Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
the Roma living with their camper vans on the site of the abandoned factory in
Via dell'imbrecciato (adjoining the Via della magliana). but all the Roma got on
well with mario, the old man who collected scrap iron with his piaggio three-
wheel truck, leaving it on the unauthorized site under the flyover near where the
Roma pitched their camper vans and tents. still in magliana, the Roma from the
settlement on the banks of the tiber had good relations with the italians who,
just as unlawfully, occupied the high-water bed of the river with their shacks and
vegetable plots.
furthermore, although it may be true that the Roma are less worried about
neighbors' sensibilities when the settlement is a long way from houses and inhab-
ited buildings, when they live in areas that are not physically separated from the
italians (for example, in the case of some car parks), the Roma try not to attract
too much attention or to cause inconvenience to people who live in the neighbor-
hood. That is to say, they avoid lighting fires, keep their music at a low volume,
make sure that their children are not too noisy, and try to keep the site clean.
Good neighborliness assumes wider forms in the maintenance of a harmoni-
ous relationship with the residential district that they visit every day. magliana,
for the Roma who still live there, is where they do their shopping, have a coffee,
play video poker, buy clothes, post a letter, or surf the internet to watch a video
of their favorite singers. The Roma need bars, tobacconists, internet points, and
food, and since the non-Roma supply these things, relations with them must be
peaceful. as long ago as 1989, asséo wrote that relations between Roma and non-
Roma had historically taken the form of an individual integration accompanied
by a collective rejection. The Vlasenicakuri and the bijeljincuri appear to have
grasped this fact clearly. indeed, they tend to disperse in their habitual visits to
the district, so as to reduce the perception—on the part of the non-Roma—that
the Roma are a burden on the area. at group level in recent years, the Vlaseni-
cakuri prefer the magliana-Villa bonelli district and the bijeljincuri, the trullo
neighborhood. furthermore, each family “in residence” (by this i mean a group
made up of various married couples and their children, as a rule closely related
and living in the same place) habitually goes to a limited number of bars, stores,
and food shops, avoiding those frequented by other Roma. it is in fact important
not to be perceived, in one's “own” bars (or supermarkets or shops) as “yet anoth-
er gypsy” who will annoy customers and frighten them away. Thus, it is precisely
the collective rejection of the gypsies that obliges the Roma, in their relation-
ship with the non-Roma whom they meet daily, to free themselves from what
hannerz ([1980] 1992) calls “role discrimination,” in this instance connected to
their own ethnic category. so they have to introduce themselves as max or maria;
gypsies, indeed, but different from the other gypsies and above all specific indi-
viduals.10 Thus, every Roma in the district has “their own gağé ” whom they have
known for years.11 These relationships are key to the Roma's rootedness in a given
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