Valuing language in the Ukrainian-Romanian Borderlands

Abstract

This article examines how informal economic activities, which have come to dominate many rural communities in the Ukrainian-Romanian borderlands since 1989/1991, are favouring a knowledge of Romanian rather than the Ukrainian language. It is based on fifteen months of ethnographic research in two rural communities on either side of the Eastern Ukrainian-Romanian border near the Romanian town of Siret, where the trading and purchase of goods across the border, in addition to migration for work to Southern and Western Europe, form a major part of the local rural economy.

Keywords

• Informal economy
• language
• ethnography
• borders
• rural populations
• migration.