Ethnologie und Tsiganologie. Warum studieren wir überrollte“ Kulturen?/Anthropology and Gypsy Studies. Why are we interested in overrolled“ cultures?

Gypsy Studies (in German: Tsiganologie) on the one side have a long tradition since the 18th century,on the other side it is still difficult to define it between social or cultural anthropology (in German:Ethnologie) and sociology. The Leipzig Forum Tsiganologische Forschung has collected data whichcan be explained by a paradigm of order and para-order, two systems of thinking and doing closelyconnected and interdependent, but in an asymmetric way, comparable with the relation of mother anddaughter. Whereas anthropology tries to understand what sometimes is described as the recent losersof the civilization process, Gypsies represent a traditional skill of being marginalized, a certain wayof mastering para-orders, which could be relevant for all other “overrolled” communities.