In the Field. Prof. George Gmelch
AND TERMINOLOGY
Before proceeding, some clarification of group names is necessary. Although the term “Gypsy” is a pejorative ethnonym (a name applied to group members by outsiders) in some European countries, this is not the case in the United Kingdom. There, it is the term used by many “Gypsy” organizations (for example, the National Gypsy Council) as well as most group members. The term “Traveller” is sometimes used interchangeably with “Gypsy” because of the similarities in the economic adaptation and lifestyle of the two groups.
To further confuse matters, other terms may also be used, such as “Romanichal” and “Romany” (or “Romani”), by those who consider the terms “Gypsy” and “Traveller” to be too broad.In the words of British anthropologist Anthony Howarth, “With the advent of political correctness and Gypsy/Traveller NGOs and Facebook sites, use of all of the terms—Travellers, Gypsies, Pavee, Mincier, Romanichal—has become complicated. However, most Gypsies in the U.K. still refer to themselves as ‘Gypsies’ and they do this with a great deal of pride.”3
Like Gypsies in other countries, those in England and Wales descend from populations who left northern and northwestern India as early as 500 CE.4 The earliest references to them in Britain date to the early sixteenth century, when some arrived presenting themselves as “Egyptians” or Christian pilgrims from “Little Egypt”—understood to have meant the Middle East—from which the English term “Gypsy” evolved. During their many migrations, Gypsies have absorbed language, customs, and marriage partners from surrounding populations. In Britain, generations of contact with householders and indigenous nomadic groups—English, Welsh, Scottish, and Irish Travellers—has Anglicized their speech and surnames, although they maintain a distinct identity and customs.
NOMADS IN CITIES
Prior to World War II, Gypsies in the United Kingdom lived in the countryside much of the year. They harvested fruit and vegetables and performed many of the services for the settled community described for Irish Travellers in chapter 2. In winter, when rural work was scarce and travel difficult, many moved into towns and cities. After the war, they began frequenting urban areas on a more permanent basis. By then, many rural trades were becoming obsolete, and campsites were being eliminated as suburbs and highways spread. In 1959, the Highways Act made camping on the roadside or “lay-bys” illegal. At the same time, postwar reconstruction and urban-renewal projects provided new opportunities, particularly in construction and scrap-metal collecting. It was at this time that Irish Travellers began arriving in the United Kingdom in numbers, although there had been some cross-channel (Irish Sea) movement for decades.5 By 1980, when our research began, virtually every British and Welsh city, especially those in the industrialized heart of the country, had Gypsies and Irish Travellers living there.
Although nomadic Gypsies and Travellers formed less than 1 percent of the United Kingdom’s population at the time of our study, they had a high profile.6 Their “illegal” campsites spawned many complaints from local householders and businesses. The evictions that resulted created personal and financial hardships for families and cost local authorities money. In 1968, the government enacted The Caravan Sites Act, requiring all local governments to provide serviced campsites for the Gypsy and Traveller families “residing in or resorting to” their area. By 1980, 166 such “sites” had been built, and another 30 temporary camping places, often just a dirt field, had been made available. Together, these provided space for less than half the population and catered primarily to localized and less nomadic families.
Figure 3-1. An illegal Gypsy encampment next to St. Pancras railway station, London, 1981.
While most householders acknowledged the need for Gypsy sites, few wanted one built near their neighborhood. “If the average householder can even glimpse a Gypsy by standing on top of his wardrobe and looking out the corner of his bedroom window,” a government official in Manchester told us, “he’ll complain.” Residents objected most strongly to the idea of paying to build sites for the “long distance” or highly mobile families we had been asked to focus on, those who lacked local ties and moved into areas unexpectedly. The typical response by local residents was to demand their eviction. When plans to build an official site for them were proposed, residents protested and were supported by their elected representatives. Many legislators believed that the only way to truly end the Gypsy or Traveller “problem” was for them to settle and integrate into society. “Make them settle down for good and live like the rest of us,” declared a Tory councilor. “Why should they be any different?” His views were widely shared. Our goal as anthropologists was to learn what Gypsies needed and wanted as well as the problems local authorities faced, and to provide the DOE with as fair and unbiased an overview of the issues as we could. We were also tasked with making recommendations.
THE RESEARCH PROJECT
George and I arrived in Leicester, a city in the British Midlands, by train on July 7, 1980, after a flight from New York to London the previous day. This was where our research colleague, David Smith, taught and lived. David had been involved in earlier research on Gypsies and Travellers, had proposed the current project in 1978, and had been working with the DOE and Welsh Home Office to lay the groundwork.7 This included obtaining our work permits, which required making the case for why we should be hired as the project’s researchers rather than two U.K. residents. Our prior work with Irish Travellers gave us the necessary credentials.
It was great to be met by David at the train station and immediately be taken to a furnished apartment on Leicester Polytechnic’s lovely Scraptoft campus.8 The project’s office was located in a converted eighteenth-century manor house, on whose estate grounds the campus had been built. It was a large and airy room on the second floor that overlooked formal gardens with a beautifully ornate iron fence and gate. With David’s help we quickly settled in.
During the first week we obtained university library cards and explored the campus—its library, Senior Commons’ room where we could take tea with other faculty twice a day, gym, tennis courts, pottery studio—and tranquil environs. We took the bus into downtown Leicester and were suitably impressed with its timbered Elizabethan buildings and thirteenth-century Guild Hall as well as its clean streets and human scale. We opened a bank account, browsed in a bookstore, and picked up maps at the tourism office. We located a lending library and, observing an entire wall of books in Punjabi, were visually made aware of the city’s multiculturalism.
The next day, David gave us a tour of the surrounding countryside. We were fascinated by his Renaissance breadth of knowledge; he seemed to know everything from the roosting habits of local sparrows to the minutiae of Tudor architecture. Stopping at a quaint village pub for a pint and a Ploughman’s lunch (bread, cheese, and pickle), we spent the entire afternoon talking about the research. We were happy to learn that our schedule as the project’s principal researchers was flexible but disappointed that our planned ethnographic fieldwork had been scaled back. The DOE’s steering committee—comprised of DOE officials, two members of the National Gypsy Council (NGC), and representatives from several local authorities—wanted a survey and were interested only in information that directly related to the central concerns of the project: the migration patterns and accommodation needs of the most nomadic Gypsies and Travellers.
Only statistics, David said, were likely to convince them of the validity of whatever recommendations we might make. We decided to use an interview-based survey with a number of opened-questions as our major research tool and to aim for a sample of one hundred families. While discussing what to ask, it emerged that three generations earlier, David’s ancestors—Smiths and Taylors—had been Gypsy horse dealers who had become grooms and then lost their Gypsy identity. David did not identify as a Gypsy but had many contacts in the Gypsy and Traveller communities based on his work as an educator, local historian, and accomplished wagon and cart painter.
A few days later, we drove to Manchester to meet Huey Smith, a Gypsy leader and head of the NGC, who was on the project’s steering committee.9 The normal two-and-a-half-hour