Romani people in Spain

"Spanish Gypsy" redirects here. For other uses, see Spanish Gypsy (disambiguation).

Romani people in Spain
Gitanos

Spanish Gitanos: Lolita Flores · Isabel Pantoja · Joaquín Cortés
Total population
Estimated at around 1,000,000 2% of the Spanish population
Regions with significant populations
Spain 1,000,000
Andalusia 37%[citation needed] Valencia 13%[citation needed] Madrid 10%[citation needed] Catalonia 10%[citation needed]
Languages
Caló · Spanish · Catalan · Basque (Erromintxela) · Galician · Asturian · Aragonese · Romani
Religion
Predominantly Evangelicalism , Roman Catholicism
Related ethnic groups
Other Romani people

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Spain Portal

The Romani people in Spain are generally known as gitanos (Spanish pronunciation: [xiˈtanos]). Spanish Romanies belong to the Iberian Kale group, with smaller populations in Portugal (known as ciganos), in southern France and Morocco. A number of gitanos were also historically present in Algeria, together with other Spanish Pied-Noir immigrant communities under French rule, although whether any remain is unknown. They tend to speak Caló, which basically encompasses a range of regional dialects of Spanish with numerous Romani loan words and mannerisms. Nevertheless, to varying degrees, they identify with Andalusian culture and music due to the large gitano population present in that region. Although no official census exists, the latest estimates of the Romani population in Spain are of 970,000 people or 2% of the total population. It is not clear whether this figure refers to gitanos only or to the total Rom population, including those of Eastern European origin.

Name

"Gitano" word come from "Egipciano" that is the Spanish for "Egyptian". Like in the word "Gypsy", which come from "Egyptian", is due to a medieval belief that the Romani people came from Egypt.

Identity

Gitano identity is particularly complex in Spain for a variety of reasons which are examined below. Nevertheless, it can be safely said that both from the perspective of gitano and non-gitano (payo) Spaniards, individuals generally considered to belong to this ethnicity are those of gitano descent and who also self-identify as such.

A confusing element is the thorough hybridization of Andalusian and Roma culture (and some would say identity) at a popular level. This has occurred to the point where Spaniards from other regions of Spain can commonly mistake elements of one for the other. The clearest example of this is Flamenco music, an art form which is Andalusian rather than gitano in origin but, having been strongly marked by gitanos in interpretative style, is now commonly associated to this ethnicity by many Spaniards. The largest population of gitanos being concentrated in Southern Spain has even led to a confusion between gitano accents and those typical of Southern Spain, even though many Kale populations in the northern half of Spain (e.g. Galicia) do not speak Andalusian Spanish.

Indeed, the boundaries among gitano and non-gitano ethnicities are so blurred by intermarriage and common cultural traits in the south of the country, that self-identification is on occasion the only real marker for ethnicity.

The term "gitano" has also acquired among many a negative socio-economic connotation (much as the term quinqui) referring to the lowest strata of society, sometimes linking it to crime and marginality and even being used as a term of abuse. There are also Roma who reclaim the term "gitano" and fill it with self-generated meaning, as a strategy to attack racism within spanish and european society. Non-Roma people should be somehow careful not to re_produce racism by using the latter term.

On the other hand, the exaltation of Roma culture and heritage is a large element of wider Andalusian folklore. Gitanos, rather than being considered a "foreign" or "alien" minority within the country are perceived as "deep" or "real Spain", as is expressed by the term "España Cañí" which interestingly means both "Gypsy Spain" (wheras gypsy is the racist term for Roma) and "Traditional" or "Folkloric Spain".

Evidently this results in a strong distinction between gitanos and Rom immigrants from Eastern Europe, who are commonly identified by the wider population according to their country of origin (Romanians, Bulgarians, etc.) rather than by their actual Rom ethnicity.

The Erromintxela of the Basque Country are also Romani. Their number is small but they identify as distinctly separate from the Caló-speaking Romani in Spain.

History

Romani migrations.

The gitanos emigrated from Northern India, presumably from the Punjab and Rajasthan region, as early as 1000 A.D. The music and culture of the gitanos highly influenced the cultures they had reached in Al-Andalus through North Africa. Flamenco, the heart of gitano culture, is a mixture of the various western and oriental influences which have resulted from the Andalusian history, with the later Indian influence infused by the Romani adoption of this art form.

Many sources attribute the difference between Romani culture and music in Spain to other parts of Europe to an alleged arrival of this community from North Africa. Nevertheless, historical records show that Spanish Gitanos arrived in Spain through Europe concentrating in Andalusia and adopting the region's unique hybrid culture as their own. Gitanos were recorded in Barcelona and Zaragoza by 1447. At first they were well received and were even accorded official protection by many local authorities.^{[citation needed]} By 1492, a time of increased persecution of minorities, the first anti-Romani law was passed in Spain.^{[citation needed]} Spanish Romanies are linked to Flamenco and have contributed a great deal to this Andalusian musical art.

Gitanos have a prominent role in Andalusian nationalism and identity, which is strongly based on a belief in the oriental basis of Andalusi heritage acted as a bridge between Gitano and non-Gitano Andalusian populations at a popular level. The father of such a movement, Blas Infante, in his book Orígenes de lo flamenco y secreto del cante jondo, etymologically, went as far as alleging that the word flamenco derives from Andalusian Arabic fellah mengu, supposedly meaning "escapee peasant", a theory now considered false. Infante believed that numerous Muslim Andalusians became Moriscos, who were obliged to convert, dispersed and eventually ordered to leave Spain stayed and mixed with the Romani newcomers instead of abandoning their land.

Spanish Romani people. Yevgraf Sorokin, 1853.

For about 300 years, Romanies were subject to a number of laws and policies designed to eliminate them from Spain as an identifiable group: Romani settlements were broken up and the residents dispersed; sometimes, Romanies were required to marry non-Roma; they were prohibited from using their language and rituals, and were excluded from public office and from guild membership.^{[citation needed]} In 1749 A major effort to get rid of the gypsy population in Spain was carried out through a raid organized by the government. It arrested all gypsies (Romani) in the realm, and imprisoned them in labor camps.

During the Spanish Civil War, gitanos were not persecuted for their ethnicity by either side. Under Franco, Gitanos were often harassed or simply ignored, although their children were educated, sometimes forcibly, much as all Spaniards are nowadays. On the other hand, Andalusian and gitano culture was instrumentalized in the country's tourist promotion strategy which focused on the south to exalt the uniqueness of Spanish culture. However, the country's industrialization negatively affected gitanos as the migration of rural Spaniards to major cities led to the growth of shanty towns around urban areas with a consequent explosion in birth rates and a drastic fall in the quality of living and an abandonment of traditional professions. Traditional Gitano neighbourhoods such as Triana in Seville became gentrified and gitanos were slowly pushed out to the periphery and these new shanty towns.

In the post-Franco era, Spanish government policy has been much more sympathetic, especially in the area of social welfare and social services. In 1977, the last anti-Romani laws were repealed, an action promoted by Juan de Dios Ramírez Heredia, the first Romani deputy.

Since 1983, the government has operated a special program of Compensatory Education to promote educational rights for the disadvantaged, including those in Romani communities. During the heroin epidemic that afflicted Spain in the 80s and 90s, Gitano shanty towns became central to the drug trade, a problem which afflicts Spain to this day. Although the size of shanty towns has been vastly reduced in Madrid, they remain significant in other major cities such as Seville, Huelva and Almería. Nevertheless, Spain is still considered a model for integration of gitano communities when compared to other countries with Rom populations in Eastern Europe.

Many Spanish Romanies have been converted to Evangelical Christianity by US-funded religious organizations. However, the bulk of gitanos in Andalusia remain strongly faithful to the region's religious traditions such as the cult of the Virgin of the Rocío.

Religion

In Spain, gitanos were traditionally Roman Catholics who participated in four of the church's sacraments (baptism, marriage, confirmation, and extreme unction). They are not regular churchgoers. They rarely go to folk healers, and they participate fully in Spain's state-supported medical system. Gitanos have a special involvement with recently dead kin and visit their graves frequently. They spend more money than non-Gitanos of equivalent economic classes in adorning grave sites.^{[citation needed]}

The Spanish Evangelical Federation (mostly composed by members of the Assemblies of God and Pentecostal) claims that 150,000 Gitanos have joined their faith in Spain.^{[citation needed]} The Romani Evangelical Assembly is the only religious institution entirely led and composed by Roma.

Marriage

The traditional Spanish Romani place a high value on the extended family. Virginity is essential in unmarried women. Both men and women often marry young.

A traditional gitano wedding requires a pedimiento (similar to an engagement party) followed by the casamiento (wedding ceremony), where el yeli must be sung to the bride for giving her honor to her husband (proven by the ritual of the pañuelo). In the pañuelo ritual, a group consisting of an ajuntaora (an elder woman who is well respected in the family), along with the older aunts and elder woman of the family, take the bride into a separate room during the wedding and examine her to ascertain that she is a virgin. The "ajuntaora" is the one who practices the ritual on the bride, as the other women watch to be witnesses that the bride is virgin.

The cloth (pañuelo) must have three rose petals on it. When finished with the exam, the women come out of the room and sing el yeli to the couple. During this, the men at the wedding rip their shirts and lift the wife onto their shoulders and do the same with the husband, as they sing "el yeli" to them. Weddings can last very long; up to three days is usual in the Gitano culture. At weddings, "gitanos" invite everyone and anyone that they know of (especially other gitanos). On some occasions, payos (gadjos) may attend as well, although this is not common. Through the night, many bulerías are danced and especially sung. Today, rumba gitana or rumba flamenca are a usual party music fixture.

Criminality

According to the website of Fundación Secretariado Gitano ("Gitano Secretariat Foundation"), in the Spanish prison system the Spanish Romani women respresent the 25% of the incarcerated femenine population, while the formers represent the 1.4% of the total Spanish population. 64% of the detentions of gitano people are drug trafficking-related. 93.2% of women inmates for drug trafficking are gitanas. 13.2% of the total drug trafficking-related inmates are of gitano ethnicity. These numbers are based on racial profiling by police and criminalization of Roma in Spain, similar to other european countries, and decontextualize extensive racism against Roma.

In literature

The Gitanos in Spanish society have inspired several authors:

• Federico García Lorca, a great Spanish poet of the 20th century, wrote Romancero Gitano ("Gypsy Ballad Book")

The Roma is the most basic, most profound, the most aristocratic of my country, as representative of their way and whoever keeps the flame, blood, and the alphabet of the universal Andalusian truth.

—Federico García Lorca

• Candela, the female protagonist of the story El Amor Brujo, by Manuel de Falla is Romani.

• Prosper Mérimée's Carmen (1845) features the protagonist as a femme fatale, ready to lie, or attack and degrade men's lives. His work was adapted for Georges Bizet's opera of the same name.

• The beauty of a dark-haired Gitana has inspired artists such as Julio Romero de Torres.

Notable gitanos

The ballet dancer Carlotta Grisi as the Romani Paquita (1844).

Following are notable people of gitano ethnicity or descent:

• Carmen Amaya, Flamenco dancer.
• Isabel Pantoja, singer.
• Manolo Caracol, Flamenco singer.
• Lolita Flores, singer and actress, daughter of Lola Flores.
• Antonio Flores, singer and actor, son of Lola Flores.
• Rosario Flores, singer and actress, daughter of Lola Flores.
• Quique Sánchez Flores, coach and nephew of flamenco dancer, Lola Flores.
• Vicente Escudero, dancer and choreographer of Spanish Flamenco; occasionally painter, writer, cinematographic actor and flamenco singer.
• Helios Gómez, artist, writer and poet
• Antonio González, el Pescaílla, guitarist
• Ricardo Baliardo, Manitas de Plata, French guitarist
• Joaquín Albaicín, Spanish writer, lecturer and columnist for the artistic life
• José Heredia Maya, Spanish poet and dramaturg
• Poncho Zurulo Spanish Andorran stylist
• André-Pierre Gignac, French footballer
• Juan Vargas, Spanish sculptor
• Luis Heredia Amaya, Spanish sculptor
• Antonio Maya Cortés, Spanish artist painter and sculptor
• Fabian de Castro, Spanish artist painter
• Juan Peña Fernández el Lebrijano, guitarist
• Gipsy Kings, French group of Flamenco Rumba
• Nicolas Reyes, lead vocalist of the Gipsy Kings
• Matéo Maximoff, Romani born in Barcelona
• Micaela Flores Amaya, La Chunga, Flamenco dancer
• Pedro Pubill Calaf, Peret, Flamenco Rumba music star
• Juan de Dios Ramírez Heredia, Spanish Socialist Workers' Party MEP
• Camarón de la Isla, Flamenco star
• Farruquito, Flamenco dancer
• Juan José Moreno Cuenca "El Vaquilla" ("The Heifer"), notorious criminal
• José Antonio Reyes, Spanish footballer, currently plays for Sevilla FC
• Daniel Güiza, Spanish football player, currently plays for Getafe CF
• Jesús Seba, Spanish footballer, ex-Real Zaragoza
• Diego, Spanish former footballer, with Sevilla FC
• Carlos Muñoz, Spanish former footballer, with Real Oviedo
• Arzu, Spanish football player, currently plays for Real Betis
• Apoño, Spanish football player, currently plays for Real Zaragoza
• Iván Amaya, Spanish football player, ex-Atlético Madrid
• Antonio Amaya, Spanish footballer, currently with Wigan Athletic F.C.
• Marcos Márquez, Spanish footballer, currently plays for UD Las Palmas
• López Ramos, Spanish footballer, currently plays for UD Las Palmas
• Israel Bascón Giga,(Israel), Spanish football player, currently plays for Real Betis
• José Mari, Spanish football player, currently plays for Gimnàstic de Tarragona
• Javier Casquero, Spanish football player, currently plays for Getafe CF
• David Cortés Caballero, Spanish football player, currently plays for Getafe CF
• Juana Martín Manzano, fashion designer
• Los Niños de Sara, French fusion musicians
• Sarah de Nardi, singer in The Lambrini Girls
• Ketama, Spanish fusion musicians
• Diego "El Cigala", Flamenco singer
• Ceferino Giménez Malla, blessed
• Pitingo, Flamenco singer
• Joaquín Cortés, Flamenco dancer
• Faustino Reyes, Spanish Boxer
• José Antonio Jiménez, Spanish Boxer
• Patxi Ruiz Giménez, Basque pelota champion
• Jairo Barrull Fernández, Flamenco Dancer

Gitano surnames

Due to endogamy, several Spanish surnames are more frequent among the Gitanos, though they are not exclusive to them:

• Jiménez or Giménez
• Heredia
• Amaya
• Montoya
• Cortés
• Vargas
• Muñoz
• Santiago, the name means Saint James. It is also common among descendants of Sephardic Jews.

See also

• Gitanos article in the Spanish Wikipedia.
• Triana, Seville, a neighborhood traditionally linked to Gitano history.
• Sacromonte, the traditional Gitano quarter of Granada.
• George Borrow, an English missionary and traveller who studied the Gypsies of Spain and other parts of Europe.
• Quinqui, a community of Spain with a similar lifestyle, but of unrelated origin.

References

•  This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the Library of Congress Country Studies.
• The Situation of Roma in Spain. The Open Society Institute, 2002 (PDF).
• Worth, Susannah and Sibley, Lucy R. "Maja Dress and the Andalusian Image of Spain." Clothing and Textiles Research Journal, Summer 1994, Vol. 12, pp. 51–60.

External links

• Romani union (Spanish)
• Romani/Gypsy presence in European Music (Spanish)
• Teacher's telematic formation on gypsy culture (Spanish)