Near or Far: Daily Life, Migration, and Symbolic Boundaries between Roma and gagè in Romania

The space analysed in this paper consists of some villages and towns in south-western Romania, located in the mountainous region of Banat, on the border with Serbia. It is a largely agricultural region, where many of the Roma who live in Italy and in the city of Turin are from. These locations were the centre of a thriving economic area, which experienced a dramatic decline with the end of the regime. Analyses of social practices and representations are, therefore, related to more general social and economic change in the landscape: the impoverished countryside, urban centres which have lost their power of attraction because they are emptied of productive potential and have not found a new economic role, aging population, falling birth rates, and continued population decline.