Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
territory. in the short-term, movements are generally local. The Roma, even when
they are constantly moving, tend to gravitate around the same quarter, or around
the same encampment lived in by Roma that belong to their own network; routes
to places of work radiate from these areas, which serve as magnets and centers of
everyday life. During the period of my field research, all the families of Vlaseni-
cakuri living in illegal settlements moved several times between car parks, Roma
encampments, riverbanks, and beds of reeds, but always within a territory that
extended between the zones of Viale marconi and muratella, along an imagi-
nary axis formed by Via della magliana. The families moved independently of
each other, dispersing on their own, but maintaining their “base” in the area
and their daily frequentation of trastevere. in this case, mobility itself can have
its roots, in that it is limited to a restricted territory; thus the daily practices in
both place of residence and place of work are not impaired. it would seem that
precisely the possibility of moving between various spaces within one territory
allows the Roma to stay in a specific zone of the city, since their presence is di-
luted and individual places are thus relieved of the gypsy “pressure.” in other
words, discontinuity becomes the other face of continuity.19 habits of mobility
relating to periods of time lasting several years, instead, often take on an urban
rather than local neighborhood dimension; thus, it is the place of residence that
changes, while the workplace remains unchanged. The places chosen for resi-
dence are preferably ones with good connections to the work area (which basi-
cally does not vary); in general, they are zones already known to the Roma and/or
inhabited by other Roma belonging to their own relational network. During the
past five years, there have been three main places that attract the Vlasenicakuri
and bijeljincuri: the bastoggi quarter (Via di boccea, near the ring road); the Via
della Cesarina camp (Via Nomentana, just after the ring road); and the magliana
quarter.20 sometimes various nuclei belonging to the same extended family dis-
perse to different territories. This is what happened to tony's family, whose sons
with their respective families spread all over Rome at various times: some were
living in trastevere (where a few Vlasenicakuri found accommodation near the
station), some in bastoggi with relatives, some in various car parks along the Via
Nomentana (together with other relatives who had part of the family living in
the Cesarina camp), and some in magliana. The fact that different family nuclei,
related to each other, gravitated around different focal points and relied on the
specific Roma communities based there intensified the link between the various
centers of attraction and made a range of city territories easily accessible at any
time to all the nuclei belonging to tony's family.
here we touch on a point of fundamental importance for understanding the
logic of the Roma presence: it is the existence of a sort of “base” for the Roma
that makes it possible for someone who no longer lives there or has never lived
there before to cross or move into a given territory. for example, fred, having
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