Back to search

SAMKUL-Samfunnsutviklingens kulturell

Norsk romanispråk

Awarded: NOK 2.9 mill.

The project's main objective has been to provide knowledge of Norwegian Romani, a Para-Romani variety spoken by "tatere"/"romanifolk", a national minority who has been living in Norway since the 16th century. In the PhD dissertation "(De)mystifying Norwegian Romani. The discursive construction of a minority language", the author Jakob A. P. Wiedner discusses the status of Norwegian Romani from a discourse analytic perspective. In doing so, the author takes into account three different perspectives: the historical literature on Norwegian Romani, European and Norwegian language policy documents, and interviews with members of the romanifolk/tater minority. The dissertation gives a thorough presentation of the history of the romanifolk/tater minority in Norway, highlighting the role of language in regard to identity. The dissertation provides, moreover, a thorough linguistic analysis of Norwegian Romani in the context of Romani linguistics. The data are analysed with respect to the questions of whether Norwegian Romani is depicted as a language in its own right or not, what kind of Norwegian Romani is seen as "the real Norwegian Romani", the functions assigned to the language, and the role it plays for constructing group identity. The author concludes by comparing the different discursive constructions of Norwegian Romani and the role they play both in the process of the official recognition of Norwegian Romani as a minority language by the Norwegian state, as well as in the process of adapting the self-­image of the Romanifolk/Tater community, from a marginalised suppressed minority to an officially acknowledged minority group of Norway, by the group itself. In addition to the dissertation, Wiedner has made an internet-based dictionary for Norwegian Romani, where it is possible to comment on the specific words, suggest new words or improvements, and give concrete examples of the use of words. The dictionary is available from: https://app.uio.no/hf/nro/index.php?lang=eng In order to secure its maintenance it will be transferred to The Text Laboratory's servers at: http://www.hf.uio.no/iln/english/about/organization/text-laboratory/

Norwegian Romani was after years of suppression officially recognized as a national minority language in 1993. The project’s main goal is to investigate the vitality of Norwegian Romani; to what extent it still exists; to document what it linguistically exists of after years of stigmatization; how it is used among its speakers; and how they perceive and relate to it. The linguistic vitality is explored through sociolinguistic interviews with and narratives from proclaimed speakers of Norwegian Romani. The interviews are guided by a sociolinguistic questionnaire regarding grammar, language examples, language competence, and language use and attitudes. The project’s second aim is to develop a knowledge base where former research on Norwegian Romani are explored and included. The third and final ambition is to develop an on-line Norwegian Romani dictionary which will be publically available for Norwegian Romani speakers and other stake-holders. The dictionary will be interactive in the sense that Norwegian Romani speakers are encouraged to include words and phrases, and it might serve as a knowledge tool if Norwegian Romani is included in the Norwegian curriculum. The project’s main challenge is to recruit participants to the sociolinguistic interviews since the community appears to be rather closed and often sceptical to people from “outside”. This accounts especially for their language since it was kept secret for a long time, and there are still community members who do not want to reveal their knowledge about the language. Moreover, it must be taken into consideration that various groups within the Romani minority have different ideas about the way the language should be used and what speaking Romani actually means; to the extent to which Romani can be seen as a “complete” language which can be adapted for all kinds of linguistic needs or if it is a type of language which is bound to specific situations. Norwegian Romani has until recently been mostly a spoken language and the attempts to use it in a written form are limited to few speakers who have a vital interest in maintaining the language. Since the traditional way of living semi-itinerantly does not play such an important role as it did in the past, but also due to the repressive policy against the Romani people, it is expected to find that the use of Romani is in the state of decline. However, certain linguistic vitality is expected due to the important role Norwegian Romani seems to play for the proclaimed speakers in their construction of a “Romani” identity.

Funding scheme:

SAMKUL-Samfunnsutviklingens kulturell