Now that the political and economic plight of European Roma and the popularity of their music are objects of international attention, Romani Routes provides a timely and insightful view into Romani communities both in their home countries and in the diaspora. Over the past two decades, a steady stream of recordings, videos, feature films, festivals, and concerts has presented the music of Balkan Gypsies, or Roma, to Western audiences, who have greeted them with exceptional enthusiasm. Yet, as author Carol Silverman notes, Roma are revered as musicians and reviled as people. In this book, Silverman introduces readers to the people and cultures who produce this music, offering a sensitive and incisive analysis of how Romani musicians address the challenges of discrimination. Focusing on southeastern Europe then moving to the diaspora, her book examines the music within Romani communities, the lives and careers of outstanding musicians, and the marketing of music in the electronic media and "world music" concert circuit. Silverman touches on the way that the Roma exemplify many qualities--adaptability, cultural hybridity, transnationalism--that are taken to characterize late modern experience. And rather than just celebrating these qualities, she presents the musicians as complicated, pragmatic individuals who work creatively within the many constraints that inform their lives.

Who are the Romani people? -- Romani society -- Customs and traditions -- The Romani language -- The Roms among the nations -- Between romanticism and racism -- A modern Romani identity -- Appendix: The mosaic of Romani groups.

This book provides a detailed and comprehensive description of the Gitano community of Mexico City. The ethnographic study showcases the interplay between cultural reproduction, economic reproduction, and the Gitano / non-Gitano opposition. The first part of the book discusses how the cultural identity of this community is reproduced based on migratory processes, social relations and the dynamics of kinship and gender roles to understand the contradiction between value systems and practices in a patriarchal society. In the second part, emphasis is placed on the economic dynamism of this group in its interactions with the majority society in the context of informal economy and the group’s articulation with space and mobility in the territory. The analysis problematizes territorial mobility and circulation regimes based on fieldwork carried out in the process of active participation with Gitano families selling textile clothes and accessories through the country.

Gypsies, Egyptians, Romanies, and—more recently—Travellers. Who are these marginal and mysterious people who first arrived in England in early Tudor times? Are claims of their distant origins on the Indian subcontinent true, or just another of the many myths and stories that have accreted around them over time? Can they even be regarded as a single people or ethnicity at all? Gypsies have frequently been vilified, and not much less frequently romanticized, by the settled population over the centuries. Social historian David Cressy now attempts to disentangle the myth from the reality of Gypsy life over more than half a millennium of English history. In this, the first comprehensive historical study of the doings and dealings of Gypsies in England, he draws on original archival research, and a wide range of reading, to trace the many moments when Gypsy lives became entangled with those of villagers and townsfolk, religious and secular authorities, and social and moral reformers. Crucially, it is a story not just of the Gypsy community and its peculiarities, but also of England's treatment of that community, from draconian Elizabethan statutes, through various degrees of toleration and fascination, right up to the tabloid newspaper campaigns against Gypsy and Traveller encampments of more recent years.

Are human rights universal? The immediate response is "yes, of course." However, that simple affirmation assumes agreement about definitions of the "human" as well as what a human is entitled to under law, bringing us quickly to concepts such as freedom, property, and the inalienability of both. The assumption that we all mean the same things by these terms carries much political import, especially given that different communities (national, ethnic, religious, gendered) enact some of the most basic categories of human experience (self, home, freedom, sovereignty) differently. But whereas legal definitions often seek to eliminate ambiguity in order to define and protect the rights of humanity, ambiguity is in fact inherently human, especially in performances of heritage where the rights to sense, to imagine, and to claim cultural identities that resist circumscription are at play. Cultural Heritage in Transit examines the intangibilities of human rights in the realm of heritage production, focusing not only on the ephemeral culture of those who perform it but also on the ambiguities present in the idea of cultural property in general—who claims it? who may use it? who should not but does? In this volume, folklorists, ethnologists, and anthropologists analyze the practice and performance of culture in particular contexts—including Roma wedding music, Trinidadian wining, Moroccan verbal art, and Neopagan rituals—in order to draw apart the social, political, and aesthetic materialities of heritage production, including inequities and hierarchies that did not exist before. The authors collectively craft theoretical frameworks to make sense of the ways the rights of nations interact with the rights of individuals and communities when the public value of artistic creations is constituted through international law. Contributors: Valdimar Tr. Hafstein, Deborah Kapchan, Barbro Klein, Sabina Magliocco, Dorothy Noyes, Philip W. Scher, Carol Silverman.

Anthropologists are increasingly pressurised to formulate field methods for teaching. Unlike many hypothesis-driven ethnographic texts, this book is designed with the specific needs of the anthropology student and field researcher in mind, with particular emphasis on the core anthropological method: long term participant observation. Anthropological Practice explores fieldwork experiences unique to anthropology, and provides the context by which to explain and develop practice-based and open-ended methodology. It draws on dialogues with over twenty established and younger anthropologists, whose fieldwork spans the late 1960s to the present day, taking place in locations as diverse as Europe, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Africa, Iran, Afghanistan, North and South America.Revealing first-hand and hitherto unrecorded aspects of fieldwork, Anthropological Practice provides critical, systematic ways to enhance anthropological and alternative knowledge. It is an essential text for anthropology students and researchers, and for all disciplines concerned with ethnography.Interviewees include: Paul Clough, Roy Gigengack, Louise de la Gorgendière, Suzette Heald, Michael Herzfeld, Signe Howell, Felicia Hughes-Freeland, Ignacy Marek Kaminski, Margaret Kenna, Raquel Alonso Lopez, Malcolm Mcleod, Brian Morris, Hélène Neveu Kringelbach, Akira Okazaki, Joanna Overing, Jonathan Parry, Carol Silverman, Mohammad Talib, Nancy Lindisfarne-Tapper, Sue Wright, Helena Wulff, Joseba Zulaika.

Gypsies have for centuries been simultaneously vilified and romanticized—associated with criminality and dirt, but at the same time with color, magic, and music. Gypsy music is popular around the world and often performed with gusto at major events, including at weddings in Bulgaria, jazz bars in Paris, and festivals in the United States. In Gypsy Music, Alan Ashton-Smith explores why this music has such wide appeal, surveying the varied styles that are considered to be gypsy music and asking what links them together. The book begins in the Balkans, home to the world’s largest Romani populations and a major site of gypsy music production. But just as the traditionally nomadic Roma have traveled globally, so has their music. Gypsy music styles have roots and associations outside of the Balkans, including Russian Romani guitar music, flamenco and gypsy jazz, and the more recent forms of gypsy punk and Balkan beats. Covering the thirteenth century to the present day, and with a geographical scope that ranges from rural Romania to New York by way of Budapest, Moscow, and Andalusia, Gypsy Music reveals the remarkable diversity of this exuberant art form.

The music of clarinetists Naftule Brandwein and Dave Tarras is iconic of American klezmer music. Their legacy has had an enduring impact on the development of the popular world music genre.

Music in the American Diasporic Wedding explores the complex cultural adaptations, preservations, and fusions that occur in weddings between couples and families of diverse origins. Discussing weddings as a site of negotiations between generations, traditions, and religions, the essays gathered here argue that music is the mediating force between the young and the old, ritual and entertainment, and immigrant lore and assimilation. The contributors examine such colorful integrations as klezmer-tinged Mandarin tunes at a Jewish and Taiwanese American wedding, a wedding services industry in Chicago's South Asian community featuring a diversity of wedding music options, and Puerto Rican cultural activists dancing down the aisles of New York's St. Cecilia's church to the thunder of drums and maracas and rapping their marriage vows. These essays show us what wedding music and performance tell us about complex multiethnic diasporic identities and remind us that how we listen to and celebrate otherness defines who we are.

This anthology ‘The Culture of the Finnish Roma’ is a highly needed collection of articles intended for a wide audience, in Finland and internationally. The editors of the anthology, when participating in many international conferences and seminars, have often been asked: Is there Roma research in Finland? What is it like? Which perspectives does it utilize? The main function of this anthology is to reply to those questions. It compiles an array of contemporary Roma research done in present day Finland, both by Finnish, Finnish Roma, and international scholars. It will be of interest to both academic as well as lay readers interested in Roma culture and Roma life in Finland, past and present. The chapters focus on the research and the life of Roma in Finland. Bringing to light the various sides of the Romani way of life, scholars from different fields include historians, linguists, anthropologists, and cultural and social researchers. Many of the previous books have suffered from a recycling of materials that mythologize and stereotype Romani people. Including the viewpoint of Roma scholars and diverse research branches ranging from culture, language, religion, and gender, the anthology aims at overcoming the stereotypes and bring knowledge of aspects of Romani life. The eternal contemplation and negotiation of identities lies in the heart of any culture. We hope that the way The Culture of the Finnish Roma discusses these issues brings forth interesting topics to consider for any reader, regardless of national or ethnic origin.