Ewa Krasinska - Ryszard Kantor: Derenk és Istvánmajor (Borsodi Kismonográfiák 31. Miskolc, 1988)

SUMMARY The etnographical investigations into the ethnically Polish community in the village Istvánmajor in Hungary were conducted in the years 1977-1980 by the research workers of the Chair of Ethnography of the Slavonic Peoples at the Jagiellonian University in co-operation with Polonia Research Institute at Jagiellonian University (Instytut Badart Polonijnych) in Cracow and the Department of Polonia Studies at Polish Academy of Science (Zakiad Badart nad Polonia Zagraniczna PAN) in Poznart. The data found in the ethnographic and historical literature as well as the information obtained from Hungarian ethnographers indicated the existence, until the year 1941, of a village Derenk situated north of Miskolc in the valley of the Bodva River, which vas inhabited by people of presumably Polish origin. The inclusion of the village ground to an enclosed hunting area was the immediate cause of displacing the inhabitants of Derenk to other localities. About sixty families from Derenk settled down at that time in the village Istvánmajor near Bnőd situated southwards of Miskolc. It was stated during the investigations that the majority of the inhabitants of Istvánmajor have the awareness of the Polish origin and the sense of separateness from the Hungarian surrounding and, moreover, they often refer to the language they use to communicate with one another as the Polish language. The description of the culture presented in this book is a reconstruction of its chosen sections until the moment of displacing the villagers of Derenk. This material was supplemented by the most important information concerning the changes which took place after settling down in Istvánmajor in two clearly marked periods of time: 1941 to 1961 - the period of individual usage of the land, and 1961 to 1980 - the period of collectivized economy. The collected material has also brought the answers to the following questions: 1. to what degree the inhabitants of Istvánmajor still have the awareness of the Polish origin and what factors contributed to the durability of their sense of separateness from the Hungarian surrounding; 2. how the inhabitants refer to their language and what is the degree of their command of it. 139