Ian Hancock, Harold C. and Alice T. Nowlin Regents Professor in Liberal Arts, University of Texas, Austin
There are some fourteen million Romani people worldwide, of whom about one million live in Spain, where they are known as the Calé. The Calé are widely associated with flamenco, an Andalusian art form that grew out of traditional Romani music and dance. Less well known is their tumultuous and often troubled history, from their origins in the Indian subcontinent to their victimization during the Inquisition and the Spanish government’s policy of forced migration to the New World, known as the solución americana. This lecture, offered in connection with the Meadows Museum’s recent acquisition of Carlos Vázquez Úbeda’s 1906 Mozos de Escuadra (Catalan Police Arresting a Romani Couple), will provide an overview of the history, language, and culture of the Romani people and their lives in Spain since their first arrival in the fifteenth century.