On a longtemps soutenu que les attitudes des Tsiganes à l’égard du temps s’inspiraient d’une orientation court-termiste. À partir d’une enquête de terrain menée parmi les Roms Cortorari de Roumanie, je suggère que leur appréhension du temps comprend également une dimension qui permet à l’avenir de figurer dans leurs conceptions de la vie. Plus encore, une préoccupation constante pour le mariage et la succession des générations, conjuguée à une manière particulière de considérer certains objets de valeur (les « taxtaja », calices), confirme une parenté orientée vers l’avenir.
This chapter gives an ethnographic account of marital practices and their ceremonial manifestations among the Romani population of Cortorari living in central Romania, Transylvania. Marriage-making is central both to the fulfillment of gendered personhood and to the definition of Cortorari as a collective. The public enactment of marriages in agreements, contracts, and weddings communicates the moral and social order of the community. (Grand)Parents arrange the marriages of their offspring, the process of which unfolds as follows: the bride is removed from her parental house; is relocated into the groom’s parents’ house; produces offspring, compulsorily a boy; and is incorporated into the marital family, who should receive a dowry. Yet such an achievement is fraught with difficulties, and marital ties are fragile and continuously under threat of unraveling. To offset the tendency toward dissolution, Cortorari place at the center of their marriages ancient chalices inherited from their forebears and passed along male lines.
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