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AFAIK it's a cultural / historical delineation, not a geometrical one. Kind of like how the "US Midwest" is actually mostly in the eastern third of the contigu
by gshdg 7y ago
AFAIK it's a cultural / historical delineation, not a geometrical one. Kind of like how the "US Midwest" is actually mostly in the eastern third of the contiguous states. AFAICT the boundary is roughly the eastern border of the Holy Roman Empire.
- adamnemecek 7y agoRight, people living in those countries will tell you that it's Central Europe. What other cultural/delineation is there?
- carapace 7y agoThe Cold War had a pretty deep psychological effect all over. When I was growing up East vs. West was the fundamental political distinction. Check out this map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NATO_vs._Warsaw_(1949-1990).svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NATO_vs._Warsaw_(1949-199... The world was divided right down the to the physical Berlin Wall. It was so amazing when that finally fell.
- twic 7y agoAlthough the Berlin Wall was about 100 kilometres east of the Iron Curtain. And Greece was another several hundred kilometres east!
- empath75 7y agoEastern and Western Europe is a commonly understood in American media. Central Europe is not. Whether you’re in East or west depends on which side of the iron curtain you were on.
- marton78 7y agoThis distinction was relevant for a mere 45 years, a period which ended almost 30 years ago. It's time to get it over with. The Czech Republic is about as Central European as it gets.
- rozab 7y agoIt's a cold war thing. Czechia was part of the Eastern Bloc for 40 of the last 70 years. And is also situated in the east of Europe. I don't really understand the controversy
- pbhjpbhj 7y agoWell I guess if you live in the middle, then just having East and West aren't quite sufficient to describe locations -- where's the dividing line? -- so you need an idea of what's central; and people will tend to think of themselves as central. I mean Czechia/Eastern Germany/Western Poland is pretty much the centre of the land-mass from Ireland/Portugal in the West to Ukraine/Estonia in the East. So, it's not wrong.