About the national language of Moldova Cover Image

Dėl Moldovos nacionalinės kalbos
About the national language of Moldova

Author(s): Ala Sainenco, Vidas Kavaliauskas
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies
Published by: Vytauto Didžiojo Universitetas
Keywords: Romanian language; the Moldovan dialect of Romanian; national self-identification; political and historical factors.

Summary/Abstract: The present article examines the issue of the national language in the Republic of Moldova. The presentation of the linguistic problem is preceded by a brief description of the ethnogenesis of the Romanian nation and language formed in the V-VI centuries AD on the territory of ancient Dacia. Later, three Romanian principalities, unified for the first time in 1600, were formed on this territory. The second unification of Romanian principalities occurred in 1856. The events that took place in the 19th century (the Russian-Turkish wars) and particularly those from the 20th century (the October revolution, the Ribentrop-Molotov Pact, World War II, the Soviet aggression, the Soviet communist regime) led to the disintegration of the territorial unity of these three principalities where Romanian people lived. Part of Romania was annexed to the Soviet Empire and the Soviet Socialist Republic of Moldova was created on this territory. In the Republic of Moldova, the intense denationalization policy promoted throughout the USSR was focused on proving the existence of two distinct nations: the Romanians, who lived in Romania and Bucovina and the Moldovans, who lived in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Moldova. It also aimed at proving the existence of two different languages – Romanian, spoken by Romanians, and Moldavian, spoken by Moldovan people. Thus a new language that used the Cyrillic alphabet was artificially created. After Moldova gained its independence the Latin alphabet was reintroduced and the language spoken on this territory got its correct name – Romanian. At present, the Republic of Moldova, oriented towards European integration, undergoes a strong process of recognizing the ethnic and linguistic identity of the Romanians who live in Romania and of those who live in the Republic of Moldova. The syllabus at all levels includes the following subjects: the Romanian language, Romanian literature, History of Romanians.

  • Issue Year: 13/2011
  • Issue No: 3
  • Page Range: 19-24
  • Page Count: 6
  • Language: Lithuanian