Gypsy Music, Hybridity and Appropriation: Balkan Dilemmas of Postmodernity
Gypsy Music, Hybridity and Appropriation: Balkan Dilemmas of Postmodernity

Summary/Abstract: Balkan Gypsy music has recently become globalized – it is found in festivals of Balkan music and world music, on YouTube, and in dance club remixes by DJs. As Europe’s largest minority and its quintessential “other,” Roma face severe marginalization, yet ironically, their music, especially brass bands, commands growing attention. Referencing debates about how collaborations and hybridity may be liberating and/or exploitative, I explore strategies through which non-Roma appropriate, perform, and consume Balkan Gypsy music. Noting that Roma are rarely in charge of their own representations, I illustrate how the image of the fantasy Balkan Gypsy has been created, and who participates in and who benefits from the popularization of Gypsy arts. I focus on DJs and club culture in western Europe and North America and tie my analysis to performative displays of European multiculturalism.

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