Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 At 10:42 PM 6/12/01 -0400, you wrote: >The NY Times article below brings up an interesting issue: Since gypsies are >from India and many have reclaimed their Hindu origins, why is it that there >are no European scholars of subaltern studies, tribes, dalits, low caste, >etc. who want to study them? The International Council for Traditional Music has a permanent study group devoted to the music of the Rom (Gypsies). It may be possible that aside from the African-American diaspora, the music of the Rom has had a greater impact on the development of popular music style from West India to Cuba than just about any other. Quick reference to my university library catalogue gave me a list of 95 texts by scholars who appeared to be "European". Reference to caste etc gave me 143, by scholars of any background. mmmmm. Then again, European studies have always been a little bigger at this Uni than South Asian studies. > Rather, western scholars emphasize going all >the way to India Here in Australia, India is a bit closer :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 About European Gypsies: I really don't know why so many messages here need this taunting tone which I find completely inappropriate. First: there are scholars studying European gypsies. There is a journal, Journal of the Gypsie Lore Society. It is true that there is no academic subject of "Gypsie Studies" or likewise, but that would be asked too much: there is also no separate discipline of, say, "Rajput studies", or "Pathan studies", but scholars of different disciplines are Gypsie specialists. In Indology, Hermann Berger published on Gypsie languages. Living in Germany, I can tell you there is information about the killing of the Sinti and Roma by the Nazies, and they are memorized - though it is a matter of debate whether they do not get somewhat into the background, because their lobbies are less influential than those of other groups. In Berlin, the planning is currently to set up a separate mermorial, also in the city centre, for Sinti and Roma victims of the Holocaust (apart from the big memorial for the Jewish victims). The dramatic situation of Roma in some countries of central/eastern Europe is a different matter. The relation of European gypsies to South Asian groups is far from clear, which is to say, there is no consensus about it. But sociological point of view, it is certainly misleading and grossly simplifying to compare them directly with Indian Dalits: briefly, Dalits/Harijan, the traditionally untouchable castes, have traditionally always been integrated in local and regional patterns of work and ritual interaction, and were kept separate in most cases precisely because of the nature of this interaction, and their supposed origin. I personally find it unlikely that European gypsies hail from such groups. There are, as Indians know, a number of peripatetic (nomadic) groups living in South Asia, and many of them originated in the Western areas of the subcontinent, what is now Rajasthan, Gujarat, Sind. This is suggested by their language and their culture - I worked for two years with one of these groups as a Social Anthroplogist, people who call themselves Vagri - I worked mostly in Tamil Nadu (where they are called by others Narikoravar or Kuruvikkaran). The best known of these groups are the Banjara/Lambadi, as they are called in different areas - their own name for themselves is Gor or Gormati, and they feel themselves related to the Vagri (and other groups). These groups really are a white spot on the sociological map of South Asia. While the low social status of these groups may amount to practical - and practized! untouchability, their relation to the surrounding population is different: they are normally not incorporated into regional systems of interaction, but follow marginal economic activities like hunting, some trading or selling of folk medicines (apart from the menial construction work at whic so many Gor women are seen). Their origins are also different: to evaluate them it must not forgotten that the Indian Subcontinent changed its appearence crucially in the last 200 years through the explosion of the population and large-scale deforestation. In former times, a much larger part of India's population lived, at least partly, nomadic, and those peripatetic groups were probably occupying the spaces of wilderness between states/settled areas, where they would hunt and supply the population with other forest products, but also trade (they had sometimes a special status which allowed them to cross front lines between enemy armies to trade, for instance, salt, also for army supply). They also had a dangerous/ambiguous reputation, and their status was probably cmplex and on the whole higher than today when they are often forced into a roadside existence (government schemes for settlement notwithstanding). I think it likely that European gypsies orginated from such groups, but there is no proof for this, during to a lack of historical data. Lukas Werth At 22:42 12.06.01 -0400, you wrote: >The NY Times article below brings up an interesting issue: Since gypsies are >from India and many have reclaimed their Hindu origins, why is it that there >are no European scholars of subaltern studies, tribes, dalits, low caste, >etc. who want to study them? Rather, western scholars emphasize going all >the way to India to study India's underclass when they have 10 million right >in Europe crying for help. Also, there seem to be no academic chairs or >departments to study gypsies in Europe's universities. Why are these Dalits >within Europe being ignored? Their holocaust by the Nazis has been ignored - >no museums, no coverage in textbooks, no events in their honor, etc. - >unlike for the Jewish victims. Does anyone have knowledge of the major >funding sources in Scandinavia, Germany, including the church, doing serious >projects pertaining to the gypsies? > > > > > >June 12, 2001 , New York Times. >Bulgaria Opens School Doors for Gypsy Children >By JOHN TAGLIABUE >IDIN, Bulgaria, June 8 - Linka Shankova, a Gypsy mother in her 20's, is >taking part in an unusual experiment intended to lift the lot of her people >in Bulgaria, and indeed across Eastern Europe. >For decades here, Gypsies, known as Roma in this part of the world, have >been segregated in their schooling, confined to the poorly run and badly >maintained schools like the one across a dusty lot from Ms. Shankova's >ramshackle one-story brick home. That education kept them on society's >lowest rungs, subject to the poverty and discrimination that has been their >lot for centuries. >So this past year, in a curious throwback to American desegregation of past >decades, Ms. Shankova has let her 10-year-old son, Bilian Mateev, join some >460 other Gypsy children who are bused from the dusty Nov Put neighborhood >each morning to schools in other parts of Vidin to be integrated with other >Bulgarian children. "My boy's lively," Mrs. Shankova said, praising a result >of one year's integration. "But he's quieter now. He's very wise now." In >September, her daughter Silvia, 8, will follow Bilian on the daily bus. >The struggle to integrate Vidin's Gypsy children has not been easy. Similar >efforts to integrate the children of Gypsies elsewhere in Bulgaria failed >after protests by non-Gypsy parents. Moreover, integration here was the >fruit of a local initiative - unusual in a region accustomed to awaiting >governmental remedy - that raised the hackles of education bureaucrats in >the capital of Sofia, a three-hour drive to the south. >If the efforts here succeed, the model could well spread elsewhere in >Eastern Europe, where Gypsies form a large part of the population. Vidin's >experiment is being imitated in cities in Hungary and Slovakia, and will be >repeated in September in four other Bulgarian cities. It has attracted the >attention of Western benefactors, including the George Soros Foundation, >which is paying salaries and providing books and other aid to Gypsy >schoolchildren. >The need for desegregation is in part the paradoxical result of decades of >efforts by former Communist governments in Eastern Europe to better >integrate Gypsies into society. >After World War II, Communist leaders forced the historically nomadic >Gypsies into a sedentary way of life, with fixed places of residence and >jobs. To eliminate widespread illiteracy, special schools were established >for Gypsy children. >For all the good intentions, the program masked racist undertones. In >Bulgaria, for instance, the Gypsy schools were officially dubbed `'schools >for children with inferior lifestyle and culture." >Overcrowded and underfunded, they often served as penal colonies for >uncooperative teachers. The results were abysmal. According to Bulgaria's >1992 census, while 36 percent of Bulgarian children graduate from high >school, fewer than 5 percent of Gypsy children do; 9 percent of Bulgarian >youths obtain university degrees, compared with one-tenth of 1 percent among >Gypsies. >Donka Panayotova, 45, a Gypsy teacher, daughter of a construction worker and >the guiding light of the integration here, got to know this situation in >1983, after finishing college and joining the faculty of Vidin's Gypsy >school. >"Officially, about 600 kids were registered," she said in a recent >interview. "In fact, no more than 280 to 300 were ever attending." The >conviction that integration was the sole solution came after she persuaded a >Bulgarian colleague to enroll her grandson at the Gypsy school. The boy's >presence forced Gypsy classmates to speak Bulgarian, sharply improving their >academic performance, she said. >In 1997, Mrs. Panayotova decided to quit teaching and found an organization >called Drom - Bulgarian for "the road" - to fight for desegregation. Despite >the Bulgarian government's acceptance in 1999 of a framework agreement with >Gypsy leaders to integrate Gypsies more fully into Bulgarian society, the >government had dragged its feet on school desegregation. Seventy percent of >Gypsy children remained in Gypsy schools. That same year, after several >Gypsy families in Yambol, in southeastern Bulgaria, sought to enroll their >children in Bulgarian schools, Bulgarian parents blocked their entrance with >protests. >In Vidin, despite scattered resistance, preparations for desegregation began >in earnest last spring. >Katya Trifonova, the principal of a desegregated secondary school, said >meetings with Bulgarian parents and teachers who feared a drop in >educational standards were often heated and emotional. Gypsy parents, for >their part, had to be assured for the safety of their children, she said. In >scattered instances, teachers at the Gypsy school, apparently fearing for >the future of their jobs if children deserted the school en masse, suggested >that Gypsy children might face attacks from skinheads if they ventured out >of the Gypsy neighborhood. >"I was worried, because my boy is darker than the others," said Aneta >Sashova, gesturing toward her son, Goshko Kotsev, 11, a fourth grader. >Mrs. Sashova's situation is typical of many of Vidin's Gypsies, estimated to >number roughly one-quarter of the population. Her family lives with the >parents of her husband, who has never held a job. Until 1999, she worked in >a chemical factory but was laid off when it shut down, and has survived on >welfare ever since. >She overcame her worries for her children after learning that Drom would buy >them school books, materials like crayons for art lessons, and even shoes. >"I had about decided to stop sending them to school altogether," she said of >Goshko and his sister, who is in eighth grade. >Ms. Panayotova's experiment in desegregation was particularly risky as a >test of tolerance in times of high stress. Slowly and painfully, Bulgaria is >weaning itself from a Communist, centrally planned economy to a more open >market. Vidin's two biggest factories, once employing tens of thousands to >supply rubber tires and water pumps to markets in the old Soviet empire, are >closed. Unemployment is so widespread that, by some estimates, as much as >half the city's 1989 population of about 60,000 have emigrated in search of >work. >The economic battering heightened the isolation of the Gypsies, who once >came out of their isolated slum neighborhood to work with other Bulgarians >in local factories, but are now unemployed. >Rumyan Russinov, the director of a center in Budapest that is run by the >Soros Foundation's Open Society Institute to help Gypsies, called the >organizers in Vidin "the sappers that find the mines," to enable similar >desegregation to succeed elsewhere in Eastern Europe. >"Every Romany leader feels he's a Martin Luther King," said Mr. Russinov, >34, who was born in Dunavtsi, down the Danube from Vidin. "We don't need >that now, we need a movement, not just an individual. We need critical >mass." Future initiatives, he said, will include university scholarships for >Gypsy graduates of desegregated schools. >In Vidin, he said, despite initial acceptance of desegregation, the struggle >is not yet over. Few Gypsy children are in integrated schools, though more >are expected as the idea catches on among Gypsy parents. Moreover, the >long-term effect of desegregation has yet to be felt. >"This is not a one-act play: it will be a long-term process," said Mariika >Vasileva, vice principal of a primary school whose Gypsy pupils jumped last >year to 110, from 80. "Only teachers who never had the chance to work with >children of different ethnic backgrounds could believe that this would be an >easy and quick process." >Lingering differences were evident as the sixth-grade class of Julia >Petkova, who teaches Bulgarian language and literature at the school of SS. >Cyril and Methodius, had a last lesson recently. In the first row, Borislav >Borisov, a boy of 12 who is not a Gypsy, shared a two-seat bench and desk >with Alexander Danchev, also 12, a tousled Gypsy boy - one of 7 in the class >of 26. It was the last day of school, exams were over, everyone had passed, >and thoughts were on vacation. >Borislav, asked about his summer plans, said he hoped his parents would take >him, as in past years, to the Black Sea coast. Alexander, when asked the >same question, appeared confused. After a pause, he replied, "I guess I'll >play." > > > > > >indology > > > >Your use of is subject to > > >Attachment Converted: "c:\eudora\attach\winmail15.dat" > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 Prof. Giorgio Renato Franci (Indologist and Chair or the Dept. of Oriental and Linguistics Studies, University of Bologna --Italy) has published a series of articles on gypsies. E.g. see his paper in the volume edited by him *Studi Orientali e Linguistici. V (1994- 95)*, Istituto di Glottologia dell'Università di Bologna, Nuova Serie V, 1996, where he writes on gypsy literature. See New Titles in IJTS vol. 2, no. 2: http://www.asiatica.org/publications/ijts/vol2_no2/titles.asp best -- enrica -- Dr. Enrica Garzilli University of Macerata, Italy Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of Tantric Studies Journ. of S. Asia Women Studies http://www.asiatica.org ****************************************************** Rajiv Malhotra wrote: > > The NY Times article below brings up an interesting issue: Since gypsies are > from India and many have reclaimed their Hindu origins, why is it that there > are no European scholars of subaltern studies, tribes, dalits, low caste, > etc. who want to study them? Rather, western scholars emphasize going all > the way to India to study India's underclass when they have 10 million right > in Europe crying for help. Also, there seem to be no academic chairs or > departments to study gypsies in Europe's universities. Why are these Dalits > within Europe being ignored? Their holocaust by the Nazis has been ignored - > no museums, no coverage in textbooks, no events in their honor, etc. - > unlike for the Jewish victims. Does anyone have knowledge of the major > funding sources in Scandinavia, Germany, including the church, doing serious > projects pertaining to the gypsies? > *** Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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