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Challenging Americanism and Europeanism: African-Americans and Roma in the American South and European Union ‘South’

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Abstract

In this piece, I illustrate how a number of the successes of the Civil Rights movement in the United States have travelled to Europe to advance the cause of Roma Rights, and question if Roma inclusion initiatives in Central and Southeast Europe can bring forth a more inclusive notion of Europeanism in the same way that the Civil Rights movement changed the narrative of Americanism to include marginalised African-Americans. In employing an ethno-symbolist approach, I interrogate the fluid concepts of Americanism and Europeanism to analyse myth, memory, symbol, and cultural imaginaries of ‘North’ and ‘South’ in the United States and Europe. Through careful comparisons of similarities and differences between African-American and Central and Southeast European Roma communities and their quest for equality, this piece details how dominant discourses of the nation distance minority populations, rendering inclusion possible only with great narrative shifts in the ideal of the nation, the passage of time, and, most importantly, the enforcement of laws to support equality measures.

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Notes

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  11. I will not go into great detail here about the origins of the Romani people as there is a considerable amount of literature on their origins. In fact, volumes have been written to support the idea that the origins of the Romani people lie in India. For a useful historical sketch on the origins of the Romani people, constructed by way of linguistics, see We Are the Romani People and The Pariah Syndrome by Ian Hancock. See ‘What Makes Us Gypsies, Who Knows …?! Ethnicity and Reproduction’ by Judit Durst, in Multi-disciplinary Approaches to Romany Studies, for a discussion of the utility of situating the ethnic origins of Romani people. In her chapter, she relates this phenomenon to a ‘burgeoning investment by displaced persons in imagined places and homelands’ rather than a useful exploration of origins (Okley, 38).

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  13. Some numbers of Romani peoples were enslaved in Wallachia, however, that is not universally true for the majority of European Romani people, which differs greatly from African-Americans.

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  23. For Lemon reference, please see note 1 above; The Imre reference can be found in note 8.

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  34. I approach my discussion of America and Europe via nationalism well aware of the tradition of viewing these spaces as affected by patriotism and not nationalism. Nevertheless, I employ the arguments of Anthony Smith in his Ethno-Symbolism and Nationalism: A Cultural Approach (2009) and Michael Billig’s Banal Nationalism (1995) to recognize that irrespective of nomenclature, the processes of nationalism and patriotism are similar if not the same.

  35. While it is true that Europe evades a precise definition that Europeans feel kinships toward others because of a belief in shared values and proximity, it functions in a similar function as the nation. Consider the definition of the nation that Anthony Smith offers in his work, Myth and Memories of the Nation ‘a named human population sharing a historic territory, common myths and historical memories, a mass, public culture, a common economic and common legal rights and duties for all members … ‘(Smith, 11) The European Union serves this function for a number of individuals who strongly identify as European.

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  40. The timing of equal protection language being included in European Union documents can therefore be viewed as a cynical response to war, and a reinforcement and continuation of post-Communist East European associations with alterity, positioning those states as inveterate European Other despite their EU pre-accession talks and strong desires to (re)integrate into Europe. See Iver Neumann, Uses of the Other: ‘The East’ in European Identity Formation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999) and

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  41. Fred Casmir, Communication in Eastern Europe: The Role of History, Culture, and Media in Contemporary Politics (New York: Routledge, 1995) for further information.

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  42. See note 20 above for reference.

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  45. Die Wende, or ‘the turns’ indicates the period following the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

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  49. Since the European Union refugee and migrant crisis, the position of the Balkans has come under increasing scrutiny as these borderlands and once periphery enforce and carry out the immigration policies of the European Union to maintain ‘Fortress Europe’.

  50. For reference, see note 21 above.

  51. Similar arguments have been made about other countries in their process to attain EU membership. See Michael Johns, ‘“Do as I Say, Not as I Do”: The European Union, Eastern Europe and Minority Rights’, East European Politics & Societies 17, no. 4 (2003): 682–99. See also

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  70. See reference 46 below. Two other useful resources on the intersection of minority and human rights in Europe Dimitry are Kochenov, ‘European Union’s Troublesome Minority Protection: A Bird’s-Eye View’, in International Approaches to Governing Ethnic Diversity, ed. W. Kymlicka and J. Boulden (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014) and Bernd Rechel ed., Minority Rights in Central and Eastern Europe (London: Routledge; New York: Anchor Books, 2009).

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  74. This connection to Europe, according to 2012 Eurobarometer surveys, illustrates that a weak connection with Europe continues to be widespread in Southeast European EU member states. In response to the question: ‘Do you feel yourself a citizen of the EU’. 64% of Slovenian citizens answered affirmatively, 59% in Hungary, 53% in Romania, 48% in Bulgaria, and 45% in Cyprus, and 50% in Greece. These numbers in 2015 increased slightly: 67% in Hungary, 65% Romania, 50% in Bulgaria, and 50% in Cyprus and Greece. However, it should be noted that the question was changed from ‘Do you feel yourself a citizen of the EU’ to ‘Do you feel that you are a citizen of the EU’ which could evoke similar, but different responses. See also European Commission, ‘Standard Eurobarometer 83. Spring 2015’ https://doi.org/ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/eb/eb83/eb83_first_en.pdf —’Special Eurobarometer 393. Discrimination in the EU in 2012’ https://doi.org/ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_393_en.pdf — ‘Special Eurobarometer 77. European Citizenship’. 2012b. https://doi.org/ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/eb/eb77/eb77_citizen_en.pdf

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  79. See note 14 above for Imre reference.

  80. Ibid.

  81. I consider in this context the recent Decade of Roma Inclusion (2005–2015) and National Integration Strategies (2011–2020), both initiatives enacted from outside, but affecting most directly the citizens in the European Union South. See Peter Vermeersch, ‘Reframing Roma: EU Initiatives and the Politics of Reinterpretation’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 38, no. 8 (2012): 1195–212. doi:10.1080/1369183X.2012.689175.

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  82. This situation is reminiscent of the American South, where scarce resources gave birth to nativism and nationalist Americanism that rendered Blacks outside the nation and therefore unworthy of economic and social inclusion.

  83. See note 57 below.

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  85. Christopher Driscoll, White Lies: Race and Uncertainty in the Twilight of American Religion (New York: Routledge, 2016) and see note 8 above for Michelle Alexander reference on this subject. To read the content of the Voting Rights Act see: The Voting Rights Act. 1964. https://doi.org/library.clerk.house.gov/reference-files/PPL_CivilRightsAct_1964.pdf.

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  91. Aidan McGarry, Romaphobia: The Last Acceptable form of Racism (London: Zed Books, 2017). In addition to the McGarry text, there are a number of texts addressing Romani discrimination, specific texts consulted for this article include, but not directly referenced include

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  95. There are a number of Romani politicians throughout Central and Eastern Europe. There numbers, however, within government ranks are minimal. Hungary actually has a government body consisting of only minority representatives, however, their power only affects their own communities and has little to no impact on national legislation or laws.

  96. See reference 39 above.

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  1. German Studies Department, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH, USA

    Sunnie Rucker-Chang

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Sunnie Rucker-Chang is an Assistant Professor of Slavic and East European Studies in the German Studies Department and Director of the European Studies Program at University of Cincinnati. Her primary interests lie in contemporary cultural movements and identity formation in Central and Southeast Europe. In her work, she examines how literary and filmic works contribute to cultural landscapes and offer insight into the formation of nations and nationalities, particularly as they relate to the construction of minority-majority relations and formations of difference. Other research interests include émigré and exile literature and the application of post-colonialism to post-socialist contexts.

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Rucker-Chang, S. Challenging Americanism and Europeanism: African-Americans and Roma in the American South and European Union ‘South’. J Transatl Stud 16, 181–199 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1080/14794012.2018.1450936

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