It was in 2023 that the Faculty of Humanities (FoH) of the University of Debrecen (UD) signed a cooperation agreement with the Consulate General of Hungary in Montreal to explore and preserve the history of the Hungarian diaspora in the Canadian city of Montreal. The program, led by Balázs Venkovits, Director of the Institute of English and American Studies at the Faculty of Humanities of UD, was joined by Concordia University’s Oral History and Digital Storytelling (COHDS) research center and, as supporters, the Hungarian community and its organizations in Montreal.
- During the course of the past two years, we have succeeded in launching and establishing an international, interdisciplinary research, education, and community project in which Canadian and Hungarian researchers, such as migration research experts, sociologists, linguists and literary scholars, are working together, and which has already yielded significant scholarly results while also serving as a force for community building- said Balázs Venkovits to hirek.unideb.hu.
The presentation was officially opened by Barbara Lorenzkowski (Concordia University, COHDS), Miklós Lengyel, Hungary’s newly appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Canada, Helga Pritz, Consul General in Montreal, Péter Szilágyi, Deputy State Secretary for National Policy, and William Cheaib, Vice President for International Affairs at Concordia University. In their addresses, they all acclaimed the results and significance of the project for the Hungarian as well as other diaspora communities.
Balázs Venkovits presented the background, launch, and results of the joint research project (archival and oral history research), including a series of community events, a volume detailing the history of the St. Stephen Ball in Montreal, and a recently published study examining the role of social capital in the acculturation process of immigrants based on a network approach, which appeared in the Q1-rated Journal of International Migration and Integration (https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12134-025-01330-5).
The latest result of the cooperation is an interactive map developed by the University of Debrecen, which presents the most important, roughly 180 organizations, locations, and events of the past 100 years of Hungarians in Montreal, with descriptions, document and photo galleries and, in quite a few places, interview excerpts prepared by researchers. This allows users to learn about the First Hungarian Reformed Church in Montreal, which will celebrate the 100th anniversary of its foundation next year, the history of Hungária Social Association, organizations founded by immigrants, women’s associations, historical monuments, and even locations associated with famous Hungarians. This map is available in Hungarian and English at https://humtl.unideb.hu/.
At the event, Sonya di Sclafani (Concordia University, COHDS) gave a presentation showcasing her own research on Hungarian food and restaurants, followed by the life stories of four Hungarian-Canadian individuals, amongst them refugees from 1956, who had contributed to the research through interviews.
In the next phase of the project, planned to be coordinated by Éva Huszti (Institute of Sociology, FoH, UD), an online social science diaspora research project will be launched among Hungarians living across Canada, exploring their responses to a range of questions, such as who in the family decided to emigrate and why, how many generations live abroad, how attached they still are to Hungary and how this is manifested (in language use, maintaining contacts and everyday habits), how closely they follow events in Hungary, and whether they participate in Hungarian-related associations and organizations.
- The questionnaire is available in three languages at the website https://e-kerdoivek.unideb.hu/hungarians-in-canada. Our long-term objective is to provide a comprehensive account of the everyday life of Hungarians in Canada and their relationship to the culture and customs of their country of origin, as well as the changing network structure during the integration process- said Éva Huszti.
Next year, based on the unique documents and archival materials offered (see https://hirek.unideb.hu/ujabb-adalek-montreali-magyarsag-tortenetehez), further publications are planned, as well as info-collections similar to the previous ones, in cooperation with organizations celebrating the centenary.
The Hungarian community in Montreal will celebrate a double anniversary in 2026. This year will mark 100 years since the First Hungarian Reformed Church was founded in the city as part of the United Church of Canada, and 125 years since the birth of its founding pastor, Mihály Fehér (1900-1986), who attended the Reformed College in Debrecen and then studied theology at Tisza István University.
- The Archives of the Trans-Tibiscan Reformed Church District hold several sources related to Mihály Fehér, which we researched during last fall. In addition, thanks to his daughter, Mária Fehér, who still lives in Montreal, we were able to obtain the pastor’s written legacy. Although he completed writing a significant part of his congregation’s history himself, which was published during his lifetime, his notes and reflections on his life, including the years he spent in Hungary, his studies abroad, and his mission among Hungarians in Canada, have been hitherto unknown. We are currently working on processing and editing these- said Gergely Fazakas, Director of the Institute of Hungarian Literature and Cultural Studies at the University of Debrecen.
As an additional result of the project and the cooperation agreement signed by the two universities, the relationship between UD and Concordia University may be further expanded, enabling continued research activities as well as faculty and student exchanges in the future.
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