Csángó (Romanian: Ceangăi) are an ethnic group of Hungarian-speaking of Roman Catholic religion that live in the Bacău county, Moldavia region of Romania. They settled there between the 13th and 15th century.

The Csángó can be distinguished from other Hungarians by their linguistic peculiarities, traditions and folklore. Their identity as a people was based on their language and religion, different of the Moldavian Romanians nearby. Since the Middle Ages, the Csángó have lived isolated from the main body of Hungarian speakers, which also meant that they were largely untouched by the nationalist movements that swept 19th-century Europe and led to the formation of modern nations. As a consequence, the primary identity of the Csángó was not national (Hungarian as opposed to Romanian) but rather confessional (Roman Catholic as opposed to Eastern Orthodox). This made them an easy target of assimilation: today only a tiny minority of Catholics in Bacău county consider themselves Hungarian.

The issue of assimilation is a topic of heated debate between and inside the Csángó, Hungarian and Romanian communities. Most people agree that the process of assimilation was, to some degree, natural: the Csángó has been a small isolated rural community with no Hungarian-language education system of their own and very few Hungarian-speaking intellectuals. Many Csángó have associated the Hungarian language with backwardness (Romanian was the language of city dwellers, business, industry, church and state) and advocated an aggressive policy of assimilation as a means of integration and modernization. The Roman Catholic diocese of Iaşi has also adopted this stance and has refused to use Hungarian in its liturgy although many Csángó still speak Hungarian and, quite understandably, would like to be able to hear mass or confess in their mother tongue, a wish the official church has so far ignored.

Since the end of the 19th century, the Csángó issue has been an object of considerable interest in Hungary as many Hungarians felt it is their duty to help their ethnic brethren preserve their identity.

In recent years, a small but vocal Csángó revival movement has evolved, with the aim of fighting linguistic assimilation and preserving Csángó culture. They receive some support from Hungary but have to endure continual harassment by state and church authorities in Romania.

In the census of 2002, in the Bacău county there were 4,528 declared themselves Hungarians and 1,266 declared themselves Csángó, reaching a total of 5,794 out of the county's total population of 747,645.

External link

• Fundaţia culturală Siret (in Romanian)