Book Review: Materializing Difference: Consumer Culture, Politics, and Ethnicity among Romanian Roma

Abstract

Materializing Difference: Consumer Culture, Politics, and Ethnicity among Romanian Roma is a fascinating foray into the role of silver beakers and roofed tankards in the prestige economies, politics and in the ethnic and patrilineal identities of the Gabor Roma and, to a lesser extent, of the Cǎrhar Roma. To someone with no previous knowledge of Gabor Roma culture, it has proved both engaging and accessible. The monograph is primarily based on 33 months of multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork in Transylvania conducted over 20 years. Highlighting the lack of research on the ideologies and practices which organize inequalities among Roma people, the book sets out to understand the workings of the politics of difference. The book is organized in three parts, the first of which focuses on the importance of beakers and tankards in Gabor Roma intra-ethnic relationships and politics. Berta begins with an exposé of the strategies used by Gabors to establish hierarchies of prestige, namely, the consumption of patina-based (beakers and tankards) as well as of novelty-based (modern western consumer goods) prestige objects, marriage politics, and participation in the ethics of sociability (Chapter 1). Beakers and tankards must have particular characteristics to be considered prestige objects, which differ from those valued on antique markets. When acquired on antique markets, they must follow a process of deastheticization and dehistoricization before being reaestheticized and ethnicized to become proper prestige objects (Chapters 3 and 4). Along with aesthetic characteristics relating to decorations, size, age and material, the Gabor Roma value the ethnicized ownership history of beakers and tankards (Chapters 2 and 4). Ideally passed down from father to son for eternity, these objects are not only prestige markers but also symbols of ethnic and patrilineal identity (Chapter 4). Yet, as financial circumstances change, this state of inalienability is rarely achieved for extended periods of time and owners must part with a tankard or beaker. Among the Gabors, these retail for considerable sums (Chapter 2) and Berta covers sale management (Chapter 5). As the renown and prestige hierarchies are both fluid and only recognized by the Gabor Roma, the Gabors have to ensure a balance between politics of difference and ethics of sociability (Chapter 6). 1092888 CUS0010.1177/17499755221092888Cultural SociologyBook Reviews book-review2022