CHRISTIANITY, STIGMA, AND MASS CONVERSION AMONG SPANISH GITANOS

For over half a century, Pentecostal and charismatic movements have transformed Roma ethnic minorities' religious landscape in Europe and beyond. Roma spiritual awakenings and mass conversion to Evangelical Pentecostal Christianity have proved to be sources of significant social change. This is particularly true in Spain, where Spanish Roma Evangelical churches hold great sway Gitanos'social and spiritual life (Cantón Delgado 2010; Gay y Blasco 1999; Griera 2013; Montañés Jiménez 2016).
Most Spanish Roma -known as Gitanos - believers affiliate with an autonomous Gitano-led church: the Iglesia Evangélica de Filadelfia (IEF). The proposed project aims to build upon a multi-award-winning ethnographic PhD research that examined the IEF's emergence and how Pentecostal Christianity has reshaped worldviews, values, and imaginaries among Gitanos in Spain. By examining how Spanish Gitano communities engage with Pentecostalism, I provide a lens through which to comprehend the intertwining of religion and ethnicity (Bruce 1996) in contemporary Spain and enhance our understanding of the influence of non-Catholic forms of Christianity among social minorities in southern Europe. Here, the project explores some classic anthropological themes (religion, organisations, citizenship) as well as political debates about the persistence of Roma exclusion in European societies. My research contributes to several fields of social scientific inquiry, especially the Sociology of Religion, the Anthropology of Christianity, and Romani Studies.
The host Department of my fellowship is the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of St. Andrews, a prestigious anthropological research unit in the UK. My fellowship will link to The Centre for Minorities Research (CMR). The CMR is the first and only academic hub in the UK to deal exclusively with minorities, and it is strongly connected to other major European research centres specialised in this theme.
The project seeks to widely disseminate findings and make a valuable impact in my area of expertise. It will produce high-quality work for an academic audience to expand the scholarship on Roma Pentecostalism. The project will explore how social minorities inhabiting the outskirts of contemporary societies engage with novel forms of protestant Christianity and look to advance conversations regarding the role of religion in secular and political orders. It will also contribute to emerging debates regarding the role of religion in endergendering social cohesion within diverse and multicultural societies.
As a critical outcome of the project, I will set up an international workshop with senior academics on the stigma, experiences of segregation and social struggles endured by ethnic minorities in modern capitalist societies during pandemic times. In the future, the candidate aim to publish an edited volume/special issue gathering the papers presented at the workshop. Additionally, I will organise public events within the framework of the Centre for Minorities research at The University of St. Andrews to bring together experts and social and religious leaders to further debates and joint initiatives regarding the political and religious exclusion of ethnic minorities. The project will gain visibility by participating in two major international conferences organised by the American Anthropological Association and the European Association of Social Anthropologists in the 2021/2022 academic year.
The project will serve to build up my teaching experience by leading sections on Roma communities and Pentecostalism on subhonors modules at The University of St. Andrews and will enable the shaping of a future postdoctoral research project examining the performance of religion in pandemic times and the impact of the pandemic on the performance of religion and its after affects