2021 Gypsy Lore Society Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies – Book of Abstracts

1 CONTEMPORARY CHALLENGES AND FUTURES OF ROMA HOUSING 1 2021 Gypsy Lore Society Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies – Book of Abstracts 2021 Gypsy Lore Society Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies – Book of Abstracts Charles University, Faculty of Arts Prague, 2021 Slovak Academy of Sciences, Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology 2021 Gypsy Lore Society Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies Prague, Czech Republic (in person) and online via http://gls2021.ff.cuni.cz/ September 8–10, 2021 The conference and preparation of the e-book was supported by the Strategy AV 21, Program 22, Society in Motion and Public Policy: Mobility and Migration, funded by the Institute of Ethnology, Czech Academy of Sciences. The organization of the GLS 2021 Conference on Romani Studies and the publication of the book of abstracts was supported by the Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague under the program: „CRP 2021“. Edited by: Helena Sadílková Reviewed by: Elena Marushiakova Popova, Lada Viková © Charles University, Faculty of Arts, 2021 © Slovak Academy of Sciences, Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, 2021 © Tatiana Zachar Podolinská, Helena Sadílková, Pavel Kubaník, and Zdeněk Uherek, 2021 First edition, Praha 2021 ISBN 978-80-7671-036-8 (online: pdf) DOI: https://doi.org/10.31577/2021.9788076710368 Available at: http://gls2021.ff.cuni.cz/ 2021 GYPSY LORE SOCIETY CONFERENCE ON ROMANI STUDIES The 2021 GLS Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies were held in Prague, Czech Republic as a hybrid event, allowing for in-person as well as online participation (September 6 to 8, 2021). The meeting and the conference were organised on behalf of the Gypsy Lore Society by the Seminar of Romani Studies at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague, in cooperation with the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague. Academic Committee n Michael Beníšek, Assistant Professor, Romani Studies Seminar at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University (Czech Republic) n Pavel Kubaník, Assistant Professor, Romani Studies Seminar at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University (Czech Republic) n Elena Marushiakova Popova, Professor of History, University of St Andrews (Scotland) n Helena Sadílková, Assistant Professor, Head of the Romani Studies Seminar at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University (Czech Republic) n Zdeněk Uherek, Associated Professor of Ethnology, Director of the Institute of Sociological Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University (Czech Republic) n Tatiana Zachar Podolinská, Doctor of the Science of Religions, Director of the Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Sciences (Slovakia), President of the Gypsy Lore Society Conference Organizing Committee: n Pavel Kubaník, Charles University n Helena Sadílková, Charles University n Sheila Salo, Treasurer of the Gypsy Lore Society n Zdeněk Uherek, Charles University ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We are grateful to all panel conveners and all other participants for their submissions, cooperation during the preparation of the book of accepted abstracts and patience with the prolonged organization of the 2020/2021 GLS Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies. The panels prepared for the conference are listed in this publication in alphabetical order by their titles, individual submissions are listed in alphabetical order by the name of their author(s). Our special thanks go to Sheila Salo for her help with economic, managerial and organizational matters – all this over a two-year period during which the conference was being prepared. We are especially grateful to Ann Ostendorf, Sheila Salo, and Daniel Škobla, as well as the conveners of the organized panels for their generous help with proofreading parts of the texts in 2020. We would like to express our gratitude to the Museum of Romani Culture (and individually to Petra Svobodová and Dušan Slačka) for helping us with the organization and preparation of the program of the excursion to Brno on Sept. 11, 2021, which included the visit to the Museum of Romani Culture and Vila Tugendhat. We would also like to thank our colleagues and students who offered their help and assistance with the on-site organization of the conference as a hybrid event (listed in alphabetical order): Renata Berkyová, Viktor Elšík, Markéta Hajská, Jan Ort, Kornélie Peterková, Klára Anna Poláková, Nikola Pompová, Tereza Turková, and Milada Závodská. We are also very grateful to Tatiana Zachar Podolinská and Karolína Ryvolová for their cooperation and support during the preparation of the Book of Abstracts. Last but not least, our thanks go to Jaro Dufek, Adéla Vosičková, Ondřej Prcín and Martin Crkovský for the design and preparation of the conference web page – http://gls2021.ff.cuni.cz/ Helena Sadílková, Pavel Kubaník, Zdeněk Uherek July 30, 2021, Prague On behalf of the Gypsy Lore Society, let me express my deep gratitude to the organisers of the Gypsy Lore Conference and Annual Meeting in Prague in 2020 and 2021. My sincere gratitude also goes to those who had reviewed all calls for panels and delivered abstracts, serving as members of the GLS 2020 and 2021 Academic Committee. In 2020, due to the pandemic situation, the Conference Organising Committee and the GLS Board of Directors decided to postpone the annual conference and the meeting, firmly believing the improvement of the epidemic situation the following year. All organisational efforts invested in the 2020 conference were thus shifted to 2021. All participants with already approved abstracts were kindly asked to express their interest in either continuing with last-year’s abstract or delivering a new one. The same possibility was offered to the convenors of panels. Thus, the conference works with all panels and reconfirmed abstracts accepted for the originally planned conference in 2020 and the ones accepted under the new call for 2021. We would like to thank all of you who registered for the GLS conferences 2020/2021. We still hope to meet at least a small proportion of contributors in person in Prague. We are confident that should the need to transfer the whole event online arise, we can still enjoy valuable contributions and learn about teach other’s work over the course of last two years. Tatiana Zachar Podolinská President of the Gypsy Lore Society July 16, 2021, Bratislava Opening words Tatiana Zachar Podolinská. Roma in the Midst of the Pandemic of Racism and Social Stigmatisation 12 Helena Sadílková, Pavel Kubaník. 30 years of Prague Romani Studies at Charles University (1991–2021) 21 Zdeněk Uherek. Romani Studies at the Institute of Ethnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Sociological Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University 37 GLS conferences 1979–2021 43 2021 GLS Conference on Romani Studies ORGANIZED PANELS n Anthropology and History in Romani Studies (conveners: Grégoire Cousin, Vita Zalar) 48 n Contemporary Challenges and Futures of Roma Housing (conveners: Ewa Nowicka, Maciej Witkowski) 60 n Critical Perspectives on the Impacts of Covid-19 Pandemic on Roma (conveners: Maria Manuela Mendes, Stefánia Toma, Olga Magano) 64 n Environmental Justice for Roma 81 (conveners: Jekatyerina Dunajeva, Joanna Kostka, Richard Filčák, Daniel Škobla) n Future Directions of the Gypsy Lore Society: Scholarship, Activism, Names, Purposes (convener: Carol Silverman) 87 n Groups Understood as Gypsies with no Romani Heritage: Similarities and Differences (conveners: Anthony Leroyd Howarth, Freya Hope) 95 n International Romani Literature(s): Approaches to a “New” World Literature 113 (conveners: Lorely French, Marina Ortrud M. Hertrampf, Sofiya Zahova) 104 n Migration and Adaptation to New Environments (convener: Zdeněk Uherek) 121 n Pal o Roma romanes / Pa Rom romanes (Panel in Romani) (conveners: Jan Červenka, Markéta Hajská) 131 CONTENTS 16 differently, particularly for „historically oppressed groups, based on their varied interlocking demographics (e.g., race, ethnicity, gender, class)“ (Bowleg, 2020). In this case, a “colour-blind” approach would definitely not help the Roma (and other vulnerable or marginalised groups)6 to overcome structural inequalities and institutional discrimination (Filčák and Škobla, 2021). It has already been pointed out that, in fact, it might be disguised racism. Colour-blind racism is blind to the fact that the problems at hand are worse for communities of colour and may thus require race-based social policies to address them in the most effective and targeted way (Bonilla-Silva, 2020). The pandemic situation displayed in the most alarming way that over-ethnicisation (excessive accentuation of the ethnic perspective) as well as de-ethnicisation (its intentional suppression/ silencing) of issues, measures, and strategies may serve as a practical (political) tool for an objective fixing of the unfavourable position of the Romani ethnic minority (Podolinská, 2017). As a result, they contribute to the perpetuation of majoritarian dominance and structural asymmetries in societies. At the beginning of 2020, the World Health Organization issued a Guide to Preventing and Addressing Social Stigma Associated with COVID-19, stating in the Overview that “social stigma in the context of health is the negative association between a person or group of people who share certain characteristics and a specific disease. […] People who don’t have the disease but share other characteristics with this group may also suffer from the stigma. The current COVID-19 outbreak has provoked social stigma and discriminatory behaviours against people of certain ethnic backgrounds as well as anyone perceived to have been in contact with the virus” (WHO, 2020). COVID-19 impacted people on global scale. People of colour or specific ethnic background and members of minoritarian groups experienced not only the stress of getting sick, but they also had to face social stigmatisation, imposed social distancing, and negative quarantine. COVID-19 taught us to recognise that the problems made apparent during the COVID-19 pandemic have a structural nature, e.g., class and racial inequalities, the lack of a proper safety net, and the need for universal health care (Bonilla-Silva, 2020). We have also learnt lessons that health issues may serve as a tool for social stigmatisation and “bio-securitisation” and deteriorate the situation of those who are most exposed to danger. The virus has thus revealed the “erosion of our limited, highly racialised welfare states, which have left large segments of society vulnerable to health and economic disasters” (Ward, 2005). The virus has also displayed that the intellectual and cultural colonialism (Irfan et al., 2020) OPENING WORD 6 The Roma were not alone in facing the “pandemic of racism” Across the globe, the Chinese, Asians, Black and Brown people were blamed for spreading the virus in majoritarian societies and faced discrimination and securitisation and even violence (Irfan et al., 2020). 17 ROMA IN THE MIDST OF THE PANDEMIC OF RACISM AND SOCIAL STIGMATISATION is still vibrant in our societies and that we need to acquire cultural respect, translated into discursive sensitivity and ethnically balanced decisions. Nevertheless, the pandemic has also manifested something else: that politically imposed racism, fuelled and repeated by the media and in social discourse, has not fallen on very fertile ground and has failed to significantly mobilize the public opinion against ethnic minorities at the level of individual nation states. In Slovakia, for instance, during the first phase of the pandemic, the racist discourse and the blaming of the Roma were particularly strong. After strong criticism by activists, the NGO sector, and the academia, the discourse developed to be more sensitive of the fact that words do matter, and politicians (as well as health experts) learnt that one of the most effective ways of managing the pandemic is to peacefully handle the communication with the media, which leads to the calming of the overall situation. During the pandemic, we also observed growing spontaneous human solidarity within communities, both among the Roma and non-Roma. Romani migrants, for instance, were sending (financial or other) assistance to their home town districts, neighbourhoods or localities, helping not only their own relatives, but often also their non-Romani neighbours.7 The non-governmental sector, civic associations, charity organisations, etc. were also active in providing help. “Ordinary people” were also engaged; face masks were sewn in many countries, volunteers delivered food to the elderly or dependent citizens, etc. Both Romani and non-Romani health mediators organised assistance to all those who needed it most (Belák, forthcoming). They helped to fight the disease in Romani settlements in a targeted and effective way, provided information, support, consolation, all that was necessary, often 24-hours a day (for assistance in Slovakia, see: Mižigárová, forthcoming). Improvisation, lack of information, and frequently chaotic decisions led to the loss of trust in the state, the government, and the official healthcare system. However, the pandemic mobilised grassroots activism and self-help (Hrustič, 2022) as well as neighbourhood and mutual support in many places, strengthening faith in one’s strengths and abilities, activating local resources, and promoting coherence within communities across ethnic and racial categorisations. COVID-19 also affected academic communities considerably. We were unable to continue our field research, and learnt how to accommodate our research into the “home-office” mode. We were unable to travel physically, and so we quickly developed and learnt effective ways of communicating at distance, sharing instantly our scientific knowledge. From this point view, the virus contributed to even more digitised academia, research has become even more internationalised and trans-disciplinary. This has all contributed to the unprecedentedly accelerated exchange of knowledge via various forms of webinars, online or hybrid conferences, 7 The case of Bulgaria, from my e-mail communication with E. Marushiakova, June 17, 2021. 18 like the Gypsy Lore Society conference and annual meeting in Prague in September 2021. Let us keep those habits and vibrant energy for the post-pandemic times, which we are all desperately looking forward to! REFERENCES: n Anghel, I. M. 2019. ‘It’s in Their Blood’. The Securitization of Roma Westward Migration in Europe. Calitatea Vieþii, 30 (2): 146–161. n Arza Porras, J., Gil-González, D., Català-Oltra, L. et al. 2020. COVID-19 Crisis: Impact on households of the Roma community. International Journal of Roma Studies, 2 (2): 28–51. doi: 10.17583/ijrs.2020.6242. n Belák, A., Fiľakovská Bobáková, D., Madarasová Gecková, A., van Dijk, J.P., Reijneveld, S.A. 2020. Why don’t health care frontline professionals do more for segregated Roma? Exploring mechanisms supporting unequal care practices. Social Science & Medicine, Feb; 246:112739. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2019.112739. n Belák, A. (forthcoming). O my antiracist friends, where art thou? A health expert’s diary of hopes and frustrations regarding pandemic prevention and control across segregated Roma enclaves. In: Gay y Blasco, P., Fotta, M., Eds. Romani Chronicles of COVID-19. Berghahn. n Berescu, C., Alexandrescu, F., Anghel, I. M. 2020. Vulnerable Roma communities in times of the Covid-19 negative quarantine. Moravian Geographical Reports, 29 (2): 125–136. doi: 10.2478/mgr-2021-0011. n Bonilla-Silva, E. 2020. Color-Blind Racism in Pandemic Times. First Published July 31, 2020. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/2332649220941024. n Bowleg, L. 2020. We’re Not All in This Together: On COVID-19, Intersectionality, and Structural Inequality. American Journal Of Public Health, 110 (7): 917-917. doi: 10.2105/ ajph.2020.30576. n Bulgarian Institute for Legal Initiatives. 2020. The state of emergency in the large minority neighbourhoods, March 13–May 13, 2020. Sofia, Bulgarian Institute for Legal Initiatives. n EURACTIV. 2020. Bulgarian authorities struggle to enforce containment with Roma population. Available at: https://www.euractiv.com/section/languages-culture/news/ bulgarian-authorities-struggle-to-enforce-containment-with-roma-population/. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n Filčák, R., Škobla, D. 2021. Sanitation Infrastructure at the Systemic Edge: Segregated Roma n Settlements and Multiple Health Risks in Slovakia. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18: 6079, doi:10.3390/ijerph18116079. OPENING WORD 19 ROMA IN THE MIDST OF THE PANDEMIC OF RACISM AND SOCIAL STIGMATISATION n Gabrizova, Z. 2020. Slovakia to merge two stages as the country starts reopening. Available at: https://www.euractiv.com/section/health-consumers/short_news/slovakia-covid-19update/. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n Hrustič, T. (forthcoming). ‘In difficult times we should stick together’. Romani self-help initiatives and awareness raising activities as an immediate reaction to Corona virus spread early in March 2020. In: Gay y Blasco, P., Fotta, M., Eds. Romani Chronicles of COVID-19. Berghahn. n Irfan A., Bieniek-Tobasco, A., Golembeski, C. 2020. Pandemic of racism: public health implications of political misinformation. Harvard Public Health Review, 28. n Kramer, A., Guillory, J., & Hancock, J. 2014. Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks. Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences, 111 (24), 8788-8790. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1320040111(https://doi. org/10.1073/pnas.1320040111). Accessed on: July 9, 2021 n Krasimirov, A., Tsolova, T. 2020. Bulgaria’s Roma say some coronavirus measures are discriminatory. Reuters. Available at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirusbulgaria-roma-idUSKBN21B355. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n Mižigárová, A. (forthcoming). Quarantine, segregation and resistance: The case of Žehra. In: Gay y Blasco, P., Fotta, M., Eds. Romani Chronicles of COVID-19. Berghahn. n Newman, B., Merolla, J., Shah, S., Lemi, D., Collingwood, L., & Ramakrishnan, S. 2020. The Trump Effect: An Experimental Investigation of the Emboldening Effect of Racially Inflammatory Elite Communication. British Journal Of Political Science, 1–22. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1017/s0007123419000590. n Podolinská, T. 2017. Roma in Slovakia––silent and invisible minority: Social Networking and Pastoral Pentecostal Discourse as a case of giving voice and positive visibility. Slovenský národopis / Slovak Ethnology, 65 (2): 135–57. Available at: https://www.sav.sk/journals/ uploads/0704111304%20slovensky_narodopis_2_2017_podolinska.pdf. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n Yore, H. 2020. Coronavirus and HIV Parallels: On Racializing and Queering Illness. Advocate. com. Available at: https://www.advocate.com/commentary/2020/2/26/coronavirus-andhiv-parallels-racializing-and-queering-illness. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n Sevelius, J. M., Gutierrez-Mock, L., Zamudio-Haas, S., McCree, B., Ngo, A., Jackson, A., Clynes, C., Venegas, L., Salinas, A., Herrera, C., Stein, E. Operario, D., Gamarel, K. 2020. Research with Marginalized Communities: Challenges to Continuity During the COVID-19 Pandemic. AIDS and Behavior, 24: 2009–12. Doi: 10.1007/s10461-020-02920-3. n van Baar, H., Ivasiuc, A., Kreide, R. 2019. The Securitization of the Roma in Europe. Cham, Palgrave Macmillan. 20 n Virostkova, L. 2020. Slovak army deployed to quarantine Roma settlements. EUOBSERVER Available at: https://euobserver.com/. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n Ward, Deborah E. 2005. The White Welfare State: The Racialization of U.S. Welfare Policy. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. n WHO. 2015. WHO best practices for naming of new human infectious diseases. Who.int. Available at: https://www.who.int/topics/infectious_diseases/naming-new-diseases/en/. Accessed on: July 9, 2021. n WHO. 2020. A guide to preventing and addressing social stigma associated with COVID-19. Available at: https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/a-guide-to-preventingand-addressing-social-stigma-associated-with-covid-19?gclid=Cj0KCQjwubHBhCyARIsAPc tr7zmILd2RkU8dvQMYl4CV7QXzpeYUrBOvbLPvdmeY1RFh_Ifq5AAsOgaAi8NEALw_wcB. Accessed on July 10, 2021. OPENING WORD 21 30 YEARS OF PRAGUE ROMANI STUDIES AT CHARLES UNIVERSITY (1991–2021) INTRODUCTION There is yet another subject we have introduced in the last academic year in the belief that it will serve the public well, particularly those employed in the fields of pedagogy and public awareness. It is the Romani language taught by Milena Hübschmannová. […] The social relevance of this field of study is reflected in the composition of the current class: a curator from the social-work department at the Municipal National Council in Prague 8, two office workers from the Municipal House of Culture in Prague 6, several teachers, a historian, some students, etc. […] The aim of the course is to help the students develop active speaking skills in Romani. The teaching material is selected so as to make the students familiar with Romani culture, folklore, literature written by Romani authors and Romani traditions and customs. […] The students practise by regularly providing transcription of Romani recordings (songs, fairy tales, interviews) from a tape recorder. Under the leadership of c[omrade] Hübschmannová, the students visit Romani families, write down their utterances (Romani cultural customs, education of children, traditional occupations, cooking instructions, etc.). […] C[omrade] Hübschmannová is preparing an anthology of texts in Romani to be used as teaching material for the course, the publication of which however remains an open question. From a report by Zorica Dubovská on Romani language courses at Language School in Prague newly opened in the academic year 1976/1977 (Dubovská 1977)3 Regardless of the language tinted with communist jargon, the short report on the classes of Romani language at the Language School in Prague in 1970s very accurately describes 30 years of Prague Romani Studies at Charles University (1991–2021)1 Helena Sadílková, Pavel Kubaník Seminar of Romani Studies, Department of Central European Studies Faculty of Arts, Charles University2 1 The text was written within the framework of the Grant no. 19-26638X, funded by the Czech Science Foundation. 2 We would like to express our gratitude to the reviewers of the text and our colleagues for their valuable comments: Jan Červenka, Lada Viková, and Milada Závodská. 3 We are grateful to Michael Beníšek for sharing this unique document with us. 22 the teaching aims and methods of Milena Hübschmannová, a key figure of post-war Romani studies in Czechoslovakia and the founder of today’s Romani Studies Seminar at Charles University.4 Close contact with the Roma and their culture, and involvement of students of Romani language as co-workers in research and production of public outputs continued to lay the basis of the studies of Romani language at the Department of Indian Studies at the Faculty of Arts since 1991. What journey needed to be travelled from the opening of the Romani language courses in 1976 to the establishment of Romani as a university study program in 1991 at Charles University in Prague and the creation of Romani Studies Seminar in 2000? And what are its current shapes? We would like to take the opportunity to outline these developments and their contexts and thus to present this unique university department to the audience of the 2021 GLS Conference on Romani Studies, taking place in Prague on the anniversary of 30 years of its existence. The uniqueness of this university unit lies precisely in the fact that it is the oldest institution worldwide offering a complex BC and MA study program focused on the language, history, and culture of the Roma at university level. It continues to be one of the few university institutions that take the language of the Roma as the basis of the study, providing not only the possibility to study the language as a medium of communication, but also focusing on other aspects of its development and existence today, all this in combination with courses on the history, culture, arts and other aspects of the life of the Roma. Keeping this combination in mind, Romani Studies in Prague not only offers more courses about Roma, their history, and culture including the arts than any other institution in former Czechoslovakia but represents a university unit that is unique in the complex approach to the topic of the Roma.5 Hübschmannová herself (Hübschmannová 2000) describes the opening of the Romani courses in 1976 as a milestone in the institutionalization of Romani studies in Czechoslovakia. Viewed against the backdrop of the then development of the socio-political situation in Czechoslovakia in general and in the approach to the Roma in particular, the opening of the Romani courses at the state-run Language School seems to be an anomaly. They were opened only three years 4 For the summary of Milena Hübschmannová‘s work and contributions to Romani studies in the international perspective, see for example Friedman (2005). A thematic issue of Romano džaniben presented an assessment of her work by Czech, Slovak and Romani researchers and colleagues as well as her friends – Romano džaniben 13 (2006), 1 (ňilaj). 5 Several other Czech and Slovak universities have included Romani language courses as part of their study programs – currently, courses on some aspects of the life of the Roma and their cultural heritage are offered at universities in Pardubice (CZ), Nitra (SK), and Prešov (SK). While the newly established study program in Prešov focuses on the education of teachers of Romani and literature and its curriculum – based on the model of the Prague Romani Studies program – covers not only the language but also other aspects of Romani studies, the other programs specialize in the broader disciplines of social work (Nitra) and social anthropology (Pardubice) and offer additional courses on the language or specific Romani studies sub-fields. OPENING WORD 23 after the dissolution of Svaz Cikánů-Romů (Union of Gypsies-Roma, UGR), a unique socio-political organization of Czechoslovak Roma (Donert 2017, Lhotka 2009), which marked the end of hopes that the state approach to the Roma in Czechoslovakia, after almost 15 years of assimilation pressure, could be redefined so as to accommodate a national minority approach. The official assimilation ideology declared Romani a language without a future and called any attempts at its use and further development futile (Sus 1961: 30–32, 36–37). Because of her involvement in the Union and her open disagreement with the assimilation policy, including the approach to the language, Hübschmannová found herself without a permanent job. In this precarious situation it was her professional and personal connections – as a graduate of Hindi, Urdu and Bengali at Charles University and thus with links to the Czech Indian studies circles – that helped her not only to find an employment6 but also to establish a safe haven for the development of research and teaching of Romani culture and language according to her vision and outside the pressure of the official establishment. It also allowed for the establishment of a group of students and colleagues that later became important in the future development of Czech Romani studies networks in the post-1989 Czechoslovakia.7 While focusing on the teaching of Romani in the complex context of the culture of the Roma, aiming at especially the non-Romani public, Hübschmannová also further developed her cooperation with culturally and socio-politically active Roma.8 Her classes at the Language School offered these Romani activists courses of creative writing, overview of grammar of their mother tongue as well as a space where their visions for the future could be discussed. The tacit understanding and support on the side of the colleagues at the Department of Oriental Languages at the Language School of her emancipatory approach to the issues that concerned the Roma and 6 Hübschmannová did not become a regular employee of the Language School until 1982, before then, she had been in the position of an external lecturer. 7 Several of her students from the Language School later became important figures in Czech Romani studies, such as Zbyněk Andrš, Hana Šebková, Lada Viková, Anna Žigová and Edita Žlnayová. The output of the work launched in those years – before 1989 mostly published abroad – include, for example, the so far unsurpassed Czech-Romani dictionary published in 1991, covering the northcentral dialect of Romani (Hübschmannová, Šebková, Žigová 1991; see also Romlex for its on-line adaptation – http://romani.uni-graz.at/romlex/). Andrš together with another student from the Language School, Ruben Pellar, were key figures in the documentation of the forced sterilization campaign targeting Romani women in Czechoslovakia since the early 1970s and in the long-lasting fight to put a stop to this practice and compensate its victims. This fight is hopefully nearing its end as the Czech Parliament is currently discussing the law that would allow for the compensation of the victims of the campaign (see Öfner, de Rooij, Andrš, Pellar, 2019; Sadílková 2019; Sokolová 2008). Andrš and Viková have formed a team currently teaching Romani studies courses at the University of Pardubice. 8 Her textbooks (Hübschmannová 1973, 1976) and other texts prepaired as teaching materials very often made use of authentic texts – narratives, literature, folklore – collected among the Roma including politically active Roma and members of their families. 30 YEARS OF PRAGUE ROMANI STUDIES AT CHARLES UNIVERSITY (1991–2021) 24 of dissent from the assimilationist views that continued to lay at the basis of the communist state approach to the Roma in the 1970s and 80s is reflected also in the fact that the above quoted report uses consistently the term “Romové“ (Roma) and “romština” (Romani) instead of the term “C/cikán” (Gypsy) and “cikánština” (Gypsy language)9 then used in all aspects of public life and official communication (or the “Gypsies-Roma” compromise coined in the circles of the already non-existent UGR). ATTEMPTS AT INCLUSION OF ROMANI STUDIES RESEARCH INTO CZECHOSLOVAK STATE RESEARCH STRUCTURES BETWEEN 1948–1989 The uniqueness of the Romani studies unit at the Language School in Prague and the relative freedom it offered Hübschmannová and her colleagues becomes even more obvious when seen in the context of the history of the attempts to include Romani studies research into the official research structures in communist Czechoslovakia via the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences between 1948–1989 (Sadílková 2016: 11–19, 33–36, 49–54). The idea of establishing a research unit focused on the Roma as well as the teaching of Romani was in communist Czechoslovakia voiced for the first time in the early 1950s in the context of the debate regarding the possibility of grounding the approach to the Roma on their conceptualisation as a national minority. It was in this time when the first steps to integrate Romani studies (or the study of Romani in particular) into the official research plan of the Institute of Oriental Studies within the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences were taken (Závodská 2018: 67, Pavelčíková 2004: 35–36).10 This venture, however, had no tangible results, probably also due to the stiffening of the ideological approach towards the Romani issue. The communist leadership decided to abandon the soft emancipatory approach and, supported by the reports produced by the Ministry of Interior (Spurný 2011), declared, in 1958, the policy of complete assimilation of “Gypsies” as the new line of dealing with the Romani issue.11 In the following decades, the central authorities initiated two further 9 While the term „Cikán/cikán“ was used in all official communication during communism, in Czech it carries a rather pejorative connotation, especially when used in lower case (“cikán”) marking a socially defined group. (For the discussion of the possible translation of the term into and from English, see Červenka 2015.) 10 Among others, for example Vincenc Lesný, a linguist and an important figure of the interwar Oriental/ Indian studies in Czechoslovakia and one of the first members of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, was interested in the study of Romani alongside his major focus on Indian languages already in the interwar period. In 1952, the Institute of Oriental Studies was also in contact with Antonín Daniel, a teacher and an important figure of the Romani emancipation movement in communist Czechoslovakia. In late 1940s, Daniel was in contact with the Gypsy Lore Society via his cooperation with Stewart Mann – publishing texts on and from his native Romani community in the JGLS (Závodská 2018). OPENING WORD 25 attempts (in 1965 and 1977) to establish a Romani studies unit within the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences (CSAS) in the proclaimed attempt to base and asses specific state policies targeting the “Gypsies” on scientific research. Neither of these thus envisaged teaching as part of the planned activities. As a matter of fact, the research teams were indeed established within the CSAS but with a delay of several years which had important repercussions on their focus, publication outputs and further existence/development – all of these further influenced by the turbulent political developments in Czechoslovakia at the turn of the 1960s and in the late 1980s. In 1968 a small team was created inside the Institute for Philosophy and Sociology of the CSAS, with Hübschmannová and Davidová as key leaders of the research based mainly on sociologic and ethnographic approaches. While originally the task of the envisaged research team was connected with the implementation of the state campaign from 1965, focused on the state-organized resettlement of the Romani population and their equal redistribution across the Czechoslovak territory, by the time the team was created, the policy had been proclaimed a failure by the state authorities themselves. The research was thus focused more on the phenomenon of the continuing work migration of Roma from Slovakia to the Czech Lands, which laid the basis of today’s Romani population in Czechia, its patterns and effects, including the reactions of local authorities and attitudes of the local non-Romani communities. It was especially this line of research – stemming also from the atmosphere of the growing reformist movement allowing for the critical assessment of previous approaches also in the field of “the question of citizens of Gypsy origin” – which made obvious the problem of acceptance of the Romani migrants by the Czech society, exacerbated by state social engineering policies and rather high proportion of negative stereotyping towards the Roma (Davidová-Turčínová 1970, Guy 1977, Hübschmannová 1970). The team had the ambition to cooperate also with historians – Ctibor Nečas and Vlasta Kladivová who were at the beginning of their research of the 11 The early 1950s was a time when a number of university students across Czechoslovakia graduated with a theses focused on the Roma. Among them two ethnographers, Eva Davidová and Emília Čajánková (Horváthová), and the linguist Jiří Lípa. All of them continued with their research in the following decades and became important figures in the Czechoslovak Romani Studies field, having to cope with the political and ideological pressures stemming from the assimilationist approach. For example, Lípa’s doubts about the possibility of development of Romani (Lípa 1963: 11) were used by the communist ideology to support the assimilatory perspective. Andrš (2021) suggests Lípa ran courses of Romani language – most probably at the Faculty of Arts at Charles University – already in the academic year 1954–55. This would very probably be the very first presence of Romani courses at Charles University. Lípa also assisted Milena Hübschmannová in her study of Romani in the mid-1950s, their views on the future of Romani were however in stark contrast (Hübschmannová 2000). For the discussion of the impact of the ideology and political pressures of the time on the approach of Emília Horváthová and her publications see Mann 1996. 30 YEARS OF PRAGUE ROMANI STUDIES AT CHARLES UNIVERSITY (1991–2021) 32 materials for the students of Romani studies, but also the lack of texts on and by the Roma for the general public, including the Roma. Having transformed into a peer reviewed scientific journal (www.dzaniben.cz), the journal continues to publish texts (in Czech and Slovak) on and by the Roma, cooperating also with the international pool of researchers in Romani studies. It also offers one of the major platforms for publication of texts in different dialects of Romani in the Czechoslovak context. Since 2010, Romano džaniben and the Romani Studies Seminar have been organizing a cycle of public lectures and debates, which has become an important platform for the discussion of current research and applied projects in the field of Romani studies in CR as well as for networking among researchers and interested public. CLOSING WORDS With a 30-year long history, it is perhaps not exaggerated to say that the Seminar of Romani Studies forms an important part of the Czech and Slovak infrastructure that supports further development of research in the field of Romani Studies, enables the dissemination of information on the culture and history of the Roma, and contributes to the cultivation of the public debate regarding the Roma and, in the long run, to the improvement of their position in the current society. We are acutely aware of the fact that antigypsyism, negative stereotyping and structural discrimination of the Roma unfortunately continue to be a part of our everyday reality. We are proud to see that many of our Romani as well as non-Romani graduates continue to work in fields that deal in one way or another with the different problems that members of the Romani communities face in the current society using the knowledge, skills, insight and networks that they have developed while studying at our institution. While the individual achievements of our graduates remain their personal successes and fruits of their personal skills, endeavours and ambitions, it is interesting to see how at least some of them asses the benefits of having studied at our department:20 Romani Studies has offered me, as a native speaker of Romani, a certain superstructure, such as the knowledge of Romani grammar, dialects, etc. But first and foremost, the studies have armed me with arguments in relation to the situation of the Roma, because here it is the historical connection and the capacity to include the topics into a wider context that is so important. (David Tišer, the director of the NGO Ara Art, production of theatre and cultural events, LGBTQ advocacy group) OPENING WORD 20 All quotations come from a short Facebook video published as part of the promotion campaign for the Seminar of Romani Studies in 2021: https://www.facebook.com/romistikaFFUK/videos/400396474710227 33 Similarly to the Czechs who have the opportunity to study their own language and support their identity, I also had the chance to learn more about my own language. We know that Romani absorbed many words from other languages, and this has opened for me the door also to these other languages and their histories. (Michal Mižigár, Central European University) Apart from information on the history, culture and language of the Roma, Romani Studies have taught me to think about them and assess them critically. Romani Studies offered me the opportunity of further professional development and work, by which I can contribute to both the Czech and Romani society by bringing new information and knowledge. (Renata Berkyová, Institute of Contemporary History, Czech Academy of Sciences) While studying at the Romani Studies Seminar, I learned Romani, which is something I appreciate very much because I come from a Roman family but I did not speak Romani at all until then. I learned a lot from the history of the Roma, ethnology, etc. But what I value the most is the fact that I learned how to search for information, how to assess and think about it and how to work with it. (Veronika Hlaváčová, Romea media organization) While trying to keep the best of its heritage and expanding on it, the Seminar of Romani Studies continues to face several challenges. Among those ranks the recognition of the necessity of the presence of Romani voices in the public space, including the university and the academia, that continues to be an issue also in the current Romani studies debates. Hübschmannová was acutely aware of the absence of the “Romani voices” in the public space and she tried to challenge it with the means she had at her disposal: devoting large space in her texts to Romani voices (including the comprehensive oral history edition on war-time Slovakia – Hübschmannová 2005); inviting Roma as guest/co-lecturers; supporting the writing and publication of literary texts written by Roma; and the inclusion of Roma as authors of diverse texts inside the Romano džaniben journal. In the Czech context this set-up, and her open support of the Romani emancipation movement, were later criticized for mixing the academic and activist approach. Similarly, the same issue revolving around the possible interconnections between academia and activism and their limits re-surfaced recently in the Romani studies field in a wider geographical space. The Prague Romani Studies Seminar continues to negotiate its position in these debates and in the realities of the support of the participation of Roma in the academia. The challenges of keeping a university study program defined by topic/focus rather than a specific disciplinary methodology and constant searching for further (cross)disciplinary co-operation – which lays at the foundation of the study program itself – also remains an ongoing concern. 30 YEARS OF PRAGUE ROMANI STUDIES AT CHARLES UNIVERSITY (1991–2021) 34 The impacts of the Covid-19 related pandemic measures, including the necessity to move all teaching and public activities on-line and cope with limited options of research travel belong to the obvious current issues we are dealing with, trying to use for the best the experiences we have made during this uneasy period. Having had to postpone the 2020 GLS Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies to this year, we sincerely hope that the hybrid form of the event will be a good start to the renewal of the so important face-to-face meetings and discussions and networking in our professional field and that we will continue to meet with most of you in the future in the diverse fora that the Romani studies discipline creates and offers. REFERENCES n Andrš, Z. Za Jiřím Lípou, zapomenutým romistou. Romano voďi 2021, no. 6 (červen), p. 14–15. n Červenka, J. 2000. Úloha české romistiky při poznávání Romů. In: Terénní výzkum integrace a segregace: Týmový monitoring situace obcí s romskými sídly v SR a studentské výzkumy v ČR. (Praha): Cargo, 267–270. n Červenka, J. 2015. „Cikán, Gypsy & Rom“ – dynamika pojmenovávání Romů v různých diskurzech. In: Podolinská, Tatina, Hrustič, Tomáš. Čierno-biele svety. Rómovia v majoritnej spoločnosti na Slovensku. Bratislava: Veda, Ústav etnológie SAV, 324–345. n Davidová-Turčínová, E. 1970. Cikánské-romské etnikum v Ostravě (ekologická analýza a problém vývojových změn Cikánů-Romů v městském průmyslovém prostředí). Praha/Ostrava: Výzkumný ústav výstavby a architektury. n Donert, C. 2017. The Rights of the Roma. The Struggle for Citizenship in Postwar Czechoslovakia. Cambridge University Press. n Dubovská, Z. 1977. Nové obory na orientálním oddělení Jazykové školy v Praze [New subujects at the Department of Oriental Languages of the Language School in Prague]. Zprávy Československé společnosti orientalistické při ČSAV, XIV (1977), 1: 36–37. n Friedman, V. A. Obituaries: Milena Hübschmannová. Romani Studies vol. 15, no. 2, (Dec 2005): 175–179. n Grulich, T., Haišman, T. 1986. Institucionální zájem o cikánské obyvatelstvo v Československu v letech 1945–1958. Český lid, 73 (1986), 2: 72–85. n Guy, W. 1977. The Attempt of Socialist Czechoslovakia to Assimilate its Gypsy Population. Unpublished dissertation thesis. University of Bristol, UK. n Holman, P. 2017. Za Jaroslavem Vackem. Bubínek revolveru, 1. 2. 2017. Available at: https:// www.bubinekrevolveru.cz/za-jaroslavem-vackem [accessed 2021-07-15] n Hübschmannová, M. 1970. Co je tzv. cikánská otázka. Sociologický časopis 6 (1970), 2: 105–118. n Hübschmannová, M. 1973. Základy romštiny. Praha: Academia. OPENING WORD 35 n Hübschmannová, M. 1976. Cikánština. Metodický materiál pro učitele cikánských dětí. Ústí nad Labem: Krajský pedagogický ústav. n Hübschmannová, M. (2000). Romistické studie. A collection of texts for university habilitattion. Filozofická fakulta, Univerzita Karlova. n Hübschmannová, M. 2005. “Po židoch cigáni.” Svědectví Romů ze Slovenska 1939–1945. Praha: Triáda. n Hübschmannová, M., Šebková, H., Žigová, A. 1991. Romsko-český, česko-romský kapesní slovník. Praha, Státní pedagogické nakladatelsví. n Lhotka, P. 2009. Svaz Cikánů-Romů 1969–1973. In: Lhotka, P., Schuster, M., Závodská, M., eds. Svaz Cikánů-Romů 1969–1973: doprovodná publikace k výstavě Muzea romské kultury „Svaz Cikánů-Romů (1969–1973) – z historie první romské organizace v českých zemích“. Brno: Muzeum romské kultury, 5–23. n Lhotka P., Závodská M. Profesor Ctibor Nečas – historik a zakladatel vědeckého zkoumání holocaustu Romů. Romano džaniben 20 (2013), 1: 7–19. n Lípa, J. 1963. Příručka cikánštiny. Praha: Státní pedagogické nakladatelství, 1963. n Kramářová, J. et al. 2005. (Ne)bolí. Vzpomínky Romů na válku a život po válce. Praha: Člověk v tísni. n Mann, A. B. 1996. Zakladatelka romistiky na Slovensku Emília Horváthová (1931–1996). Romano džabinen 3 (1996), 1/2: 141–144. n Öfner P., de Rooij, B., Andrš, Z., Pellar, R. 2019. Odkupování plodnosti. Výzkum sterilizačních praktik týkajících se romských žen v Československu, který provedli Paul Öfner a Bert de Rooij z pověření sdružení Vereniging Lau Mazirel a nadace Stichting Informatie over Charta 77. Překlad zprávy z roku 1990. Romano džaniben 26 (2019), 2: 147–215. n Pavelčíková, N. 2004. Romové v českých zemích v letech 1945–1989. Praha: UDVZK. n Romano džaniben, 13 (2006), 1 (ňilaj). Available at: https://www.dzaniben.cz/files/c26609d0af31e6e18150be094f2acfb4.PDF [accessed 2021-07-15] n Sadílková, H. 2016. Poválečná historie Romů v Československu ve vzpomínkách pamětníků: Možnosti rekonstrukce poválečné migrace vybrané skupiny Romů ze Slovenska do českých zemí. (Unpublished dissertation thesis). Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague. n Sadílková, H. 2019. Historie a historiografie nucených sterilizací romských žen v Československu a jejich přesahu do současnosti. Úvod k tematickému číslu Romano džaniben. Romano džaniben 26 (2019), 2: 5–18. n Sadílková H., Slačka D., Závodská M. 2018. Aby bylo s námi počítáno: Společensko-politická angažovanost Romů a snahy o založení romské organizace v poválečném Československu. Brno: Muzeum romské kultury. 30 YEARS OF PRAGUE ROMANI STUDIES AT CHARLES UNIVERSITY (1991–2021) 36 n Sokolova, V. 2008. Cultural politics of ethnicity: discourses on Roma in communist Czechoslovakia. Stuttgart: Ibidem. n Spurný, M. 2011. Nejsou jako my. Česká společnost a menšiny v pohraničí (1945–1960). Antikomplex, Praha. n Sus, J. 1961. Cikánská otázka v ČSSR. Praha: SNPL. n Šebková, H., Žlnayová, E. 1999. Romaňi čhib. Učebnice slovenské romštiny. Praha: Fortuna. n Uherek, Z., Weinerová, R. 2004. Migrace do České republiky, sociální integrace a lokální společnosti v zemích původu. In: Uherek, Zdeněk et al. Migrace do České republiky, sociální integrace a lokální společnosti v zemích původu: (prostor bývalého SSSR a slovenští Romové): výzkumná zpráva. Praha: Etnologický ústav AV ČR, 176–203. n Závodská M. 2018. Žákovská a studentská léta učitele Antonína Daniela. Romano džaniben 25 (2018), 1: 59–92. n Zpravodaj koordinované sítě vědeckých informací pro etnologii a folkloristiku: Materiály k problematice etnických skupin na území ČSSR, 1986, no. 7, part 2 (Cikáni v průmyslovém městě – problematika adaptace a asimilace). OPENING WORD 37 ROMANI STUDIES AT THE INSTITUTE OF ETHNOLOGY OF THE CZECH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES AND THE INSTITUTE OF SOCIOLOGICAL STUDIES, FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, CHARLES UNIVERSITY Romani studies are in various forms present at a relatively large range of Czech academic institutions. In addition to the Department of Central European Studies, authors dealing with the Roma are affiliated with anthropological university units at Charles University, University of Pardubice, and University of West Bohemia. They are also at the Faculty of Education, Charles University, where a research team of school ethnography was established, and at several institutes of the Czech Academy of Sciences (Institute of Ethnology, Institute of Contemporary History). This text pays special attention to the Institute of Ethnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Sociological Studies of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, mainly because they are the co-organizing institutions of the Gypsy Lore Society meeting in 2021. Thus, it is desirable to provide more information about them. INSTITUTE OF ETHNOLOGY OF THE CZECH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES Romani studies have a relatively long tradition at this academic institution. The Roma have been systematically studied there since the 1970s. The academic team partly thematically and personally followed the previous work of the first prominent personalities 1 This study was written with the institutional support of the Institute of Ethnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences, v.v.i., RVO: 68378076 and the support of Strategy AV21, the research programme “Society in Motion and Public Policies”. Romani Studies at the Institute of Ethnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Sociological Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University Zdeněk Uherek Charles University, Czech Academy of Sciences1 38 of Czech Romani studies Milena Hübschmannová and Eva Davidová in the then Institute for Philosophy and Sociology of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences in the 1960s. However, activities in Ethnological Institute (at that time Institute of Ethnography and Folkloristics of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences) reflected only some aspects of the life of the Roma and focused mainly on the Czech lands, not Slovakia as it was previously at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology. Since most Romani families migrated to the Czech lands from Slovakia after World War II and settled in Czech and Moravian industrial cities, the research activities primarily focused on Romani urban settlements and changes in the Romani lifestyle in the post-migration period. Although the research projects “Gypsies in the Industrial City” in essence focused on integration and assimilation of the Roma into the urban society from a sociological point of view, Tomáš Haišman, who gradually became the main organizer of Roma-related research at the Institute of Ethnology, enabled enough space for the mapping of Romani cultural life and traditional social institutions as well. The largest corpus of data on the topic was collected from the 1970s until the 1990s in Kladno, an industrial town approximately 25 kilometres northwest of Prague, where Tomáš Haišman, Renata Weinerová, Ivana Kubečková, Věra Pelíšková, and Denisa Lipavská made their enquiries (Haišman 1978; Cikáni v průmyslovém městě 1986; Cikáni v průmyslovém městě 1988), and in Český Krumlov, a town near the Austrian border, where Eva Davidová worked and lived for a long time (Davidová 1988). In addition to the works framing the basic field activities of the research team for Romani studies, several other texts dealing with the history of the Roma in the Czech lands and their sociability were written at the Institute of Ethnology until 1989. Most of them were devoted to the archival study of the state institution´s records (Grulich, Haišman 1986; Haišman 1989). After 1989, the Institute of Ethnology responded to the changed social situation of the Roma, which became apparent especially after the partition of Czechoslovakia in 1992 and the establishment of the independent Czech Republic in 1993. A project called “Romanies – the search for lost security?” was designed by Renata Weinerová. She published her results within the institutional publication series Prague Occasional Papers in Ethnology. Her publication describes the problems that some Romani families were facing in the early 1990s following the changes in the situation on the labour market and in the atmosphere in the Czech society (Weinerová 1994). One of the effects of these lost securities was the increased migration of the Czech and Slovak Roma abroad, especially to the West of Europe, the United Kingdom and Canada. OPENING WORD 39 In the 1990s and at the beginning of the 21st century, these were migrations associated with asylum claims, hence attracting public attention not only in the Czech Republic but also in the destination countries. Similarly, attention was raised by the Romani migration from Slovakia to the Czech Republic, which had since 1993 become international. The Institute of Ethnology has paid attention to both types of these migrations in several projects and undertook field enquiries especially in Eastern Slovakia (Zdeněk Uherek, Eva Davidová, Renata Weinerová, Kateřina Plochová) and in Canada (Zdeněk Uherek, Jana Grohmannová, Veronika Beranská). On the example of Romani migration from Slovakia, the concept of the so-called unfinished chain migration was developed. It was applied to the migration of the Roma from the Czech Republic to Western countries after 1989 (Uherek and Weinerová 2004; Uherek 2007) – in parallel with its similar use in the context of migrations from Slovakia to Bohemia since 1945. Most of these migration research projects were realized in an international circle of collaborators. The Institute of Ethnology team sought to connect a wide spectrum of countries and place Romani migrations in broader European contexts (Guy, Uherek, Weinerová et al. 2004). However, the most intensive cooperation took place with the Czech ethnologist Eva Davidová (Davidová and Uherek 2014). At the end of her academic career, she worked at the University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice and connected both workplaces for cooperation also on health and social issues. Another research topic in connection with the Roma at the time of the new millennium was indebtedness. This topic was studied mainly in the Ostrava and Ústí nad Labem region (Zdeněk Uherek, Renata Weinerová), where indebtedness was the largest at that time. Another project, the employment of the Roma, was then studied in cooperation with the World Bank. Romani migration activities are still monitored at the Institute of Ethnology of the ASCR, although, especially after the Czech Republic acceded to the European Union, the topic is no longer as politically sensitive. The team has shrunk significantly, and the last research in Prague was undertaken by Zdeněk Uherek and Andrej Sulitka. Research activities are supported now by the project Strategies AV 21. ROMANI STUDIES AT THE INSTITUTE OF ETHNOLOGY OF THE CZECH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES AND THE INSTITUTE OF SOCIOLOGICAL STUDIES, FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, CHARLES UNIVERSITY 40 INSTITUTE OF SOCIOLOGICAL STUDIES, FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, CHARLES UNIVERSITY The Faculty of Social Sciences is a relatively young institution. It was established in 1990 and the Institute of Sociological Studies in 1993. It focuses on a wide range of sociological, anthropological, and socio-political issues. The studies of minorities in the Czech Republic have an important place here. Both departments, the Department of Sociology (with anthropological section) and the Department of Public and Social Politics, study minorities, NGO activities, political movements, education policies, migrations, and related topics. There are no specialized lectures on the Romani minority. However, Roma related issues are discussed in lectures on family and kinship, the anthropology of the European Union, anthropology of migrations, nations and nationalism lectures and related topics. Many Roma-related graduate theses have been submitted based on the students’ own field research. Since 1990, approximately 60 Roma-related works have been defended. The last one was on the segregation of Romani pupils in primary schools (Tisová 2021). The works relate mainly to the Czech environment, but some are also focused on Slovakia (for instance, Schurdaková 2010, 2013). They sometimes have a broader scope than just the Romani issue. They are linked with multicultural education, the coexistence of pupils in schools, poverty, narrations about a particular town or village environment. An important topic in the Czech Republic is the situation of the Roma on the labour market (Laisková 2010). Printed materials and media discourses are also analysed at the Institute of Sociological Studies. Notable stories in the media concerning the Roma have an important place here. For instance, a B.C. thesis on media discourse concerning the riots in the Šluknov area was defended here in 2015 (Tremčinský 2015). An interesting recent piece was a master thesis on the projection of the concept of purity into several ethnographically researched modern urban Romani households (Kadeřávková 2020). The supervisors of these theses include (among others) Magdaléna Mouralová, Zdeněk Uherek, Jadwiga Šanderová, Milan Tuček, and Martin Hájek. An interesting venture was the research project What You Do Not Want to Know About the Roma (2019), which was carried out mainly among the Romani middle and upper-middle classes and recorded the everyday life of the actors without stressing their Romani origin and their self-identification as such (investigators Zdeněk Uherek and Martin Pátek). The overview presented above clearly demonstrates that in its many forms the Romani topic has its enthusiastic proponents at the Institute of Sociological Studies. Both students and teachers bring to the Institute valuable field data for further cognitive and decision-making processes. OPENING WORD 41 REFERENCES: n Cikáni v průmyslovém městě. 1986. Zpravodaj koordinované sítě vědeckých informací, 7. n Cikáni v průmyslovém městě. 1988. Zpravodaj koordinované sítě vědeckých informací, 11–13. n Davidová, E. 1988. Cikáni (Romové) v městském prostředí Českého Krumlova (1945– 1988). Zpravodaj koordinované sítě vědeckých informací 13: 1–81. n Davidová, E., Uherek, Z. 2014. Romové v československé a české společnosti v letech 1945–2012: národnostní struktura, specifika romské rodiny a migrací. Praha: Národohospodářský ústav Josefa Hlávky. n Grulich, T., Haišman, T. 1986. Institucionální zájem o cikánské obyvatelstvo v Československu v letech 1945–1958. Český lid 73 (2): 72–85. n Guy, W., Uherek, Z., Weinerová, R. et al. 2004. Roma Migration in Europe: Case studies. Münster: LIT Verlag / Institute of Ethnology of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. n Haišman, T. 1987. Výzkum cikánského obyvatelstva v Kladně (koncepce, dosavadní výsledky, perspektivy). Zpravodaj koordinované sítě vědeckých informací 6: 115–23. n Haišman, T. 1989. Snahy orgánů státní správy o řešené tzv. cikánské otázky v českých zemích v letech 1945–47 ve světle tisku. Český lid 76 (1): 4–11. n Kadeřávková, I. 2020. Čistota a nebezpečí: pohled na dodržování rituální čistoty v současné romské domácnosti. (Purity and danger: A view to maintanance of the ritual purity in a contemporary Romani household). Praha: Univerzita Karlova (unpublished MA thesis). n Laisková, M. 2010. Postavení Romů na trhu práce v České republice. (The position of the Roma in the Czech labour market) Praha: Univerzita Karlova (unpublished BA thesis). n Schurdaková, P. 2010. Metamorfózy obce Lomnička. (Metamorphoses of the village of Lomnička.) Praha: Univerzita Karlova (unpublished BA thesis). n Schurdaková, P. 2013. Lomnička včera a dnes: přeměny sociální struktury na vesnici a jejich reflexe v žitém světě romských dětí. (Lomnička yesterday and today: Transformations of social structure in the village and their reflection in the lived world of Romani children.) Praha: Univerzita Karlova (unpublished BA thesis). n Tisová, K. 2021. Segregace romských žáků na základních školách: případová studie. (Segregation of Romani pupils in primary schools: A case study). Praha: Univerzita Karlova (unpublished BA thesis). n Tremčinský, M. 2015. Kultura strachu: Diskurzivní analýza mediální kauzy Šluknovska. (Culture of Fear: Discourse Analysis of Šluknovsko Media Event.) Praha: Univerzita Karlova (unpublished BA thesis). ROMANI STUDIES AT THE INSTITUTE OF ETHNOLOGY OF THE CZECH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES AND THE INSTITUTE OF SOCIOLOGICAL STUDIES, FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, CHARLES UNIVERSITY 48 ORGANIZED PANELS History and anthropology have had a long, fruitful, and epistemologically challenging past of theoretical and empirical encounters, exchanges and cooperations. These have even resulted in new research subfields, for example historical anthropology, socio-cultural anthropology, and anthropology of history. Historiographical and anthropological methods have been converging and benefitting from mutual encounters. For example, while socio-cultural anthropologists are extending the field of their inquiries to incorporate archival sources, historians have turned to oral interactions as a major historical source. We strongly believe that this interdisciplinary dialogue shows great potential for future research. We also believe that Romani studies have already accommodated this dialogue. It has already been shown, for example, that the institutional archives in our countries are full of traces of Romani groups’ lengthy presence in Europe but, at the same time, that overlaps, inconsistencies, and silences between oral histories and memories of those involved in historical events and archival accounts of the same events are always possible. It has also been shown that Romani group ethnography can be combined fruitfully with archival research by constituting, case by case, varied forms of “historical anthropologies” or “ethno-histories” or “regressive histories” or “anthropological histories”. In this panel, we invite you to explore the dynamics of hybridization in history and anthropology in the field of Romani studies. Papers are solicited on critical reflections on using a combination of archival and ethnographic ANTHROPOLOGY AND HISTORY IN ROMANI STUDIES Conveners: Grégoire Cousin, Verona University, Italy (gregoir[email protected]) Vita Zalar, Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Slovenia ([email protected]) 49 methods, on the different regimes of historicity observed, on the intersections between archival and oral histories and memories, as well as between missing archival traces and significant silences. We are also interested in presentations that can demonstrate and comment on failed attempts at bridging the interdisciplinary gaps. POSSIBLE QUESTIONS FOR CONSIDERATION INCLUDE: n How have historians implemented anthropological knowledge and its methods (the rise of oral history, memory studies)? n How is reflexivity practiced in anthropology and history? n What impact has the anthropological concept of identity and ethnicity had on historiographical research? n What are the relations among institutional histories, circumstantial histories and oral histories; what are the relations between histories and memories? n How can the concept “regimes of historicity” (Hartog, 2003) and the social construction of time in different societies be addressed in Romani studies? n How have different groups constructed their own “stories” and the relation between “history” and “myth”? n What are the possible ways of combining archival and ethnographic research in an anthropological perspective (Sahlins 2000)? n How is “engaged scholarship” (Berger 2019) perceived in anthropology and history? Since an increasing number of researchers are involved in these questions on an international scale, this panel aims to assess the state of the art of research, as well as create space and time for mutual reflection; starting, above all, from a comparison of currently ongoing case studies and research projects. The organizers of this panel wish to encourage a continuation of the discussions from the panel Anthropologies and Histories of Romani groups ANTHROPOLOGY AND HISTORY IN ROMANI STUDIES 50 ORGANIZED PANELS from the 2019 Gypsy Lore Society Annual Meeting in Reykjavík. REFERENCES: F. Hartog. Régimes d’historicité. Présentisme et expérience du temps. Paris: Le Seuil, 2003. M. Sahlins. Culture in practice: selected essays. NewYork: Zone Books, 2000. S. Berger (ed.). The Engaged Historian: Perspectives on the Intersections of Politics, Activism and the Historical Profession. New York – Oxford: Berghahn, 2019. LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS n Abakunova, Anna. Between History and Myth: The Roma Oral History Accounts on the Reasons about Their Persecution during the World War II in Ukraine n Aresu, Massimo. Gypsies Travellers across the Mediterranean Sea in the Early-Modern Era: La Ruta de las Islas n Cousin, Grégoire. Râmnicu de Jos, 1947. Ethnography of a Forgotten Massacre n Leroy, Théophile. Identification Practices and Genocidal Dynamics in the Borderlands. A Case Study on the Roma and Sinti Families Deported from Annexed Alsace in March 1943 n Ort, Jan. “I’m moving out for good, and I don’t intend to come back”: Negotiating Belonging of Roma through Their Mobility in Postwar Czechoslovakia n Reitinger, Daphne. On the Origin of the Auto-Ethnonym Sinti – a Historical and Linguistic Examination n Rotaru, Julieta. The Governance of Gold Production in Wallachia and the Status of the Rudari (1388–1838) n Salo, Sheila. The Fortunes of the Fransuzuya, c. 1890 – c. 1940 51 Between History and Myth: The Roma Oral History Accounts on the Reasons about Their Persecution during the World War II in Ukraine The persecution and destruction of the Roma as individuals and as communities during the World War in Ukraine has been an under-researched topic. The scarce information about the occupation of Ukraine and annihilation of the Roma can be found in Ukrainian, Romanian and German State archives. This information includes official records of orders to persecute the Roma, the localities and the number of those killed. In addition, methods employed in historical studies allow researchers to a certain extent to understand the reasons for the persecution of the Roma from the occupiers’ perspective. That explication is entirely based on archival sources. Oral history and anthropological perspectives give scholars an opportunity to look at the reasons of why the Roma were persecuted by the German Nazis and their Romanian allies in Ukraine from the victims’ perspective. Often the Roma, in their recorded oral narratives and in private conversations reflect on their understanding of why they were persecuted during the occupation of Ukraine. This reflection differs and depends on the locality where Roma lived on the eve of the occupation, but primarily on the group to which they belonged. For instance, the Kelderash survivors state in their narrations that they were persecuted because of their wealth: Romanians and Germans decided to deport and kill the Kelderash Roma in order to take the money and houses of the Roma. The proposed research will analyse the Roma oral history accounts in comparison to archival findings to show how the Roma survivors and their descendants view the reasons for the Roma persecution in occupied Ukraine during the war and how the Roma perspective differs Anna Abakunova, independent scholar ([email protected]) ANTHROPOLOGY AND HISTORY IN ROMANI STUDIES 52 ORGANIZED PANELS from or corresponds to the archival materials. Thus, the proposed paper will try to examine how different Roma groups constructed their own “stories” of events, why they do so, and what are the factors for construction of different or similar “stories”. In this way, the paper will try to show the relation between “history” and “myth” among the Roma survivors in Ukraine. The research is based on various archives including the Yahad in-Unum Archive, the Shoah Foundation Visual Archive, the author’s personal collection of interviews, Ukrainian and German State Archives collections and Yad Vashem archives. Gypsies Travelers across the Mediterranean Sea in the Early-Modern Era: La Ruta de las Islas This paper analyses the presence of groups and individuals categorized as ‘Gypsy’ in the Mediterranean area between the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period (14th–16th century). It is based on new research in the field, as well as on unpublished documents coming from the Italian and Spanish archives (in particular those in the islands of Mallorca and Sardinia) and from the Fraser Gypsy collection held at the Brotherton Library of the University of Leeds (UK). This Mediterranean presence has been often overlooked by scholars, who seemed to be more fascinated by the groups led by so-called ‘Earls’ and ‘Dukes of the Little Egypt’, whose movements along land routes throughout Continental Europe were reported since the first half of the 15th century. I will focus on the Mediterranean route known as ‘la ruta de las islas’ (the route of the islands), and was followed by groups known as ‘Zingari’ or ‘Greeks’ (‘Griegos’ or ‘Grecianos’ in the Castellan documents), who would travel from the Eastern Mediterranean quadrant, through Southern Italy and through the islands of Sardinia, and Mallorca, finally reaching the Iberian peninsula. Thanks Massimo Aresu, University of Leeds (max.ar[email protected]) 53 to the comparison of several testimonies I will show that the circulation of these groups did not always have a diasporic character, but was part of a wider range of mobility strategies. Furthermore, my analysis of the available documents shows how the categories of ‘pilgrim’ and ‘refugee’ are not necessarily the most appropriate to describe these movements across the Mediterranean, as they exclude a range of travels that were much more varied, and often motivated by commercial reasons. In the Early Modern era, traces of a Gypsy presence can be found in every port of the Mediterranean sea, where they were registered as horse breeders or horse brokers, mercenaries, artisans, and travelling artists, and also as patrons of ships. In addition, since the 16th and until the first quarter of 18th century their movements took place not only along the East-West trajectory, but also in the opposite direction, from West to East. Finally, it seems that migrations by sea were less dangerous for these groups of migrant Gypsies than the central-European land transfers that used to take place along the borders of states often in permanent conflict. If we paraphrase the words of Predrag Matvejević (1999), we can state that, at least before the appearance of Barbary corsairs the sea was “pontos […] space, scene and road”. Râmnicu de Jos, 1947. Ethnography of a Forgotten Massacre I have heard many times in the Roma community of Tulcea, Romania that shortly after World War II there was been a massacre in the countryside between Tulcea and Constanta. In this presentation, I will show how I gradually reconstructed this story, until I know the names of the victims, of their persecutors, and the circumstances of the event. I will also show how this event is now Grégoire Cousin, University of Verona (gregoir[email protected]) ANTHROPOLOGY AND HISTORY IN ROMANI STUDIES 54 ORGANIZED PANELS an issue among the Roma and in their relations with the Romanian authorities. For the Roma of Tulcea, the memory of this event is today more traumatic than the deportation to Transnistria of a few years earlier. I will end with an epistemological reflection on the difficulty of reconstructing a past which is important for a local community when the event does not conform with the accepted history of persecution. Identification Practices and Genocidal Dynamics in the Borderlands. A Case Study on the Roma and Sinti Families Deported from Annexed Alsace in March 1943 On March 21, 1943, 62 people arrested in annexed Alsace as “Gypsies” (Zigeuner) were registered in the Zigeunerfamilienlager of Auschwitz-Birkenau. The camp’s entry register lists seven family names: Blum, Braun, Franz, Freiwald, Gerste, Rosenbach and Wesel. These families, originally from Germany, were arrested in the Strasbourg area by agents of the Kriminalpolizei between late 1942 and early 1943. The youngest person was born in Haguenau in June 1942, the oldest in Lower Saxony in 1872. Deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, some were then transferred to Buchenwald, others to Mauthausen. Using the family files of the Rassenhygienisch Forschungstelle kept at the Bundesarchiv in Berlin, the resources available on the Arolsen Archives database and the correspondences and registers of the Strasbourg Kriminalpolizei, the aim of this paper is to shed light on the application of genocide policies in a Western European borderland territory through a case study of the individual and collective trajectories of the deported families of the Strasbourg convoy. Analyzing the police standards used to census, identify and arrest this targeted group provides an efficient method of understanding who the German authorities considered a “Gypsy”. By the comparison of social origins, professions, Théophile Leroy, EHESS, Paris (theophile.ler[email protected]) 55 economic mobilities, family ties or prewar registrations of people identified as “Gypsy” in 1942/1943, this work will show how the German criminal police applied racial policy to fight the so-called Zigeunerplage in Alsace, a former French territory and a borderland area of the Rhine region. By crossing microhistorical approach and spatial analysis, this work will also consider the mapping method as an efficient instrument to comprehend the familial dislocation of the Rhine Sinti groups. On the Origin of the Endonym Sinti – a Historical and Linguistic Examination The origin of the endonym Sinti has been subject of investigation for well over 200 years. In the wake of the discovery of the Indo-Aryan affiliation of Romani, one of the earliest sources mentioning this endonym interprets the term ‚Sinte‘ as the ‚true‘ ethnonym (‚der wahre Name‘)‚ of all Romani-speaking groups and allocates its origin to the river Sindhu and the province of Sindh in northwest India (Biester 1793:365–366). In the 1900s Hasse (1803:32–38), in his search for attestations of Gypsies, refers to the classical literature and proposes a connection to the Sintians of ancient Thrace. Pott (1844:34), referring to Hasse in his review of reference literature on the Roma of that time, revisits a potential connection to the ancient Σινδοί (Zindoí) people of the Bosporus and notes on but dismisses a morphologically possible relation to ‚Gesinde‘ (germ. ‚domestic servants‘; ,comrades‘). Piasere discusses the possible affiliation to a pre-European pool of inherited Romani self-appellatives, as well as additionally touching upon ‚Gesinde‘ anew (2019:110). Matras (1999, 2019) concludes the term Sinti to be a European borrowing in Romani due to its employment of the inflectional pattern characteristic of European loanwords. Notwithstanding the interpretations and arguments made to date, an Daphne Reitinger, Linguistic Department, University of Graz ([email protected]) ANTHROPOLOGY AND HISTORY IN ROMANI STUDIES 56 ORGANIZED PANELS etymology accepted by the general scientific community has yet to be put forward. In my presentation, I will discuss the linguistic practices and dialectology of the Late Middle Ages and onwards (starting roughly in the year 1400) of Central and Western Europe, with a particular focus on the peripatetic populations. Consequently, I will closely examine the early attestations of the self-appellative term Sinti as well as the early sources of northwestern Romani varieties in general and Sinti Romani in particular with regard to their geographical and dialectological implications. Finally, by considering the linguistic, historical and anthropological ramifications, I will propose an etymology for the term ‚Sinti‘, in accordance with Matras‘ findings of Sinti being a loan acquired after the emergence of the Northwestern group. REFERENCES: n Biester, Johann Erich: Ueber die Zigeuner, besonders im Königreich Preußen (Beschluß vom Februar Nr. 3). Von ihrer Sprache. In: Biester(Ed.): Berlinische Monatschrift, Band 21, p.360–394, Berlin 1793 n Hasse, Johann Gottfried: Zigeuner im Herodot, oder neue Aufschlüsse über die ältere Zigeuner-Geschichte aus griechischen Schriftstellern, Königsberg 1803 n Matras, Yaron: Johann Rüdiger and the Study of Romani in 18th Century Germany, Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society, fifth series, 9, p. 89–116, 1999 n Matras, Yaron: Romani self-apellations in a linguistic perspective. A reply to Leonardo Piasere, Anuac Vol. 8, 2, p. 105–112, 2019 n Piasere, Leonardo: Pour une histoire des autodénominations romanès, Anuac Vol. 8, 1, p. 85–118, 2019 n Pott, August Friedrich: Die Zigeuner in Europa und Asien, Halle 1844 57 Jan Ort, Seminar of Romani Studies, Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague ([email protected]) “I’m moving out for good, and I don’t intend to come back”: Negotiating Belonging of Roma through Their Mobility in Postwar Czechoslovakia My paper is a microhistorical study of a village in north-east Slovakia, which is a region that was in the past strongly socially and economically marginalized. Migration was a common economic strategy of all local inhabitants; but there was also a shared experience of displacement. Many villages in the region were almost completely destroyed at the end of World War II, and during the first postwar years the people were coming back to rebuild their homes. For this purpose, however, many of them migrated to the Bohemian lands, seeking better economic opportunities. In this sense, migration and mobility did not stand in contrast to local belonging but were an integral part of a shared local identity and experience. However, mobility of the local Roma met in certain situations with the dominant discourse of naturally “nomadic” and “fluctuating Gypsies”, and as such it was to be controlled or even prohibited. In my paper, I will focus on the local implementation of central policies of socialist Czechoslovakia which targeted the Roma/“Gypsies” and their mobility. It was mainly the 1958 Law on the Permanent Settlement of Nomadic Persons, and the Government Decree 502/1965 on “controlled dispersal” and “organised transfer” of the Roma. I will show how the implementation of these measures was negotiated by the local actors and the ways in which it contributed to the understanding of the quality of the local belonging of the Roma. ANTHROPOLOGY AND HISTORY IN ROMANI STUDIES 64 ORGANIZED PANELS During 2020, the world was confronted with a global pandemic which had and continues to have an impact on all countries, not only in terms of people infected with the disease, the actual death toll, but also due to its repercussions in diverse areas of daily and structural life, such as employment, access to foodstuffs, and basic services (e.g. health and education supplies) (Nicola et al., 2020). While we are experiencing a situation that embodies a threat to each and every one of us, worldwide, there are strong asymmetries in the way that Covid-19 pandemic has affected different social groups and the way how people deal with and manage these impacts. For Romani people the scenario of social asymmetries has been even more serious, given the exacerbation of racialization and ethnicization of the Roma, with the banalization of anti-Roma prejudices and attitudes (Matache & Bhabha, 2020). Those Romani families, which already lived under precarious conditions before the pandemic, have experienced a further worsening of their disadvantaged position (Berta, 2020; Korunovska & Jovanovic, 2020; Mendes 2020). In fact, for many Roma whose priority has been to secure subsistence and attend to the basic needs of their households, the historical and structural inequalities have been aggravated and the impacts of the pandemic have been multifaceted (FRA, 2020). CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ROMA Conveners: Maria Manuela Mendes, Faculdade de Arquitetura da Universidade de Lisboa, and CIES-IUL, ISCTE, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, Portugal ([email protected]) Stefánia Toma, Romanian Institute for Research on National Minorities (ISPMN), Babes-Bolyai University (BBU), Romania (tomaste[email protected]) Olga Magano, Uab & CIES-IUL, ISCTE, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa, Portugal ([email protected]) 65 CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ROMA This panel aims to present a critical reflection and expand our knowledge of the main impacts of Covid-19 pandemic on Roma, which are still relatively unknown, focusing especially on those Romani communities that live in difficult socio-economic situations. Indeed, we want to bring together studies and investigators with different backgrounds to look at the impact of Covid-19 pandemic on various dimensions (access to basic services and human rights, especially medical care; access to digital tools and education; decent housing; economic activity; reduced income levels; the rise of racism and inequality etc. among Romani people in different countries). Already, we know that the pandemic has contributed to a greater gap in education, considering the fact that Romani children and young people were “disproportionately affected by substandard housing without access to the Internet or even electricity and lacking the necessary IT equipment” (FRA, 2020:13). We would like to understand the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic as experienced by the Roma, both in terms of difficulties and also opportunities that opened up with the pandemic and what strategies have Romani people and their familiesactivated to deal with the constraints to which they have been subjected. REFERENCES n Berta, Peter (2020), “Ethnicizing a pandemic: COVID-19, culture blaming and Romanian Roma”. Society for Romanian Studies Newsletter, 42(1), 1–7. n European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (2020), “Coronavirus Pandemic in the EU – Impact on Roma and Travellers”. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union. ISBN: 978-92-9474-382-4; DOI:10.2811/06170. n Korunovka, Neda & Jovanovic, Zeljko (2020), “Roma in the Covid-19 Crisis: An Early Warning from Six EU Member States”. Roma: Open Society Foundations. 66 ORGANIZED PANELS n Matache, Margareta & Bhabha, Jacqueline (2020), “AntiRoma Racism is Spiraling during COVID-19 Pandemic”. Health and Human Rights Journal, 22(1), 379–382. n Mendes, Maria Manuela (2020), “Anticiganismo em contexto de pandemia”, In Público, 12 de maio de 2020. https://www.publico.pt/2020/05/12/opiniao/ noticia/anticiganismo-contexto-pandemia-1916051. n Nicola, Marta, Alsafi, Zaid, Sohrabi, Catrin, Kerwan, Ahmed, Al-Jabir, A., Iosifidis, Christos, Agha, Maliha, & Agha, Riaz (2020), “The socio-economic implications of the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19): A review”. International journal of surgery (London, England), 78, 185–193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j. ijsu.2020.04.018 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS n Emilia Aiello, Rosamaria Kostic Cisneros. Romani Civic Organizations and Their Role During COVID-19: Reflections from the Catalan Case and the Leadership of Grassroots Romani Women n Andrej Belák. Management of the Covid-19 Epidemics in Segregated Roma Enclaves in Slovakia II: Racialized Politics as Mirrored in Epidemiological Data n Pedro Caetano, Ana Rita Costa, Sara Pinheiro, Susana Mourão. Listening to the Voice of Romani Students. Perceptions of the Effects of the Pandemic on the Path of Secondary School Students n Ana Rita Costa. Does “the world need two urgent vaccines, one for Covid-19 and one for racial hatred”? n Angel Heredia. Gypsy Old Age and COVID-19: The Drowned Scream n Tomáš Hrustič. Management of the Covid-19 Epidemics in Segregated Roma Enclaves in Slovakia I: Aspects of Civic and Political Engagement n Tammi Lynne. Across the Great Divide: The Impact of Digital Inequality on Scotland’s Gypsy/Traveller Children and Young People During the COVID-19 Emergency 67 n Almudena Macías León. The Impact of the Pandemic on the Eastern European Romani Population in Spain n Daniela Mosaad Pěničková Public Health Mediation in Roma Health Care Including Management of the Epidemic: New Strategies by the Czech Ministry of Health via the NIPH n María Félix Rodriguez, Diana Maria Gil Gonzalez, Javier Arza. COVID-19 Crisis: Impact on Households of the Romani Community n Stefánia Toma. “Stay Home! Stay Safe!” - Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Romani Communities in Romania ABSTRACTS OF CONTRIBUTIONS Romani Civic Organizations and Their Role During COVID-19: Reflections from the Catalan Case and the Leadership of Grassroots Romani Women With the measures put in place to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic in Spain, especially during the strict lockdown and social distancing enforced from March until June 2020, the Roma faced additional barriers in the accomplishment of daily needs, such as taking care of the elders, keeping the already precarious sources of income, or even ensuring good quality education of children in those cases of Romani households with limited access to the Internet or low bandwidth. While national and international governmental institutions fell short at the time of providing a timely, coordinated response to the pandemic, and better serving the needs of those communities most-affected, some civic organizations operating at the grassroots level were uniquely impactful at helping their constituencies to interpret the confusing and contradictory information related to COVID-19 received especially in the beginning, as well as to identify Emilia Aiello, Harvard Kennedy School, USA ([email protected]ard.edu) Rosamaria Kostic Cisneros, Coventry University ([email protected]) CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ROMA 68 ORGANIZED PANELS where assistance was most urgently required. Framed in this particular context, in this presentation we present and discuss how grassroot Romani women organized around the Roma Association of Women Drom Kotar Mestipen based in the city of Barcelona, and with a public voice at the regional level, were able to serve the needs of their communities and bridge the gap with public institutions. This case suggests that in those sites where there is an existing infrastructure of Romani organizations operating on the ground, and with public recognition, the impact of the COVID-19 multiple crises was better cushioned. In turn, this and other similar organizations were able to contest racist reactions that were constantly emerging from different sectors of mainstream society against the Roma, and which accused the Roma of being sceptical in relation to the severity of the virus, promoting anti-science, and a general unwillingness to comply with the rules. In all, we bring into discussion how civic organizations with a public recognition have played a major role at two levels; (a) within the Romani communities themselves (inward-bound), in channeling assistance to ensure basic living conditions and human rights such as education; (b) and at the broader society (outward-bound), in challenging stereotypes and showing a unified public voice when cases of anti-gypsyism have emerged. Management of the Covid-19 Epidemics in Segregated Roma Enclaves in Slovakia II: Racialized Politics as Mirrored in Epidemiological Data Early during the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak in Slovakia (mid March 2020), a surveillance system has been set up by the author and his colleagues monitoring the development of the epidemics specifically within segregated Roma communities. The system first focused Andrej Belák, Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Sciences (andr[email protected]) 69 on data regarding Roma coming back home from foreign countries (an important indicator of infection risk before clinical testing was available) acquired through the Slovak national network of health mediators on a 2-day basis (operating in 250 segregated municipalities, covering 3/4 of segregated Roma communities in Slovakia). With people becoming clinically tested – and first cases of Covid-19 confirmed in some Roma communities – the system then shifted its focus towards recording and reporting this and related clinical data, too. In my presentation, I will use interactive visual reports (Power BI platform) summarizing the development of the epidemics in the Roma communities to review and discuss some of the political influences on the development. More specifically, I will focus on discussing mostly various possible negative influences of racialized accounts of Roma ethnicity. Listening to the Voice of Romani students. Perception of the Effects of the Pandemic on the Path of Secondary School Students The first state of emergency that was declared in Portugal over the COVID 19 pandemic, covering a 6-week period from March to April 2020, led to the interruption of faceto-face classroom lessons in mid-March, with the majority of Portuguese students not returning to school in the academic year of 2019–2020. 700 schools remained open for the children of front-line workers and to provide food support to children who needed it. In two weeks, media reports announced that a much higher number of meals had been served than initially expected. This information highlights the growing economic difficulties faced by families, but also the important social role of schools in Portugal. Nevertheless, families were expected to provide the necessary support for distance learning (suitable Pedro Caetano, Centro Interdisciplinar de Ciências Sociais da Universidade Nova de Lisboa (CICS.NOVA) (pedr[email protected]) Ana Rita Costa, Centro em Rede de Investigação em Antropologia (CRIA-IUL), Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (Ana.Rita.[email protected]) CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ROMA 70 ORGANIZED PANELS working space, digital technologies, adequate internet connection, school materials, teaching support). Even though the government, municipalities, civil society, and local institutions have sought to respond to these needs, their efforts were insufficient, and it is known that socioeconomic disparities were exacerbated, with the ethnic origin possibly being an aggravating factor. Romani children are a particularly vulnerable group of youth. In Portugal, although distance learning is not entirely new particularly for young Ciganos/Roma women, the majority of the population lack the knowledge, skills, and digital resources (Mendes et al. 2014) to attend distance learning at home. Many Ciganos/Roma parents have low schooling levels or are illiterate. In addition, many have precarious living conditions, overcrowded households, without furniture and equipment suitable for distance learning. The pandemic has also largely banished young people from socialization, which has generated some demotivation and apathy among them. Since the pandemic’s real effects on dropout rates and academic underachievement are yet to be ascertained, it seems pertinent to launch this debate, starting from a content analysis. Using information collected from the Educig project, we intend to examine the impacts of the pandemic on educational pathways, considering the social inequalities and public policies, but also exploring the responses of the schools, young people and their families in relation to the present challenges. The data originates from 34 interviews (some carried out remotely) with Ciganos/Roma secondary school students, resident in the Metropolitan Areas of Lisbon (18) and Porto (16); 14 interviews, with Evangelical preachers and professionals/ coordinators from Portuguese educational projects; 3 focus groups carried out online (24 participants), including students, families, mediators/activists, and professionals working with Romani people. Sara Pinheiro, Centro de Investigação e Estudos de Sociologia (CIES-IUL), ISCTE, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (Sara.Pinheir[email protected]) Susana Mourão, Centro de Investigação e Estudos de Sociologia (CIES-IUL), ISCTE, Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (susana_so[email protected]) 71 REFERENCES: n Mendes, Maria Manuela; Magano, Olga & Costa, Ana Rita (2020), “Ciganos Portugueses: Escola e mudança social”. Sociologia, Problemas e Práticas, n.º 93, 109–126. DOI: 10.7458/SPP20209313546. Does “the world need two urgent vaccines, one for Covid-19 and one for racial hatred”? The year 2020 is marked by the covid-19 pandemic and the consequent worsening of multiple social, economic, and political tensions. Uncertainty, fear, sanitary and circulation control measures became part of everyday life. In many ways, we are living what can be called a “liminal” situation, with the flow of everyday life interrupted (Turner 1969), as states of emergency were declared in many countries, enhancing ambiguous and disorienting experiences. In this sense, Covid-19 pandemic has the potential to exacerbate and expose tensions that are more or less accommodated or hidden in societies, but also to trigger new ways to respond to them. It is known that Romani populations all over the world have been particularly affected by the Covid-19 crisis, with a worsening of their already precarious living conditions, sense of security and well-being. Across Europe, Romani citizens have become a target for discriminatory control measures. This presentation addresses the specific situation experienced by the Portuguese Roma during this present crisis, but also how the Portuguese Roma perceive the news about the persecution of other Romani citizens across Europe and the possible upsurge of the rightwing. With professions strongly linked to commerce and contact with the public, Portuguese Roma saw their subsistence activities particularly threatened. The majority were unable to fall back on their savings, being among the first to be economically harmed. Moreover, Ana Rita Costa, Centro em Rede de Investigação em Antropologia (CRIA-IUL), Instituto Universitário de Lisboa ([email protected]om) CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ROMA 72 ORGANIZED PANELS many did not benefit from the social support created to mitigate the effects of the pandemic. In the absence of formal support, networks of mutual help were created, overcoming the previously existing solidarities between close families. Through social media, funds were raised, and the extreme situations faced by some were deflected. At the same time, discrimination against Portuguese Roma has taken on worrying forms. As the pandemic worsened, the media echoed requests for “special confinements”, targeting particular neighbourhoods and buildings. In the pandemic-electoral context, discrimination against Portuguese Roma also served to galvanize the growth of a political party which has been openly discriminatory against the Roma. In view of this situation and the absence of action by official bodies, there was an unprecedented mobilization of Portuguese Roma which culminated in an increase in their electoral participation. The presentation is based on material collected in different stages of an ethnographic study carried out within the scope of a doctoral project, which seeks to analyse the presence of Portuguese Roma in social media. References: Turner, V. 1969. “Liminality and Communitas”, The Ritual Process: structure and anti-structure. Harmondsworth, Penguin books, pp 80–118. Across the Great Divide: The Impact of Digital Inequality on Scotland’s Gypsy/ Traveller Children and Young People During the COVID-19 Emergency The COVID-19 pandemic has served to further highlight how the chasmic digital divide has impacted on young Gypsy/Travellers’ ability to access their education rights. In this paper the author examines current Scottish national and local government awareness of, and responses to, the learning and development needs and entitlements Tammi Lynne, University of Dundee ([email protected]) 73 of Gypsy/Traveller children and young people pre and during the COVID-19 pandemic. A snapshot analysis of emerging testimony from young Gypsy/Travellers, their parents and community learning workers focuses on how the lack of access to digital devices and data and the discretionary decision making of street level bureaucrats (Lipsky, 1980) are key contributors to the challenges Gypsy/Traveller children and young people face when attempting to access home schooling and other learning and development opportunities in times of crisis. To address the evident inequalities of the digital divide the author calls for universal provision of devices and data, a safe, supportive and flexible environment driven by a clear understanding of Gypsy/Traveller habitus and robust monitoring and evaluation processes to ensure that guidance and directives from central government are being delivered on a basis of equality at the local level; positing that failing this, discretionary decision making powers, underpinned by prejudice and driven by false social representations, will continue to be enacted and the ‘forever thus, business as usual’ doxic worldview of Gypsy/ Travellers and other marginalised groups will endure. REFERENCES n Lipsky, M. (1980) Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services. Russell Sage Foundation, New York. Gypsy Old Age and COVID-19: The Drowned Scream For more than 4 years, I have been working on my thesis “The Gypsy Experience of Old Age: Study of Cultural Differences in Aging Processes and Their Psychosocial Consequences”. Old age among Romani groups has been neglected. There is a notorious lack of studies in this area. We have worked Angel Heredia, University of Granada ([email protected]) CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC ON ROMA 80 ORGANIZED PANELS “Stay Home! Stay Safe!” – Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Romani Communities in Romania The global COVID-19 pandemic proved to be more powerful than expected and its effects are immediately perceptible. The probability that these effects are going to be noticeable in long term perspective is high. It was obvious from the early moments of the interventions that the “Stay Home” policies were going to be implemented with difficulty in certain contexts, for example as regards the marginalized Romani communities and other vulnerable populations that had already been exposed to inequalities and inequities even before the pandemic hit even harder. The pandemic contributed to the deepening of social and economic inequalities between different segments of the population and the measures that were envisaged to be universally suitable to everybody proved to be inadequate in the case of those who already had to cope with every-day survival difficulties: inadequate housing conditions, unemployment, lack of or difficult access to certain services (eg. education and public healthcare), to mention just a few. These conditions were exacerbated by the growing public shaming of the returnee migrants (including the Roma), who were presented as virus carriers. In my presentation, I will focus on the way vulnerable rural Romani communities in Transylvania were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. I will use pre-pandemic ethnographic data in contrast to online interviews and discussions during the lockdown. I will also (shortly) critically discuss some methodological aspects of online and digital data collection methods. Stefánia Toma, Romanian Institute for Research on National Minorities (RIRNM), Babes-Bolyai University (BBU), Romania (tomaste[email protected]) 81 This panel aims to provide a forum for a critical dialogue surrounding race/ethnicity and its intersection with environmental justice, encompassing the dimension of distributive and procedural justice. Exposure to environmental threats, access to natural resources and benefits are strongly influenced by racial and socioeconomic factors: environmental (in)justice works alongside the structural violence of poverty and neoliberal practices of the state. However, these forms of violence receive little exposure or priority within discussions on the marginalisation of Europe’s Roma minority. Furthermore, even less attention is paid to Roma communities’ struggle for environmental justice, thus obscuring the ongoing mobilisation against powerful forces driven increasingly by neoliberal imperatives. We welcome papers and presentations that address the broader context of state and regional policies leading to discriminatory practices in the distribution of environmental benefits and harm, as well as papers based on empirical field work, and community-relevant issues surrounding the theme of environmental injustice. Possible subjects include, but are not limited to, analyses of how decommissioning of the welfare state and neoliberal policies influences people’s access to natural resources, including clean air, safe environment and clean water. The topics should explore disparities in environmental quality driven by socio-economic status, race, and/or ethnicity; analysis of national environmental legislation and its impact on Roma communities; collective struggles of ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE FOR ROMA Conveners: Jekatyerina Dunajeva, Department of Political Studies, Pazmany Peter Catholic University, Budapest, Hungary (katyadunajev[email protected]) Joanna Kostka, Department of Social Work, University of Lancaster, UK (joanna.k[email protected]) Richard Filčák, Center of Social and Psychological Sciences and Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Science, Bratislava, Slovakia (Filcak.richar[email protected]) Daniel Škobla, Center of Social and Psychological Sciences and Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Science, Bratislava, Slovakia (daniel.sk[email protected]) ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE FOR ROMA 82 ORGANIZED PANELS Roma people to democratise access to natural resources and live a life in safe and clean surroundings. With this panel we aim to create a platform for discussing key issues pertaining to environmental justice for Roma, such as proposals and recommendations for essential changes and improvements in the legal system; existing policies necessary for achieving climate and environmental justice for Roma; critical analysis of the current state of racial environmental discrimination; case studies of environmental (in)justice, and the like. LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS: n Dunajeva, Jekatyerina; Kostka, Joanna. Racialized Politics of Garbage: Waste Management in Urban Roma Settlements in Eastern Europe n Filčák, Richard; Daniel Škobla. Where the Pipelines End: The Roma and Access to Basic Sanitation in the Slovak Republic. n Spreizer, Alenka Janko; Kovič-Dine, Maša; Sancin, Vasilka; Šumi, Irena. Is Right to Water a Right for All: The Case of Roma in Slovenia ABSTRACTS OF CONTRIBUTIONS Racialised Politics of Garbage: Waste Management in Urban Roma Settlements in Eastern Europe This paper is based on preliminary findings from a project that analyses the racialised dynamics embedded in neoliberal policies, and how Roma are affected by said dynamics. The project is undertaken in four countries located in Central and Eastern Europe (Hungary, Romania, Kosovo, Albania), and it engages in a case study analysis of four Roma neighbourhoods (one neighbourhood in each country) exposed to environmental risk and unjust waste management services. We build on the premise Jekatyerina Dunajeva, Department of Political Studies, Pazmany Peter Catholic University, Budapest, Hungary Joanna Kostka, Department of Social Work, University of Lancaster, UK 83 that disproportional accumulation of waste is anchored and aggravated by neoliberal policies of extensive privatisation and commodification of public services (and public spaces), together with the imposition of a pervasive “market mentality” (Jessop 2002), as well as stigmatisation of Roma neighbourhoods along racial lines. Our research aims to highlight the political aspect of solid waste management in marginalised urban neighbourhoods where Roma live, by focusing on the racialising techniques of the neoliberal policies – a topic largely unexplored by the scholarly community. Ethnically-segregated and vulnerable urban Roma neighbourhoods are all too common around the world, which is a phenomenon inseparable from the commodification of basic services and the neoliberal approach to policy. We show that unjust waste management services is one instance of capital taking precedence over social justice in a neoliberal state, which results in ethnic and socio-cultural tensions. The study demonstrates that racialisation of impoverished minorities serves as a tool for legitimising discriminatory policies regarding land use, zoning, waste disposal and regulation, which further results in ethnic and socio-cultural tensions in the society. Moreover, subordination of equity values to commercial interests creates the conditions for “the suspicion against others, the intolerance of difference, the resentment of strangers and the demands to separate and banish them” (Bauman 1998: 47). As a result, there is differential access to goods, services, and opportunities in a neoliberal society divided by race. REFERENCES: n Bauman, Z. (1998). Globalization: The Human Consequences, New York: Columbia University Press,. n Jessop, B. (2002). Liberalism, Neoliberalism, and Urban Governance: A State–Theoretical Perspective. Antipode, 34(3), pp. 452-472. ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE FOR ROMA 84 Where the Pipelines End: The Roma and Access to Basic Sanitation in the Slovak Republic Lack of sanitation is among the root problems of many heath conditions. It leads to water-borne diseases, thus decreasing life expectancy and well-being. Sewage infrastructure is often non-existent in the Roma settlements. The outcome is houses lacking very basic access to portable water and safe sanitation, self-made latrines in close proximity to water sources, and children playing in streams just metres downstream from the latrines. The pipelines often end at the borders of Roma settlements, and where these infrastructures exist, the services might not work properly or be disconnected from the main network. The main objective of the paper is to identify factors that hinder access to sanitation, and particularly adequate sewage disposal in the localities inhabited by the Roma population in Slovakia. The study combines quantitative data on the sewage and water infrastructure in so-called Roma settlements with a qualitative account based on the field research. Based on these two types of data, the paper further explores the situation and highlights the critical role of power asymmetries regarding public policies and decision-making at the local level. The paper builds a conceptual framework using Bourdieu’s theoretical apparatus, and analyses the role of dominant social actors within ‘local fields of power’. This paper also suggests that access to sanitation should be strengthened via putting into operation more universalistic social policies in combination with new dwelling construction. The authors point out the need for reinforcement of Roma-focused affirmative action in order to neutralise Antigypsyism and biased decision-making at the local level – often connected with stigmatisation of the minority, where sanitation is an important part of the overall picture. ORGANIZED PANELS Richard Filčák, Center of Social and Psychological Sciences and Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Science, Bratislava, Slovakia (Filcak.richar[email protected]) Daniel Škobla, Center of Social and Psychological Sciences and Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Science, Bratislava, Slovakia (daniel.sk[email protected]) 85 Is Right to Water a Right for All: The Case of Roma in Slovenia Many Roma, as a minority in today’s Europe, are exposed to structural discrimination that reproduces their marginalised position. Moreover, due to the neoliberalist policies of the states, they are pushed into the structural violence of poverty. In Slovenia, Roma communities are also facing the challenges of environmental justice, especially in relation to the fulfillment of the right to safe drinking water and sanitation, as has been noted by nongovernmental organisations such as ERRC and Amnesty International. In light of the recent judgment of the European Court for Human Rights, which rejected the appeal for the right to water of Roma families, supported by Amnesty International, our proposed paper reflects on the intersections of the diverging interpretation of the right to water and sanitation by different actors dealing with the provision or denial of the right to water and sanitation in selected Roma communities. These actors include representatives of Slovenian state institutions, municipality representatives, the Roma, and NGOs. Slovenian legislation regulates the special position of the Roma from the Constitution of the Republic of Slovenia downwards. Even though the regulation grants a special status to the Roma in Slovenia, they still regularly face barriers in accessing adequate living conditions, education, employment and health care, which are a consequence of violations of fundamental human rights, including the right to safe drinking water. The violation of the latter is based on various obstacles to the access of safe drinking water for the Roma in Slovenia. Consequently, limited access to safe drinking water impedes participation of Roma students in schools. With a limited level of concluded education, the Roma find it difficult to gain employment. Additionally, due to their poor health status, the younger members ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE FOR ROMA Alenka Janko Spreizer, Faculty of Humanities and Institute of Intercultural Studies, University of Primorska, Slovenia (alenka.janko.spr[email protected].si) Maša Kovič-Dine, Faculty of Law, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia ([email protected]) Vasilka Sancin, Faculty of Law, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia (V[email protected]) Irena Šumi, Faculty of Social Work and Faculty of Law, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia (ir[email protected]) 86 ORGANIZED PANELS are more susceptible to disease and have a harder time finding legal protection in the field of health law. Slovenia has also been warned about its violation of this international legally-binding right by the United Nations, the Council of Europe, and others (expl. the Special Adviser of the United Nations for the right to water and sanitation, ...). Hence, it is necessary that these violations be remedied. The goal of the proposed paper is to present the preliminary results of an ethnographic and theoretical research project on access to safe drinking water in connection with the legalisation of the Roma settlements and access to employment, health care and education for the Roma people. The research project’s aim is to prepare suggestions for a strategic framework of measures to ensure better and non-discriminatory access to drinking water, education, employment and health care, as well as to suggest concrete measures to prepare the national programme of measures for the Roma for the period after 2021. 87 FUTURE DIRECTIONS OF THE GYPSY LORE SOCIETY: SCHOLARSHIP, ACTIVISM, NAMES, PURPOSES This panel addresses two intersecting issues: current perspectives in Romani Studies and the changing roles of scholarly societies. The “critical turn” in Romani Studies centers Roma in the production of their own knowledge and interrogates the hegemony of past outsider studies “on rather than with” Roma. Simultaneously, scholars have examined the fraught colonial/collector/racist history of GLS (Acton 2014). GLS is grappling with how to attract more scholars and more Roma; does GLS need to re-tool its mission or its structure? These issues raise questions such as how is scholarship produced, who controls regimes of truth (re: structural inequality), what are the appropriate roles of insiders and outsiders (and how are these descriptors applied and with what consequences), and how and where can collaboration happen. An overarching theme is interrogating the purposes of scholarship. What is knowledge good for, and how is it related to activism and real-world applications. Many Roma as well as non-Roma are involved in policy and grassroots work to change inequalities and address anti-Gypsyism. GLS, in its conferences and journal, has embraced studies of activism. Should GLS play a more public role? How can embracing diversity help GLS grow and become more vibrant? What role can GLS play in bridging the gap between theory and practice, academia and public policy? Regarding terminology, Convenor: Carol Silverman, Anthropology and Folklore, University of Oregon, USA ([email protected]) FUTURE DIRECTIONS OF THE GYPSY LORE SOCIETY: SCHOLARSHIP, ACTIVISM, NAMES, PURPOSES 88 ORGANIZED PANELS do the terms “Gypsy” and “Lore” represent the scholars, the scholarship, the future of the society, and its public understanding? What is our relationship to the heritage of our society and our name? Clark offers a schema of scientific and critical reasoning on squaring the circle of past activities and outputs of GLS as well as assessing the potential of future directions, in terms of mission, engagement, activism and politics. He argues that GLS can reenergize itself as a body that is relevant to the 21st century. Dunajeva deals with the “critical turn” to decolonize knowledge, and the ethnic, geographical and linguistic inequalities of academic contributions. How does the nexus between language and power operate within Romani Studies in providing space for certain voices, as well as incorporating local knowledge(s) and culture(s)? What is the role of GLS in this movement, and how can it guide the field toward progressive scholarship? Vajda argues that white fragility affects institutions that support Roma and their emancipation, such as GLS. It has damaging effects on understanding and dialogue, especially when Roma feel empowered to issue a challenge, whether overt or subtle, to nonRoma, regarding the anti-Gypsyism they experience. She outlines steps that non-Roma can take to shed their fragility and emerge as robust partners in the fight against anti-Gypsyism. Ostendorf posits that the future of Romani Studies (and thus GLS) will be enriched by considering a trans-Atlantic context, moving away from a Euro-centric view. Bila interrogates “othering” in the history of GLS, and asks how Romani experiences are visible today in GLS. Can we learn from Romani experiences in working towards a future without nationalism? How can GLS help to distinguish the mythological “Gypsy” from real Romani peoples? 89 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS: n Colin Clark. Addressing the Past, Rewriting the Future: An Agenda for Change for the Gypsy Lore Society n Katya Dunajeva. Decolonizing Knowledge Production and the Role of the Gypsy Lore Society n Violeta Vajda. White Fragility in Romani Studies n Ann Ostendorf. The Global Future of the Gypsy Lore Society: A View from the Americas n William Bila. Romani Contributions to European and North American Cultures ABSTRACTS OF CONTRIBUTIONS: Addressing the Past, Rewriting the Future: An Agenda for Change for the Gypsy Lore Society This paper will offer a schema of scientific and critical reasoning on squaring the circle of past activities and outputs of the Gypsy Lore Society as well as assessing the potential of future directions, in terms of mission, engagement, activism and politics. Based on firm principles and clear values, it is argued that the GLS can potentially reenergize itself as a body that is relevant to the 21st century advocacy scholarship enterprise. The means and methods of such mobilisation are contested and not straight-forward. It is only slightly longer than twenty years ago that the GLS was one of the very few bodies organising English-language international conferences and regularly producing a journal and newsletter in the field of Romani Studies. It had, to some extent, an intellectual monopoly over such knowledge production. This is now no longer the case and a range of international academic events take place with Roma at the front and centre of such gatherings (in a sense, the academic enactment of the ‘nothing about us without us’ rationale). Similarly, there are now a range of English-language, international academic journals with “Gypsy Studies” or “Critical Romani Studies” Colin Clark, University of the West of Scotland (Colin.[email protected]) FUTURE DIRECTIONS OF THE GYPSY LORE SOCIETY: SCHOLARSHIP, ACTIVISM, NAMES, PURPOSES 96 ORGANIZED PANELS well-being, and ideological and cosmological conceptions of in/out group identity. These can be theoretical pieces, ethnographic portraits (whether experimental or analytical), historical accounts, and more applied work from public health, legal studies and social policy, which address questions such as: What exactly is a Gypsy? How is this category constituted, imagined, repudiated? To what extent does the legalistic and ethnic categorisation of Gypsy/Roma affect non-Romani groups’ identities and lifeways? How do groups with no Romani heritage creatively employ or reimagine the Gypsy category to their own advantage? What economic activities do these groups engage in? Is work part of an ideology of manhood, if so, how is women’s work understood? What kinds of gambling practices do these groups engage in? Is gambling solely the domain of men, or are woman involved? Is gambling simply a waste of time and money, or is it culturally significant? How do these groups order in-group/out-group relations? Can this ordering of worlds be considered cosmological, ideological, or something else? What are the mortality and morbidity outcomes for these groups? What are the factors that impinge upon their poor health? Do they have cultural conceptions of health and illness and, if so, what do these consist of? ABSTRACTS: n Hope, Freya. Freedom and Belonging? The Continued Coherence of the New Traveller Community n Howarth, Anthony. Getting a Living from Country People: Transactions not Relations n Singh, Punita G. Getting to Know the Sikligars—a Marginalized Community of Ironsmiths with Possible Links to Roma Origin Loci n Tribulato, Chiara. Being ‘Dritti’ in the Italian Funfair. Social Boundaries and Cultural Significances in a Peripatetic Niche 97 n Yılgür, Egemen. An Overview of the non-Roma Peripatetics in Turkey: Socio-Historical Background and the Present Conditions Freedom and Belonging? The Continued Coherence of the New Traveller Community Individuals often termed ‘New Age’ or, in academia, ‘New’ Travellers largely do not trace far-reaching cultural or biological Gypsy, Roma or Traveller heritage (though there are exceptions). Neither do many of them regularly use these aforementioned externally imposed ascriptions, instead referring to themselves simply as ‘Travellers’ or as being ‘from site’, to signify those that physically live or lived together on encampments (originating largely from the UK), even if this was years or even decades before hand. Nevertheless, the practicalities of a mobile lifestyle have led to some similarities between the groups, including some of their types of homes and economic trades. However, New Travellers did not adopt their lifestyles in an attempt to ‘become Gypsies’. Instead, this group were/are made up of different generations of people who either sought an alternative to, or were disenfranchised by, protesting against, or displaced within, societal contexts, and political policies and programs, in the UK over the last six decades. These included the nuclear arms project, the neoliberal settlement, and lack of employment and housing. Consequently, these Travellers come from all classes and all sectors of society. However, once living a mobile lifestyle, I suggest that New Travellers are subject to similar high mortality rates, and many of the effects of anti-Traveller legislation and oppression by the state, as ethnic Gypsies and Travellers. When asked why they first went on the road, and what they like most about the lifestyle, most New Travellers in my research said ‘freedom.’ Consequently, this paper will explore how notions and experiences of freedom shape Freya Hope, University of Oxford (fr[email protected]x.ac.uk) GROUPS UNDERSTOOD AS GYPSIESWITH NO ROMANI HERITAGE: SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES 98 ORGANIZED PANELS the continued survival of this new group, despite the obstacles they endure. Getting a Living from Country People: Transactions not Relations Popular representations of Irish Traveller men’s work are often couched in discourses of predation. In this imaginary, men are depicted as inherently untrustworthy; obtaining money through deception and employing aggressive sales routines that induce prospective customers to contract their services. At first glance, this is not without veracity. However, when men’s economic activity is examined from what I term an ‘ideology of manhood’, a more complicated picture emerges. From this perspective, economic success and masculine pride are synonymous with, and contingent upon, men’s ability to procure resources, including customers, from the environments in which they work. In order to understand this, the paper draws correspondences between the way that men procure a living, and hunting; arguing that Travellers operate within what I call a ‘getting environment’: A form of economic activity distinct from wage labour, gift giving, and other forms of reciprocal exchange. Undoubtedly, Travellers trade their time and energy for financial recompense, thereby conforming to broad understandings of exchange. However, from their perspective, they control the economic relationship and thereby avoid the constraints of bonded reciprocity. By making these suggestions, I argue against scholarship that categorises Traveller and Gypsy economic practices as being relations of dependency. Instead, when examined through the logic of Traveller manhood and their economic practice of aggressive one-upmanship, men’s economic relations with their customers more resemble predatory and exploitative relationships. Here customers are used by Travellers for their own ends Anthony Leroyd Howarth, University of Oxford ([email protected]) 99 and, due to the contest of procurement, men imagine themselves to be superior to, or in their own words, ‘cleverer’, than their non-Traveller counterparts. Drawing these strands together, the paper ends by considering whether it is productive to conceptualise men’s economic activity as a socio-cosmological configuration of in/outgroup boundary making which acts to invert unequal power relationships between Travellers and ‘country people’ (non-Travellers). Getting to Know the Sikligars—a Marginalized Community of Ironsmiths with Possible Links to Roma Origin Loci Once valued for their metal-burnishing skills, the Sikligar community of smiths have since lost their lustre and have been relegated to living on the fringes of mainstream India. Scattered across the country in shantytowns, the Sikligars suffered the ignominy of being labeled a nomadic ‘criminal tribe’ by the British in 1871 (Singh ‘Sher’, 1966). This appellation was later ‘denotified’ and the community classified under dubious categories like ‘Scheduled Castes’ (SC) and ‘Other Backward Classes’ (OBC) despite many being affiliated to the Sikh faith which believes in an egalitarian, casteless society. This paper reviews extant writings and research on the Sikligars, supplemented by ethnographic accounts of encounters with Sikligar families. The community’s own sense of their history is of particular interest, as many narrate stories of Rajput ancestry and links to places like Chittor, Kannauj, Multan and Sindh that have been implicated in Roma origin theories. Their devotion to Sikh gurus Hargobind and Gobind in the 16th and 17th centuries also comes up in narratives recounting their role as weapon makers for battles with the Mughals. As ‘lohars’ (ironsmiths), the Sikligars now subsist primarily by making farm implements, metal tools, locks and Punita G. Singh, Ashoka University, India ([email protected]) GROUPS UNDERSTOOD AS GYPSIESWITH NO ROMANI HERITAGE: SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES 100 ORGANIZED PANELS keys. While the Indian government has attempted to ‘settle’ some of the SCs and OBCs, the Sikligars often face discrimination from the majority communities they find themselves embedded in, on account of linguistic and lifestyle differences. In the 1984 Sikh pogrom in Delhi, it is purported that a large majority of the Sikhs murdered were Sikligars and Labanas—easy targets living in ‘resettlement colony’ ghettoes (Radhakrishna, 2007). The irony of their existence is further highlighted, not just in tense out-group relations, but also within the religious in-group, with Sikh elites sometimes treating them as lesser-than. With some scholars and activists raising awareness about these ‘forgotten Sikhs’ (Singh, 2009) the Sikh community is now rallying to uplift the Sikligars and restore the dignity and respect they were accorded by their revered gurus. REFERENCES n Singh, J., 2009. On the Forgotten Sikhs’ Trail. Chandigarh: Institute of Sikh Studies. n Radhakrishna, M., 2007. ‘Urban Denotified Tribes: Competing Identities, Contested Citizenship’, Economic and Political Weekly, 42(51): 59-64. n Singh ‘Sher’, S., 1966. The Sikligars of Punjab: A Gypsy Tribe. New Delhi: Sterling Publishers. n Being ‘Dritti’ in the Italian Funfair. Social Boundaries and Cultural Significances in a Peripatetic Niche. n Chiara Tribulato, Lacito, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) ([email protected]) The funfair, a contemporary embodiment of the medieval fair, is a special economic niche that gathers social categories linked in multiple different ways to the world of travel. This world is nowadays a complex system shared among Sinti and non-Sinti travelling entertainers, who define themselves as ‘Dritti’. This term was traditionally 101 employed as an ethnonym by vagabonds, peddlers, performers and animal trainers who travelled across northern Italy, following seasonal markets and traditional fairs. Today, said term is commonly used to designate Italian showpeople by bloodline, i.e. born from Traveller parents in the environment of the funfair or circus. The group, though geographically scattered, is supported by a social hierarchy based on the seniority of families in the world of travel and is organized around a dense network relying on marriage alliances. The profession is strongly marked in terms of identity and is transmitted from father to son across generations. This transmission within the family applies also to the ride, which is both the center of economic life and a symbol of prestige status inside this separate world. The condition of social marginality and itinerant lifestyle strengthens the self-perception of the people belonging to this service-provider group, whose sense of ‘self’ is built in ideological opposition to the outside world; the ‘sedentary’ world. From the latter they are often labelled as ‘gypsies’ and with ‘gypsies’ they also share their living and economic routines. Taking into account the complexity of this specific peripatetic niche, this paper assesses the relationship between the Dritti and Sinti communities within the arena of travelling show business, where mixed marriages have provided the appropriate setting for a meaningful cultural and linguistic exchange. It specifically explores the processes through which being Dritti is conceptualized and reproduced in a mixed environment, constantly divided between the two needs of mimesis and differentiation. GROUPS UNDERSTOOD AS GYPSIESWITH NO ROMANI HERITAGE: SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES 102 ORGANIZED PANELS An Overview of the Non-Roma Peripatetics in Turkey: Socio-Historical Background and the Present Conditions The Turkish Republic succeeded the Ottoman Empire, which encompassed parts of the Middle East, North Africa and Eastern Europe, and hosted diverse communities who almost perfectly fit the ideal type definition of peripatetics that Joseph C. Berland and Aparna Rao formulated in the last quarter of the 20th-century. Their matrimonial practices were more or less endogamic and they, as family groups, regularly visited their clients, partly settled agriculturalist and town dwellers and partly pastoral nomads, to provide some services and goods in exchange for cash or agricultural products on a seasonal basis. However, as the rise of new institutions and industry decreased demand for what they provided, some of them gradually disappeared, merging into the majority. The others revised their subsistence strategies, generally on a less mobile basis, but succeeded to preserve their group identity. Such groups, for whom the use of another term, postperipatetics, would be more appropriate, constitute the majority of the population called ‘Gypsy’ by the surrounding locals today. Since the 15th-century, the Ottoman Empire had had a distinct policy of taxation for peripatetics and thus registered them separately under generic terms such as Çingāne or Ḳibṭī, the Ottoman counterpart of Anglo-Saxon ‘Gypsy’. Although modernisation attempts abolished many aspects of the pre-modern taxonomy of the Ottoman population in the 19th-century, official usage of the term Ḳibṭī somehow remained longer. The modern Turkish state, as an administrative body, inherited such terms from the empire and used them as legal titles until the mid20th Century. These idioms are still a part of everyday language, whereby people use them to denote postEgemen Yılgür, Yeditepe University, Turkey (teg[email protected]) 103 peripatetics and peripatetics, generally in a stigmatising manner. This presentation will be an overview of present archival and ethnographic data, reflecting on how non-Roma peripatetics, such as Dom, Lom, Teber (Abdals), and Tahtacis, have become post-peripatetics, and how they have interacted with the majority and the state. GROUPS UNDERSTOOD AS GYPSIESWITH NO ROMANI HERITAGE: SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES 104 ORGANIZED PANELS INTERNATIONAL ROMANI LITERATURE(S): APPROACHES TO A “NEW” WORLD LITERATURE Romani literature has experienced remarkable developments during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. As of today, in almost all countries where Roma live, authors of Romani background have been producing books and other publications in various languages, including Romany. In the decades since 1989 the number of books that authors of Romani background have published has increased. Likewise, the usage of Romani in books, translations, and periodical publications by and for Roma has also risen. Romani literary pieces share features that go beyond the borders of any one country or region. These circumstances allow us to speak of Romani literature, and even of Romani literatures, as a heterogeneous and multifaceted, yet still a collective phenomenon. The remarkably developing Romani literature scene has provoked a considerable interest among researchers, and increasing scholarship on Romani literature has assumed at least three distinct approaches. First, there are those studies that adopt a historical approach and are based on providing accounts of Romani literature production and authors’ life paths, along with outlines of socio-political factors (socio-biographical approach). Second, there are those studies that adopt the methods of the field of literary theory and comparative literature and focus on case studies of authors and theoretical interpretations of Conveners: Lorely French, Pacific University, USA (fr[email protected]) Marina Ortrud M. Hertrampf, University of Passau, Germany (Marina.Hertramp[email protected]) Sofiya Zahova, University of Iceland / University of St Andrews, UK ([email protected]) 105 INTERNATIONAL ROMANI LITERATURE(S): APPROACHES TO A “NEW” WORLD LITERATURE literary works. Third, there are studies analysing Romani literary production in terms of methods and theories developed in the field of cultural studies. This panel proposal comes as one of the follow-ups to the multi-session panel Narratives by and about Roma organized as part of the 2019 GLS Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies, 15–17 August 2019, at the University of Iceland. The panel participants have identified the need to further maintain a forum for discussion of Romani literature from various disciplinary angles and within the field of Romani Studies. We recognize that despite the dynamic development of Romani literary scholarship in recent decades, such scholarship has been somehow underrepresented within Romani Studies, both at forums and in academic publications. The overall aim of the panel is to provide an interdisciplinary forum for discussion of Romani literature from historical and contemporary perspectives, bringing together researchers and practitioners from various backgrounds. We invite participants who address in their papers issues such as: Theoretical approaches to Romani literature; Developments of Romani literature as a field nationally and/or internationally; Analysis and comparison of narratives and motifs in Romani literature; Case studies of Romani authors and literary works; Romani language production, publishing and translation; Authenticity, representation and cultural appropriation in literature (co-written) by Roma; Interfacing between Romani literature research and other fields (for instance history, migrations, antigypsyism, ethnic studies, nationalism, etc.) 112 ORGANIZED PANELS The Textual Composition of Flamenco Lyric as a Media of Romani Collective Memory: Oral Tradition, Formulas and Fragmentation The obvious relationship between Flamenco lyrics, oral tradition, new text production and the collective memory of Spanish Roma has not yet been possible to be explained convincingly, as Flamenco culture in general first was romanticized as an ancient exclusively gitano patrimony and then, after the scientific refutation of the theories about a hermetic phase of origin defended by Mairena y Molina in the 1960s, has often been considered as a mere popular folkloric product. This contribution will show that particular Flamenco modalities, such as the Acapella types of tonás and martinets, are actually derived from specific forms of Romani self-representation and that their original texts, today still sung in a drastically fragmented form, have been produced by gitanos. Applying the techniques of oral-formulaic composition and using formulas of epic romances, gitanos were one of the main transmitter groups since the Spanish Golden Age. Thus, in this case, the gitano heritage of Flamenco is not mainly explained by the musical performance. Instead, the thesis that emphasizes the literary elements of Flamenco is also significant, namely, that the mentioned palos indeed stem from narratives and large romances in the sense of epic-based ballads that function as oral forms of both news bulletins and media of collective memory in the Romani community. Therefore, these simple texts really related – properly speaking, must have related in former times, as Flamenco poetry is nowadays said to be non-narrative but essentially lyrical – the stories of the persecution of Roma, such as terrible events like La Prisión General de los Gitanos (Great Gypsy Round-up) of 1749; this raid thereby becomes remembered in the communicative memory of Spanish Roma. To follow this Florian Homann, University of Cologne, Germany ([email protected]) 113 argumentation, I will explain why the imprisonment could be deleted from Spanish historiography and forgotten in national as well as later even in Romani cultural memory. I will describe a long-term process in relation to the evolution and drastic fragmentation of Flamenco poetry as that poetry develops from narrative ballads to the short song texts as we know them today, losing their elements of storytelling in the literary trends of late romanticism in the nineteenth century. Furthermore, I argue that these particular cantes and their texts, whose narrativity still surfaced in the lyrical Flamenco verses at the beginning of the twentieth century, had a considerable influence – as a specific type of World Literature – on Spanish poetry of all authors related to Flamenco culture. Imagology of the “true Gypsyness” in the Literary Work of Jerzy Ficowski Jerzy Ficowski was a self-taught ethnographer who, from the turn of the 1940s and 1950s, when he began to publish his first dissertations in “Gypsy Studies” (also in “Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society”), presented himself in opposition to earlier Polish gypsiologists as a “Gypsypractitioner”. He underlined the fact that he had travelled with the “Gypsy caravans” for a long time, hiding from the Security Service. However, my archival research proves that his contacts with the Roma were rarer than he had presented. He was the author of a popular book Cyganie polscy (Polish edition: 1953, 1965, 1985, 1989, English edition: 1989), which is still the most popular source of information about the Roma in Polish Romani studies. At the same time, Ficowski was working on his unfinished novel on “Polish Gypsies” (Wygasłe ogniska). From the turn of the 1940s into the 1950s and then the 2000s he also regularly published poems about “Gypsies” and wrote “Gypsy songs” for folk bands. The image of Gypsies contained in his poems and songs reproduced many Emilia Kledzik, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland ([email protected]) INTERNATIONAL ROMANI LITERATURE(S): APPROACHES TO A “NEW” WORLD LITERATURE 114 ORGANIZED PANELS stereotypes of “gypsyism”, but also tried to question and transcend them. This image of “real Gypsies” visible in his literary output also appear in his ethnographic works. The political context of his literary output was also significant – occurring at a time when Ficowski was involved in the state campaign targeting settlement of the “Gypsies”. The purpose of the paper is to present the imagology of the “Gypsies” in the poetry and prose of Jerzy Ficowski against the background of his personal career and his other publications about the “Gypsies” in Poland. “Thanks to her ‘dissident’ status, she was granted cultural asylum”. The Figure of Dissident Artist in Kiba Lumberg’s Work The figure of the (woman) artist is a central element of the Finnish Romani writer, artist and activist Kiba Lumberg’s (*1956) literary work, including one of her comic books. Lumberg’s take on the subject is pronouncedly autobiographical (e.g. Lappalainen 2012), highlighting the important role of the artist’s gender, sexuality, ethnicity and other aspects of her identity, though constantly problematizing and ironizing it. In terms of genre, previous research on Lumberg’s work (i. e. her Memesa trilogy, 2004– 2008 and her comic books, 2010) has highlighted her strategies of using e. g. elements from the (feminist) artist’s novel and autofiction, including features of ethno/autobiography (see Parente-Čapková 2018 and Kauranen, Parente-Čapková & Vuorinne 2020). In my present contribution, I intend to depart from the Memesa trilogy, but concentrate on Lumberg’s last novel, Irtiottoxxx (2018, Breakxxx), so far largely ignored by the Finnish literary establishment. In Irtiottoxxx, which takes place in Italy, the lesbian Romani artist Memesa (the protagonist of Lumberg’s earlier novels) is no more the first person narrator, but only a narrated figure in the background. However, with the help of the “Memesa Viola Parente-Čapková, University of Turku, Finland ([email protected]) 115 narrative” embedded in the discussion on artists’ rights and their position in society in general, Lumberg continues to discuss the role of the artist in the context of the – allegedly liberal and generous – Finnish cultural institutions. I am going to map Lumberg’s critical view of the Nordic society with the help of contextual, multilayered intersectional analysis of her last novel. REFERENCES: n Kauranen, Ralf, Parente-Čapková, Viola & Vuorinne, Anna (2020), Escapes of a “Mad Artist”: Intersectional Identities in Kiba Lumberg’s Comics. Hertrampf, Marina, Ortrud, von Hagen, Kirsten (eds) Selbstund Frembilder von Roma in Comic und Graphic Novel: Vom Holocaust bis zur Gegenwart, München: Akademische Verlagsgemeinschaft München, 243–272. n Lappalainen, Päivi (2012), “Haluan löytää oman tähteni” [“I Want to Find My Own Star”], in: Kurikka, Kaisa/ Löytty, Olli/Melkas, Kukku/Parente-Čapková, Viola (eds): Kertomuksen luonto [The Nature of Narrative], Jyväskylä: Jyväskylän yliopisto [Nykykulttuurin tutkimuskeskuksen julkaisuja 107], 177–186. n Parente-Čapková, Viola (2018): “Is Professionalism the Same as Inhumanity?” Social Criticism in the Literary Work of Kiba Lumberg, in: Multiethnica 38, 18–27. http://www.valentin.uu.se/digitalAssets/686/ c_686162-l_3-k_multiethnica38.pdf [27.03.2020]. INTERNATIONAL ROMANI LITERATURE(S): APPROACHES TO A “NEW” WORLD LITERATURE 116 ORGANIZED PANELS Minority Press as the Prerequisite for a Small Ethnic Literature: The Informační zpravodaj and Románo ľil Romani Magazines (1969–1973) as the Solid Foundation for the Contemporary Romani Literature in the Czech Republic The short-lived Romani magazines Informační zpravodaj and its successor Románo ľil, released as the internal newsletter of the Union of Gypsies-Roma between 1969 and 1973, helped forge written Romani in the Czech Republic, set the tone for Romani writing for the future, and served as a hotbed that bred new talents. Although non-Romani intellectuals such as Milena Hübschmannová, Eva Davidová or Pavel Steiner significantly contributed to the magazine’s form, the topics and renditions therein were the Romani writers’ own. Contemporary Czech Romani writing, even by the youngest writers who have had little or no contact with the UGR generation, owes its writers’ confidence to write and their motivic patterns to the literary pioneers, many of whom have been forgotten. In my paper, I will briefly discuss the history of the newsletter, its characteristic features, and some leading topics and approaches as represented by Tera Fabiánová, Andrej Pešta, Josef Bánom and Andrej Giňa, and I will show how the ethos of the first independent Romani organisation in Czechia has transcended decades and continues to live in the works of contemporary Romani writers. I will also demonstrate that the conservative vein of narrative embedded in the oral tradition and the activist, politically engaged approach existed parallel to each other from the start; rather than being two successive stages of development, they are in fact two trends of Romani representation, and, as such, two sides of the same coin. Karolína Ryvolová, Kher Publishing House, Prague, Czech Republic ([email protected]) 117 Finding a Voice: the Slovak-Roma Woman Writer in Irish and Czech Fiction The Irish-American writer Colum McCann’s Zoli, published in 2006, features a Slovak-Roma woman who survives the Nazi occupation and Communist-era discrimination to become an acclaimed poet, only to be cast out by her community and forced into exile. While giving a (fictional) voice to a marginalized minority, the novel is dominated by two male narrators: a Slovak writer named Stranský and Zoli’s lover, an Englishman of mixed Irish-Slovak background named Swann. The novel received widespread critical acclaim (the Guardian called it “a convincing account of Gypsy life”) and was translated into a number of languages, including Czech. Two years after Zoli appeared, another depiction of postwar Slovak Roma life was published in the Czech Republic: Irena Eliášová’s Our Settlement (Naše osada). With its affectionate but unsentimental view of Romani culture, the work reveals a community deeply invested in its traditions yet confronted with social change. The text is distinguished by a simple yet distinctive mixture of languages: while the characters speak Slovak (with some use of Romani phrases), the narrative voice is in standard Czech. Despite some critical attention from scholars of Romani studies, Eliášová’s work remains mostly unknown in both Czech and Slovak literary circles. Both Zoli and Naše osada walk an uneasy balance in their well-intentioned presentations of the SlovakRoma woman writer, both real and fictional. In the case of McCann, the effort to bring one of Europe’s most misunderstood minorities to an Anglophone readership borders on what John McCourt calls a “patronizing gesture.” The issues of control in Eliášová’s case are less obvious but also reflect deeply engrained power balances. Her book is illustrated by drawings made by children from a mainly Romani primary school, but the editors included Charles Sabatos, Yeditepe University, Istanbul, Turkey ([email protected]) INTERNATIONAL ROMANI LITERATURE(S): APPROACHES TO A “NEW” WORLD LITERATURE 118 ORGANIZED PANELS footnotes to “correct” the characters’ mistakes in Slovak. In the Central European context, where national identity is still heavily defined by language, Eliášová’s use of multilingualism negotiates between both the “separate but equal” status of Czech and Slovak language under Communism and the suppression of Romani language that has persisted to the present. Whether in a bestselling novel written in New York, or in a memoir from provincial Bohemia, the Slovak-Roma writer faces obstacles to selfexpression not only due to gender and ethnicity, but to issues of appropriation similar to those debated by US Latinx and other minority artists. Double-Consciousness and Cultural Mediation in Transnational Romani literature W.E.B. Du Bois coined the term “double consciousness” to refer to the conflictive subjectivities of African Americans (as racialized subjects) who strive to reconcile their ethnic bodies, behaviours, values, and experiences with those of the hegemonic group in their societies. The fact that these hegemonic values are internalized by the racialized subjects, despite the trauma those values inflict on the subjects, reveals the complexity and vulnerability of the human mind. Drawing on the concepts of “double consciousness,” “autoethnography” (Pratt), and the notion of cultural mediation (Vigotsky), this paper examines the work of Ronald Lee (Goddam Gypsy), Mateo Maximoff (Dites-le avec des pleurs and Les Ursitori), and Jorge Emilio Nedich (Leyenda gitana and El aliento negro de los romaníes), analyzing how the literary texts become a space in which values and behaviours are confronted and resignified. REFERENCES: n Du Bois, W.E.B. The Souls of Balck Folk. New York: Penguin, 1903. Ana Belén Martín Sevillano, Department of World Languages and Literatures, Université de Montréal, Canada ([email protected]) 119 n Pratt, Marie-Louise. Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation. New York: Routledge, 1992. Vigotsky, L.S. Mind in Society. Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press, 1978. Fighting for Peace in Uriah Burton’s Life Story Uriah Burton ”Big Just” His Life, His Aims, His Ideals (1979) The title of Romani Uriah Burton’s 26-page collaborative life story includes the words “aims” and “ideals,” and these two words capture significant parts of the contents of the life story. Aims include building a caravan park for his fellow Gypsies and Travellers to live on, walking from Belfast to Dublin in “Peace People” style, constructing a monument to his father on top of a Welsh hilltop, and negotiating punishments in terms of “Gypsy Law”. Some of these aims were ideals to begin with, but he made them real, while other ideas remained ideals, but not for the want of trying. The following words can be seen directly after the title on the inner flap of the life story: “WITH GREETINGS TO ALL PEOPLE IN THE WORLD,” and these few words also capture parts of the life story. Burton took personal action to bring attention to the much-needed idea of peace in a troubled Ireland, but he also wanted world peace. One aspect of Burton’s identity seems to contradict this description – he was a renowned no-rules, bare-knuckle fighter with a fierce reputation, but he depicts himself as maintaining the idea that he used his many abilities, including his fighting ability, to preserve and maintain different forms of peace. His life story is quite rare, as there were only a few hundred copies published; it has circulated within Gypsy circles, and, he writes: “Four copies of this article have been issued to every country in the world” (p. 23). The life story is referred to as a booklet and an article, and the 1st of January, 1980, is suggested as the “day of the declaration Martin Shaw, Mid Sweden University, Sweden ([email protected]) INTERNATIONAL ROMANI LITERATURE(S): APPROACHES TO A “NEW” WORLD LITERATURE 120 ORGANIZED PANELS of peace”: that is, the declaration of the desire for world peace. Burton claims that he has difficulty making himself understood and understanding modern society (p.1), but maybe it is time that he was understood; my presentation will consist of an attempt to do so. 121 MIGRATION AND ADAPTATION TO NEW ENVIRONMENTS Romani migration is an important issue. As a result of migration, Romani groups have spread across the globe. During the migrations, Romani modified their languages, livelihood strategies, their skills and crafts, and the way of communication with the surrounding population. Moving was a daily routine for nomadic and semi-nomadic Romani groups. However, settled groups also move, and for them, migration is leaving home. Perhaps at present sedentary families travel more than in the past, when moving large numbers of people was logistically much more difficult. Present-day Romanies thus engage in large-scale global migration movements that affect world politics, modify national interests, and push cultural boundaries. This panel deals with the reasons, context and circumstances of the arrival of individuals, families, or wider migrant groups in new locations. It focuses on the way they take their first steps in the new places and establish themselves, and their acceptance by the surrounding population. It seeks to answer the question of what social space the newly arrived Roma create, and how migration to a specific place affects their lives. It asks how their language and subsistence activities have changed, and how their standard of living, property ownership and other characteristics that influence the quality of life of individuals and families, have also changed. What people tell about migrations is usually more important for the daily life of an individual or group than what is traceable in the archives. An important place in MIGRATION AND ADAPTATION TO NEW ENVIRONMENTS Conveners: Zdeněk Uherek, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic (zdenek.uher[email protected]) 128 ORGANIZED PANELS n Mróz L., (2001), Poland: The clash of tradition and modernity (in:) Between Past and Future: the Roma of Central and Eastern Europe. Guy W., (ed.), Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press. Modern Migration Processes of Roma from Macedonia As a topic, the migration of Macedonian Roma in the post-war period is insufficiently researched in science. This social and cultural aspect of the recent history of the Roma from the Western Balkans has a special impact on the identity issues and especially on the demographics of the Romani population. This paper will focus on the Macedonian Roma’s migration and ethno-cultural changes in the post-war period. As a marginalized people, the Roma were particularly affected by the consequences of World War II, which significantly increased poverty and unemployment, which in turn had repercussions on education. After the war, industrialization began, especially in progressively developing countries such as America, Australia and China, as well as some European countries (Germany, France, and Italy). Such an economic and social set-up of the great powers vis-a-vis underdeveloped countries has led to mass migration and job search in the world’s economic centres of power, especially by the countries of the Western Balkans. The post-war migration of Macedonian Roma was happening during the existence of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). The first period took place in the 1960s and 70s, when the world economy was looking for workers from the Balkan countries. The second period can be called a “socio-economic wave” and the reason for the mass exodus in the late 1980s is the spread of information in Romani neighbourhoods that by means of asylum application one can obtain documents Daniel Petrovski, Institute of Folklore “Marko Cepenkov”, Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia petrov[email protected] 129 enabling him to stop in European countries quickly and easily. Since Macedonia gained independence in 1991, many Roma have returned from Germany through a reintegration programme. The third period of modern migration wave has been taking place since 2009 and can be called an “asylum wave”, after Europe opened its borders to the citizens of Macedonia. According to field research, some asylum seekers received full protection and financial assistance from the European states. The modern migration of Roma from Macedonia has contributed to a significant improvement in their housing, economic stability and raising awareness of education. There is no official data on the number of Roma from Macedonia in EU countries, but according to data obtained by local “Romani leaders” from European cities, Macedonian Roma are mostly in Germany, Belgium, Italy, Sweden, and France. Romani International Migration Experience in the Times of Socialism: the Czech Lands There is still a widespread notion that Romani migration from Czechoslovakia abroad is a new issue that only appeared at the end of the 1990s. The era of socialism in the Czech lands is mainly associated with inner Romani migration from Slovakia to Bohemia and Moravia. However, we also recorded Romani migration to Western countries prior to 1989. Not to a large extent, but certainly an extent worth our attention. Migrations to the West were motivated by economic, political, and family reasons. In some cases, curiosity also played a role. Several cases, which I will present in more detail, will show how closing the borders and the state propaganda about the West also worked in Romani households and influenced the behaviour of individuals and narrow groups of Romani actors. We can also consider networks of relatives that exceeded the state borders. Zdeněk Uherek, Charles University; Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic (zdenek.uher[email protected]) MIGRATION AND ADAPTATION TO NEW ENVIRONMENTS 130 ORGANIZED PANELS However, we have also recorded stories of departures to a completely unknown environment, without family ties and knowledge of the language, where the Roma gained an appropriate position only with diligence and wit. It is symptomatic that since 1989, the radius of action of Romani migrations has increased considerably, while before 1989 migrations were mostly directed to neighbouring Western countries. 131 PAL O ROMA ROMANES / PA ROM ROMANES / PANEL IN ROMANI PAL O ROMA ROMANES Pro konferencii GLS sas dži akana konferenčno čhib jekhbuter angliciko. Amen paťas, hoj the romaňi čhib šaj chasňaras andro diskusii pal o romisticka buťa the disciplini u hoj the e romaňi čhib šaj jekhetaňarel eksperten pal buter lumakere thema. Vašoda o panelos nane definimen temaha, aľe čhibaha: the o referati the o diskusii musaj te jel andre romaňi čhib. Užaras referati butere subdisciplinendar romane študiendar (sar hin lingvistika, etnologia, historia, literarno vaj bašavibnaskero džaniben…) O vakeribena musaj te jel pre učo džanibnaskero levelos, no mangas tumen: musaj len te achaľol the o džene pal o aver džanibnaskre disciplini. Ole paneloha kamas (pašavreste) te sikhavel, hoj pal e romaňi tematika šaj diskutinas pro džanibnaskero levelos andre romaňi čhib. PA ROM ROMANES Pej GLS konferencii ži ákánik mindik vorbijas pe maj but englišicka šibasa Ame paťas, hoď pa kadal phušimátura andaj intrégone akademickíva búťa šaj vorbinas vi romanes. Romana šibasa šaj vorbin khetánes le akademikura pi cára luma, taj šaj haťáren peske le ekspertura andaj sa intrégi thema. Kado paneli naj anglal dino la témasa, de la šibasa: i vorba (vi prezentácia, vi diskuzia) si t´avel feri romanes. Azír lešinas le referátura andaj akharsoske disciplíni romane studijendar (sar si lingvistika, etnologia, historia, literatura vaj romano arto). Kadal referátura si PAL O ROMA ROMANES / PA ROM ROMANES / PANEL IN ROMANI Conveners: Jan Červenka, Romani Studies Seminar at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Czech Republic ([email protected]) Markéta Hajská, Romani Studies Seminar at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Czech Republic (mark[email protected]) 132 ORGANIZED PANELS t´avel iskirime maj zurálasa akademickíva vorbasa, de vi kadej, hoď šaj haťáren la vorbake vi le manuš andaj áver disciplíni. Kadale panelosa kamas te sikhavas, hoď pa sogodi romani tématika del pe te vorbij romana šibasa. PANEL IN ROMANI The common language of Gypsy Lore Society conferences has primarily been English. We believe that Romani can also feature as the language of common academic discussion about different issues and disciplines in Romani studies, which can connect experts from different countries. The panel is thus not defined by its topic, but by the common language of the presentations: both the contributions and discussion will be held in Romani language. This panel is thematically open, papers in any field of Romani Studies (e.g. linguistics, ethnology, history, theory of Romani literature or art) are accepted. Papers should be on high academic level but contributors are asked to make them comprehensible for researchers from different scientific disciplines. One of the aims of this panel will be to show the potential of Romani language use in debating a wide variety of academic topics. LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS n Červenka, Jan. Vakeriben pal o mule pro trin bara (borderi): Vakeribena pal o revenanti maškar fikcia the realita, maškar informacia the literatura vaj maškar folkloris the individualno kreacia / „Vakeriben pal o mule“ on Three Borders: Revenant Stories between Fiction and Reality, between Information and Literature or between Folklore and Individual Creative Writing n Gáborová, Jana. Pal le Romengeri vakeribnaskeri tradicija ki e moderno romaňi literatura / From Romani Oral Tradition to Modern Romani Book Creation 133 n Martin Gális, Iveta Kokyová. Košibena andre romaňi čhib / Curses in Romani n Hajská, Markéta. “Apal nás aba slobodo te phíras le vurdonenca”. The End of Itinerant Life in Former Czechoslovakia from the Perspective of Vlax Roms n Pavel Kubaník, Michal Mižigár. O čhibakere repertoari le romane študentegere pre CEU / Language Repertoires of CEU Roma Students n Kozhanov, Kirill; Oslon Mikhail. Historical Evidence from Romani Etymology: A New Etymological Dictionary of the Romani Language. ABSTRACTS OF CONTRIBUTIONS Vakeriben pal o mule pro trin bara (borderi): Vakeribena pal o revenanti maškar fikcia the realita, maškar informacia the literatura vaj maškar folkloris the individualno kreacia. Vakeribena pal o mule hin importantno fenomenos andre romaňi mentalno luma. Maj savore Roma džanen te vakerel pal o konkretna kontakti maškar o džide the o mule, so zadžiďile jon vaj lengeri fameľia. Pre jekh sera hine ola historii individualna, pre aver sera hin andre kala vakeribena kolektivna charakteristiki. Kala vakeribena na šunas ča andre normalno komunikacia, no hine the tema andro literarna publikacii (dikh Demeter 1992, Kher 2012, Ryvolová – ed.- 2019). O referatos kamela te sikhavel o vakeribena pal o mule sar fenomenos pre bar (pro borderis), u te sikhavel kada trine dromenca: 1) E angluňi bar (angluno borderis) dikhel o autoris maškar fikcia the realita. Avruňa, gadžikaňa perspektivatar dičhol kala vakeribena najbuter sar fikcia, ta o referatos len sikhavela buter sar realisticka vakeribena pal e transcendentno luma u kontrastinela len mamuj o fantasticka paramisa. O autoris sikhavela pojekh dikhibena Jan Červenka, Romani Studies Seminar at the Department of Central European Studies, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Czech Republic ([email protected]) PAL O ROMA ROMANES / PA ROM ROMANES / PANEL IN ROMANI 134 ORGANIZED PANELS andre teoria. Jekh egzemplos: O drom, saveha hin kala vakeribena prezentimen andre edicia Kher, so del avri romaňi literatura, džal komplikimen dromeha: andro berš 2012 hine mek prezentimen eksplicitnones sar paramisa, andro berš 2019 hin e pozicia buter strukturimen. Dujto egzemplos: E Milena Hübschmannovo (dikh 2006) len bešľarel andro kontekstos, sar o Roma dikhen e luma. No joj koda romano dikhiben ajci kontrastinel le gadžikane racionalnone dikhibnaha, hoj o vakeribena pale (implicitnones) agoraren andre jekh kategoria fantastickone paramisenca. 2) Le autoris interesinela the keci hin andro konkretna vakeribena literarno kompozicia. Ta jov rodela dujto bar: maškar informativna the literarnones koncipimen vakeribena. E dujto bar hin tiž dinamicko, ta o autoris sikhavela the sar pes kala duj fenomeni andro vakeribena miksinen. 3) O autoris komparinela narativna strukturi butere vakeribnendar: o rekordingi pal o romane koloňiji, o teksti, so has lekhade pre publično akhariben (Ryvolová – ed.- 2019), the o vakeribena publikimen sar autorsko literatura. Jov zumavela te sikhavel e trito bar: maškar o kolektivna strukturi the o individualna inovacii. The e trito bar hin dinamicko u le autoris pale interesinela the kada, sar pes o duj fenomeni miksinen. Vakeriben pal o mule on Three Borders: Revenant Stories Between Fiction and Reality, Information and Literature, and Folklore and Individual Creative Writing Vakeribena pal o mule is an important phenomenon in Romani spiritual world. The majority of Roms can tell specific stories about contacts between the living and the dead from their own or their relatives` experience. These stories are on the one hand individual, on the other hand they have a lot of collective features. These stories can 135 be heard in everyday communication but they also represent the topic of creative writing (e.g. Demeter 1992, Kher 2012, Ryvolová ed. 2019). The aim of this paper is to show revenant stories as a border phenomenon in three ways: 1) The first border is between fiction and non-fiction. From outer, „Gadjo“ perspective these stories may seem like fiction so the author will rather show them as non-fictional stories about the transcendental world, and contrast them against fantastic fairy-tales. Various theoretical approaches to these stories will be presented: For example, Kher, a publishing house which specializes in Romani literature, has presented these stories in different ways: from explicitly labelling them fairy-tales in 2012 to a more stuctured interpretation in 2019. On the other hand, Milena Hübschmannová (2006) showed these stories in the context of Romani world. Nevertheless, she describes the Romani point of view as so radically different from the non-Romani rational one, that these stories (implicitly) are again in the same category as the fantastic fairy-tales. 2) The author will also consider the degree of literary composition in specific stories. Hence, the second border will be shown between conventional “informative“ stories and stories with real artificial composition. This border will also be shown as a dynamic one regarding mixing of particular features on both sides of this border. 3) The author will compare the narrative structure of diftferent revenant stories: the recordings from Romani settlements, texts written as a reaction to a public call (Ryvolová ed. 2019) and other texts published as auvthor`s literature. He will try to find the third border: the border between collective structures and individual innovations. Also, the third border will be shown as a dynamic one regarding mixing of particular features on both sides of this border. PAL O ROMA ROMANES / PA ROM ROMANES / PANEL IN ROMANI 136 ORGANIZED PANELS BIBLIOGRAFIA /REFERENCES n Danišová, E. 2019: Angluno lav (Foreword) In: Ryvolová, K. (ed). 2019. n Demeter, Gejza 1992. O mule maškar amende. Praha: Romaňi čhib. n Hübschmannová, M. 2006. Moje setkání s romano šukar laviben. Romano džaniben ňilaj 2006, s. 27 – 60. Šaj arakhen adaj: https://www.dzaniben.cz/files/ de787bf3d588e0d4d37e4de04397e2b2.pdf n Kher 2012. Angluno lav (Foreword) In: Otcův duch. Šaj arakhen adaj: http://www.kher.cz/Eknihy/Nase/duch.pdf n Kher 2013. Angluno lav (Foreword) In: Rozummění. Literatura Romů (nejen) ve výuce romských žáků. Šaj arakhen adaj: http://www.kher.cz/Eknihy/Nase/rozummeni_2.pdf n Kher 2014. Angluno lav (Foreword) In: Moji milí. Sbírka romské narativní prózy. Šaj arakhen adaj: http://www. kher.cz/Eknihy/Nase/Moji_Mili_pdf.pdf n Ryvolová, K. (ed). 2019. O mulo! Povídky o duchách zemřelých. Praha: Kher. Šaj arakhen adaj: http://www. kher.cz/Eknihy/Nase/O_mulo_pdf.pdf Pal le Romengeri vakeribnaskeri tradicija ki e moderno romaňi literatura Kada geňiben amen ľidžala paš o romano vakeriben, savo sas adaj, andro Československo the paš oda, sar pes kada vakeriben paruďa pro iriben. Miri študija sikhavela le Romengero vakeriben. Pro kada vakeriben, savo vičinas paramisi, dikhaha pal o buter seri. Jekha seratar dikhaha pre oda, sar o Roma vakerenas paramisa. So kerenas o paramisara prekal oda, hoj lengero vakeriben te el interesantno, sar o Roma džanenas, ko hin paramisaris pre vatra, u kaj ola paramisa pen vakerenas. Kada savoro analizinav olestar, so dikhľom the chudňom pro diktafonos andre jekh vatra pre Slovačiko. Koda, so mange o Roma phende pro diktafonos sas but... Vaš oda Jana Gáborová Kroková, National Scientific Library in Prešov, University of Prešov (Institue for Romani Studies, Center of Languages and Cultures of nationation Minorities), Documentation and Information Center for Romani Culture, Prešov, Slovakia (jana.gaborova.krok[email protected]om) 137 thoďom lengero vakeriben andro buter temi. Ala temi hine interesantne aleha, hoj len arakhas na ča andro vakeribena, aľe he andro irimen buťa, irimen romaňi literatura. Soske o paramisa imar pro vatri o paramisara na vakeren? Sar u so pre kada te phenel? Pre kada imar pes del te phenel avka, sar dikhas, hoj sar džal o svetos. O študiji, save kerďas e Milena Hubschmannovo, the akana e Helena Sadílkovo, o Jan Červenka, e Sofia Zahovo, o Hristo Kyutchukov, vaj the andro digitalna kulturna objekti, save kerďas o Dokumentačno the informačno centrum vaš e romaňi kultura pre Slovačiko. FROM ROMANI ORAL TRADITION TO MODERN ROMANI BOOK CREATION The topic of this study is the Romani oral tradition in former Czechoslovakia and its development into book format. My work will provide some insights on Romani oral tradition. The oral tradition called fairy tales, or storytelling will be viewed from several different views. One of them is the analysis of the ways in which Romani people told the fairy-tales: what the narrators did in order to make their stories interesting, how the Roma knew there was a storyteller in the settlement, where were the stories told. The analysis is based upon the interviews recorded by me in one of the settlements in Slovakia. The material collected from the Roma in the visited community was rather extensive, which is why it is divided into more categories, covering more topics. These are interesting also thanks to the fact that they can be found both in oral representation as well as in written form _in works of Romani literature. Why aren’t the stories and fairy-tales told in the settlements anymore? How to answer this question? This can be answered with the changes in societies worldwide. Some facts are provided in the studies by Milena Hubschamnnová or more recently by Helena Sadílková, Jan PAL O ROMA ROMANES / PA ROM ROMANES / PANEL IN ROMANI 144 ORGANIZED PANELS language native speakers who can depend on their command of English. Furthermore, their language repertoires are comprised of other languages too. The analyses of the interviews will reside in the analysis of the content as well as language strategies per se as used by the interviewer and his respondents during the interviews, including strategies going beyond the differences in the varieties of Romani language. Our research had just commenced at the moment of submitting our abstract. At the conference, we would like to present preliminary results. Ə řomaji ətimologija sar istoricko izvoro: nevo ətimologicko vorbari la řomaja ibako So šaj haťaras paj istorija le Řomengi anda lengi ib? But anda so źanas pa le Řomengo puranimos: lenga polekrako than ande Indija, lengə migracyjangə droma karing ə Əvropa — rekonstrujime sy po fundo la ibako. Ama maj but anda kodola putərdimata kərdile barəm ək šəl bərš palpale. Ande amaro divano sykavas kə ə ətimologija maj šaj avel khə šukar izvoro te barvaras amaro źanglimos pa le řomengi istorija. Kamas te sykavas amaro nevo projekto pa baro ətimologicko vorbari la řomaja ibako. Ame hramos pa sa le sařomane vorbi kaj sy źangle, vi kaj sy andaj Indija, vi kaj sy line vunźile dəvrʼamʼa anda aver iba (iranicka, armenicko, gyrcycko aj slavicka), vi kaj ći źanas katar le. Ande kado vorbari sy te avel paša 1300 anglune vorbi (kujburʼa) aj sa lengə derivacy. Kana avela gata o vorbari, ande leste avela paša 3000 vorbi, aj sa kodo šaj sykavel amengə savʼatar sas ə proto-řomaji ib. Źi akana hramosarďam pa 400 vorbi, ka vuni ďam neve etimologiji aj ka vuni vortosarďam purane ətimologiji. Le vorbaresko fundo sy la řomaja ibaki istorijaki fonologija kaj laarďam la (maj-anglal nas). Amari ətimologicko analiza del naj numa lingvisticka arakhlimata, ama vi orəl vudud pe vuni importanto aspekturʼa le řomenga istorijakə, sar lengo nakhlimos ande le Kirill Kozhanov, Södertörn University, Sweden (kirill.kozhano[email protected]) Mikhail Oslon, Institute of Polish Language, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland ([email protected]) 145 Xristosko paťamos (fajma ande Armenija) vor lengo trajo ande k kompakto dijaspora po nordo la Grecyjako maškar le sudoskə slavurʼa (fajma karing o foro Kosturo) angla lengə maj-durune migracyji. Historical Evidence from Romani Etymology: A New Etymological Dictionary of the Romani Language What can be inferred about Roma’s history from their language? Much of what we know about the Roma’s past, e.g. their place of origin in India or migration routes to Europe, has been reconstructed based on their language. However, most of these discoveries were made at least a century ago. In our talk, we argue that etymology can still be a valuable source for enriching our knowledge about the Romani peopleʼs past. We will present our ongoing project of a comprehensive Romani etymological dictionary containing all of the known common Romani vocabulary, both words of Indic origin and early loans (from Iranian, Armenian, Greek and Slavic), as well as words with no known etymology. It will contain about 1300 detailed entries, grouping related words into word families, citing all known forms from all described dialects, including morphological derivatives. The resulting number of lexemes will thus be around 3000, giving an idea of what Proto-Romani may have been like as a living language. So far, we have processed over 400 entries, providing in many cases new etymologies and correcting existing ones, based on the newly elaborated historical phonology of Romani. Apart from purely linguistic findings, our etymological analysis sheds light on some important aspects of Romaʼs history, such as their conversion to Christianity (probably in Armenia) or their life as a compact diaspora in northern Greece among South Slavs (probably around the city of Kastoria) before their further migrations. PAL O ROMA ROMANES / PA ROM ROMANES / PANEL IN ROMANI 146 ORGANIZED PANELS RELIGION(S) AMONG ROMA/ GYPSIES (CHURCHES, RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS, AND INSTITUTIONS) Since the rise of modern society, religion is said to have disappeared (“disenchanted word”, Weber 1978). It is only in the last decades that secularisation itself is unveiled as a “modern myth” (Berger 1999). “Re-enchantment” is currently placed at the very heart of modernity (Jenkins 2000). Some authors not only observe a “return of the sacred” but even “desecularisation” (decrease in the secular aspects of modern culture, Bell 1977, Berger 1999). As mentioned by H. Knoblauch (2019), religion is not just “returning”, it is undergoing a fundamental transformation, and only those forms of religion are booming that have undergone such transformation. The purpose of the panel is to examine the state of the art of the academic research on religiosity/spirituality among Roma/Gypsies. In 2019 the Platform for Academic Networking on Religions among Roma/Gypsies was established with the aim to establish a network and spread academic knowledge about research on all forms of religion, including institutional, non-institutional, private and individual forms of religiosity and spirituality among the Roma/Gypsies worldwide (PAN-ROM, see https://uesa.sav.sk/?q=sk/pan-rom.). The GLS 2021 panel is meant to be a kick-off on the topic of the role of religiosity in the social life of Romani communities. In some regards it is also a continuation of the pre-arranged Convenor: Tatiana Zachar Podolinská, Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia (ta[email protected]) 147 RELIGION(S) AMONG ROMA/GYPSIES (CHURCHES, RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS, AND INSTITUTIONS) panel of GLS 2019 devoted to the mission of Pentecostal and charismatic denominations operating among Roma. This year the thematic scope is much broader in order to also examine traditional and non-traditional forms of religiosity and spirituality among Roma/Gypsies. Contributors are invited to formulate the topic of their contribution according to their current interest in the given area. As a sort of inspiration and points of reference following theses are pinpointed: n religiosity as a vehicle of social, cultural, and ethnic innovation n role of pastoral discourse in construction and reconstruction of identity n role of religion in social inclusion/exclusion n role of religion in social mobility (horizontal and vertical) n role of religion in social cohesion and social networking n religion and migration n non-traditional forms of religiosity and spirituality The panel is also open to innovative methodological approaches, especially qualitative methodologies and approaches in order to achieve a holistic picture with emic perspectives. REFERENCES: n Bell, D. 1977. The Return of the Sacred? The Argument on the Future of religion. In: British Journal of Sociology 28(4): 419–449. n Berger, P. L. 1999. The Desecularization of the World. In: P. L. Berger (Ed.), The Desecularization of the World: Resurgent Religion and World Politics. Washington: Eerdmans, pp. 1–18. n Weber, M. 1978. Economy and Society. Berkeley: University Press of California Press. LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS n Erolova, Yelis. Public Discourse and Academic Insights on Re-Islamization of the Millet Community in Bulgaria 148 ORGANIZED PANELS n Kool-Anne-Marie. Exploring an Unknown Face of Christianity: The Biographical Dictionary of Roma Christianity n Ljung, Jörgen. The Charismatic Church – Hope for the Roma? n Povedák Kinga. The Sound of Romani Religiosity. n Slavkova, Magdalena. First Evangelical Missions among Bulgarian Gypsies n Šotola, Jaroslav. Religion, Ethnicity, and Reproduction of Social Inequalities in Eastern Slovakia n Wachsmuth, Melody J. Explorations of the Miraculous in Roma Pentecostal Spirituality n Zachar Podolinská, Tatiana. Marian Devotion as PostModern Religious Response to Marginality n Zăloagă, Marian. Religious Practices and Confessional Affiliation(s) of the Romanian Roma People. A Critical Examination of the Bibliography Published in the Last Three Decades ABSTRACTS OF CONTRIBUTIONS Public Discourse and Academic Insights on Re-Islamization of the Millet Community in Bulgaria Among the so-called Millet in Bulgaria, Turkish-speaking Roma – Muslims (professing ‘traditional’ everyday syncretic Sunni Islam) or Evangelical Christians, processes of religious strengthening and re-Islamization have been running for the last 20 years. These processes, often referred to as an “adoption of radical Islam”, became the centre of not only a number of public discussions and court cases, but also, have attracted the attention of part of the Bulgarian scholars. Religious conversion, religious “return”, or increased religiosity are not specific to Romani/Gypsy groups but are also characteristic for Yelis Erolova, Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Studies with Ethnographic Museum, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Bulgaria ([email protected]) 149 other communities in many countries around the world. Although still insufficiently examined, the case of the re-Islamized Roma from Bulgaria is an interesting and debatable question in several directions. Based on my ethnological research conducted from 2018 to 2020, the paper presents an analysis of the public attitudes (incl. Muslim communities), the views of the experts, politicians and institutions toward the re-Islamization of this part of the Roma, as well as the reactions of the affected community members themselves. The research methodology includes face-to-face interviews, qualitative content analysis of online social networks and media publications; expert assessments, and ethnographic observations, supplemented by a review of the scholarly studies made so far. The aims of this paper are: to identify the directions of the public and scientific discourse on the re-Islamization of part of the Roma in Bulgaria; to establish whether new public (stereotyped) Roma image has been formed; to address the interplay between public and scholarly debates; and to analyse the reactions of the affected communities regarding the ongoing problematization of their religiosity and what are the consequences for their identity, their place in the Romani and Muslim communities in the country, as well as in the Bulgarian society. Exploring an Unknown Face of Christianity: The Biographical Dictionary of Roma Christianity This paper seeks to discuss methodological issues linked to the establishment of the Biographical Dictionary of Roma Christianity (BDRC), as a tool for generating data on significant figures in Romani Christianity. It seeks to explore an unknown face of Christianity off the radar, often marked by a great vitality. The BDRC will not only strengthen the identity of Romani Christianity, enrich Anne-Marie Kool, Evangelical Theological Seminary, Osijek, Croatia (Amk[email protected]) RELIGION(S) AMONG ROMA/GYPSIES (CHURCHES, RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS, AND INSTITUTIONS) 150 ORGANIZED PANELS European churches, and the worldwide Church, but also dissolve stereotyped images while bridging the gap between the Roma and the Gadje. Recently, sociological and anthropological initiatives have been undertaken in the field of Romani research. These initiatives have been dealing with a perspective which has received relatively little attention, i.e. the Roma and Churches as well as the Roma and Christian organizations. The BDRC will explore the names and stories of Romani indigenous church leaders and lay persons who embraced the Gospel, pioneered churches, led independent Christian movements, and applied biblical values to Romani social and political challenges. Most of them are almost unknown even to Romani Christians, as well as to the rest of the world. In the first phase, two tools will be developed: one to map Romani Christianity (RoCMaps), including exploring significant figures. The second tool is a digital library (RoCPrints) to collect and make resources on Romani Christianity accessible, within the limitations of copyright and GDPR. Both allow for collaborative addition of data and for making these data accessible in a secure environment. In the second phase, existing biographies will be identified, in close international, interdenominational and interdisciplinary collaboration among researchers otherwise working in separate worlds: sociology, anthropology as well as church history. In the third phase, courses will be offered to theological schools in different countries and from different denominational backgrounds. These courses will introduce students to Romani Christianity and teach them to write biographies as part of their course assignments. The BDRC will build on and utilize the methodology of the Dictionary of African Christian Biography (DACB – www.dacb.org, Accessed 9th April 2020) as developed by 151 Jonathan J. Bonk (2008). Apart from obvious differences rooted in the nature of the population researched, there are striking similarities between African and Romani Christianity. In both populations, ecclesial ‘maps’ continue to “badly represent, under-represent, or simply ignore the actual state of affairs”. In both, mainline church historians hardly take any note of these unknown faces of Christianity, probably also because “the lenses through which the Christian academy peers are opaque, rendering [them] invisible.” Some elements of the methodology of the DACB should be adapted and contextualized. One is that of doing justice to diversity. As in CEE politics and ideology, the Roma are treated under one term: “Roma”, in an attempt to homogenize them. Exploring the “significant figures” in Romani Christianity does justice to the diversity of the Roma in terms of culture and languages. Another is that of counting with the deep divides between the Roma and the majority society. By exploring an unknown branch of Christianity and literally giving Roma a face, the BDRC can serve to overcome some of these stereotypes, and thus strengthen reconciliation. The methodology employed, of suggesting names for the BDRC and researching and writing biographies, in which both Roma and non-Roma and people from different countries, denominations and disciplines participate, can serve to further bridge the existing gap and deep engrained patterns of exclusion. REFERENCES n Bonk, Jonathan J. “Ecclesiastical Cartography and the Invisible Continent: The Dictionary of African Christian Biography.” Council on African Studies and the MacMillan Center African Studies Lecture Series, 15th October 2008. Available at https://dacb.org/about/ bonk-article/, accessed 9th April 2020. RELIGION(S) AMONG ROMA/GYPSIES (CHURCHES, RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS, AND INSTITUTIONS) 152 ORGANIZED PANELS The Charismatic Church – Hope for the Roma? While in secular Europe, Christianity is more and more marginalized in the public debate, a spiritual awakening is currently happening among the Roma. Religion and Christianity are back, but in a different shape then in the old forms of Christianity (Knoblach 2003). In the book “God is Back” by Micklethwait and Wooldridge (2009), they say that “there are at least five hundred million renewalists around the world”. In Newsweek magazine, Quarmby (2014) wrote that Romani people are on the way to becoming a new moral force of Christians in Europe. The charismatic spirituality has spread through the Romani communities, a new revival seems to have been awakened across the whole of Europe. A study of these new religious movements describes how the church has changed the local society. Of the Christian groups, the converted primarily joined the Pentecostal church. Their lifestyle has changed; consumption of alcohol has dropped dramatically and crime has also been tangibly reduced. Children and young people go to school for at least eight years. Nevertheless, the problem later is that there are no jobs. Therefore, unemployment is high, and many are dependent on state benefits. Men move to find jobs in other parts of Romania or elsewhere in Europe (Cace et al. 2012). The Romani people are locked in by themselves. The majority society has marginalised them for hundreds of years, labelling them outsiders to be avoided. There are not only two sides (with locks) that need to be open, but there is also a third one which needs to be considered – that of the individual’s own identity. This also needs to change (Slavkova, 2007). Those who have had charismatic or Pentecostal experience of being “born again”, converted and possessing spiritual gifts often talk about something happening deep inside of them. This Jörgen Ljung, Heart to Heart association jorg[email protected] 153 new life that has arisen has consequences in the form of changed values and lifestyle. It seems that in the process of conversion a hope is born that they can change their own situation as well as the situation of other believers within the church community. REFERENCES n Cace Sorin, Tomescu Cristina, Cojocaru Daniela. 2012. The role of religion in several Roma communities. Revista de cercetare si interventie sociala, 2012, vol 36, pp 162–177. n Knoblach Hubert. 2003. Europe and Invisible Religion in Social Compass Band 50, Number 3 n Micklethwait John, Wooldridge Adrian. 2009. God is Back. How the Global Revival of Faith is Changing the world. The Penguin Press, New York. n Quarmby Katharine. 2014. How the Roma Are Becoming Europe’s New Moral Army, Newsweek Magazine (2014-08–10). n Slavkova Magdalena. 2007. Evangelical Gypsies in Bulgaria: Way of life and Performance of Identity. Romani Studies 5, Vol 17, No 2, Bulgarian Academy of Science, Sofia. The Sound of Romani Religiosity This paper investigates the role of Romani worship music in Hungary. Although there is more and more research on Pentecostal Roma conversion, there is hardly any study looking at Romani religious experience through a musical-anthropological/ethnomusicological perspective. I argue that the anthropological analysis of Romani religious music and the surrounding phenomena enables us to better understand Romani religious experience and religious culture. I discuss congregational music as an important pastoral method in the conversion to Pentecostal-charismatic communities. As part of my Kinga Povedák, ‘Convivence’ Research Group on Religious Pluralism, Hungarian Academy of Sciences – University of Szeged, Hungary (po[email protected]) RELIGION(S) AMONG ROMA/GYPSIES (CHURCHES, RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS, AND INSTITUTIONS) 256 INDIVIDUAL SUBMISSIONS G Gáborová Kroková Jana, p. 132, 136 Gális Martin, p. 133, 138 Gamella Juan F., p. 122, 124 Georgieva-Stankova Nadezhda, p. 246, 252 Gil Gonzales Diana Maria, p. 67, 78 Grabowska Barbara, p. 219, 252 Greenfields Margaret, p. 220, 252 Gripenberg Lidia, p. 167, 171 H Habryn Petro, p. 213, 253 Hajnáczky Tamás, p. 181, 187 Hajská Markéta, p. 131, 133, 140 Heredia Angel, p. 66, 73 Hertrampf Marina Ortrud M., p. 104, 106, 110 Homann Florian, p. 106, 112 Hope Freya, p. 95–97 Horváthová Jana, p. 181, 188 Howarth Anthony Leroyd, p. 95, 96, 98 Hrustič Tomáš, p. 66, 75 Hulmes Allison, p. 223, 252 I Iliadis Christos, p. 122, 125 Iwatani Ayako, p. 225, 253 J Jurková Zuzana, p. 226, 254 K Kalinin Valdemar, p. 182, 191 Kapralski Slawomir, p. 227, 253 Kledzik Emilia, p. 106, 113 Kocmanová Markéta, p. 228, 253 Kokyová Iveta, p. 133, 138 Kool Anne-Marie, p. 148, 149 Koper Tomasz, p. 122, 127 Kostka Joanna, p. 81, 82 Kovatcheva Lilyana, p. 229, 253 Kovats Martin, p. 230, 253 Kovič-Dine Maša, p. 82, 85 Kozhanov Kirill, p. 133, 144 Kubaník Pavel, p. 133, 142 Kwadrans Łukasz, p. 219, 252 L Leroy Théophile, p. 50, 54 Ljung Jörgen, p. 148, 152 Ludlová Nikola, p. 231, 254 Lukáč Marek, p. 167, 172 Lukáčová Silvia, p. 167, 172 Lynne Tammi, p. 66, 72 M Macías León Almudena, p. 67, 76 Magano Olga, p. 64, 166–7, 173, 175 Martín Sevillano Ana Belén, p. 106, 118 Marushiakova Elena, p. 180, 182, 191 Marušiak Juraj, p. 233, 253 Matei Petre, p. 181, 193 Mendes Maria Manuela, p. 64, 167, 175 Mižigár Michal, p. 133, 142 Monteiro Edilma do Nascimento J., p. 167, 176 Mourão Susana, p. 66, 70, 167–8 Muntean Vasile, p. 122, 124 Mušinka Alexander, p. 60, 61 N Nam Irina, p. 182, 194 New William, p. 234–5, 252 Nowicka Ewa, p. 60, 62 Nuska Petr, p. 236, 254 O Ogáyar Francisco J., p. 122, 124 Ort Jan, p. 50, 52 Oslon Mikhail, p. 133, 144 Ostendorf Ann, p. 88–9, 91, 161–2, 164 257 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS P Panaroni Daniele, p. 238, 254 Parente-Čapková Viola, p. 106, 114 Pěničková Daniela Mosaad, p. 67, 77 Petrovski Daniel, p. 122, 128 Pinheiro Sara, p. 66, 70, 167–8 Podolinská Zachar Tatiana, p. 146, 148, 157 Polackova Zuzana, p. 168, 177 Popov Vesselin, p. 180, 182, 192 Povedák Kinga, p. 148, 153 R Reitinger Daphne, p. 50, 55 Rigová Edita, p. 168, 178 Rodriguez María Félix, p. 67, 78 Rogers Carol, p. 220, 252 Roman Raluca Bianca, 182, 195 Rotaru Julieta, p. 50, 58 Ryvolová Karolína, p. 106, 116 S Sabatos Charles, p. 117 Sadílková Helena, p. 239, 253 Salo Sheila, p. 50, 59 Samagaio Florbela, p. 167, 168 Sancin Vasilka, p. 82, 85, 240, 253 Sedláková Renáta, p. 241, 252 Segľová Lucia, p. 182, 196 Shapoval Viktor, p. 182, 198 Shaw Martin, p. 106, 119 Shmidt Victoria, p. 245, 254 Schuster Michal, p. 243, 253 Silverman Carol, p. 87 Singh Punita G., p. 96, 99 Slavkova Magdalena, p. 148, 154 Spreizer Alenka Janko, p. 82, 85 Steiner Stephan, p. 162 Stoica Cristina, p. 182, 199 Stoyanova Plamena, p. 182, 200 Symeou Loizos, p. 247 Š Škobla Daniel, p. 81, 82, 84 Šotola Jaroslav, p. 148, 155 Šumi Irena, p. 82, 85 T Tihovska Ieva, p. 182, 201 Toma Stefánia, p. 64, 67, 80 Toyansk Marcos, p. 248, 253 Tribulato Chiara, p. 96, 100 Turšič Domen, p. 248, 254 Tyson Thomas, p. 162, 163 U Uherek Zdeněk, p. 120–1, 129 Unwin Peter, p. 223–4, 252 V Vaiman Dmitriy, p. 182, 202 Vajda Violeta, p. 88, 89, 92 Viková Lada, p. 181, 202 Vojak Danijel, p. 249, 253 W Wachsmuth Melody J., p. 148, 156 Witkowski Maciej, p. 60, 62 Y Yılgür Egemen, p. 97, 102 Z Zahova Sofiya, p. 104, 182 Zalar Vita, p. 48 Zăloagă Marian, p. 148, 159 Zlatanović Sanja, p. 250, 253 2021 Gypsy Lore Society Annual Meeting and Conference on Romani Studies – Book of Abstracts Charles University, Faculty of Arts Náměstí Jana Palacha 2, Praha 1, 116 38, Czech Republic www.ff.cuni.cz Slovak Academy of Sciences, Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology Klemensova 19, Bratislava, 813 64, Slovak Republic www.uesa.sav.sk Editor: Helena Sadílková Copy Editor: Karolína Ryvolová Peer Review: Michael Beníšek, Pavel Kubaník, Elena Marushiakova Popova, Tatiana Zachar Podolinská, Helena Sadílková, Zdeněk Uherek (abstracts) Elena Marushiakova Popova, Daniel Škobla (study by T. Zachar Podolinská) Jan Červenka, Milada Závodská (study by H. Sadílková and P. Kubaník) Tatiana Zachar Podolinská, Helena Sadílková (study by Z. Uherek) Logo Design: Jaroslav Dufek Lay out: Kateřina Krčíková First published 2021 ISBN 978-80-7671-036-8 (online: pdf) DOI: https://doi.org/10.31577/2021.9788076710368