Top-down and bottom-up Magyarization in multiethnic Banat towns under dualist Hungary (1867–1914)

Abstract

The paper examines entanglements between aspects of linguistic Magyarization in four towns of the Banat under Dualist Hungary, two of which are today in Romania and two in Serbia. After outlining local power relations and the shifting relations to central and county authorities, the author assesses the spread of Hungarian language skills in the urban population and charts out the evolution of language policies. This reveals that local decision-makers had to walk a fine line between the expectations of a monolingual norm and their homegrown elites’ limited competence in the state language. While the four towns continued to project a multilingual image to their citizenries and their elected bodies continued to rely on the local languages, government agencies had by the end of the era enforced the use of Hungarian in everyday bureaucratic routines. Special focus is placed on German-speaking Catholic elites, who often resonated with Hungarian state nationalism, but typically without full cognizance of its linguistic consequences.