Blog Post 1
The National Self
National identity is a concept that refers to a group of people who share the same beliefs, language, political system, and culture that allows them to be an undivided community. National identity has been explained in numerous ways throughout history, incorporating the various aspects by which nations define themselves. Anthony Smith defines it as “A named population sharing an historic territory, common myths and historical memories, a mass, public culture, a common economy and common legal rights and duties for all members,”(Triandafyllidou, 1998, p.595).
Moldova has had a long, complicated history, torn between who has had control over its territory. For most of this time Moldova has been under the control of Russia or Romania. In 1891 the region of Moldova was a part of Romania until it was taken over by Russia during the Ottoman Empire. It stayed under the control of Russia until World War I where it was taken under the control of Romania again. After World War II, Russia took over this region again, making Moldova into Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic. It was not until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 that Moldova declared independence. As a result, Moldova has struggled with its own national identity (Buckmaster, n.d.).
When looking at Moldova, it is complicated to explain its national identity. While most countries have a distinct language or religion separate from their neighbors, Moldova does not. Although its official language is Moldovan, many still speak Romanian. The issue of language has been a long and difficult battle for those in Moldova. One example of this is when Moldova switched to using the Cyrillic alphabet from the Latin alphabet to separate themselves from Romania during the Stalin Era. In 1989 they changed the alphabet back to Latin, and Romanian became the state language (Chinn, 1994, p.310). For those Moldovans who already spoke Russian or Romanian, they feared having to learn multiple languages. Nationalists living in Moldova wanted to have a unique identity from Romania and insisted for Moldovan to be the official language. At this point, those speaking either Romanian or Moldovan did not have a problem due to the languages being so similar.
This battle between what language to speak in Moldova is one of its defining characteristics to it’s national identity. Even with the influence from both Russian and Romanian control, the people of Moldova pushed for Moldovan to be the official language to be different from their “others.” As Anatol Ciobanu put it “Something is not all right in our country if the language of the minority Russian ethnic community is elevated to the language for interethnic communication” (Baar, 2017, p.23).
The idea of an “other” is based on the theory that national identity is influenced by those around a nation that pose as a threat to their own identity. There are two types of “others,” external and internal (Triandafyllidou, 1998). An “other” can be a small nation inside of a country, another country surrounding, or even as small as an immigrant community. Moldova has two internal “others” Transnistria and Gagauzia, and two external “other” Romania and Russia. One of Moldova’s “others” is the Russian influence that has been within their culture for a long time. Although a small percentage of people living in Moldova still speak or identify as Russian, many want to be differentiated from this influence. A region within Moldova is the small enclave of Transnistria. Transnistria is a small region that is within Moldova and between Ukraine. They still mainly speak in Russian and Romanian and use the Cyrillic alphabet (Chinn, 1994, p.312). Those who live in Transnistria are often the only ones who say that Romanian and Moldovan are different languages. The state of Transnistria declared independence in 1990 but is not recognized as its own nation by many other countries in Europe. According to Deutsche Welle, only three other places recognize Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Nagorno-Karabakh (Tomes, 2017). Transnistria has its own currency, military, and many other aspects that make up a national identity. Transnistria is a threat to Moldova due to the fact that they still want to speak the Russian language and people often describe them as being stuck in the time of the USSR (Reid, 2020).
In the research, Romania can be considered as an “other” to Moldova due to the fact Moldova wanted to separate itself from Romania. However, it is easy to see that Romania has heavily influenced Moldova. We see this not only in the language, the religion, but also looking at Moldova's flag. It features the same colors as the flag of Romania, vertical stripes of blue, yellow, and red. The flag does bring in the identity of Moldova with its coat of arms featured in the center. We can learn a little about what makes up the identity of Moldova by looking at the coat of arms. An eagle is seen holding an Orthodox cross in its mouth, thus symbolizing the national religion. In its claws it holds an Orthodox scepter and an olive branch. The olive branch is shown to symbolize peace. In the middle of the eagle an aurochs, the nation's national symbol (presednite, n.d.).
When Moldova declared independence, there was a divide between its people. Many still supported “Romanianism” while others supported “Moldovanism.” Romania often regards Moldova as being the same since they were previously apart of Romanian territory. “Romanianists regard Moldovan and Romanian identities as being complementary. On the contrary, Moldovanists regard the two identities as being competitive” (Baar, 2017, p.26). This mindset of Romania is what poses as a threat to Moldova’s independence and identity.
Gagauzia is an autonomous region also within Moldova. This region declared independence from Moldova after they left the USSR in 1991. Like Transnistria, Gagauzia is a pro-Russian region and has ties with Moscow. Turkey has also influenced this small region, where a language similar to Turkish is spoken. Gagauzia feared that Moldova would merge with Romania, and they would lose their ties with Russia. Gagauzia sees Russia as a protector from Romania (Calus, 2014). Gagauzia poses a threat to Moldova with many of its people being pro-Russian and fearing that Moldova will rejoin Romania.
Moldova is a unique community where language, religion, and territory are the major components that make up their national identity. Language is one of the most important defining features of Moldova due to their persistence on separating their identity from Romania. Because of Moldova's previous status as being a part of Russian and Romanian territory, those countries have influenced Moldova's national identity.
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References
Baar, V., & Jakubek, D. (2017). Divided national Identity in Moldova. Journal of Nationalism, Memory & Language Politics, 11(1), 58-92. https://web.s.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer? vid=1&sid=7fc4a52b-cd5b-4d37-a2ab-451c93466442%40redis
Buckmaster, B. (n.d.). Moldova. In Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved January 23, 2022,
Całus, K. (2014). Gagauzia: Growing separatism in Moldova. OSW Commentary, 129, 1-10.
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Chinn, J. (1994). The politics of language in Moldova. Demokratizatsiya, 2(2), 309-315.
Reid, T. (February 6, 2020). Celebrating a nation that doesn’t exist. BBC. https://www.bbc.com/travel article/20200205-celebrating-a-nation-that-doesnt-exist
The state flag of the Republic of Moldova. (n.d.). Presidency of the Republic of Moldova.
https://www.presedinte.md/eng/
Triandafyllidou, A. (1998). National identity and the “Other.” Ethnic and Racial Studies, 21(4), 593–612. https://doi.org/10.1080/014198798329784
Tomes, J. (October 15, 2017). Transnistria — not on the international community's map. DW.
https://www.dw.com/en/transnistria-not-on-the-international-communitys-map/a-40937845
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