‘Here are the Gypsies!’ The importance of self-representations and how to question prominent images of Gypsy minorities

Abstract

Gypsy, Roma or traveller minorities remain a group that is still homogenized as the ‘other’¹. The European imagination continues to be entrenched in the spectacle of their difference – images of weddings, musicians, funerals and fights are fascinating and are thus prioritized. But what would happen if the cameras were given to these people themselves? What if they became the image-makers? This article examines how ethnic studies might contribute to breaking the mould of the exoticized Gypsy through self-representations. The study here formed part of an ethnographic project among primary school pupils in Hungary. Using the photo elicitation method, children were given disposable cameras producing 451 photographs that then formed the basis of interviews. The results reveal very few indicators that could be described as significantly or distinctively divided into ‘Gypsy’ or ‘non-Gypsy’ identifications, questioning the status of difference in discourses around such minorities.

Keywords:

• Gypsy
• difference
• self-representations
• photo elicitation
• ethnography
• Hungary

Notes

1. There are an estimated 12 million Gypsy people across Europe, with the majority residing in Central and Eastern Europe. ‘Roma’ is the European institutional preferred umbrella term, but it is often rejected by activists and at a local level because many groups still identify as ‘Gypsies’ (Gay y Blasco 2002; Mayall 2004; Szuhay 2005). In this article I use ‘Gypsy’ as a translation of the Hungarian word cigány as this is how the participants self-identified.

2. From 2000-1 I lived in Hungary as a volunteer in the European Commission-funded ‘European Voluntary Service’ (EVS), obtaining a ‘Future Capital’ grant 2001-2 to carry out my own project that focused on intercultural education called ‘Crossing Boundaries’

3. In Hungary, although there are no reliable statistics, about 5 per cent of the population are said to be of Gypsy origin, with three main groups: Hungarian Gypsies (65–75 per cent of the Gypsy population); Vlach Rom (20–30 per cent); and Beás or Romanian Gypsy (5–10 per cent) (Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada 1998).

4. The PhD was undertaken at King's College London from 2003–2007 and was fully funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) (Tremlett 2008).

5. With a consolidated figure of over 8 million viewers, Big Fat Gypsy Wedding is in the top 10 of UK broadcaster Channel 4's highest-rating programmes ever (Frost 2011).

6. For example Charlotte Dean (2007) reports on a community project using photographs taken by UK English travellers, while Krista Harper's (2010) ongoing work uses photo-voice to look at the environment in which Romani people live in Hungary.

7. This was also important because of my status as ‘less-than-fluent’ in the language and cultural practices of my research participants (discussed in depth in Tremlett 2009a).

8. Ethical consent was sought from the participating children and their parents in accordance with UK ethical guidelines. The children were verbally explained the purpose of the project, both as a group and individually. Once the photographs were developed, the children were also asked if there were any photographs they would not be happy to be shown to a wider audience, and some were highlighted that have not been used. Signed ethical consent forms were obtained from at least one parent of all participating children, which stated that the images may be used in wider material, but that all names would be changed.

9. The study was conducted in 2004–5 in a small school of approximately 120 pupils on the outskirts of a city of about 100,000 people in the ‘Southern Great Plain’ (Dél-Alföld) region of Hungary. The children were from similar local, low socio-economic backgrounds, with the school records showing that the majority of children (nearly 60 per cent) came from families who were in need of some government assistance. Approximately 20–30 per cent of the school's pupils were from a ‘Hungarian Gypsy’ (Magyar cigány) background. While a few of these families were among the poorest attending the school, not all Hungarian Gypsy families were in this category, and there were some non-Gypsy families who were also deemed extremely poor in school records.

10. The statistical analyses were carried out with the advice and supervision of Dr Helen Tremlett, assistant professor at the University of British Columbia in the Faculty of Medicine, Divisions of Neurology and Health Care and Epidemiology, Canada.

11. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 15 was used for statistical analyses. The non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare the proportion and number of photos taken within each category between Gypsy versus non-Gypsy children and between boys versus girls. A p<.05 was considered significant (Munro 2005, pp. 123–6). No adjustments were made for multiple testing. This increases the risk of a type I error (Rothman 1990, pp. 43–46). However, the previous absence of research into self-representations of Gypsy and non-Gypsy children using photographic methods provides some justification for this approach. In addition, correction for multiple testing can increase the risk of type II errors (Perneger 1998, pp. 1236–8). A full exposition with all the relevant test results can be read in Tremlett (2008).

12. ‘Hungarian’ was also not often used; in fact across the interviews there were also 11 uses: three children used ‘Hungarian’ (to mean the Hungarian language) six times with reference to the way the pop star ‘Gyoőzike’ talked (star of the reality show of the same name); Csilla, who used cigány the most, also used ‘Hungarian’ the most, with five references to Hungarian people when talking about conflicts with her neighbour.

13. It could have been the case that these children were too young (aged 10–11 years) to be expected to have the role of a carer. However, in literature on the ‘Gypsy way’, awareness of the gendered role of girls and boys in Gypsy families is said to begin from birth (Stewart 1997, pp. 52–3).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Annabel Tremlett

ANNABEL TREMLETT is Senior Lecturer in the School of Health Sciences and Social Work at the University of Portsmouth.