Camelamos naquerar (1976)

Overview

Camelamos naquerar (We Want to Speak) is an adaptation of the theatre play of the same name which was born out of a collaboration between Romani poet and university professor José Heredia Maya and Romani flamenco dancer and choreographer Mario Maya; the latter also performs in the piece, along with other artists. The title in Caló, the language used by Gitanos, translates as ‘we want to speak’, a revolutionary message that illustrates the efforts to reclaim a place in Spanish history for the Roma people and denounce the institutional injustice suffered by the community. It takes as its starting point the Pragmatic decrees signed by the Catholic Monarchs at the end of the fifteenth century, which heralded the long persecution of the Roma people, and continues right up to the twentieth-century Francoist laws.