The life stories of Roma Pentecostals in Croatia and Serbia reveal both significant hardship and resilience, which notably impacts how they incorporate a Pentecostal identity and the ways in which they transform their daily lives in accordance with Pentecostal theology.

Holy Brotherhood: Romani Music in a Hungarian Pentecostal Church is a musical ethnography of this exceptional religious community."--BOOK JACKET.

This book presents the charismatic Christian revivalism taking place amongst Romani people in Europe. It brings together scholars that have all studied local variants of Romani Pentecostalism in different parts of Europe. In sixteen chapters it sheds light on the multifaceted and complex phenomenon that Romani Pentecostalism has become today.

A Pentecostal revival is sweeping the Romani communities of Europe. The dominant religious orientation of European Roma, Pentecostalism has become one of the major factors behind Romani social development, in the wake of the discrimination, marginalisation, and growing anti-ziganist sentiments of the latest decades. Through this form of charismatic Protestant Christianity, Roma have overcome social problems and internal conflicts as well as battle against the hostility and exclusion of the 'macro gajo' (non-Roma) society. Based on interviews and field work, this original ethnographic study offers a unique presentation and analysis of the Pentecostal revival in one of Europe's many Romani communities - the Kaale Roma of Finland and Sweden. Through individual life stories, historical exposes, sociological interpretation, and ritual and discourse analysis, Thurfjell provides a vivid, accurate portrait of the multifaceted and complex situation of contemporary Roma. Despite the efforts of the Nordic welfare state over the past decades to counteract poverty, and to integrate their Romani communities into society, these groups are persistently problematic. Inspired by postcolonial theory, Thurfjell's study addresses the failure of the integration politics of the Roma; he highlights the discursive pressure the hegemonial society places on outsiders as it reaches out to help them. Romani individuals, it is argued, are caught in a deadlock between the pressure to assimilate themselves into the majority society, and that of their community, to remain Romani. This study of the Pentecostal movement is of interest to anyone who seeks to understand the religious, historical, social and discursive processes that underlie the complex and difficult situation of European Roma today.

Almost three decades of anthropological fieldwork on ethnic coexistence situations, completed by the author of the present volume, have revealed that in the multi-ethnic local communities of the Carpathian Basin, Roma-non-Roma coexistence practices are always based on opposition, regardless of whether the latter are Romanians, Saxons, Slovaks, Ukrainians or Hungarians. After presenting the theoretical-methodological framework and historical processes, this book presents patterns of Roma-non-Roma coexistence that emerge through case studies, which can be directly applied in the fight against the exclusion and stigmatisation of the Roma today. Thus, the book discusses two applied anthropology projects where research results have been used in urban regeneration and development projects. It interprets cannibalism charges against Gypsies as a typical type of chimerical prejudice. Through the case studies, it contributes to existing research by interpreting the coexistence of different ethnicities in the local socio-historical context, in the local embeddedness of inter-ethnic relations, as a constantly evolving and changing phenomenon, focusing on the performativity, dynamic interaction and functional role of relations.

The intersection of religion, ritual, emotion, globalization, migration, sexuality, gender, race, and class, is especially insightful for researching Pentecostal notions of the body. Pentecostalism is well known for overt bodily expressions that includes kinesthetic worship with emotive music and sustained acts of prayer. Among Pentecostals there is considerable debate about bodies, the role of the Holy Spirit, possession of evil spirits, deliverance, exorcism, revival, and healing of bodies and emotions. Pentecostalism is identified as a religion on the move and so bodies are transformed in the context of globalization. Pentecostalism is also associated with notions of sexuality, gender, race and class where bodies are often liberated and limited. This volume evaluates these themes associated with contemporary research on the body.

This final volume is an authoritative collection from more than two dozen leaders and scholars of the Spirit-empowered movement.