Brekovští Romové – „nejlepší v Československu“. Cikánství jako struktura vztahů a logika sociální mobility v období socialismu

Abstract

This text enters the discussion on the way of understanding the references to „Gypsies“ 
in historical sources, here specifically in the context of socialist Czechoslovakia. In doing 
so, it goes beyond tracing the ways in which the state categorized the population, where 
many authors have already pointed to the official definition of „Gypsy“ as a category 
of social deviance rather than ethnic (self-)identification. In an ethnographically 
informed approach to researching Romani histories, this text traces various overlapping 
contemporary discourses of ‚gypsyness‘ and their negotiation within a locally anchored 
hierarchy of socio-economic relations. Using the case study of the eastern Slovakian 
village of Brekov, it specifically traces how this category spoke not only to the exclusion of 
Roma from non-Romani society, but also to the ways in which relations between Roma 
themselves were defined, not only at the narrative level, but also at the level of concrete 
social practice. In so doing, it is a contribution to the growing debate among historians 
and Romani studies scholars about the nature of agency of the Roma in history.