David Crowe is a Professor of History at Elon University. Crowe's presentation, "Chains and Shadows: A History of the Roma in Romania" was given during the "Past and Present: Historical and Cultural Representation of Roma in Social and Academic Discourse" panel at the "Reasonable Accommodations & Roma Issues in Contemporary Europe" symposium on April 7, 2015 at Duke University.
Presentation Abstract:
Soon after the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, they began to issue a series of laws and decrees that stripped the country’s Jews of all of their political, social, and economic rights in an effort to force them to flee the Reich. They also adopted a series of laws that resulted in the forced sterilization of 375,000 to 400,000 Germans from 1933-1945. However, when it came to the Roma and Sinti, no new laws were needed to maintain a watchful eye over them, since anti-Roma laws adopted by various German states since the late 19 century were considered sufficient to do this.
These laws were rooted in similar legislation across Europe that dates back centuries. With the exception of a brief period after they began to arrive in Europe in the 13th century after a long migration from northwest India, the Roma became entrapped in a vast body of legalized discrimination across Europe that continues to this day.
The suffering of the Roma was most harshly felt in Wallachia and Moldavia (Romania), home today to the world’s largest Roma population. There they were enslaved by wealthy landowners and the church, suffering from conditions not unlike those of African American slaves in the U.S. The end result of such conditions, despite emancipation in 1864, was to ensure that the Roma would remain at the fringe of Romanian society – poor, illiterate, and haunted by stereotypes that continue to plague their efforts to break out of the cycle of poverty that defines their place in Romanian society today.
This presentation will explore the historical place of the Roma in the history of Romania, with an emphasis on their post-1864 experience. It will particularly emphasize their plight during World War II, when the Antonescu regime adopted deadly Nazi-style policies towards the Roma, and efforts by successive postwar Romanian communist and post-communist governments to deal with a community that, according to a recent World Bank report, lives a life of exclusion. “If you are a Roma child living in Romania today, the likelihood that you were born in poverty is three times higher than other Romanians born around you. You will likely grow up in an over crowded dwelling or a slum, will probably not finish school, and you are not likely to find a job. Your life expectancy is at least six years less than your non-Roma peers.” This paper will look carefully at the historic, political, and economic causes and dimensions of this modern tragedy.
The project, “Reasonable Accommodations?“: Minorities in Globalized Nation States, is a series of four workshops that will take place during the 2014-2015 academic year and will explore religious diversity and minority religious freedoms in different regions of the world.
It is directed by the Duke Council for European Studies in collaboration with the Council for North American Studies, the Duke Islamic Studies Center, the Kenan Institute for Ethics, and the Center for Jewish Studies at Duke University, and funded by the Mellon Foundation and the Provost’s Office at Duke University.
