Romani people in Slovakia

Romani in Slovakia
Total population
(2011 census: 105,738[1])
Languages
Romani and other languages (Slovak, Hungarian)
Religion
Catholicism · Calvinism · Pentecostalism · Islam
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According to the last census from 2011, there were 105,738 persons counted as Romani people in Slovakia, or 2.0% of the population.[2] The Romani are the second-largest ethnic minority in Slovakia after Hungarians and they live mostly in the eastern parts of the country.

Other sources claim that 7.5% of inhabitants of Slovakia[3] (402,840 people[4]) may be Romani.

History

Origin

The Romani people originate from the Northern India,[5][6][7][8][9][10] presumably from the northwestern Indian states Rajasthan[9][10] and Punjab.[9]

The linguistic evidence has indisputably shown that roots of Romani language lie in India: the language has grammatical characteristics of Indian languages and shares with them a big part of the basic lexicon, for example, body parts or daily routines.[11]

More exactly, Romani shares the basic lexicon with Hindi and Punjabi. It shares many phonetic features with Marwari, while its grammar is closest to Bengali.[12]

Genetic findings in 2012 suggest the Romani originated in northwestern India and migrated as a group.[6][7][13] According to a genetic study in 2012, the ancestors of present scheduled tribes and scheduled caste populations of northern India, traditionally referred to collectively as the Ḍoma, are the likely ancestral populations of modern European Roma.[14]

In February 2016, during the International Roma Conference, the Indian Minister of External Affairs stated that the people of the Roma community were children of India. The conference ended with a recommendation to the Government of India to recognize the Roma community spread across 30 countries as a part of the Indian diaspora.[15]

Migration to Slovakia

Roma children in Eastern Slovakia
A Roma settlement in the region of Šariš
The Roma minority in Slovakia (census 2001)

The first record of sightings of small groups of Romani within the area of present-day Slovakia are from 1322 AD, when the region was part of the Kingdom of Hungary. Major waves of Romani nomads were recorded from 1417 onwards. In 1423 they received a decree from the Hungarian king Sigismund of Luxemburg at Szepes Castle, granting them Europe-wide right of passage and the right to settle. They proved to be useful metal workers for the royal armies fighting the Turks.

Through the ensuing centuries, whilst in western and central Europe Romani were treated violently and often expelled, the Hungarian Kingdom and Habsburg Monarchy in general provided a tolerant and stable safe-haven for the Romani community. In the 18th century, Joseph II of the house of Habsburg attempted to 'civilize' the Romani, for example by prohibiting their dress and customs and educating them. However these efforts generally failed. On the other hand, increasing repression of the Romani in the Czech, Polish and Austrian lands caused them to become concentrated in the more tolerant regions of Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Serbia and Russia.

20th century

After the repressive Romani policies of the first Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1939), the communist government of 1945-1989 attempted to integrate the Romani into the majority population through obligatory education and employment, and the formation of Romani organizations. The nomadic way of life was banned in 1958. Parts of the Romani population were also transferred from Slovakia into the country's Czech regions.

Though these policies were partly successful, after the 1989 Velvet Revolution, the Romani have once again found themselves on the margins of the society. On the one hand, there is a generous social system, but the system fails to effectively integrate them into the mainstream society.

Discrimination in education

Roma people suffer serious discrimination in Slovakia. Roma children are segregated in school and do not receive the level of education as other Slovakian children. Some are sent to schools for children with mild mental disabilities. As a result, their attainment level is far below average.[16] Amnesty International’s report "Unfulfilled promises: Failing to end segregation of Roma pupils in Slovakia" describes the failure of the Slovak authorities to end the discrimination of Roma children on the grounds of their ethnicity in education. According to a 2012 United Nations Development Programme survey, around 43 per cent of Roma in mainstream schools attended ethnically segregated classes.[17]

Forced sterilisation

A human rights fact finding mission found widespread violations of Romani women’s human rights including forced sterilisations, racially discriminatory access to health care and physical and verbal abuse by medical staff amongst others. The report states that there was a "clear and consistent patterns of health-care providers who disregarded the need for obtaining informed consent to sterilization and who failed to provide accurate and comprehensive reproductive health information to Romani patients."[18]

Crime

Panel house in the Luník IX. ghetto

Roma are the cause of ethnically driven violence and crime in Slovakia. According to monitoring and reports provided by the European Roma Rights Center (ERRC), racist violence, evictions, threats, and more subtle forms of discrimination have increased over the past two years in Slovakia. The ERRC considers the situation in Slovakia to be one of the worst in Europe.[19]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on November 14, 2012. Retrieved April 13, 2013.
  2. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on November 14, 2012. Retrieved April 13, 2013.
  3. ↑ "Po deviatich rokoch spočítali Rómov, na Slovensku ich žije viac ako 400-tisíc". SITA. 2013-09-25. Retrieved 2013-09-25.
  4. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on May 15, 2009. Retrieved January 19, 2009.
  5. ↑ Hancock 2002, p. xx: ‘While a nine century removal from India has diluted Indian biological connection to the extent that for some Romanian groups, it may be hardly representative today, Sarren (1976:72) concluded that we still remain together, genetically, Asian rather than European’
  6. 1 2 Mendizabal, Isabel (6 December 2012). "Reconstructing the Population History of European Romani from Genome-wide Data". Current Biology. Retrieved 12 December 2012.
  7. 1 2 Sindya N. Bhanoo (11 December 2012). "Genomic Study Traces Roma to Northern India". The New York Times.
  8. ↑ Current Biology.
  9. 1 2 3 K. Meira Goldberg; Ninotchka Devorah Bennahum; Michelle Heffner Hayes. "Flamenco on the Global Stage: Historical, Critical and Theoretical Perspectives". Books.google.ca. p. 50. Retrieved 2016-05-21.
  10. 1 2 Simon Broughton; Mark Ellingham; Richard Trillo. "World Music: Africa, Europe and the Middle East". Books.google.ca. p. 147. Retrieved 2016-05-21.
  11. ↑ Šebková, Hana; Žlnayová, Edita (1998), Nástin mluvnice slovenské romštiny (pro pedagogické účely) (PDF), Ústí nad Labem: Pedagogická fakulta Univerzity J. E. Purkyně v Ústí nad Labem, p. 4, ISBN 80-7044-205-0
  12. ↑ Hübschmannová, Milena (1995). "Romaňi čhib – romština: Několik základních informací o romském jazyku". Bulletin Muzea romské kultury. Brno: Muzeum romské kultury (4/1995). Zatímco romská lexika je bližší hindštině, marvárštině, pandžábštině atd., v gramatické sféře nacházíme mnoho shod s východoindickým jazykem, s bengálštinou.
  13. ↑ "5 Intriguing Facts About the Roma". Live Science.
  14. ↑ Rai, N; Chaubey, G; Tamang, R; Pathak, AK; Singh, VK (2012), "The Phylogeography of Y-Chromosome Haplogroup H1a1a-M82 Reveals the Likely Indian Origin of the European Romani Populations", PLoS ONE, 7 (11): e48477, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0048477
  15. ↑ "Can Romas be part of Indian diaspora?". khaleejtimes.com. 29 February 2016. Retrieved 4 March 2016.
  16. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on September 3, 2014. Retrieved September 2, 2014.
  17. ↑ "Slovak authorities in breach of obligations to Romani school children | Amnesty International". Amnesty.org. Retrieved 2016-05-21.
  18. ↑ Center for Reproductive Rights and Poradna pre obcianske a l’udské práva , in consultation with Ina Zoon. "BODY AND SOUL Forced Sterilization and Other Assaults on Roma Reproductive Freedom in Slovakia" (PDF). The Center for Reproductive Rights and Poradπa pre ob∞ianske a ∂udské práva (Centre for Civil and Human Rights or Poradπa). Retrieved 2 September 2014.
  19. ↑ Lake, Aaron (2013-12-25). "The New Roma Ghettos | VICE | United States". Vice.com. Retrieved 2016-05-21.
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