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Moldovan (also Moldavian) is the official name for the Romanian language in the Republic of Moldova and in its breakaway territory of Transnistria. The Constitution of Moldova (Title I, Article 13) states that the Moldovan language is the official language of the country. In Moldova's Declaration of Independence the same language is called Romanian. Linguists consider standard Moldovan to be identical to standard Romanian, and many Moldovan officials and official bodies do or have done so as well.

"Moldovan" (graiul moldovenesc, in older sources limba moldovenească) can also refer to a northern variety of colloquial Romanian approximately within the territory of the former Principality of Moldavia (now split between Moldova and Romania). There is no particular linguistic break at the Prut River, which divides Moldova from Romania. Moldavian variety is considered one the the five major spoken varieties of Romanian, all five being written identically, but only about half of the speakers of this variety live in Moldova, while the other half live in the neighboring regions of Romania.

In formal use, the languages are identical except for one minor orthographical issue (the Moldovans often, but not always, write î in some contexts where Romanians would use â; this same form used to be normal in Romania until 1990s). Linguistically, Moldovan in its official or literary use is identical with official or literary Romanian.

The standard alphabet of the language is the Latin alphabet (currently official in the Republic of Moldova). Before 1989, Soviet authorities have forced the locals to use Cyrillic alphabet. The latter ramains currently in use only in the region of Transnistria, which is presently administered by unrecongnized breakaway authorities seeking closer ties with Russia.

Moldavian was assigned code mo in ISO 639-1 and code mol in ISO 639-2 and ISO/DIS 639-3.

History and politics

The history of the Moldovan (Romanian) language in Moldova is closely tied to the region's political status, with long periods of occupation by Russia and the Soviet Union influencing the language's name and (when Cyrillic script was in use) orthography. Major recent developments include the return to a Latin script from Cyrillic in 1989 and several changes in the statutory name of the language used in Moldova, from Moldavian to Romanian and by some individuals back.

Controversy

The matter of whether or not Moldovan is a separate language is a contested political issue within and beyond the Republic of Moldova.

The 1989 law on language of the Moldavian SSR, which is still effective in Moldova according to the Constitution, asserts the real existence of "linguistic Moldo-Romanian identity". Title I, Article 13 of the Moldovan Constitution, names it "the national language of the country" (the original Moldovan/Romanian uses the term limba de stat, which literally means the language of the state, or official language, thus avoiding the term national, whose sense is that of ethnicity). In the breakaway region of Transnistria, it is co-official with Ukrainian and Russian.

Despite the official nomenclature, standard Moldovan is widely considered to be identical to standard Romanian. Writing about "essential differences", Vasile Stati, supporter of Moldovenism, is obliged to concentrate almost exclusively on lexical rather than grammatical differences. Whatever language distinctions may once have existed, these have been decreasing rather than increasing: "... in the main, Moldovan in its standard form was more Romanian by the 1980s than at any point in its history".

In 2002, the Moldovan Minister of Justice, Ion Morei, said that Romanian and Moldovan are the same language and that the Constitution of Moldova should be amended, not necessarily by changing the word Moldovan into Romanian, but by adding that "Romanian and Moldovan are the same language". Education Minister Valentin Beniuc said, "I have stated more than once that the notion of a Moldovan language and a Romanian language reflects the same linguistic phenomenon in essence." The President of Moldova, Vladimir Voronin, acknowledged that the two languages are identical, but said that Moldovans should have the right to call their language "Moldovan".

The official language of Moldova is regulated by the Academy of Sciences of Moldova, which calls it Romanian. The name Romanian is also used in all schools and universities in Moldova.

In the 2004 census, out of the 3,383,332 people living in Moldova, 16.5% (558,508) chose Romanian as their mother tongue, whereas 60% chose Moldovan. While 40% of all urban Romanian/Moldovan speakers chose Romanian as their mother tongue, in the country side hardly each 7th Romanian/Moldovan speaker indicated Romanian as his mother tongue.

There are, however, few regional differences between the colloquial spoken languages of Moldova and Romania, as might be found within any linguistic territory, and the common speech of areas such as Chişinău or breakaway region of Transnistria can be distinguished from the speech of Iaşi, a Romanian city that is also part of the former Principality of Moldavia, while the difference in the common speech between Iaşi and the capital of Romania Bucharest is even greater. In general, before 1988-89, the less educated, the greater the difference from standard Romanian, and the more words were borrowed ad hoc from Russian into the daily speech.

The 1917 poem Limba noastră ("Our language") by Alexei Mateevici has been the national anthem of Moldova since 1994. It does not, however, make any claims relating to whether not it is 'Romanian' or 'Moldovan' which is "our language."

Orthography

Between 1940 and 1989, i.e. during the Soviet rule, Cyrillic replaced Latin as the official alphabet in Moldova (then Moldavian SSR). In 1989, Latin replaced Cyrillic back. When switching to the Latin alphabet, standard Moldovan adopted entirely the orthographic rules of Romanian at that moment. However, a short time after that, the Romanian Academy reformed the orthography in order to bring it closer to the standard of the pre-communist era: e.g., the Romanian phoneme previously exclusively transcribed as î (except the derivatives of "român") was to be written â or î, depending on its location in the word; also, the third person plural form of the verb "to be" was to be spelled "sunt" instead of "sînt". The â/î reform had no impact upon the pronunciation (unlike the "sunt/sînt" change). On the other hand, the regulating institution in Moldova, the Institute of Linguistics at the Academy of Sciences of Moldova, has made no similar recommendations.

The result of this reform is some ambiguity in the orthographic practices of both countries. While in Romania, some prestigious publications (such as Academia Caţavencu, Cotidianul) refused to apply the new rules based on linguistic arguments, in the Republic of Moldova the issue is seen as mirroring a political attitude. In fact, almost all Moldovan newspapers in Romanian opposing the national ideology of the ruling communist party consistently follow the official orthography used in Romania (e.g., Timpul, Jurnal de Chişinău, Ziarul de Gardă, Flux, etc.), while the papers voicing pro-governmental positions (e.g., Moldova Suverană and rarely Comunistul) use a mixed orthography from article to article.

In the countryside, some elderly people might prefer writing in Cyrillic script, while knowing the Latin script nonetheless.

Notes

1. Kogan Page 2004, p 242
2. From 1989 until 1994 there was a tendency in the official circles to use more the term "Romanian", until the point that from 1992 the term "Moldovan" was no longer in official use. After 1994, "Moldovan" made a come back and was used in some instances. These grew after 2001, but fell back to the pre-2001 levels two years later. Very often officals prefer to use "offical language" or "state language" to avoid making a public choice.
3. Template:Ro-iconDeclaraţia de independenţa a Republicii Moldova, Moldova Suverană
4. Omniglot http://www.omniglot.com/writing/moldovan.htm
5. The Cyrillic script has not been in official use in the Republic of Moldova since 1989, but is official in Transnistria, and possibly can still be used by some individuals elsewhere. For an example, see the Constitutional Court of Transnistria site, written in Moldovan Cyrillic.
6. SIL International: ISO 639 code sets: Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: mol
7. Constitution of the Republic of Moldova, Title 7, Article 7: "The law of 1 September 1989 regarding the usage of languages spoken on the territory of the Republic of Moldova remains valid, excepting the points where it contradicts this constitution."
8. Legea cu privire la funcţionarea limbilor vorbite pe teritoriul RSS Moldoveneşti Nr.3465-XI din 01.09.89 Vestile nr.9/217, 1989 (Law regarding the usage of languages spoken on the territory of the Republic of Moldova): "Moldavian SSR supports the desire of the Moldovans that live across the borders of the Republic, and considering the really existing linguistical Moldo-Romanian identity - of the Romanians that live on the territory of the USSR, of doing their studies and satisfying their cultural needs in their maternal language."
9. Kogan Page 2004, p 291 ; IHT, 16 June 2000, p. 2 ; Dyer 1999 , 2005
10. King 2000
11. Ion Morei: The Moldovan language is identical to the Romanian language, Moldova Azi, 10 September 2002
12. Din nou fără burse, Jurnal de Chişinău, 25 May 2004
13. Mediafax interview
14. National Bureau of Statistics of the Republic of Moldova: Census 2004
15. Language in Moldova - observations in streets and houses in the Republic of Moldova by Diana Nissler

References

• Dyer, D. (1999). The Romanian Dialect of Moldova: A Study in Language and Politics. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press. (ISBN 0-7734-8037-4)
• Dyer, Donald Leroy, ed. Studies in Moldovan. New York: Columbia University Press (East European Monographs), 1996. (ISBN 0-88033-351-0)
• Stati, V.N. Dicţionar moldovenesc-românesc. Chişinău: Tipografia Centrală (Biblioteca Pro Moldova), 2003. (ISBN 9975-78-248-5)
• Dumbrava, V. (2004). Sprachkonflikt und Sprachbewusstsein in der Republik Moldova: Eine empirische Studie in gemischtethnischen Familien (Sprache, Mehrsprachigkeit und sozialer Wandel). Bern: Peter Lang. (ISBN 3-631-50728-3)
• Movileanu N. Din istoria Transnistriei (1924-1940), Revista de istorie a Moldovei, 1993, #2.
• Negru E. Introducerea si interzicerea grafiei latine in R.A.S.S.M, 1999, Revista de istorie a Moldovei, #3-4.
• (2004). Europe Review 2003/2004. Kogan Page.
• King, C. The Moldovans: Romania, Russia and the Politics of Culture, Hoover Institution Press, 2000, ISBN 0-8179-9792-X.

External links

• Ethnologue report for Moldova
• Academy of Sciences of Moldova
• Conference presentation by Tamara Cărăuş, about identity issues in Moldova
• Essay on Language in Moldavia by Diana Nissler
• Article by Attila Demkó

• Languages of Moldova
• Romanian language