Media consumption and self-identification: Hungarian and Slovak case study

Abstract

The media impact on the process of ethnic identification, particularly with regard to how ethnic minority individuals reflect upon their ethnic origin, is the focus of this article. We analyse the relationships media consumption has with the identity-reflection process using biographical narratives of individuals from two ethnic minority communities in Eastern European countries: Slovaks in Hungary and Hungarians in Slovakia, focusing on how media consumption channels ethnic self-identification of minority individuals in terms of their affinity with their country of origin, their country of residence, and with Europe as a whole. Ethnic minorities in these two countries have been intensely affected by political changes of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. We include analysis of some quantitative data and biographical narratives of ethnic minority individuals from the ENRI-EAST project, with close analysis of six biographical cases.

Keywords:

• Eastern Europe
• ethnic minorities
• identification
• media
• language
• biographical study

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. ENRI-EAST- is a FP7 project ‘European, National and Regional Identities’, which was primarily funded by the European Commission through FP7-SSH Grant No 217227. The authors are from the institutions, which were partners in the project. http://www.abdn.ac.uk/socsci/research/new-europe-centre/enrieast-project-364.php

2. In our analysis, we used some data from the ENRI-East Values and Identity Survey, a quantitative study. The survey was conducted by the ENRI-East project partners in eight countries along the new EU border in the east: Russia, Belarus and Ukraine; Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary, among 12 ethnic minorities that we mentioned in the introductory paper to the thematic issue. The total number of respondents interviewed was 7000, comprising 400–800 respondents from each ethnic minority group depending on the size of the population of each particular ethnic minority. The data collection took place in the winter of 2009–2010 using ‘face-to-face’ methods. Respondents were chosen on the basis of their self-identification; no formal identity proof was required, only that they had to have lived in the country of their residence for at least one year. The questionnaire was compatible with World Value Survey, European Values Survey, New Europe Barometer, New Democracies Barometer,: EU-MIDIS: European Union minorities and discrimination survey, International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), European Social Survey (ESS).

3. Groups without access to ethnic media were excluded from our consumption models.

4. All personal names are fictitious. Only names of geographical places and media sources are factual.

5. L’udové Noviny is a weekly Slovakian minority newspaper.

6. Sloveský Komlóš is a Slovak name of the Hungarian town Tótkomlóš in Békés County, Hungary.

7. Kossuth radio is the Hungarian national radio station in Budapest.

8. Ludas Matyi-Hungarian satirical weekly newspaper

9. Knédli is a Slavic sweet dish, a fruit-filled dumpling; recipes could vary from country to country.

10. Range of kitchen equipment and utensils.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the European Commission through an FP7-SSH [grant number 217227].

Notes on contributors

Lyudmila Nurse

LYUDMILA NURSE is Director of Oxford XXI think tank.

Anna Gibson

ANNA GIBSON is a Private Sector Development Adviser with the UK Department for International Development, Kenya (at the time of contributing to the publication Anna Gibson was a Researcher at Oxford XXI).

Ráchel Surányi

RÁCHEL SURÁNYI is a Sociology PhD student at ELTE University, Budapest, Hungary.