The fact that Serbo-Croatic and Romanian are spoken across borders and have their own national states, makes them true international languages with far more monolingual speakers, so clearly they would incredible useful for every Hungarian to learn, at least by the standards being set up here. Yet I don’t think most Hungarians will learn them, because learning those two language won’t be worth benefit versus the cost, at least not outside individual cases. Hungarian is in a catch-22 situation, the more the language are forced on the minorities of Transleithania, the more hostile they will at learning and using the language and the less it’s forced on them the less use the minorities need to learn and use it. German is in a another position, simply because it’s a bigger and more prestigious language. So everyone has a interest in learning it as L2 language, and for the minorities of Transleithania learning it can serve as a counter against Magyarization policies.
Demographics of a surviving Austria-Hungary?
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The fact that Serbo-Croatic and Romanian are spoken across borders and have their own national states, makes them true international languages with far more monolingual speakers, so clearly they would incredible useful for every Hungarian to learn, at least by the standards being set up here. Yet I don’t think most Hungarians will learn them, because learning those two language won’t be worth benefit versus the cost, at least not outside individual cases. Hungarian is in a catch-22 situation, the more the language are forced on the minorities of Transleithania, the more hostile they will at learning and using the language and the less it’s forced on them the less use the minorities need to learn and use it. German is in a another position, simply because it’s a bigger and more prestigious language. So everyone has a interest in learning it as L2 language, and for the minorities of Transleithania learning it can serve as a counter against Magyarization policies.
Is Serbo-croatic 1 language like how Macedonians are considered Bulgarians then?
"A well defined, distinct political unit"
Naturally, I was talking about the linguistic map not changing much compared to 1910, not OTL 2019.
Romanians and Hungarians lived extremely intermixedly in the Eastern parts of Hungary. From a day-to-day standpoint, it would be immensely more beneficial to learn to speak your neighbours' language, than to learn a language which albeit has slightly more speakers, isn't really beneficial to you at home. This goes for both the Hungarians and Romanians.
Otherwise, I'm not that sure about the "far more monolingual speakers" bit there. Without the drastic relative decline of Hungarian, I think the numbers would be close enough to not matter.
Why? What else would the Hungarians prefer to learn aside from German? As I said, in mixed communities, the benefits are obvious. To give Serbo-Croatian another good reason to be learned, it would be quite convinient to know the language of the area towhich a large chunk of the population goes vacationing.
That could be true, if there would be no benefit in learning Hungarian at all, and each linguistic group would live in a bubble. Afaik, that's not the case here.
Ah, I see. So that's where you're coming from. You don't expect people to learn a second foreign language, don't you? Given the very nature of the Danubian Monarchy, that seems unlikely to me to say the least.
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Serbo-Croatian is one language, albeit they use different writing systems. Both languages' official versions were developed from the same dialect, the (Western) Shtokavian.
What does Bulgarian have to do with this though?
Oh ok. I thought that at this point, Macedonians were considered the same ethnicity as Bulgarians, and that only changed recently.
Something that is likely to influence language shifts... Well, Berlin German and Vienna German aren't quite the same and Vienna might want to retain its own brand of German language and culture. Might Vienna actually encourage the non-German languages in the empire as part of maintaining cultural seperateness from Germany? And am I imagining the notion that this may have happened a little in OTL?
I imagine the point was that Bulgarian and Macedonian are part of the same language continuum as Serbian, Croatian and Slovenian. And to say that the Croats and Bosnians will be part of a single Serbo-Croat language on both sides of the border is... Well, it's as true to say that Bulgarians from Sofia and Belgrade Serbs were part of a single Serbo-Bulgarian language. It is over-simplifying what was a complex and contentious situation.
fasquardon
I imagine the point was that Bulgarian and Macedonian are part of the same language continuum as Serbian, Croatian and Slovenian. And to say that the Croats and Bosnians will be part of a single Serbo-Croat language on both sides of the border is... Well, it's as true to say that Bulgarians from Sofia and Belgrade Serbs were part of a single Serbo-Bulgarian language. It is over-simplifying what was a complex and contentious situation.
fasquardon
I am quite positive Slovenes and Slovaks will not get "national" regions within the two parts of the Empire named Slovenia and Slovakia but if they are given such autonomy be named after historic provinces. Slovaks getting Principality/Dutchy of Nitra as a constituent part of the Lands of the Crown of St. Stephen (LCSS) while Slovenes getting Carantania.
Both yes and no. A more detailed answer in the spoiler so we do not derail the topic
Croatian, Serbian, Serbo-Croatia, Croato-Serbia and South Slavic dialect continuum
This is not an easy subject to explain (from experience) properly, especially to people who live in countires or are part of populations which do not use language as one of, if not the most important signifier of their identity. Here I mostly think of people living in the Anglophone world, who also make the majority of this forum.
In additions there is a still ongoing lingusitic debate of what is a language and what is a dialect and I can't see that ending anytime soon so that coplicates matters further.
Officially Croatian and Serbian languages are separate languages because the institutions of Croatia and Serbia had declared it that way. It is the same thing with Slovenian, Bosnian (though sometimes Bosnian is divided into Bosniak, Croatian and Serbian subvariant when the later two are not counted as part of Croatian and Serbian), Montenegrin, Macedonian and Bulgarian.
The official languages are standard forms agreed on by lingusits and imposed by the government through education and administration and are almost unviersally not used as a living languages by the populations in named countries.
Stretching from the Alps to the Black Sea is a curious little thing called the South Slavic dialect continuum made out of numerous dialects and maybe a few languages.
As far as official Croatian and Serbian languages are concerned they are quite similar as far as grammar and vocabulary are concerned but the speaker of either will instantly know if his corespondent is usining the other language. The Croatian language is somewhat grammaticaly more complex and may at times sound more embelished or antiquated while the Serbian language is more simpler both to speak and to learn. That fact has scientificaly been recorded that 9/10 speakers of "Croatian" will start adopting "Serbian" way of speaking if put in a "Serbian" surounding while the opposite is only true for 3/10 of speakers of "Serbian". In a way the "Serbian" language is naturally more resilient that "Croatian" due to its slightly greater simplicity, in a similar way the super simple English language is easier to learn and use than say Hungarian. At the moment official Croatian and Serbian languages share between 70-75% of their vocabulary but the similarity that has been achieved as well as the more recent separation have been mostly artificial.
Prior to the codification of the official Croatian and Serbian languages in the 19th century there was a hodge-podge of dialects/languages/speaches(sp) spoken by south slavs identifing themselves as either Croats or Serbs (Further in text Croatian/Serbian language, will be used to denote the language of the state and Croat/Serb language will be used to denote what is spoken by Croats/Serbs). So any form spoken by a Croat was considered as Croat language and the same went for the Serbs.
To add to the confusion prior to the 19th century the name of the language spoken in these parts was variously called Slavic, Dalmatian, Croatian, Serbian, Bosnian, Slavonian or Illyric by both foreign and local lingusits and historians. It wasn't until 1824 when Grimm named the language Serbo-Croatian for the first time.
There are two pople most responsible for the "problem" we have today, Vuk Karadžić and Ljudevit Gaj. As far as I am concerned these two guys are both heroes and villians and I can't quite decide which they are more. They were the leaders of movements in creating the Croatian and Serbian languages from the various Croat and Serb speaches.
At the time people who identified themselves as Croats spoke 3 main dialects, 4 yat variations and were using 3 scripts while the Serbs spoke 1 main dialect, 1 transitional dialect, 4 yat variations and were using 3 scripts.
It is important to note that the main signifier of a dialect is what word is used as the "what" word.
Kajkavian > Kaj = What
Kaj = Kej = Ke = Kae = Ce (sub-dialects)
In addition Kajkavian is used exclusivly by Slovenes
Chakavian > Cha(Ća) = What
Ća = Ce = Će (sub-dialects)
Exclusivly used by Croats
Shtokavian > Shto(Što) = What
Štao = Šta = Šte = Šće (sub-dialects)
In addition Shtokavian in the forms of Što and Šta is used by Bosniaks and Serbs
Then you have 4 yat variations
Ekavians = yat is writen as "e" used by Cr/Sr/Bo/Sl
Ikavian = yat is writen as "i" used by Cr/Sr/Bo
Jekavian = yat is writen as "je" used by Sr/Bo/Sl
Ijekavian = yat writen as "ije" used by Cr/Sr/Mn
And the scripts used were Latin, Cyrilic(3 variations), Glagolitic and Arabic.
So to get back to the story.
Mr. Gaj was born in the region of Croatian Zagorje which is north of Zagreb in modern north-western Croatia. His birthplace is the town of Krapina, his parents were German immigrants (
On the other side we have Mr. Karadžić born in Loznica where the Štakavian-ekavian writen in Cyrillic was used but his parents originated from central and eastern Montenegro where a different form was spoken and sometimes writen. He started codifing the Serbian language based on the dialect spoken in eastern Herzegovina that was Štokavian-ijekavian writen in both Cyrillic and Latin script.
That to the whole picture comes the so called Illyrian movement that tried to politicaly, culturally and linguisticly unite the south slavs living in the Monarchy, Ottoman empire as well as principalities/kingdoms of Montenegro and Serbia. Though often being persecuded by the government in Vienna that same government saw them useful when they decided they wanted a single literary language for Croats and Sebs and maybe Slovenes for administrative purposes.
So in 1850 Slovene philologist Mikolšič initiated a meeting in Vienna between leading Illyrian and Serb lingusits. There they agreed to create a unitary language made from two bordering dialects the west and east Herzegovinian Štokavian-ijekavian dialects, the western form would be the basis of Croatian and eastern form would become the basis for Serbian standard language, imediatly puting the basis for a far greater similarity that existed on the groud among the people that spoke Croat and Serb language. And a new language was born, the Serbo-Croatian that had very little support in the situation on the ground.
Later in time during the first and second Yugoslavia there were movements to bring the two languages even closer together which resulted in opposition mainly from the Croats (though there was resistance on the Serbian side). Most of the Serbs speak a form of Shtokavian and it wasn't as difficult for them to adapt to the standard form on the other hand though Kajkavian and Chakavian Croats have accepted Shtokavian as the standard language form for the sake of Croat unity they were uncomfortable with further closenes between standard Croatian and Serbian because that meant accepting not only a dialect not of your own but also a language you considered foreign. Not to mention the political pandemonium that created further frictions. The Ustaše '41-45 language purism did more harm than good and the reversals just further faned the flames.
So to cut my wall of text short the standard Croatian, Serbian, Bosnian and Montenegrian I could on a purely linguistic basis call the same language, because they were made to be that. But I can't say that the Croat, Serb, Bosniak and Montenegrin language are one and the same, some spoken forms are very close to each other while others could be a world apart. In addition as far as south slavic dialect continuum is concerned the mutual intelligibility can't be used as a mesuring tool since we(as in speakers of one diealect or sub-dialect) understand words we do not use.
So I know the standard Croatian, I speak Kajkavian ekavian/ijekavian and Šćakavian-ikavian, but also know great many words used in other dialects/forms that I do not use in my speach.
As far as I am concerned the standard languages that were created in the 19th century are a form of culturocid for the purpose of birocratic efficiency that only causes resentment. As to the question what is a Serb or Croat language I say "whatever form any individual person uses that identifies himself as a Croat or Serb".
Angel Heart and I think Halagaz could better anwser about the situation in Serbia/BiH but in Croatia virtually no one uses the standard form outside certain parts of eastern Slavonia (it was heavy settled from western Herzegovina) and official document. So when a person goes to elementary school it can be quite a shock, almost like learning a foreign language. For the Shtokavians not so much, but for Kajkavians and Chakavians it is quite a stres and it has been observed for decades now that people in areas where Kajkavian and Chakavian are spoken have considerably worse grades in Croatian language than in Shtokavian areas.
I hope this was understandable
As far as demographics an languages go there is the remaining question of Dalmatia. Region with a Slavic majority and a Romance minority administered by Austria but being part of the Triune Kingdom of C-S-D and the LCSS.
Teaching kids 3 or 4 languages until they graduate at 18 isn't that hard.
You start with the 2 most spoken languages in the region during primary, then you have english and a third empire language during secondary, and another mandatory language during their stay in university later.
For example in Czechia that would mean Czech and German in primary, English and Hungarian in secondary. In Transylvania it would ne Hungarian and Romanian in primary school.
That means the AH school system would have a heavy focus on languages, and to not fall back in other studies the average school day would be longer than in other countries. A bit clumsy but it can be made to work and only steps on the toes of the smaller groups without large territorial homogenity, like Jews or Roma.
You start with the 2 most spoken languages in the region during primary, then you have english and a third empire language during secondary, and another mandatory language during their stay in university later.
For example in Czechia that would mean Czech and German in primary, English and Hungarian in secondary. In Transylvania it would ne Hungarian and Romanian in primary school.
That means the AH school system would have a heavy focus on languages, and to not fall back in other studies the average school day would be longer than in other countries. A bit clumsy but it can be made to work and only steps on the toes of the smaller groups without large territorial homogenity, like Jews or Roma.
I feel like they would have trouble learning all of those and people would hate it. Some might do it, but surely it would be difficult to remember all 3/4?
You will forget what you dont use. But for example the already mentioned situation in Transylvania and eastern hungary was that hungarians and rumanians lived incredibly intermixed. Knowing both languages would be a huge benefit to anyone living in those regions -also make it unlikely that they would forget it. And there are a lot of such areas (though not to this extent) in Austria-Hungary.
It’s not impossible to be taught several languages ,the question is the degree of skill of the children being taught after they have been taught. Czech children which would be taught Hungarian, would be unlikely to speak more than a few phrases in Hungarian. Language skill really depend on the language being practiced in daily life and how useful it in general is. And yes the Czech children would hate it and their parent would hate it too.
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Well yeah for a Czech it'd be more useful to learn Polish as their third language, that way they could say they were fluent in the three most spoken languages in Cisleithania.
To take a different line of enquiry on this topic, what are people's thoughts about the Jewish population of a surviving empire?
IOTL the Jews in Vienna reached 200,000 by around 1920. Meanwhile Budapest appears to have surpassed 200,000 by around 1900. If I'm not mistaken that would have made them the second and third largest Jewish communities in Europe, after Warsaw. After NYC, probably the third and forth largest in the world.
I feel Vienna has the economic and demographic momentum to develop a centrifugal pull for Ostjuden over the coming decades, and quite possibly from central and western Europe too. It was one of the largest and richest cities in the world in 1914 (IIRC the city proper was larger than Berlin), and ITTL will still be the financial capital of a rapidly industrialising hinterland. Further, the percentage of population as Jews in Vienna was only ever around 12%, compared to 25% in Budapest and 35% in places like Odessa and Warsaw. Given that urbanisation in the long run favours specialisation and skilled tradespeople, I think the Jews would come to comprise an even larger fraction of the city's population, given their high levels of education and skills.
The big unknowns of course are whether there is still a Mandatory Palestine, and how many choose aliyah if there is. Also many Jews may bypass this dichotomy and instead just head for the US.
It would be a fascinating thing, if Indeed greater Vienna got to 5M+, to explore the cultural and social dynamics of Europe's first city of a million Jews!
IOTL the Jews in Vienna reached 200,000 by around 1920. Meanwhile Budapest appears to have surpassed 200,000 by around 1900. If I'm not mistaken that would have made them the second and third largest Jewish communities in Europe, after Warsaw. After NYC, probably the third and forth largest in the world.
I feel Vienna has the economic and demographic momentum to develop a centrifugal pull for Ostjuden over the coming decades, and quite possibly from central and western Europe too. It was one of the largest and richest cities in the world in 1914 (IIRC the city proper was larger than Berlin), and ITTL will still be the financial capital of a rapidly industrialising hinterland. Further, the percentage of population as Jews in Vienna was only ever around 12%, compared to 25% in Budapest and 35% in places like Odessa and Warsaw. Given that urbanisation in the long run favours specialisation and skilled tradespeople, I think the Jews would come to comprise an even larger fraction of the city's population, given their high levels of education and skills.
The big unknowns of course are whether there is still a Mandatory Palestine, and how many choose aliyah if there is. Also many Jews may bypass this dichotomy and instead just head for the US.
It would be a fascinating thing, if Indeed greater Vienna got to 5M+, to explore the cultural and social dynamics of Europe's first city of a million Jews!
Ohhh. I hadn't thought of Jewish immigration to A-H. Almost certainly there'd be significant amounts, simply due to A-H's position and it having a reputation for tolerance. Quite how things go will depend on politics. When even the US went through periods of limiting Jewish immigration in this period, you can be sure that the possibility for such exists in Austria-Hungary.
I would have thought that the imperial authorities would tend to look favorably on Jewish immigration, since they would tend to be pro-Hapsburg. Especially those immigrating from Russia.
fasquardon
There's a book on my to-read list, "The idea of Galicia", a lot of it can be read on Google books.
Pre-war there was already large Jewish immigration from Russia, mainly to Eastern Galicia. Eastern Galicians in turn would migrate to the cities. They were firecly pro Hapburg, understandable as the alternative is seen as being barely out of barbarianism.
Pre-war there was already large Jewish immigration from Russia, mainly to Eastern Galicia. Eastern Galicians in turn would migrate to the cities. They were firecly pro Hapburg, understandable as the alternative is seen as being barely out of barbarianism.
If central Europe becomes, instead of a place that Jews seek to leave, a. magnet attracting Jews, then yes, not just Vienna but most of the major cities of the empire will acquire relatively and absolutely large Jewish populations. The Jews of Hungary were reportedly one of the manor groups most prone to accept Magyarization; Budapest will look very different.
Possibly Central Europe could become both.
It's cheaper to get a train ticket from Kiev to Vienna (or Berlin) than a train ticket to Odessa and a ship ticket to New York. But for the richer populations of Germany and A-H, there could be continued migration to the US and Palestine. It may also be that the German-speaking empires act as a stepping-stone for people making their way from the unfriendly environment of the Pale to their eventual goals (and as is the nature of these things, some of these through-migrants will get settled and abandon their original plans to live in Vienna, Budapest or Berlin).
Especially if, say, the US imposes immigration limits on people coming from Russian/former Russian territory, but "good hard working Germans" are still allowed in without limit, so Jews might be going to an Austria-Hungary that welcomes them due to them being seen as pro-Hapsburg, plan to stay long enough to make a nest egg, learn some German (and maybe even some English) before heading to the US to present themselves as good German Jews.
fasquardon
That gives me an idea: maybe political Catholicism would have become the glue that holds the empire together. The Hapsburgs would point out that ethnonationalism is barbaric and pagan, and a multinational, multiethnic empire where everyone (Catholic or not) acknowledges Catholic social teaching is best at fostering peace and unity. Maybe the empire declares Latin the language of the bureaucracy to further strengthen this legitimacy.
That would win over the loyalty of the Poles, Galicians, Slovaks, and Croatians.
German-speaking Austrians would be encouraged to see themselves as Catholics who speak German, and who enjoy the freedom of worship in contrast to Bavarians who suffer through kulturkampf.
Romanians would be encouraged (through various subtle measures) to join Romanian Greek Catholic Churches to create a distinction with the people on the other side of the Transylvanian mountains. Over time the Transylvanians would see themselves as separate from the "other" Romanians, the way that the Flemish see themselves as separate from the Dutch.
Hungarians would be a "nation within the nation" a similar way that Quebec is within Canada. The average Hungarian would in general only interact with institutions bearing the crown of St. Stephen, so this ideology would be toned down within the Kingdom of Hungary.
There would be subtle social pressure for non-Catholics to convert to Catholicism if they wanted to seek higher political office.
I do see scope for conflict with this ideology, though. First, the Russian and German empires will constantly suspect AH has designs on Poland and southern Germany, respectively. Second, AH would be seen as an ideological threat to the anti-clerical regimes of France and Italy. Third, while the Poles will prefer living under the Hapsburgs than the other two empires, they will still prefer that *all* of Catholic Poland be united - either under the Hapsburgs or independently. AH will need a powerful ally to guarantee its security - and what better one than the UK, which absolutely loves such games?
Maybe the Russian Empire will intentionally encourage Jewish emigration to AH, since they now have a convenient "dumping ground" for their "problem". Maybe they would even think this "problem" would undermine an imperial rival.
If that takes hold, then my previously described ideology would come under pressure. A refugee influx of that scale would cause tension in even the most tolerant and liberal societies.
It is not clear to me that Palestine will necessarily be that attractive, especially if Austria-Hungary is sufficiently stable and prosperous to be a destination in its own right.
Austria-Hungary might start off as a transit route for Jews from Romania, and from Russian Poland and Ukraine, but it can also evolve into a destination in its own right for these international migrants.
There is some interesting potential in Hungary, particularly, if Jews are attracted to this kingdom in sufficiently large numbers and continue to welcome Magyarization. Budapest a city with a million Jews?