Ruth Leiserowitz:
(The Unknown Neighbors. Minorities in Eastern Europe)
During the decades of the Eastern Bloc, national minorities, save for a few exceptions, were viewed as being backwards and outdated. The ethnical and cultural identities of the citizens were to be brought in alignment to the benefit of a total socialist profile. In this way, the various ethnicities were even unknown to the general public in their own countries. During the political upheaval in Eastern Europe between 1989–1991, numerous ethnic minorities in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and Slovenia fought for more rights and tried to rid themselves of the "disturbing factor" image, as they were seen by the various homogeneous societies. In the 1990s, the implemented process of the fifth and sixth EU expansion provided good conditions for the continuing demands of the ethnic minorities, their languages, and their cultures. The book was written with the goal of providing an overview of the story of the minorities in Eastern Central Europe in the 19th/21st centuries, whereby the book primarily focuses on the last 20 years.
The anthology consists of reports from journalists or former lecturers of the Robert Bosch Stiftung: Vivi Bentin portrayed a Polish family in Lithuania and Ulrike Butmaloiu visited Belarusians in Poland. Laura Căpăţână Juller researched a Jewish family story in Romania and Alexandra Frank embarked on a journey to the Seto people in Estonia. Blahoslav Hruška spoke with an old German lumberjack in the Czech Republic and Zuzana Kleknerová depicted life for the Romani people in Slovakia. Diljana Lambreva documented the story of a Turkish family in Bulgaria and Melanie Longerich was a guest of the Sorbs in Germany. Nikola Richter wrote about Germans in Hungary, Roland Stork interviewed Russians in Latvia, and Veronika Wengert was a guest of a Croatian couple in Slovenia. These colorful reports, which provide a glimpse into each ethnical situation from multi-generational perspectives, are respectively supplemented by a documentary part about the minorities in the new EU states. Aside from data about the ethnical politics, there are short histories about the various ethnicities, governmental data, statistical data, as well as information from each interest group and representatives in the native language.
Die unbekannten Nachbarn. Minderheiten in Osteuropa
Christoph Links Verlag (Publisher) 2008
288 pp. Softbound.
ISBN-10: 3861534924
ISBN-13: 978-3861534921
€19.90
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(Photo: Laura Căpăţână Juller)