[Callers] Fwd: Use of the word "gypsy" in various folk dances - Response from Voice of Roma

Tue Nov 3 19:47:15 PST 2015

Thank you for doing this, Martha.

-- Alan

On 11/3/2015 7:43 PM, Martha Wild via Callers wrote:
> All, I have received the following response from a representative from 
> the Voice of Roma. This seems to be a pretty definitive response to 
> whether the term is insulting or not to the Roma people.
> Martha
>
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
>> *From: *Carol Silverman <csilverm at uoregon.edu 
>> <mailto:csilverm at uoregon.edu>>
>> *Subject: **Re: Use of the word "gypsy" in various folk dances*
>> *Date: *November 3, 2015 7:28:00 PM PST
>> *To: *Martha Wild <mawild at sbcglobal.net 
>> <mailto:mawild at sbcglobal.net>>, Voice of Roma <voiceofroma at gmail.com 
>> <mailto:voiceofroma at gmail.com>>
>> *Cc: *Petra Gelbart <petragelbart at gmail.com 
>> <mailto:petragelbart at gmail.com>>
>>
>> Dear Martha,
>> Sani Rifati, President of Voice of Roma forwarded you message to me. 
>> Although I am not Romani, I am on the Board of VOR and we do care 
>> deeply about the terms used for the people we represent.
>> A large number of Roma (but not all)  are offended by the term Gypsy, 
>> especially with a small g. To “gyp" someone means to steal and 
>> swindle; plus the word connotes a false history— it a short for 
>> Egyptian whereas Roma are from India. Roma have faced centuries of 
>> discrimination, and today are subject to deportations and racial 
>> profiling;  this would be an opportunity to teach your community a 
>> little about their history.
>>
>> So whatever the history of the dance step, I know that names can be 
>> changed by sensitive callers like you. I would urge you to change the 
>> names and seize and educational moment!
>> Sincerely, Carol Silverman
>> PS Check the VOR webs page fro my information: 
>> http://www.voiceofroma.com/culture/gyp_vs_rom.html
>>
>>
>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>> From: *Martha Wild* <mawild at sbcglobal.net <mailto:mawild at sbcglobal.net>>
>>> Date: Tue, Oct 27, 2015 at 1:56 AM
>>> Subject: Use of the word "gypsy" in various folk dances
>>> To: voiceofroma at gmail.com <mailto:voiceofroma at gmail.com>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hi,
>>> I am a folk dancer - I do a lot of contra dancing and English 
>>> Country dance and I call the dances as well.
>>>
>>> Recently a newcomer who came to a dance at another venue brought to 
>>> our (a group of caller's that talk about such subjects on a list) 
>>> attention that we have been using the word gypsy for one of the 
>>> dance moves in both types of dance. This dancer (not a Roma) came to 
>>> one of our dances and was upset that we used the term "gypsy" for 
>>> this dance move, as they felt that the word was insulting to the 
>>> Roma people.
>>>
>>> I would like to know if this is the case, as we have never intended 
>>> to be derogatory to anyone, but lots of dances have this move, and 
>>> dance names even contain the name, like "The Gypsy Star" and others.
>>>
>>> The move in question is a move where two people walk around each 
>>> other and back to place, while facing each other. There is some 
>>> confusion about origin of the term, but the best guess is that there 
>>> was an English Country dance called "The Spanish Gypsy" that was 
>>> written over a hundred years ago, and it was the first to include 
>>> this move of people walking around each other while facing (prior to 
>>> that people generally did a "back to back, or what is also called 
>>> "do-si-do". The move was not called a "gypsy", but because this 
>>> dance used it and other dances copied it, people called it a "gypsy" 
>>> because it was the same move that was in that dance.
>>>
>>> I've been calling these dances for over 25 years and have used this 
>>> term to indicate this move, never intending anything by it other 
>>> than as an established name for a dance figure. I am hoping that 
>>> some of the folks at Voice of Roma could give me an opinion as to 
>>> whether you find it offensive or not for us to continue to use it. 
>>> We've been discussing on the web whether we should try to find a 
>>> different name, but if you feel that this use of the word gypsy is 
>>> not an issue then we can stop arguing over words like "eddy" or 
>>> "swirl" and continue to use it. If you do find it offensive, 
>>> however, I will gladly alter my dance cards to something else so as 
>>> not to continue to be offensive.
>>>
>>> Thanks for your input,
>>> Martha Wild
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> Sani Rifati
>>> 707/823-7941
>>> http://www.voiceofroma.com <http://www.voiceofroma.com/>
>>
>> Carol Silverman
>> Professor
>> Department of Anthropology and
>> Folklore Program
>> University of  Oregon
>> Eugene OR 97403-1218
>> Office 541-346-5114
>> Fax 541-346-0668
>> csilverm at uoregon.edu <mailto:csilverm at uoregon.edu>
>>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Callers mailing list
> Callers at lists.sharedweight.net
> http://lists.sharedweight.net/listinfo.cgi/callers-sharedweight.net

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.sharedweight.net/pipermail/callers-sharedweight.net/attachments/20151103/2d26daa0/attachment.htm>