EAN: 9783898218641

CULTURAL POLITICS OF ETHNICITY - VERA SOKOLOVA ...

This book maps out the history of Czechoslovak linguistic and social practices directed at Roma
during the communist period. It explains how contemporary Czech society has come to understand
the Romani population in terms of inherited social  medical and juridical ideas. Rather than
focusing on the Roma people as an object of analysis  the book problematizes assumed notions of
Gypsiness and Czechness in mainstream society by highlighting the role of different socialist
discourses in constructing images of Roma as socially deviant and abnormal. By uncovering the
lines of continuity in the intersections of ethnic discrimination  social deviance and
citizenship from the 1950s to the collapse of communism  this book comes to terms with a
variety of questions that have not yet been adequately addressed in the literature: What
underlying assumptions informed the socialist regime's understanding of Gypsiness  and how did
these conceptions relate to notions of citizenship  equality and normality? How and why did the
meaning of the terms Gypsies and Roma become imbued in popular discourse with ideas of
unhealthiness and social deviance? What implications does translating perceived cultural traits
and lifestyles of Roma into non-ethnic frames of reference have for understanding racism and
ethnic sensibilities in the country today? The work emphasizes historical continuities between
contemporary xenophobia and the strategies which the communist regime used to deal with the
Gypsy question. Focusing on the discrepancies between written laws and policies as well as
their implementation  this study exposes the intricate relationships between official beliefs 
institutional policies and popular consciousness under the communist regime. For it was these
relationships which together created the mechanisms of social control that facilitated
discrimination of Czechoslovak Roma under the guise of social welfare.

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