Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1976 (4. évfolyam, 9-12. szám)
1976 / 10. szám
selected. The harder material should be introduced only after the simpler forms have been mastered, thus giving the child security and a sense of accomplishment. Handicapped children benefit from the hand signals used as an aid to rote learning. The observable results of the Kodály method have been an enjoyment of music and folk dancing by children and young adults. Wanda Latham is Director of Music Theraphy at the U. of Missouri. □ The Canadian-American Review of Hungarian Studies II (Spring 1975) contains four articles in addition to book reviews and review of reviews. L.S. Domonkos (Youngstown State U.) has an article on The State of Education on the Eve of the Battle of Mohács (1526) which emphasizes that even during the turbulent years following the death of Matthias Corvinus, intellectual life continued to flourish. Though none of the three universities were able to remain open, Hungarian students attended the universities of Bologna, Paris, Prague, Cracow and Vienna in large numbers and brought back scholarship and often the scholars themselves. The cathedral and chantry schools, as well as the school of the Dominican and Franciscan orders, supplied very high quality education below the university level, and seemed to encourage the use of the vernacular. The town schools (at least 37) extended education to the sons of the merchants and traders, though these were no more restricted in whom they admitted than the clerical schools. Their role in the Reformation was significant, especially as they were able to attract scholars of considerable European reputation as schoolmasters. At least 150 village primary schools were in existence - though these are the hardest to document. Travel Reports of Hungarian Settlements in Canada,(1905- 1928). by Paul Body summarizes some of the comments of the Rev. Peter A. Vay, Ferenc Hoffman, and Ödön Paizs on Hungarian immigration in Canada. Vay found the settlements in Western Canada to be successful pioneer communities, but the conditions of the miners and construction workers were often poor. Hoffman, professor at the Agricultural Academy of Kassa, studied chiefly the homesteaders in Western Canada who were welcomed by the government for their expertise: they showed great love of the land and their practice of surveying the homestead for soil condition, topography, wind factors and other effects on tempering the frosts impressed the Canadians who often asked them to guide other new colonists. The journalist Paizs gave a report on urban immigrants in Eastern Canada. Some 1,500 lived there in 1928, but many of them were transients rather than colonists. Still, they had lively social and cultural organizations, in fact, Canadian officials remarked even of the settlers that they cling to their language and customs more than the Germans or the Slavs. □ Gabor Vermes (Rutgers U.) examines the role of the Hungarian Prime Minister at the time of the outbreak of World War I in Count István Tisza and the Preservation of the Old Order. A review of the situation in Hungary after twenty years of co-existence with Austria in the dual monarchy allows the reader to understand that Tisza was one of the few statesmen in the empire who saw the dangers inherent in the increasing domestic instability of Austria as well as the still unresolved nationality question. He was, of course, also the only ARTICLES (Continued) statesman to oppose war on the pretext of the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand, outlining the disastrous consequences in two memoranda to Franz Joseph. The key to his change of heart, Vermes suggests, was his realization that without German support Austria-Hungary could not survive against Russia’s imperialistic ambitions, as well as (possibly) emotional devotion to the idealized image of Hungary and her role in civilization. During the war Tisza was outraged over the treatment of minorities and, though disdainful of Austria, never shirked responsibility to the Allied cause. With the Germans, however, he was less able to exert influence even though constantly aware of the dangerous expansionist policies of the Reich. His opposition to a coalition government and to greater democratization, though perplexing to a later generation, stemmed from his deep conviction that both of these would lead to national disaster. Horthy, Hitler and the Hungary of 1944 traces the efforts of Horthy to defect from the German camp. What emerges most clearly from the detailed study of Peter Gosztony (Bern, Switzerland) is that Horthy did all he could both to curb Hitler’s desire to dictate at all levels of Hungarian life and to resist his inhuman treatment of the Jews. He resisted implementing any measures beyond the limits of decency, and when deportations were begun after the German occupation, he had them stopped upon learning that these people were not taken to work camps but to extermination centers. Still, even at the very end, when he saw the need to deal with the Soviet Union if Hungary were to get out of the war (all attempts to establish contact with the Western powers having failed), he attempted to observe the rules of civilized behavior: he refused to stab an ally in the back with the result that Hitler was aware of all of his plans in advance and could abort the coup of October 15, 1944. □ Degh, Linda and Andrew Vazsonyi, “The Hypothesis of Multi- Conduit Transmission in Folklore.” In Dan Ben-Amos and Kenneths. Goldstein, PERFORMANCE AND COMMUNICATION. The Hague: Mouton, 1975. 308 pages, $37.00. (Approaches to Semiotics series, no. 40.) Degh and Vazsonyi argue that the forms of oral transmission are as diverse as are people, and are subject to cultural, psychological, and environmental (milieu) factors. They say that different types of folklore messages (tale, legend, joke, proverb, riddle, etc.) are channeled through different conduits the combination of which creates a matrix of conduits, which seems to be of major importance in the better understanding of oral communication systems. The chapter is based to a large extent on Hungarian example and experiments conducted or data compiled by the authors during their field research in Hungary and in the steel cities of Northewest Indiana. Reprints of the article may be obtained from Dr. Degh, Folklore Institute, Indiana U., Bloomington, IN 47401. □ Gal, Susan. “Peasant Men Can’t Get Wives: Changing Sex Roles and Language Usage in a European Community.” Paper, presented at the 74th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, San Francisco, Calif. December 1975. Based upon a year-long research project at Oberwart (Felsőőr) in Burgenland, Austria, Gal investigated bilingualism and language preference as they relate to such variables as sex, age, prestige, and occupation. She found (Continued on page 10) 8 NO. 10, 1976, HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER
