What has alienated the settled population from traveller culture?
‘There’s not enough hippies to save our lives’ – the words of 10 year old Mary-Anne, former resident of Dale Farm in Essex; the most recent and publicised case of traveller camp eviction. But maybe, just maybe, there would be no need for ‘hippies’ if the rest of us weren’t so close-minded to the idea that the traveller community is not a bad community.
Criticism of the traveller community is not unusual. Recently, discussing traveller culture with peers, many already had formed opinions on what they believed to be traveller culture. When confronted on their opinions, however, it is unsurprising that many are misinformed and tarring the entire culture with the same brush. There are three strands of traveller culture, all with very different ideals and who often do not associate with one another: Romany Gypsies, ‘Irish Tinkers’ and the newly coined term ‘Plastic Gypsies’ to describe those who live in a similar way to Gypsies – but who are in fact not descended from traveller culture – in order to exploit the opportunities to avoid the costs of living in a settled community – ‘jumping on the bandwagon’ to sum up nicely.
Whenever the topic of traveller culture rears its controversial head, there is a reactionary steady flow of personal accounts of how Gypsies have in some way negatively affected lives, be that by parking caravans on local greens or fly tipping in back roads. It cannot be denied that, yes, these things do happen. No smoke without fire, after all. But when it comes to the traveller minority, it is clear that people cannot put their hand on heart and say that they do not judge the social minority on the few that dirty its name. Imagine plastering the entirety of the Black community with a derogatory comment. Picture the onslaught of righteous finger jabbing. Now imagine doing the same to the traveller community. The number of people bursting at the seams to defend them would most probably be limited.
Obviously, it is hard for the average person to defend traveller culture because, in all honesty, it is hard to defend such a closeted community. But how much has the settled population contributed to alienating traveller culture so much?
One way in which the settled population has contributed to the alienation of the traveller community is the racism that is aimed at them and is completely unquestioned. After questioning a descendent of the traveller community, he himself says: ‘Up until four or five years ago, there were still ‘No travellers allowed’ signs posted on the doors of pubs’. That kind of blatant racism screams America’s Deep South in the 1960s, not modern 21st century Britain, so the reaction of traveller over the years to become such a secular and self-reliant community is conceivable.
Secondly, and predictably, the media certainly has an influence. Blaming the media for a sensationalised negative portrayal of traveller culture is all too easy, but unfortunately true. The projected image of travellers by the media is readily accepted: travellers don’t pay tax; travellers are using the services that our tax provides; travellers live outside of the law with little or no consequences while the rest of us would never be able to get away with such things and so on. But it must be acknowledged that this image is easily projected. As recipients of the media, we are completely absorbed in the negative, so why on earth would the media portray the positive image of the traveller community when we are already awaiting the next wave of cynicism to satisfy us? Even the recent explosion of viewers of the documentary ‘My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding’ which, to its credit, does try to cover some of the issues surrounding gypsy culture, such as the open racism that the community face and current cases of traveller camp eviction, is providing the nation with a biased image yet again of extravagant weddings and preposterous dresses for us to gawk at.
One of the most notorious traveller site evictions to be covered by the media was the internationally reported Dale Farm eviction. It perfectly epitomised the toil between the settled population and traveller culture, as well as brought the struggle to the forefront of the media, due to the nature of the eviction. The site was technically, legally owned by travellers, the only problem being the lack of planning permission that concluded in the expansion of the site being deemed illegal. By the day of eviction in October 2011, the site was home to the largest concentration of travellers in the UK, housing over 1000 people, 83 families, including 100 children; all reiterating the same concern: they had nowhere else to go. Local councils indeed offered council housing for those being removed from the illegal part of the site, but as one resident said: ‘what kind of option is that? It would be the death of our travelling culture, the death of our community’. Their claim stands to be true: there is nowhere else for them to go, as shown by the current oncoming eviction of the families from their new settlement on the private road leading to their previous home and the neighbouring Crays Hill site, because ultimately there are not many places in which traveller camps would be accepted and planning permission for them is as difficult, if not more, as it is for the settled population.
The Sun recently reported how apparently travellers turned Crays Hill Primary school from a ‘top primary school in to the UK’s worst’
In the face of the difficulties posed by modern society, is there a future for travellers?
It’s their tradition to live the way they do. Admittedly it has changed over time, from quaint roll top horse drawn carts to admittedly slightly less pretty modern caravans, but the tradition of travelling is still the same and yet so little of them are actually able to travel anymore. The ultimate problem is that nobody wants a traveller site on their doorstep.
With the growing number of site evictions and the inability for travellers from being able to do exactly that, travel, it would seem that for those who want to continue with the tradition in which they were brought up in there are very little options. Either give up, settle, buy a residential home and live like the rest of us because, then, there would be much less hassle – or simply disappear; live as you want everywhere and nowhere.
So who can blame travellers for fighting for their rights to live as their race always has. I’d like to see us, the settled population, be forced out of our homes or obligated to live life invisibly without a struggle.
9:47 pm 29th May, 2012
Thanks for an interesting and undrestanding topic that you treated sympathetically.rnrnThe travellers face a difficult and uncertain future because the efforts that are made to help them and accomodate them will ultimately assimilate them into mainstream culture. For example, offering them set sites (very good idea to avoid angering local residents) starts to cut down on their nomadic life. They may find a refuge, a series of sites, but then their path starts to become determined. rnrnThe life of the traveller is not set by the path, they make the path, which is why their way of life is so appealing. However, to set the path means they have to move away from the pre-arranged sites. Another challenge is how their children are educated and raised. They want what is best for their children, as does every parent, yet the work opportunities, needed to sustain the traveller life, are decreasing daily. To survive and thrive in the modern world requires more than a basic education. To obtain an education requires children to remain in school for sustained periods, more than 3 months at a time. If they do not have an education, they cannot find work that will sustain their culture, their way of life. Yes, one could argue they could live on benefits, but that is not their way of life. Travellers traditionally move to find work and trade. Living on benefits will tie them to an area, which does not suit their way of life.rnrnTheir fate is very similar to the Amish, but the key differences show how the Amish can remain Amish and adapt to modernity. By contrast, the Travellers cannot adapt to modernity because their way of live is pre-modern. I fear we are seeing the final generations of the Traveller communities in the UK as modernity and post-modernity slowly reduce the available land for pitching a site and the need to assimilate more and more into society.rnrnThanks for a good article, I really enjoyed it and look forward to more of your writings.
9:00 pm 1st June, 2012
Thanks for your comment; it’s really refreshing to read an opinion that isn’t completely clouded by prejudice. rnrnI completely agree with you. I think that the culture faces a very uncertain future in terms of trying to stay as true to their tradition as possible. As you mentioned, set sites and series of sites would restrict their nomadic lifestyle. A solution, which is almost certainly unachievable, could be to allow them to freely buy and sell land between themselves, as it is necessary for them to buy it in order for them to be able to live on it, meaning that they could choose the next places to travel with more freedom. I assume that some only stay on the land they buy for the length of time they do because the difficulties of moving and getting planning permission yet again would make the move far too difficult. I know that in my local area alone, there is an ongoing case for planning permission in which residents are fiercely trying to have the one caravan removed, so it’s completely understandable on their part if they decided to cling to the land, if in fact they do manage to attain the planning permission. rnrnAgain, your point about the education of children in the culture stands to be true. Although, I have found that some traveller parents do not value the state education system. Some would rather take the education of their children into their own hands by introducing them to their field of work, as it is often true that travellers tend to rely on jobs that do not traditionally require a formal education, but more so depend on networking within their own culture and people. rnrnI share your concern that traveller culture in its most traditional form is under threat. However, I have a great faith that their culture will continue far into the future. They have overcome huge changes before; the culture, despite all the criticism it faces, cannot be denied its hardiness. rnrnThank you again for your comment!rn
10:46 am 29th May, 2012
My expectation is that you will never be able to accept the traveller community unless you make an attempt to understand why they either prefer the lifestyle or feel they have no alternative.rnrnMost of us end up living a lifestyle similar to that we were brought up in. We might do a bit better than our parents, but it’s such a challenge to move between classes, that most inevitably give up.rnrnEven with the best makeover expert in the world, I wouldn’t pass as upper class, and it wouldn’t take that long for the middle class to suss out I’m a fraud living the middle class lifestyle.rnrnSo how is a traveller ever going to be accepted?rnrnThe best question to ask is why do they continue to travel? There must have been somewhere they’ve been to that they thought was nice enough to spend the rest of their lives at.
4:27 pm 7th June, 2012
The only problem is that the idea that ’there must have been somewhere they’ve been to that they thought was nice enough to spend the rest of their lives at’ is a settled person’s view. It’s my understanding that they travel for the freedom of travelling, not because they’re trying to find their ideal place to live. Also, it could be argued that continue to travel to retain their heritage, and it is not the place of a settled community to dictate to them that they should give up what is a huge part of their identity.
10:50 am 29th May, 2012
We have a decent sized contingent of traveller children in my school. There are maybe 4 or 5 different families, with as many as 5 siblings in the school at the same time, and all seem to be related to each other somehow.rnrnI teach 6 of them in total. In year 8, I teach two girls and a boy. All are lovely, although one of the girls has a filthy temper. But she generally tries hard and achieves quite well. All have a decent level of literacy and the gobby girl is even achieving level 5, which I was surprised by, having come to the school in September with preconceived ideas of what I was going to be faced with. This girl’s father is totally illiterate, which she was happy to discuss with us in a lesson recently where a character in a book was learning to read.rnrnIn year 10, I teach another boy who you would never dream was a traveller student. He fits in completely with the other children and, to my knowledge, doesn’t hang around with the other traveller kids, who all tend to cling to each other in packs. He doesn’t have that silly hair cut the traveller boys tend to have and he is complete absorbed into ’mainsteam’ culture when at school. That said, his mother isn’t exactly supportive and his behaviour is extremely challenging. He’s a canny lad and is your typical ’cheeky chappy’ but has very little motivation to achieve (stemming from, I believe, I total lack of confidence in his ability, despite his bravado).rnrnThis boy’s elder brother is in the sixth form, which is considered to be quite remarkable. Not many traveller boys make it into year 10 and this sixth former is apparently the first traveller student to stay on at sixth form. He’s achieving As in all subjects as well.rnrnThen there’s the delightful Johnny*…..different kettle of fish entirely. Year 9, couldn’t give a toss about school, comes to school merely to take the *** out of staff and make them run about after him all day. Wanders the school site refusing to go to lessons and takes up 95% of a teacher’s time when he does make it to lessons due to his behaviour and low literacy and numeracy levels. For some reason, he always turns up to my lessons (if in school at all). I can look on the register and see he has been absent all day, yet period 5 of the day, in comes Johnny* and my heart sinks. He belongs to a traveller family that have lived in the area for over 20 years. They are literally hundreds of them and the school is terrified of every one of them. No wonder the kid knows he can get away with murder.rnrnSorry to ramble on…I found that quite theraputic in a weird way. To summarise, many of the traveller students blend in well in lessons with other students. Other than an Irish surname and a particular penchant for Nicki Minaj and TOWIE, you’d never know they were different from any of the other kids. But some of them are just obnoxious, rude and make you wonder why they bother coming to school when they know they don’t have to – because let’s face it, the families won’t be prosecuted.rnrn*name changed lol
4:33 pm 7th June, 2012
I found this really interesting to read actually because it displays that not all traveller children deserve the bad reputation that hangs over them because of their label, as your sixth former proves. Obviously there are always going to be some who deserve the reputation they have, but from my experience in education, there are plenty of students who are not related to traveller culture in any way but behave just as badly.
11:02 am 29th May, 2012
I have taught travellers in 3 out of the 5 schools I worked in. Unfortunately all 3 experiences were of horrendously abusive behaviour, physical violence towards other students, and at least 50% non attendance.rnrnOne boy had a teaching assistant with him for 50% of the time, paid for by the councils ’traveller unit’. The best this woman could do was get him to pick up his pen and write a title. He refused to do anything except shout out abuse and pick arguments with students deliberately to disrupt the lesson. He found it hilarious, and had quite a smirk on his face the whole time. He knew he was making trouble for the sake of it.rnrnI tried very hard to engage him, I talked to him a lot, found out his likes and dislikes, bought things he liked as rewards for good behaviour, which he eventually never earned.rnrnHe used to come into the classroom grinning and start ”this school is Shi1t. This class is sh1t. Youre Sh1t’. This was his regular greeting.rnrnI once asked the teaching assistant why he qualified for travelling assistance when he had lived in a brick house for at least 5 years. She said ’well we used to have a rule that you had to be actually travelling to qualify for support, but….’ (but what? You needed to justify your budget so widened your paremeters?)rnrnShe said he was from a travelling community. She said his cousins travelled and that they didnt value literacy.rnrnI said ’so if my cousins travelled or couldnt read could I get a 1-2-1 assistant for 50% of the time?rnrnDont ask me why I went off travellers after this experience.
4:46 pm 7th June, 2012
Given the opportunities that your example received – as well as the impression he gave – it’s hard to defend someone or their culture. The only point I feel I could possibly bring up is that from personal experience with travellers, not every one of them reiterates the impression that some of them project? Your point about the 1-2-1 assistant is interesting too. It may be true that the non-importance of literacy within the traveller community will continue to filter through generations, in whatever form of accommodation they live in, but there are also families who impose a devaluation of literacy on their children without a traveller background – so who is to say who is deserving of the expense of 1-2-1 assistance?