There is no "official" language and "unofficial" language and this is true for romanian or any other language. The language spoken/written on TV/radio/newspapers is different in vocabulary from the language spoken by ordinary people in the sense that it has a reduced vocabulary and uses many more neologisms. The assertion that the language used on romanian TV/radio/newspapers uses more latin-derived words is false, it just uses more neologisms, which are actually taken from french (in the XIX and XX centuries) or english (in the XX and XXI centuries), not from latin. And the language used by those invited to speak on the various shows is the language used by the common population.
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Quote from AndreiB:
Actually, the media educates us to use the latin equivalents, we're brainwashed to a certain extent
Like to use:
Speranţă for Nădejde (hope)
Timp for Vreme(time)
Oră for Ceas(hour)
Pericol for Primejdie(danger)
Eroare for Greşală(error)
Final for Sfîrşit(the end)
Culpă for Vină (guilt)
Aer for Văzduh (air)
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As I said, the media does not educate the people to use latin-derived words, but neologisms, which are mainly from english these days.
"Nădejde" is very rarely used. Almost everyone (at least in the cities) uses "speranţă".
"Vreme" is widely used, as is "timp". However, "vreme" has these days mainly uses related to meteorology.
"Ceas" is used only for "watch" (Am un ceas nou = I have a new watch) and to ask for the time (Cît e ceasul ? = What hour is it?). "Oră" is used to measure the time (cinci ore = five hours).
"Primejdie" is rarely used, although it is not an archaism, people continue to use it. "Pericol" is much more used these days.
"Greşeală" is the default word, it is extensively used in any situation. "Eroare" is used mainly related to technical situations, nobody uses it in the common language. "Greşeală" actually means "mistake", not "error".
"Sfîrşit" is the common term for "end", used by all. Another used word is "terminare", mainly as a verb (cînd se termină ? = when will it be over ?). "Final" is rarely used in the common language, it is used mainly related to the end of artistic works in the reviews.
"Vină" is the default term, nobody uses "culpă". The only use of "culpă" is when speaking about situations related to law breaking. It is a technical word used in the jargon of the law profession.
"Văzduh" is never used, except for poetry or literature. It has been almost completely replaced with "aer" in the common language.
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Quote from Ladybug:
În România, din 1993 nu se mai foloseşte „î” în interiorul cuvintelor (excepţie fac cele formate cu prefix, ex. „neîndemânatic”)…
Quote from Riks:
Văd că scriţi "cuvint" şi "cuvânt". Amândouă sunt egale sau unul dintre ele seamnă ceva alt?
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Actually many people use "Î" in the middle of the words, and they are right to do so. But let's present some history:
There were many discussions in the XIX century related to the romanian ortography, after the decision was made to use the latin alphabet instead of the cyrillic one (latin alphabet replaced the cyrillic alphabet in 1860). In those times (XIX century) the written romanian language used more diacritics than today, for example E, O or U also had diacritical marks (breve or circumflex) when present in the middle of the words. In 1904 a decision by the Romanian Academy was taken in order to simplify the ortography, so in the middle of the words was accepted only Â, and all the E,O,U with diacritical marks were changed in Â. So the romanian would have 2 letters (Î and Â) that represent the same sound. But it was a step ahead, because the ortography was simplified (E,O,U with diacritical marks disappeared).
http://ro.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fonologia_ ... om%C3%A2nehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_cent ... nded_vowelIn 1953 (under the communist regime) the Romanian Academy issued another ortographical reform, stating that  would be replaced by Î in all instances (an exception was issued in 1964 for "român" and the derived words). It was a logical step and also a practical one, which simplified the ortography and enabled a more rapid learning of writing (in that time a great percentage of the population did not know how to write, were analphabets). This helped a lot with the alphabetization of the population, which is now probably close to 99%.
In 1993 (under the democratic regime) the Romanian Academy issued what is probably the stupidest ortographic reform form all times. It reverted the decision from 1993 and reinstated  in the middle of the words. It has to be the only ortographic decision from modern times and from all over the world that actually complicates the ortography of a language. This decision had no a single rational motivation, it was purely political (many academicians were former communists, and by this decision they depicted themselves as anti-communists). It must be said that all the romanian linguistics institutes opposed that decision. But it was passed with the votes of engineers, physicians, economists, lawyers, etc. which were members of the Romanian Academy and had not a single clue about linguistics.
Another change made in 1993 by the same decision of the Romanian Academy was to replace a romanian form of the verb "a fi" ("to be") with a latin form. The words "sînt" ("am" or "are"), "sîntem" ("are"), "sînteţi" ("are") were replaced with "sunt", "suntem", "sunteţi". So "eu sînt" ("I am") was to be written "eu sunt", etc. It must be said that "Sînt" is an original romanian word, derived from the latin "Sint". It has no connection with the latin "sunt", this is proved by linguists. The form "Sînt" is present in all the texts prior to the XIX century. It is a word that evolved from latin, and is the best example of the evolution of romanian from latin (all the romanian words derived from latin are modified, as are the french, spanish, or portuguese ones). But more importantly, it is very easy to pronounce. The form "sunt" is hard to pronounce when speaking rapidly, that's why almost nobody uses it in the spoken language (not even those that use it in writing).
So why the change from "sînt" to "sunt" and the reintroduction of  ? Because from the XIX century onwards the romanian "elites" have modified artificially the language so that it will look more like latin. And for that they use all the means, including the complication of the ortography and sometimes outright lies (as in the etimology of some words, which are presented as derived from latin, even if this is not true).
All this is done to brainwash the romanian population and to impress the westerners. The brainwashing works, but the westerners are not duped by that, they have good historians and linguists that know the truth. And the truth is that genetically speaking the romanians are mainly a mix of Thracians (Dacians, the autochton population), Slavs (a migrant population that settled on all the romanian teritory) and other migrants populations like cumans or pecenegs. The romanian colonists brought after the conquest of Dacia by the Roman Empire were not from the Italian Peninsula, but from the perifery of the empire (especially form the teritory that is now the asian part of Turkey, Asia Minor). It is true that the romanian language is derived form latin, but many words are slavic even today, because many of the romanians are of slavic origin. And many of the popular first names (Bogdan, Mircea, Radu, Dragoş, Răzvan, etc.) used in Romania are also slavic. Also many toponyms (names of places) are of slavic origin, for example those that have an "ov" in them, for example (Ilfov, Braşov, Prahova, Craiova, Moldova, Milcov, Neajlov, etc.). This is not to say that the romanian are slavs, they are genetically mainly a mix of Thracians and Slavs and use a language derived from latin (borrowed from the early colonists brought by the roman conquerors). One needs only to read the history of romanians to find the truth.
Some very interesting and recent discussions about the romanian ortography are below. They all point to the conclusion that the modern romanian ortography should use only Î and not  (with the exception of "român") and should use "sînt", not "sunt".
http://forum.softpedia.com/index.php?showtopic=454379http://www.mandrivausers.ro/forum/index ... 973.0.htmlhttp://groups.google.ro/group/diacritic ... d307381f4c