Slovak Republic - People
The majority of the 5.4 million inhabitants of the Slovak Republic are Slovak (85.8%). Hungarians are officially the largest ethnic minority (9.7%) and are concentrated in the southern and eastern regions of Slovakia. Up to 10% of the population is thought to be Roma, although the last official census (2001) put their number at 1.7%. Other ethnic groups include Czechs, Ruthenians, Ukrainians, Germans, and Poles. The Slovak constitution guarantees freedom of religion. The majority of Slovak citizens (69%) are Roman Catholic; the second-largest group is Protestants (9%). About 3,000 Jews remain of the estimated pre-World War II population of 120,000.
The official state language is Slovak, and Hungarian is widely spoken in the south. The Slovak legislation guarantees use of minority languages in official contact for the inhabitants of villages and towns where their number exceeds 20% of overall population. The visible effect of this regulation is in the form of bilingual road signs.
Despite its modern European economy and society, Slovakia has a significant rural element. About 45% of Slovaks live in villages of less than 5,000 people, and 14% in villages of less than 1,000. The first towns emerged in Slovakia in the 11th century. They became centers of trade and crafts and received special privileges from rulers. They were circumscribed by walls and markets were regularly held there. The oldest free royal borough in Slovakia is Trnava. A boom came in the 14th and 15th centuries when mining and crafts fully developed with amazing prosperity. There are now 138 towns in Slovakia. The largest cities are Bratislava and Košice. The majority of population lives in towns.
The population of Slovakia has experienced several changes when as the population emigrated abroad in increased numbers. They were called emigration waves. Slovaks abandoned their homeland in the 19th century and in the first half of the 20th century when they left for the USA. The reasons were mostly economic. Political reasons and search for a more tolerant and free environment motivated the next emigration wave, which followed the end of the Second World War. Today, more than two million Slovaks live outside Slovakia and the majority of them in the USA. Some of them were very successful. Among them, for instance, is Andy Warhol, the famous pop art painter whose parents were from eastern Slovakia. Ancestors of several American movie stars of such as Paul Newman or Steve McQueen were from Slovakia. Eugene Andrew Cernan’s forefathers, who was the last human to step on the Moon surface in 1972, were Czech and Slovak.
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