care nu cunosc bine limba română, sunt obligaţi a depune în termen de doi ani un examen de limba română, iar cei care predau istoria românilor, geografia României şi instrucţiunea civică, sunt obligaţi a da în acelaşi timp şi examen de aceste materii în româneşte" ("Those members of the teaching body in state secondary schools who are not familiar with Romanian are required to pass an exam in Romanian in the space of two years [after 1934], and those teaching Romanian History, Romanian Geography, and Civic Education are, at the same time, required to pass a Romanian-language exam in those areas as well"). Hm. And this is only for those schools maintained with public funds that are secondary-level (and not primary, where it is implied a teacher could have remained a teacher without understanding Romanian). Yeah, this sure sounds like Romanianization to me... Dahn 22:52, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Divers online (which has data provided by the minorities' representatives themselves) makes a cryptical remark, stating that "general education" would have been introduced only in 1948 - which could indicate either that there had been no schools in Ukrainian, or that not all levels of higher learning had been organized in Ukrainian (which would be true for any other community until that moment). In defense of the article as is, Divers also states that it was only in 1948 that schools were also opened in Ukrainian-majority regions; however, it is unclear what had brought about the exception to the law mentioned above (if that is what it was), and also fails to note any Romanianizing of Ukrainians (from what I have noticed, the site never shies away from fully presenting persecutions etc. in other cases). Dahn 23:25, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

This book review, highly critical of Romanian nationalism (as is the book itself, I presume), only mentions Romanianization in Bukovina in regard to the Jewish elite - actully meaning its persecution and removal from civic life, and pointing, yet again, at WWII realities. It stresses Volkgeist as a negative factor in Romanian official ideology (and I fully agree with that position, as I have made clear on other topics), but does not present any specific policy against the Ukrainians/Ruthenians. (Of course, the book may contain more - but I have not read it). Dahn 23:31, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

According to this PDF file[2] written by a non-partisan source, the claims about Ukrainians as "de-Romanianized Romanians" and Ukrainian schools being repressed are right. So, yes, keep them in the text.

And it was kept. greier 13:07, 22 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)

The text on this article says: "While Romania included large national minorities, the 1923 Constitution declared the country to be a nation-state." This is non-sensical: the number of minorities and percentage of each minority is irrelevant to a country defining itself as a nation-state - inside Austria-Hungary, Hungary itself was definable as a nation-state, and it had much more cultures to ignore. A nation-state is an antiquated concept, according to many people out there, but it is by no means a repressive regime in itself. Basically, it implies that there is a single culture which identifies with citizenship; if the state legitimating itself as such goes into the private business of its citizens beyond that phase, it is a whole different matter, and one not present as a rule in nation-states. In fact, the abuse minorities were subject to in Romania could be said to have been brought about despite the fact that Romania was a nation state. Let me explain myself: if a state indicates that its citizenship identifies with the semblance of Romanian culture (the "outer" patrimony: knowledge of Romanian and Romanian as the language of culture in fields maintained by the state), then the fact that minorities are embraced by this was the predilect cause of distress with Romanian xenophobes (an outrage brought by the fact that a person was not completely excluded, and not by the fact that a person was allowed to integrate). Nae Ionescu made history as a Romanian fascist by claiming that "a Jew could always be a good Romanian, but he will never be a Romanian"[3][4]. He thus indicated his absurd questioning of the nation-state on the French model, given that the latter had allowed for Jews (and others) to pass through all the inclusive requirements (which did not question their religion, the language they spoke at home and to each other, nor, with the Ukrainian exception, communal rights), and maintaining, despite the fact that, legally, all citizens of Romania were Romanians in the most neutral of senses, there would have been an "inner-Romanianness" which should have been reflected by laws (sadly, this "necessary distinction" was passed into law in 1940, and could be said to be present in some Romanian laws today - ineffectualy, as they contradict laws that allow for local proceedings in minority languages and teaching in those languages). So, you see, the "nation-state issue" is of little relevance to the topic. Dahn 01:06, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

the table

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)

Yes, I can agree with that. Per the above talk. Dahn 13:24, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Dispute

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)

At the end of WWI, Transylvania, at the time a territory of the Austro-Hungarian empire, was occupied by the Romanian army, then the Romanian National Council (representing a majority of the population), and representatives of the Germans took the decision of unifying the province with Romania. - the Council predated occupation, and most Hungarian politician ignored it and its decision. In fact, the Romanian monarchy disposed of the Council altogether, after an effective coup d'etat against the Vaida-Voevod gvt. in Bucharest. Members of the Council also demanded full rights for other ethnic groups, as well as decentralization.

The decision was contested by the Hungarian minority. - En masse? Each and every one? For ever? What about the existence of ethnic Hungarian parties after 1920?

While Romania included large national minorities, the 1923 Constitution declared the country to be a nation-state - I have replied above why this is of little or no relevance (the creation of countless other nation-states did not bring any kind of -zation, and the principle itself does not call for a -zation). Also, this would indicate a drive towards centralism (as criticized by many Romanians themselves), not towards ethnocentrism.

The text NEEDS to clarify by period (for example, Ceausescu's policies are included just below those of inter-war Romania, as if the Romanian state was somehow following a textbook throughout its history).

populated by both nations for hundred of years are not designated by clear natural divides - without following nationalist rhetoric, that statement is wishful thinking, as is Austro-Hungary [...] pursued a somehow balanced ethnic policies in Bukovina (I think it is common knowledge that the Austrians had this habit of colonising regions)

In 1918, following the collapse of the Austria-Hungary and Russian empires the control over the entire Bukovina fell under the Kingdom of Romania - yes, through a vote similar to that in Transylvania (but even less questionable)

which was changed from Franz-Josefs Universitat to Universitatea Regele Carol I - And? What is this even supposed to mean? Dahn 00:49, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

"It means exactly the confiscation of cultural property as part of assimilation, like the closing of the Hungarian (Franz Josef) University and the confiscation of the Hungarian National Theatre in Kolozsvár. Árpád 04:13, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

If you have references about the Cluj episode, it belongs in the text to illustrate this aspect. However, the reference to the one in Cernauti is absurd: the university was by no means "Ukrainian", as should be implied by the usage of the name "Franz Josef". No confiscation there, just statism. Dahn 19:24, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Ukrainian section

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)

Yes we can, since I have already questioned the respective info and was not contradicted in all these months. I am currently involved in way to musch to be giving attention to something as complex. Note that there is no policy preventing me from keeping those tags for years on end whren nothing is being done to the article. Dahn 19:36, 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)

There are only two referenced statements in the Ukrainian section. One of them looks like sophistry (why was a university in Austrian Bukovina "more Ukrainian" than it was in Romanian Bukovina? why does it matter if the name was changed? how many people in all enrolled after the war for the percentage to really matter - more, less, the same?), and so does the rest of the section (how much of the table is accurate if we consider the loss of Bukovina?). This would imply that the facts are not, in fact, true. Questions need answers, and providing just any sort of references is not a good approach (there is some pure POV in those sources). I have no interest in losing relevant information, but, currently, the article is largely irrelevant. I would, for instance like to point out to Ukrainians that they missed a big spot: what about Antonescu's policies towards the Ukrainians, dudes? When I'll have a go at the article, I may actually both remove absurdities and expand both sections with relevant stuff. Until then, I cannot vouch for almost anything in the current text. Dahn 21:23, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh, btw. We know that Romania chose not to recognize Ukrainians as an ethnicity, right? So, pray tell, how can the source tell how many Ukrainians enrolled in the university? Dahn 21:26, 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)

Well, I think that is universally known that the policies of the Austrian Empire in Bukovina included colonization. I mistrust Romanian sources when they say that this was a sustained and prolonged policy, but I have to say that the mention of "somehow ballanced" ethnic policies in Bukovina serves no purpose in hell. Dahn 21:35, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

We also need to rephrase the first sentences of the Ukrainian section. The very perspective is POV (not necessarily related to the issue, but belonging to a certain view of history, strongly influenced by a nationalist discourse). There is a more neutral and scientific way than "ethnic territories". Dahn 21:39, 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)

Well, most of the Ukrainian scholarship writes rather highly of the Austrian policies, that much I can tell. An example, while publications in Ukrainian were prohibited in the territory of the Russian Empire, it was in the Austria controlled Galicia and Bukovina where they where published and smuggled to Ukraine. --Irpen 21:42, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

That may well be, but it has no value here (in fact, the friendship may even encourage one to think that the Austrians were favourable to "Ruthenians"). Dahn 21:44, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

If this is what Romanian sources claim, we can replace "balanced" by "pro-Ukrainian". Is that so?

I changed the "Ethnic territories" phrase per your request. Is the overall section still viewed as so flatly imbalanced that the global tag is required? --Irpen 21:44, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

May we remove the top one and keep the other two? As I have said, some info needs to be placed in context and have its more problematic aspects checked. And we can both agree that this article needs cleanup: the grammar is atrocious, and the style is puerile at times. Dahn 21:49, 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)

What I meant was: keep the two tags that are not the "totally disputed" one (what I have since done myself); I note that you had removed the cleanup tag last time around. If we do not know how the sources counted students in Romania,and if they insist on not telling us what the overall number of students was,the info needs to be, as the tags say, verified. Beside your Ukrainian academic source on the failure torecognize Ukrainians, I have several Romanian sources saying that this was the case; however, those sources do not back claims about number of students, and I have given a reason about why the info should be questioned (how come they were able to count them?) - do academic sources in Ukraine go into such detail? if they do, those are the sources we need, not various flyers (same reason I would not reference Nistor or Corneliu Vadim Tudor in this article). Dahn 22:06, 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)

The facts are that with the overall university enrollment doubled, the number of the Ukrainian students (even in absolube terms) went down. Combine this with the dismissal of the Ukrainian faculty and the overall university policy being led by such person as Ion Nistru. I think it is relevant. --Irpen 23:28, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

What does that have to with ethnic assimilation, Irpen? Dahn 23:34, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

It has to do with cultural suppression. --Irpen 23:48, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Let's not mix apples and oranges. We have already agreed that Romania would not recognize cultural rights for Ukrainians, which also, as a sidenote, counts as cultural suppresion. The topic of this article is and can only be ethnic assimilation. The inclusion of this information, in this context, is unprofessional - and it was done on the basis of a questionable deduction (whoever did it assumed that it meant to say something). We have had this argument about the notorious Romanian policies toward Jews: we have agreed that persecution is not assimilation, and that it may be the exact contrary. It is factual that Ukrainians were supposed to be turned into Romanians; thus, it would make sense to keep only the info about the disestablishment of the Ukranian departament (although it appears to be self-evident in context). It is not factual that Ukrainians mistreated, and, even if they were, it would not be material for this particular article. Dahn 00:00, 12 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 repeat: keep mention of the department's disestablishment, as self-evident as it is. But questions of enrollment, especially when obscured providing percentages without numbers, and especially when it is not established how the source counted (when it is obvious that counting would have been difficult to say the least), have no business in the article. If we are to include all supposed ill-treatments, this article would become utterly trivial and self-contradictory. Dahn 00:22, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

I replaced the pecentage with the numbers as per source. --Irpen 00:32, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

But that is still irrelevant. We do not know the cause, and we do not know how they were counted. The issue adds nothing to the debate. It adds nothing to this article, as it appears to have no proven connection with the topic; it belongs on a page about the University (and something tells me it is included there), and belongs on an article about Ukrainians in Romania. Here, it is just an overkill attempt to gather points for a debatable argument (whereas the main, intended and relevant point is already backed by evidence). Dahn 00:46, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Example of Romanianization: preventing Ukrainians from attending a university were teaching is in Ukrainian. But, if teaching in Ukrainian is forbidden, why would the Romanian state prevent Ukrainains from taking steps to become less and less Ukrainian? The number may have in fact dropped because less people wanted to attend a university where Ukrainian was not taught - which would make it an effect of an effect of Romanianization; however, even that would be a suppostion (and would rely on the assumption that a certain number of Ukrainians was supposed to attend the University). Can you see my point? Dahn 00:52, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

I must insist on the table at the bottom. The first two colums should perhaps be kept (although, again, I cannot understand how they were counted), but the other are just a spin - can readers really fathom how much of the Ukrainian community lived in N. Bukovina, Bessarabia, Hertza, and the Bujak? Am I right in saying that 90% of Romanian Ukrainians became Soviet citizens in 1940? Dahn 00:46, 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

Your point could do without the rhetoric, but fine, I guess the debate not that important after all. Dahn 01:56, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

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)

I strongly disagree with keeping the 1990s data. It certainly does not illustrate "dynamic assimilation" (it is about the same as the populational decrease overall), and it is highly problematic and, I'm afraid, insulting for a text to indicate that Romania is still enforcing assimilation. Dahn 01:56, 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)

1. even for natural assimilation, the numbers would be inconclusive; 2. this article is not about natural assimilation. Therefore, I must request again that the post 1940 data be removed from an article where it does not in fact belong. Dahn 02:29, 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

Not realy relevant, since we agree on other topics, but I feel compelled to answer: not tying this article strictly to enforced poicies would make it, to my knowledge, unique among "-zation" articles and would lead to a vague and immense quasi-paradox.

If those charges are made by actual organizations and/or publications,by all means. I know of similar complaints from other communities, and will hopefully add them to the article as well. As it is, Irpen, no mention is made of the undercounting in the article, and, as you seem to indicate yourself, comparing allegations to a regime that did not recognize Ukrainians on principle is unfair. In either situation, the post-1940 census data is of no importance: you have to assume either that the "undercounters" slept on the job (93% of previous compared with the 95% of previous on a national level is squat) or (and this is what I interpret the charge of undercounting to mean) the 1992 and 2002 results each mean less than an allegedly true number. Dahn 03:12, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

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)

Well, Romanians in general think that - I do not know if the agreement extends far beyond that. Even so, the alleged Romanian-to-Slav move preceeded Romani's existence (not to mention romanian policies); if Romania aimed at deconstructing the Hutsul identity it was dealing with, the respective policy would have as much fundament as Hans Frank's plan to re-Germanize the Poles he thought were in fact Germans (although not speaking German, although not wanting to be perceived as Germans, although not especially valuing Germany or wanting to be part of it... they were German; Frank may have even been right that their ancestors were "pure Germans", but that was arguably of no importance). Dahn 12:18, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Point taken, but what I was getting at was that since the Romanian government saw Ukrainians on its territory as "citizens of Romania who forgot their native language", this view might plausibly be correct with regard to the Hutsuls, but be quite false when speaking of other Ukrainians. Biruitorul 23:30, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Well,the main argument I introduced was that the census was and always is meant to record how the persons interviewed view themselves, not how some theory says they should be registered as (an attitude which I see as univerally applicable, but you are free to disagree). Presumably, mention is being made of the policy only because it harmed the interests of people who declared themselves x and were recorded as y. The Romanian government was neither right or well-meaning when it began turning xs into ys. Dahn 01:54, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

This opens up all sorts of topics, which I'll only get into briefly. As I see it, censuses are necessarily imprecise for a few reasons:

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)

Biru, many of those points are good objections, and some are debatable. Note, however, that none have to with the topic at hand. What Romanian authorities apparently did was to ask people what nationality they were. They would then hear them say "Ukrainians" (or "Ruthenians" - which they could've just as well recorded separeately and let the Ukrainian community deal with the anachronism, just as Romanians in N. Bukovina have to deal with the issue of Moldovans in N. Bukovina). They would subsequently proceed either to write down "Romanian" or to stike out recorded data.

I personally cannot agree that they were right even about the Hutsuls (just as I do not think they are right about recording those "Dacians" as "Romanians" - if those idiots feel they're that, they should be recorded as what they feel). I cannot accept ethnic nationalist princuiples as a workable thesis. And, even if I were to: in the case of the Hutsuls, it takes quite a strech to apply "definite Romanianness" to a group of people based on some customs (which may yet be common to shepherds in general) and a couple of words in what is a Slavic dialect. Now, it is very likely that most of those people viewed themselves as Hutsuls (a branch of Ukrainianness) or as Hutsuls (something apart), rather than as Ukrainians or undeclared (why would that not be a valid option?) or Christians or Romanians (and I cannot possibly believe that there was a significant number of Hutsuls choosing the latter identity under any circumstance). I am to assume,nevertheless,that even the definition they preferred or had in mind was perverted by the Romanian census, just as the Ukranian identity was in general. Dahn 12:54, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough–as I've noted, if indeed there was recording of self-declared Ukrainians and Hutsuls as Romanians, and I'm sure there was some, then that should not have happened. Biruitorul 02:24, 14 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

I never meant to imply anything good or bad about Ukrainian authorities, and I cannot see how you possibly thought I would. My point was strictly that an identity that claims to be "carved in stone" risks attacking the view people take of themselves. I was merely stating that Ro authorities and authorities in general have, on principle, no right to be imposing a definition - and have the duty to record any self-definition. Which is precisely why I had used the Ukrainian parallel, where people appear to be counted as what they say (as they are, in general, in Romania); I was supposing that it was possible for Hutsuls in 1930 Romania not to declare themselves "Ukrainians", but rather "Hutsuls" et al, and that the ambiguity needs not be "mended" either way and by anybody outside of scholarly debates (please note that I am not saying Hutsuls are not Ukrainians).

In fact, on another talk page I snapped at the people who keep assuming that, despite self-definition, Moldovans are not a distinct group. To be fair and consistent, the people expressing the view that they are Moldovans do so in order to be considered distinct - as the political and cultural choice that ethnicity always is. Any idiot can see that the language they speak is one and the same, and claiming difference does not allow one to play around with logic. However, not only is language not "a prerequisite" for a separate identity, but it takes a whole lot of sophistry to assume that all speakers of the same language are one and the same including those who manifestly do not want to be one and the same. So, you see, we do not disagree here. Dahn 03:23, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

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)

There are to possibilities: scholars who use "Rumanianization" together with the term "Rumanian" - whereas it was already agreed that the entire lexical family of the word will be spelled with an "o" on wikipedia (so the rule should be applied in this instance, and should be applied consistently throughout the article); scholars who use "Rumanianization" together with the term "Romanian" - who need to begin explaining why they ever though that was a good idea before even being taken into account. Dahn 03:23, 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)

Last Britannica and last Subtelny surely do. Both available online, one in britannica.com and the other in Google books. --Irpen 06:35, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that most of Britannica is recent writing. There are lots of articles which were not updated in decades. You can tell that by the population figures of cities such as "Pop. (1971 est.)". :-) bogdan 07:54, 17 October 2006 (UTC)