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Fall 2009
The Price of Identity: Romani Reality and the Gypsy Myth
UGS 302 (64750)
Parlin Hall 302, T-Th 9:30-11:00
Professor Ian F. Hancock
Calhoun Hall 420
xulaj@mail.utexas.edu, www.radoc.net,  323-7684
Policy and Grading
This course is about the world’s 12 million Romani people, the so-called “Gypsies.” It will
address their origins, migrations, culture and media and literary portrayal. Examined also will be
the challenges of ethnic/linguistic maintenance for various other diasporic peoples, the
vulnerability of stateless or formerly stateless populations to discrimination and stereotyping, and
the contemporary efforts on the part of such populations to resist and change those things.
Questions raised for discussion/debate will inter alia address the psychology of stereotyping and
racism, and how ethnic groups with radically different cultural values and practices can adjust to
coexist with those of the mainstream and continue to survive. Requirements include three inclass, closed-book, hand-in exams across the semester and the preparation of a substantial
research paper, the first draft of which must be completed and submitted by mid-term (October
14th, no exceptions), with the pre-final version to be presented before the class for comment and
criticism from each of you during the last weeks of the semester. This must be written with the
potential submission for publication in mind. Written exams will constitute 40% of the final
grade, oral presentation, your paper and your critiques of the other presentations another 50%,
and the remaining 10% will go to participation and attendance. Substance will count more than
volume. We can arrange on-campus evening classes later in the semester if necessary.
Students with disabilities may request appropriate academic accommodations from the
Services for Students with Disabilities, 471-6259. Discuss this with me first.
Assisting the class is fellow student Anna Brucker, who has taken this course previously
and who is available to advise you on your progress and answer many of your questions. Her email is anna.brcker@gmail.com.
The people at Library Instruction Services provide another valuable source of help.
Check their website at http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/~instruct/meet.html. They will be glad to
assist you with your writing assignment. Do plan to visit them during the semester, they will let
me know that you have done so.
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Calendar
First draft
Submission
August
September
Week
1 2
Tuesday
1 8 15 22 29
6 13
3 10 17 24 1
8
Thursday
27
First
Test
3
October
4
5
6
Second
Test
7
November
8
December
9
10 11 12 13
14
20 27
3 10 17 24
1
15 22 29
5 11 19 26
4
Third
Test
Thanksgiving
Break
PRESENTATIONS
DO
Ask lots of questions.
Turn in any homework assignment each morning at the beginning of class. Don’t do it once you’re here.
Watch your neatness, grammar and spelling on the tests—remember, I'm an English perfessor too!
Keep good notes in your notebook. They will serve as your textbook.
Make use of Office Hours (T-Th 7:00-8:00 and 11-12:30 in Calhoun 420).
Make use of e-mail (xulaj@mail.utexas.edu) to ask questions.
Create small study groups and meet outside of class.
Bring a tape recorder to class if you like, but no laptop computers.
Switch off your cell phone during class.
DON’T
Come late to class.
Be afraid to disagree.
Talk when someone else has the floor.
Read non-related material after the bell has rung.
Do homework for another class during this class.
Ask “what will be on the test?”
Ask “Do we have to know that for the next test?” – ANYTHING you learn in any of our classes could
potentially turn up on a test.
Miss class without a legitimate excuse. Unexcused absences will cost you two points each time off your
total grade. An attendance sheet will be circulated each day. You won’t be able to sign it if you arrive
after the bell’s rung, and you’ll be counted absent.
 Get up and leave in the middle of class to use the bathroom (or use your cell phone). Do this before
class begins. If you have a medical excuse for needing to visit the bathroom during class time, or for
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special consideration otherwise, please provide me with a doctor’s note.
 Leave your cell phone on.
Syllabus
August 27
What to expect: Overview of the class and your participation
Week 1 Tues. What is race? What is ethnicity?
Thurs. Diasporic vs. migratory populations: Jews, Africans, Armenians
Week 2
What are "Gypsies”? Where did this image come from?
What are Romanies ? Where did they come from?
Week 3
Romani exodus from the original homeland (the Teljaripe): Early hypotheses
September 17th First test
Week 4
Romani exodus from the original homeland (the Teljaripe): Current knowledge
Romani language: Origins
Week 5
Romani culture: Retention and accretion
Romani entry into the West; reception in the West (the Aresipe)
Week 6
Enslaved and non-enslaved populations
October 8th Second test
Week 7
Migrations and deportations(the Buxljaripe)
Conflict, racism and response
Week 8
The Holocaust (the Baro Porrajmos)
Romani political and social organization
Week 9
The contemporary situation
October 29th Third test
Weeks 10-14 Your presentations; 30 minutes each
Your three tests will be on the dates indicated (9/17, 10/8 and 10/29). Beginning on November
3rd you will begin giving your class presentations, in reverse alphabetical order (thus Wortmann,
Valdez, Spradling, Saladero, Patneaude, Macabitas, Le, Keller, Jeffries, Grillo, Finol, Chavez
and Burgess). These will be 30 minutes each, 15 minutes for you and 15 minutes for class
response. Your questions and suggestions will count toward your own grade, so each of you
must have something to say. Take notes as you listen. The first draft of your paper should be
brought to me by October 14th. Tell me what you want to write about first; you can find some
suggestions in the workbook. I'll tell you if the topic has already been chosen, and give you
some directions for research.
This is not an ordinary course. It is a signature course and the very best is
expected from you. Make sure you meet all the deadlines, you will not be able
to turn anything in late. It should not be necessary to remind you of the
university’s policy regarding academic dishonesty, which demands a failing
grade and immediate dismissal from the class.
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Required Books
1. Workbook for this course, from Speedway Copy in Dobie Mall.
2. Hancock, Ian, 2002.
We Are the Romani People: Ame Sam e Rromane Džene. Hatfield:
Hertfordshire University Press.
Suggested Readings
Following are some of the latest books on the subject. There are many more. I will suggest them
from time to time and recommend titles directly relevant to your own research. The PCL has
many books on Roma, and the HRC contains the rare Rupert Croft-Cooke Romani Collection.
The Romani Archives are (mostly) in my office. You may consult the materials there and in the
HRC but they cannot be taken away from either place. There are very many Internet sites that
you can browse through as well. Our own is at www.radoc.net.
In addition we will watch a number of films during the course.
Acton, Thomas, 1997. Gypsy Politics and Traveller Identity. Hatfield: Hertfordshire UP.
Acton , Thomas, 2000. Scholarship and the Gypsy Struggle: Commitment in Romani Studies.
Hatfield: Hertfordshire UP.
Acton, Thomas, 2008. Asylum-seeking, Racism and Gypsies in Contemporary Europe.
Workbook for course of same name, Department of Sociology, Criminology and Cultural
Studies, Greenwich University, London.
Acton, Thomas & Gary Mundy, 1997. Romani Culture and Gypsy Identity. Hatfield:
Hertfordshire UP.
Ahmed, Patricia, Cynthia Feliciano & Rebecca Emigh, 2007. “Internal and external ethnic
assessments in Eastern Europe,” Social Forces, 86(1):231-255.
Bancroft, Angus, 2005. Roma and Gypsy-Travellers in Europe: Modernity, Race, Space and
Exclusion. A1dershot & Burlington: Ashgate Publishing.
Baumann, Max, ed., 2000. Music, Language and Literature of the Roma and Sinti. Berlin:
VWB Verlag.
Belton, Brian, 2005. Questioning Gypsy Identity: Ethnic Narratives in Britain and America.
New York: Altamira Press.
Bhopal, Kalwant & Martin Myers, 2008. Insiders, Outsiders and Others: Gypsies and Identity.
Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press.
Bieber, Florian, ed., 2007. Guide to Minorities and Education: Foundation of Stable Relations
in the Region. Brussels: The King Baudouin Foundation.
Braham, Mark & Matthew Braham, 2000. “Romani migrations and EU enlargement.”
Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 13(2): 97-116.
Cahn, Claude, ed., 2002. Roma Rights: Race, Justice and Strategies for Equality. New York:
International Debate Education Association.
Carter, Marina Izquierdo, 1996. The Interrelation of Gypsy Culture and School Culture: An
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Ethnographic Study and Interactions. Doctor of Education dissertation, West Virginia
University.
Chokescho, Dufunia, 2008. Any Rom Will Do? BA thesis, Department of Ethnology, The
University of Stockholm.
Cooper, Belinda, 2001/2. “We have no Martin Luther King: Eastern Europe’s Roma minority,”
World Policy Journal, Winter issue, pp. 69-78.
Corriggio, Jennifer Hu, 2007. “Gitano legal codes: Social change, NGOs, and external legal
systems’ influence on governance of Spanish Roma Communities,” Michigan Journal of Race
and Law, 13(1):1-56.
Coxhead, John, 2007. The Last Bastion of Racism: Gypsies, Travellers and Policing. Stoke-on
Trent: Trentham Books, Ltd.
Cuadernos de Análisis No. 14, Special Roma issue “Movimiento contra la intolerancia,” 2007.
Diacon, Diane, et al., 2007. Out in the Open: Providing Accommodation, Promoting
understanding, and Recognising rights of Gypsies and Travellers. Coalville: Building and Social
Housing Foundation.
Difelice, Moira, 2007. The International Romani Movement: A Critical Analysis of the Claims
and Legitimacy of 21st Century Romani Activism. Universidade Técnica de Lisboa & Charles
University, Prague, internship report.
Engebrigtsen, Ada, 2007. Exploring Gypsiness. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
Fings, Karola, Herbert Heuss & Frank Sparing, 1997. From 'Race Science' to the Camps.
Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press.
Fraser, Angus, 1992. The Gypsies. Oxford: Blackwell.
Friedlander, Henry, 1995. The Origins of Nazi Genocide. Chapel Hill: NCU Press.
Glajar, Valentina, & Dominica Radulescu, eds., 2007. Gypsies in Literature and Culture.
Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Hadziavdic, Habiba, 2005. A Day with the Gypsies, paper presented at the annual
MidwestModern Languages Association, November, in Cleveland, in the Film I panel: Cinema
and Photography.
Hancock, Ian, Sibhan Dowd & Rajko Djurić, eds., 1998. The Roads of the Roma: An Anthology
of Gypsy Writers. Hatfield: Hertfordshire UP.
Hofman, Nila Ginger, 2008. “Accessing Romani women study participants: Collaborating with
their gatekeepers and other NGO entrepreneurs,” Practicing Anthropology, 30(3): 46-49.
Klimova-Alexander, Ilona, 2005. The Romani Voice in World Politics. Aldershot & Burlington:
Ashgate Publishing.
Kohn, Marek, 1995. The Race Gallery. London: Jonathan Cape.
Lee, Ronald, 2005. Learn Romani - Das Duma Rromanes. Hatfield: Hertfordshire University
Press.
Liebich, André, 2007. “Roma nation? Competing narratives of nationhood,” Nationalism and
Ethnic Politics, 13:539-554.
Lucassen, Leo, Wim Willems & Annemarie Cottar, 1998. Gypsies and Other Itinerant Groups.
London: Macmillan.
Magyari-Vincze, Eniko, 2007. “Anti-Gypsy racism and the symbolism of the female body,”
Observator Cultural, 140(397):1-5.
Marsh, Adrian, 2003. “Research and the many representations of Romani identity,” European
Roma rights Quarterly.
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Marsh, Adrian, 2008. “No Promised Land”: History, Historiography and the Origins of the
Gypsies. Doctoral dissertation, London: The University of Greenwich.
Mayall, David, 2004. Gypsy Identities 1500-2000. London: Routledge.
Müller-Hill, Benno, 1988. Murderous Science: Elimination by Scientific Selection of Jews,
Gypsies and Others, Germany 1933-1945. Oxford: OUP.
Negrin, Katy, ed., 2007. Equal Access to Quality Education for Roma. 2 vols. Budapest: OSI.
Nord, Deborah, 2006. Gypsies and the British Imagination 1807-1930. New York: Columbia
UP.
Ó hAodha, Míchéal & Ian Hancock, 2007. Migrant and Nomad: European Visual Culture and
the Representation of “Otherness.” Essen: Blaue Eule Verlag.
O'Nions, Helen, 2007. Minority Rights Protection in International Law: The Roma of Europe.
Aldershot & Burlington: Ashgate Publishing.
Pogány István, 2004. The Roma Café: Human Rights and the Plight of the Romani People.
London: Pluto Press.
Proctor, Robert N., 1988. Racial Hygiene Under the Nazis. Cambridge: Harvard UP.
Stauber, Roni & Raphael Vago, eds., 2007. The Roma: A Minority in Europe. Budapest &
New York: CEU Press.
Tebbutt, Susan, ed., 1998. Sinti and Roma. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
Thelen, Peter, 2005. Roma in Europe: From Social Exclusion to Active Participation. Skopje:
Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.
Tong, Diane, 1995. Gypsies: A Multidisciplinary Annotated Bibliography. New York: Garland
Publishing.
Tong, Diane, ed., 1998. Gypsies: An Interdisciplinary Reader. New York: Garland Publishing.
Tscherenkov, Lev, & Stéphane Laederich, 2004. The Rroma. Basel: Schwabe AG.
Vermeersch, Peter, 2006. The Romani Movement: Minority Politics and Ethnic Mobilization in
Contemporary Central Europe. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
Willems, Wim, 1997. In Search of the True Gypsy: From Enlightenment to the Final Solution.
London: Frank Cass.
A list of further recommended sources may be found in We Are the Romani People, pp. 162-165.