Cultural Differences With Rest of Ukraine
Unlike the rest of Ukraine, most of the Western Ukraine was never a part of the Russian empire. Until 1918 it was part of Austria-Hungary; that country did not persecute (political) Ukrainian organizations as severely as the Russian empire. Rather Austria-Hungary de facto encouraged Ukrainian organizations to counterbalance the influence of Polish culture in (Eastern) Galicia.
For more details on West Ukraine's cultural background, see Austrian Partition, and the Polish culture in the Interbellum.Ukrainian is the dominant language in the region (in the schools of the Ukrainian SSR learning Russian was mandatory; currently in modern Ukraine, at schools with Ukrainian as the language of instruction, classes in Russian and in the other minority languages are offered).
In terms of religion, the majority of adherents share the Byzantine Rite of Christianity as in rest of Ukraine, but due to the region escaping the 1920s and 1930s Soviet persecution, a notably greater church adherence is and religion's role in society is present. Due to the complex post-independence religious confrontation of several church groups and their fateful, the historical influence played a key role in shaping the present loyalty of Western Ukraine's faithful. In Galician provinces, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church has the strongest following in the country, and the largest share of property and faithful. In the remaining regions: Volhynia, Bukovina and Transcarpathia the Orthodoxy is prevalent. Outside of Western Ukraine the greatest in terms of Church property, clergy, and according to some estimates, faithful, is the the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate). In the listed regions (and in particular among the Orthodox faithful in Galicia), this position is notably weaker, as the main rivals, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church, have a far greater influence.
Noticeable cultural differences in the region (compared with the rest of Ukraine except Southern Ukraine) are more "negative views" on the Russian language and on Joseph Stalin and more "positive views" on Ukrainian nationalism. Calculating the yes-votes as a percentage of the total electorate reveals that a higher percentage of all (possible) voters in Western Ukraine supported Ukrainian independence in the 1991 Ukrainian independence referendum than in the rest of the country. During elections voters of Western (and Central Ukrainian) oblasts (provinces) vote mostly for parties (Our Ukraine, Batkivshchyna) and presidential candidates (Viktor Yuschenko, Yulia Tymoshenko) with a pro-Western and state reform platform.
Read more about this topic: Western Ukraine
Famous quotes containing the words cultural, differences and/or rest:
“Somehow we have been taught to believe that the experiences of girls and women are not important in the study and understanding of human behavior. If we know men, then we know all of humankind. These prevalent cultural attitudes totally deny the uniqueness of the female experience, limiting the development of girls and women and depriving a needy world of the gifts, talents, and resources our daughters have to offer.”
—Jeanne Elium (20th century)
“I don’t know what immutable differences exist between men and women apart from differences in their genitals; perhaps there are some other unchangeable differences; probably there are a number of irrelevant differences. But it is clear that until social expectations for men and women are equal, until we provide equal respect for both men and women, our answers to this question will simply reflect our prejudices.”
—Naomi Weisstein (b. 1939)
“How can a man be satisfied to entertain an opinion merely, and enjoy it? Is there any enjoyment in it, if his opinion is that he is aggrieved? If you are cheated out of a single dollar by your neighbor, you do not rest satisfied with knowing that you are cheated, or with saying that you are cheated, or even with petitioning him to pay you your due; but you take effectual steps at once to obtain the full amount, and see that you are never cheated again.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)