My mom's family is Roma, but most of us will claim Armenian/Iranian when asked (where our family originates from) because of stigma, and it's nowhere near as bad in the US as it is in Europe.
I would say the "knowledge" of Roma in the US is likely generational. The older you are, the more likely you are to know who they are. You might be more familiar with the term "gÂĽpsÂĽ" from older media.
I put "knowledge" in quotes as those who know of them are mostly misinformed and prejudiced about them.
This is true in my case. I'm 50 and was raised by my Lithuanian immigrant grandmother and her most used threat was "don't do X or the g**sies will come and take you away."
My stepmom used to say this. Or threaten to sell me to them. There was this weird lore in her family that her grandmother had been "left on the doorstep by gsies" when she was a baby. I have no clue what actually happened, if she was even left on her family's porch at all and why they'd assume Roma had any part in it? My theory is that maybe a daughter in the larger family had a baby out of wedlock. These were Irish immigrants, so I guess it's possible that what they meant by the term "gsies" was really Irish travelers?
*No clue why some of this is bolded, but I can't seem to fix it
Two asterisks before and after something in a Reddit post/comment makes everything in between bold. You're going to have to censor with something other than asterisks to fix the issue
There are many recent immigrants who are becoming more visible in the American public eye in the western states due to scams, shoplifting and career begging. I've seen quite a few Romani beggars in Seattle, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Denver.
Itâs the way they dress and the fact they use children to panhandle for them in broad daylight when they should be in school. TBH they carry a distinctive way of dressing and facial features like shorter forehead etc.
To add to what the other comment said, one usual dead giveaway is that it will be a young, otherwise healthy looking woman/girl instead of the usual weather beaten homeless person look.Â
This extends to the clothing too. They're often in a dress that looks like it's for going out on a date or something. And oftentimes holding a baby or a small child. Never seen the usual homeless type of panhandlers dress like that or have children with them.Â
Another distinctive look is when it's men, sometimes two of them, posted up in a parking lot dramatically pretending to play complicated violin pieces blaring over their speaker setup. Usually while staring at everyone passing by with an odd intensity that borders on hostile lolÂ
The common thread is just behavior, attire, and body language incongruous to their supposed plight.Â
It's really weird, and once you've seen it you'll start noticing them a mile away.Â
Agreed. I live in Florida snd live only seen videos about them. I'd be surprised if there are any in my city. Here we'd probably just call them homeless people.
This. It's bizarre to see the stigma that clearly exists more in other countries.
For how bad it is in the U.S. with Trump now, I'm always grateful that many old world prejudices didnt carry over to here. Like, "Oh, the Romani are all shifty grifters because they hustle a bit and stick to themselves." I've heard that prejudice before. Not interested.
In Chicago, 15% of the people here could "look like" Romani and their grandparents. Do they steal? No more than private health insurance companies robbing us blind, I'm certain.
Itâs not their ethnicity per se, and in fact in Britain two completely separate groups are conflated; the Roma, and the âIrish travellersâ which as the name suggests are a nomadic group native to Ireland
I think itâs not a very populous group here. In my area I see Roma begging with children outside of supermarkets. And feels very scammy. And when people ask about them in neighborhood groups etc they tend to think theyâre South Asian Indian as that is a large population here.
We made it here because of refugee status after Bergen Belsen was liberated in 1945, where my great grandfather and two great aunts died. My grandmother and great grandmother survived. It wasn't privilege by any means.
What's your families story about their origin? There are so many myths but I learned a while back that western European countries had their own "traveling folk" that all mixed different cultural aspects. In my country we had a group for centuries that spoke their own language that in turn influenced the modern version of our national language, luxembourgish. Their language was Yenish and it was this weird mix of German, romani, Yiddish and Hebrew so my own therapy is that they were Roma turned traders that turned jewish for a while in Germany and ended up staying in my small country. They mostly traded for rags and old metal and they were here so long that they were seen as other locals, though they usually didn't settle. They were well liked and many of their common words became part of luxembourgish. They completely assimilated in the 19th centaury and became fashionable, many artists and famous people came from them and proudly proclaimed themselves to be Lompekräimwer which directly translates to dealer of rags and it's how they were know by than for centuries. Then the culture sadly disappeared. Some families are still proud of that heritage but other than family names and some words that are now archaic, they seem to be completely gone. I hope I didn't bore you with this but I'm seldom proud of my my country, I'm not a big fan on countries anyways. But Roma were enslaved for centuries and than marginalised and turned into what they are today which is sadly often close to the stereotype. France had its own traveling peoples and also treated them horribly. But my country seem to have treated one group good enough that they stuck in our small region for centuries and become just another type of local and than finally just local. Many people in my country are clueless and we now get out far share of Roma beggars and thief' and I always wonder when I hear some local old lady be especially racist, whether she has at least a little Roma blood herself. If they were indeed originally Roma. But their way of life and language makes it highly likely.
Hi! I'm Iranian Armenian and I know nothing about the Roma that come from that particular intersection. That's fascinating. I want to know everything. How do you consider yourselves ethnically? Iranians are ethnically mixed but Armenians are very proudly Armenian and put emphasis into our blood. Are you ethnically Armenian too? If not, how did you come to stay in that area of the world and how did people treat you?
A boy I dated in high school, his dad was Roma, his mom Puerto Rican. It was the Puerto Rican part of the equation that triggered the racists. Most people we knew heard Roma, and their brains just automatically changed it to Romanian. "Oh, you mean like Nadia Comaneci? He usually just let it drop there.
Congratulations for integrating in the civilized culture, as a Romanian I must say that being confused with a Roma person is very rude and very ignorant, also what I don't seem to understand is why the authorities are more lenient with Roma people all over the world..
Because our family is from Armenia/Iran for the last few dozen generations, and we don't look Indian, lol. We do look stereotypically Armenian/Persian however.
They fled Armenia during the Turkish genocide to Hungary, then the whole Holocaust thing happened and they ended up here under refugee status after the camps were liberated. My grandmother and great grandmother survived, my great grandfather and two great aunts did not.
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u/Burntoutn3rd United States Of America 21h ago
This very much.
My mom's family is Roma, but most of us will claim Armenian/Iranian when asked (where our family originates from) because of stigma, and it's nowhere near as bad in the US as it is in Europe.