Detailed study of the Vlax Roma in the former Czechoslovakia depicts the life of a particular family in the 19th and 20th centuries

The book represents the most detailed historical elaboration to date of the lives of the Vlax Roma on the territory of the former Czechoslovakia. Hajská explained that the impulse to write the monograph was the lack of detailed studies about the life of the Vlax Roma.

“The sense I had was that in the Czech histories which have been dedicated to Romani people so far, there has not been a more detailed analysis of the life of just one family. I wanted to show how Romani people themselves have been reflecting on their life on the road here, whether it was forced or voluntary,” Hajská told ROMEA TV.

The author also noted that the work on this subject was quite demanding, and exceptionally so. Most historians to date have focused just on a single locality, while she was attempting to follow the movement of the Stojka family across various regions and periods of time.

Hajská compared her search for archival records on the family to detective work: “To find people who had been moving all over the republic was complicated. The direction in which to head wasn’t clear. Ultimately I worked on the book for four years and spent another year on its translation and proofreading,” she said.

The book covers not just the fates of each member of the Stojka family, but also the broader context, historically speaking. For instance, it reviews the 1927 “Act on Wandering Gypsies” during the First Republic, or the communists’ 1958 “Act on the Permanent Settlement of Nomadic Persons”.

The author does her best to dismantle the stereotypical idea that Vlax Roma always lived on the road – the Stojkas owned a home already during the interwar period and had firm social ties to the Trenčín area in Slovakia​. “It is startling to realize the degree to which this family faced a continuum of police practices and securitization of various intensities. These repressions targeting persons whom the state apparatus identified as those collectively included under the concept of the ‘traveling Gypsies’ persisted in similar forms across historical periods and political regimes,” she said.

“The authorities did not differentiate between Vlax Roma or other Romani people from Slovakia or Hungary. The only thing that was decisive for them was that a family moved around by horse-drawn wagon,” explained Hajská.

According to the author, the story of the Stojka family is also important because it shows how the Vlax Roma are usually perceived. “Historians have often reduced their history to a few basic facts, but their reality was much more diverse,” she said.

The book also offers the perspective of Romani witnesses to this history describing their own experiences of moving from place to place or being forced to settle by the state, perspectives which have so far not much been taken into consideration. Romani community member Dana Hrušková gave her blessing to the book and emphasized the importance of such authentic testimony: “I greatly regret that this book is not yet published in Czech. It includes, for example, the testimony of my father, who is no longer alive, and I would be glad if readers could one day access it in the Czech language, too.”

“Te avel bachtaľi kadi genva taj vi sogo di zhejne kaske perla ando vast taj te avel bachtaľi vi i Markéta,” Hrušková said in Vlax Romani, wishing the book success. The Stojka Family: Spatial Mobility and Territorial Anchoredness of Lovara Vlax Roms in the Former Czechoslovakia represents a significant contribution, not just for anthropologists and historians, but also for those in the broader public who want to learn more about Romani history.

The publication provides a new perspective on the lives of Romani people in the former Czechoslovakia and shows how they were formed by state policy. The author believes the book will aid readers with comprehending the complex historical position of the Roma and demolishing stereotypes about them.