Moravians (ethnic group)

The Moravians are the Slavic inhabitants of modern Moravia, the easternmost part of the Czech Republic. They speak Moravian dialects of the Czech language and are nowadays mostly considered a branch of the Czechs. The question, whether the Moravians do belong to the Czech nation or not, is still alive for some groups in Moravia. Some Moravians declare separate ethnicity in polls. However, the problem has almost no political dimension and for most people the question of a 'Moravian language' or a 'Moravian nation' is purely a part of folklore. A reason for the disputes, whether do Moravians belong to Czechs or not may by arising from the fact, that, for far-off historical reasons, both the Czech expression for a Czech and that for a Bohemian are the same ('Čech'). Then theoretically it may not be clear, which cathegory is mentioned. This leads some people (politicians, etc.) to address eventually Bohemians, Moravians and sometimes even Silesians in their speeches. Only in the first years after the Velvet Revolution some Moravian political parties seemed to be able to gain some success in the elections. However their strength lost much around the time when Czechoslovakia (peacefully)split to the Czech Republic and Slovakia. According to some politologists even most people in Moravia were afraid of possibility of another division of the diminishing country. To the north of Moravia (or rather a northern part of the Moravian region of Czechia) is historically a part of Silesia (Slezsko in Czech, Śląsk in Polish, Schlesien in German), therefore a Kraj moravskoslezský (Moravian-Silesian region) was created recently. The dialect has a quite strong Polish flavour.