Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups about Macedonians

“Harvard  Encyclopedia of American  Ethnic  Groups”, Stephan Thernstrom,  *
*   Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1980,                *
*                                                                            *
*   and from the entry under the title: Macedonians, p. 691:                 *
*                                                                            *
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                                                                          STEPS
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Macedonian L E A D E R S BEGAN to develop a strong sense of R E G I ON A L I D E N T I T Y in the 19th century, but it was not until the 20th century that SOME I N T E L L E C T U A L S BEGAN to A R G U E [2]
that Macedonian Slavs were neither Bulgarian nor Serbian, nor Greek, but a S E P A R A T E P E O P L E. The C O M M U N I S T party of Yugoslavia SUPPORTED THIS IDEA during World War II, and in 1945 a People’s
(later Socialist) Republic of Macedonia was established as one of the six constituent republics of the Federal Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia. A Macedonian L I T E R A R Y L A N G U A G E was D E V E L O P E D, and the I D E A of Macedonian N A T I O N A L I T Y was E N C O U R AG E D. In 1958 a Macedonian Orthodox C H U R C H was C R E A T E D, and nine years later it acquired jurisdictional independence. Neighboring Bulgaria, which has a Macedonian minority population, initially favored these developments and from 1944 to 1958 even recognized the existence of a Macedonian nationality. Since 1958, however, Bulgaria has argued that all Macedonians are Bulgarians, and this policy contributes to the discord and tension between Bulgaria and Yugoslavia.