Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1977 (5. évfolyam, 13-15. szám)
1977 / 14. szám
RESEARCH IN PROGRESS mutual distrust. In 1913 and 1914, when the National Party tried to reach a modus vivendi with the Hungarian Government, the socialists attacked them bitterly. No less bitter were the attacks on “clericalism” directed at the churches. By the end of World War I, relations with the MSZDP were strained, and the Romanian section, together with the Romanian National Party was determined to press for autonomy. After the failure of talks with Oscar Jaszi, who stood firmly on the MSZDP’s desire to retain Hungary’s territorial integrity, the "60 delegates of the Romanian section added their votes to the overwhelming approval of union with Romania,” and accepted membership in the Consiliu Dirigent, and moved their headquarters to Sibiu. The author is Prof, of History at the U. of Illinois, Urbana. Bela Kapotsy presented a paper on “The Interrelatedness of Legal Abortion, Divorce, and Suicide in Hungary, 1956- 1974,” at the Third International Conference of the World Population Society, in December 1976. Dr. Kapotsy can be reached at 395 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10025. Robert Austerlitz’s, paper, “Associating Freely about Repetition in General or Repetitio Matrix Stúdiósa,” is translated from Hungarian and will be published in a collective work of like-minded papers. This philosophical-linguistic essay on the role of repetition has no specific Hungarian focus, but uses Hungarian examples to illustrate the hypotheses, thereby enlightens the reader on some Hungarian repetetive patterns. Its basic theme is “that everything is repetition but that pure repetition never occurs.” The author is Prof, of Linguistics and Uralic Studies at Columbia U. Maria Kresz, the noted Hungarian ethnographer did field work in the village of Nyárszó (Nearsove) in Transylvania, first in the 1940s and again in 1967-68, to observe the way of life of the Reformed Hungarian population. The village is composed of about 400 persons of whom two-third are Hungarian Reformed and one-third Romanian Uniate. She observed little outward change (girls still practice embroidery but not spinning). She reported her observations in the two papers reviewed below. Kresz, Maria, “The Community of Young People in a Transylvanian Village,” in Youth in a Changing World. Ed. Estelle Fuchs. Mouton, P.O. Box 482, The Hague 2076, The Netherlands, 1976, 207-212. The article deals mainly with Christmas customs, which center on a series of dances. The “judges” (a Hungarian and a Romanian lad) and the “inviters" (two Hungarian boys) are chosen a few weeks before the holidays. On Christmas Eve the young men go around to the houses of girls over 16. Invited in, they sing merry songs. Next day the “inviters” ask each girl to the dance held atthe village dance house. All who have been confirmed go to church and take communion, and after the service go dancing in front of the church. Some of the people still wear traditional clothes, but none of the young men did at the time of observation. Kresz, Maria, “Property Marks in a Village of Kalotaszeg,” Acta Ethnographica 24 (3-4) (1975) 414-430. Nyárszó (Nearsova) had preserved a unique ancient custom in its sytem of drawing lots for grazing land and marking the plots with “arrows” to identify the owner. Although ownership has passed from one family to another by inheritance or sale, the basic marks remained constant. Theirdistribution was so Willian M. Batkay (41 Montague Place, Montclair, NJ 07042) is working on Count István Bethlen’s coup d'etat, the circumstances which brought about his regime in 1921. Completion is planned for 1978. □ Alexander Fenton (Natl. Museum of Antiquities of Scotland, Queens Street, Edinburgh, Scotland) is working on papers involving Hungarian language and material culture. □ Bishop Joseph Ferencz (1055 Budapest, Nagy Ignácz utca 4) is researching and preparing a biography of Francis David, founder of Unitarianism. Completion is forseen for 1979. □ Scott Eddie (Dept, of Political Economy, U. of Toronto, Toronto, ONT M5S 1A1) is drafting the Austria-Hungary chapter for the forthcoming Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Vol. VIII, Social and Economic Policy. □ Nándor F. Dreisziger (Dept, of History, Royal Military College of Canada, Kingston, ONT K7L 2W3) is preparing two papers, one on "The Hungarian General Staff and Diplomacy, 1939- 41;" and one on "Watson Kirckconnell, a Friend of the Magyars." □ Edsel Walter Stroup (4117 West 214th Street, Fairview Park, OH 44325) is preparing a paper on "The Material Conditions of the Hungarian Peasantry to 1848." □ Zoltán M. Szaz (6811 Supreme Court, Springfield, VA 22150) is engaged in research on the Hungarian and German minorities of Romania, 1945-1976. □ András Boros-Kazai (Dept, of Uralic and Altaic Studies, Indiana U., Bloomington, IN 47401) is working on his doctoral dissertation on the 1900populist literature. Completion is planned for 1978. □ Mary Boros-Kazai (Dept, of Uralic and Altaic Studies, Indiana U., Bloomington, IN 47401) is also researching and writing her doctoral dissertation on Hungarian immigration to Southeast Ohio, 1880-1930. Completion projected for 1978. □ Elemer Bako (Library of Congress) is working on a detailed biography of Col. Michael Kovats. The volume will be based on extensive research done in Europe and the U.S., and on the collection of Edmund Vasvary. □ Stephen Török (11 West 4th Street, Oswego, NY 13126) is working on the history of Roman Catholic Hungarians in America. □ (Continued on page 6) regulated as to allow each proprietor some of the good land and some of the less fertile lots. The chairman conducting the drawing was a Romanian whenever the village judge was a Hungarian and vice versa. The sequence in which marks are enumerated reflects the prestige sequence of the houses in the village. The same rank order determines the sequence in which public works are undertaken, common chores discharged, or entertainment is provided. It also seems to determine the seating arrangement in the Reformed Church. The marks have common origin with secondary markings signifying changes. The whole system is extremely useful in understanding the social structure of the Hungarians and Székelys. Romanian families, settled in the early 18th century, adopted the system. NO. 14, 1977 HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER 5
