Romania in the World. Contacts and Reception (Full PDF)
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© Cover picture: Paul Nanu (2006) © Department of Romanian Language and Culture http://www.utu.fi/fi/yksikot/hum/yksikot/romania/Sivut/home.aspx University of Turku Finland This publication is in copyright. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form without permission in writing from the Department of Romanian Language (University of Turku). Contact: [email protected] ISBN: 978-951-29-5670-8 DEPARTMENT OF ROMANIAN LANGUAGE AND CULTURE UNIVERSITY OF TURKU FINLAND ROMANIA IN THE WORLD CONTACTS AND RECEPTION Paul NANU (Ed.) TURKU 2014 Table of contents Editor’s foreword .............................................................................................................................. 7 Alexandra Crăciun Romania: Sketches for a Brand Identity ............................................................................................ 9 I. European Cultural Interferences Georgeta Orian Romanian Presences in the Spanish Literary Landscape after World War II. The Case of Romanian Writer Vintilã Horia and the Journal „Destin” (Madrid) ................................................................. 19 Laura Bădescu Strategies to Promote Romanian Culture. Diplomats as Writers in Lusitanian Space .................... 29 Gabriela Chiciudean Pavel Dan and Cesare Pavese – Two Literary Destinies ................................................................. 41 Florin Oprescu The Anxiety of Cultural Influence. The Exponential Case of Benjamin Fondane .......................... 57 Andra Bruciu-Cozlean Filimon’s Journey to Prague ............................................................................................................ 69 Marcela Ciortea Jan Amos Comenius, Orbis pictus, in Transylvania ....................................................................... 79 Silviu Miloiu From “Allies without Alliance” to Concerted Action: Romania and Finland in the Aftermath of Operation Barbarossa (1941) ........................................................................................................... 93 II. Global Echoes Petru Apachiţei 65 Years of Diplomatic, Economic and Cultural Relations between Romania and China (1949- 2014) .............................................................................................................................................. 129 Ovidiu Ivancu Cities beyond Cities. Reflections on Indo-Romanian Eclecticism ................................................ 139 Victor-Tudor Roşu Do Comrades Prefer Blondes? Marilyn Monroe in Communist Romania .................................... 149 III. Culture and Language Roxana Ciolăneanu Dor and Saudade: Conceptual Metaphor and Cultural Identity .................................................... 163 Constantin-Ioan Mladin The Romanian Language on the Internet: Computerized Linguistic Resources for the Understanding and Study of the Romanian Language .................................................................. 175 List of authors ................................................................................................................................ 195 Editor’s foreword The volume we are presenting this day is rather a novelty at the Department of Romanian Language and Culture at the University of Turku. Romanian studies have always been a relatively small unit within the Department of Romance Languages and their beginnings are situated in year 1975, when Professor Lauri Lindgren initiated them in collaboration with the Romanian counterpart, which has periodically provided qualified native lecturers. During the past four decades, Romanian language has had the chance to benefit from the support of several other representatives of local academia, culminating currently with Professor Eija Suomela-Salmi, Dean and supervisor of the Department of Romanian. This year marks the 39th anniversary of Romanian in the Finnish university curricula. We consider that the time has come to issue this publication, focusing on contributions on Romanian culture in global context. For this, we invited collaborators that primarily have experience in the teaching and researching of Romanian culture and language at universities throughout the world. Most authors are or used to be lecturers of Romanian, abroad or overseas, and we would argue that they are highly experienced in dealing with intercultural topics. They all have tackled in their research the interferences of Romanian culture with other cultures, European or not. Also, they are all Romanian nationals, so the approach is in this respect unidirectional, and it was purposefully done so. Concerning structure, the volume opens with a contribution on the image and the brand of Romania (A. Crăciun) before splitting into three directions. The first, European Cultural Interferences, is focusing on interculturality per se between Romanian and several European cultures (authors between brackets): Spanish (G. Orian), French (F. Oprescu), Italian (G. Chiciudean), Czech (A. Bruciu-Cozlean, M. Ciortea), Finnish (S. Miloiu) or Portuguese (L. Bădescu). Some of those are familiar to researchers of Romance cultures, but the part relating to Finnish, for instance, presents without a doubt a less researched area, tackled historically by the author. Interesting and relevant nonetheless, especially because the present book is published in Finland. One of the aims was precisely bringing Romania closer to Finnish readers, guiding them into discovering the actual place that our culture has among others. The second part, Global Echoes, envisages more remote cultures, listing namely interferences with Indian (O. Ivancu), Chinese (P. Apachiței) and American phenomena (T. Roșu). The authors in this section have all first hand information; they investigated the topics for years in the respective cultures, for the former two, or looked for novel sources in relevant archives for the latter. The following questions are addressed in this chapter: How Romanians and Indians are seeing the urban spaces? What are the (surprisingly) rich Sino-Romanian relations? How communist Romania received hollywoodian culture? The last part is called Culture and Language. Mostly culture in the article on the similarities between the Romanian concept of "dor" and Portuguese "saudade" and the ensuing metaphors (R. Ciolăneanu). Mostly language in the one concerning Romanian language on the internet, a thorough investigation into the relations with the newest online platforms (C. Mladin). To sum up, we are confident that the content of the volume brings sufficient and relevant arguments toward acquiring a clearer perspective of the relations of Romania with other cultures. We covered both classical and modern views, social and cultural, literature and language. From the very beginning of this endeavor, when approaching the authors and negotiating the topics of their contributions, we stated, and we maintain this position, that we were not looking for exclusively scientific and scholastic articles. The silver lining of the volume was to keep the content accessible and, if possible, intriguing. While browsing through the pages, you will find essay-like paragraphs, rhetorical questions, personal views. We embraced this kind of approach, a more flexible and humane one. Paul Nanu Turku, 2014 8 Romania: Sketches for a Brand Identity Alexandra CRĂCIUN Item Description The government of Romania's biggest fear is to 'sell the country.' They do whatever they can to make foreign investment difficult. Perhaps they are afraid someone will buy it, fix it, and then make it hard for the crooked government to have it good. It's about time someone had the guts to SELL ROMANIA TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER. And we thank eBay and the rest of the capitalist world for making it possible. Hence, for sale is a non-functional eastern-european country named Romania. The item is sold AS IS, for parts or repair, absolutely NO RETURN or warranty of any kind! It's a broken country! Don't come back to me and say I didn't stated it clear enough, or that you just changed your mind. All parts may or may not be there. Many are rotten, and will need replacement (see government). Many parts will need to be refurbished (see large percentage of population). But make no mistake! If you fix it, this could be one GREAT COUNTRY, and one GREAT PEOPLE. It could be like Star Trek The Next Generation's Federation! It contains vast mineral and geographical resources, though badly managed by its population. Some bordering countries: Bulgaria, Ukraine, Hungary, etc. Well known partly because of: AIDS infected orphans, executed dictator named Ceausescu, ultra- high literacy which seems to be of no help, Count Dracula, cheap prostitutes, extremely high corruption, highly intelligent undergrad students obtaining high scores in competitions like the ACM programming contest and the William Putnam math competition, amazing hackers (computer programmers), violent miners, extremely high percentage of employed immigrants abroad, Nadia Comaneci, bankrupt government, etc. I will happily answer any questions you may have via email. For reasons undisclosed I am obliged to sell many of my other beloved countries. Stay tuned and check soon for my other auctions. This is sold with NO RESERVE so please bid early or the bid snipers will outbid you in the last minute. The starting price is ridiculously low so it gets sold. Let the market decide what this country is worth. I have excellent feedback and will make sure you are satisfied. Item Photos: Many photos can be found on the