Sinti culture, language & the origin of the name Django

dennis

If you guys wanna hear some actually romanes, check this out:



Aladdin is speaking in German mixed with a few romanes words, but the others are speaking romanes

this is hilarious, there are a bunch of overdubbed movies in romanes on youtube

crookedpinky

Found this for anyone interested in languages. http://romani.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/index.shtml

nicksansone

Hey Denis, is that really Django announcing the band members on the Festival Swing recording? I've heard the story that when he recorded My Sweet, he was supposed to ask Vola if he wanted a solo and messed it up, so there are 2 takes of that tune. Both tracks are certainly different speakers, and though it's not a significant point of your very thorough and well written article, I wonder is that Django speaking? Thanks and keep up the great work, the Tcha videos are excellent

Matt Mitchell

A fascinating article for a variety of reasons, thank you.

PapsPier

In Festival Swing, the MC who announces the solists is Delaunay except for Rostaing who is presented by Alix Combelle and for Django Reinhardt who is announced by himself "Dzungo Rénar"

dennis

nicksansone wrote: »

I've heard the story that when he recorded My Sweet, he was supposed to ask Vola if he wanted a solo and messed it up, so there are 2 takes of that tune. Both tracks are certainly different speakers, and though it's not a significant point of your very thorough and well written article, I wonder is that Django speaking?

I haven't heard those recordings in a long time, I always thought that django spoke on both recordings.. I know he did on at least one of them!

dennis

i just listened to both takes, it sounds like django on both recordings!

nicksansone

Maybe I was a bit unclear, I meant I think he speaks on both My Sweet takes, but was he also speaking on the Festival Swing? It sounds like a different guy.

dennis

As papspier said, he s the one announcing his own name

François RAVEZ

The English pronunciation of Django is close to the Romanes word (though still not quite). In French, however, the name Django is pronounced differently. More importantly, Django pronounces his name the French way; listen to him distinctly call out his own name in a recording titled Festival Swing 41 (Paris 25/12/1940). I have personally never heard a Sinto pronounce Django’s name in the Romanes way for I awake. This, of course, is not proof enough.

Hello Dennis,

First thank you for sharing your researches about Romanès language and your interesting insights. I would like you to be more precise about what you mean by English way of pronouncing Django.
I am usin the international phonetic system wher ƹ means zh and ã represents the french sound an.

To my french ears in the Festival Swing recording Django pronouces it dƹãgo. Joseph Reinhardt in the interview with Babik pronounces it dƹãgo too. Stéphane Grappellli sometimes pronounced it ƹãgo and sometimes dƹãgo. In a recent interview of Alain Antonietto by Patrus 53, Alain first says dƹãgo but when he recalls the first time he met Sarah Tsanga at the St Ouen flea market, when she was searching the "white dog" (HMV) records of his brother, Alain quotes her own words : he says "ƹãgo mon frère".

You are certainly aware that in France in the 20's and 30's and even later, people could not pronounce the dƹ sound they said ƹazz and not dƹazz, bãƹo and not bãdƹo and also ƹãgo and not dƹãngo.

Regarding the origin of the name Django, you don't mention the version of Yves Salgues in his 'Légende de Django' :
Négros (la mère de Django) à son mari :" - Tu l’as appelé Jean? - Oui, puisque tu le voulais. - Jean, ça fait
commun. Tout le monde s’appelle Jean. Il ne faut pas que notre fils s’appelle comme tout le monde."
Nous l’appellerons Django.
- Négros (Django's mother) to his husband : "You named him Jean? - Yes, since that's what you wanted - Jean, it sounds ordinary. Everyone is called Jean. Our son must not be called as anyone. We will call him Django."

As often with Yves Salgues this is full of details that nobody can check but which give an impression of truth.

I would also like to take the opportunity to react about point 4) raised by Lango-Django

4) Do we know at what point Django's family began speaking French? Is it possible that he and his brother grew up much like you and your brother, in a family in which elders/parent(s) spoke a foreign language which the children could understand, but usually chose to respond to in the "new" language? This seems to be a common pattern among many new immigrants.

Like you I found Dennis family history very interesting and I believe that personal experiences can shade a new light and provide an example, but however at a certain point we must refer to mere historical facts. I would not like anybody to fancy that Django's parents were immigrants discussing about the best language to use at home for their son to integrate and to become a lawyer or a doctor. First, Django's father if I am correct had vanished before Django was 3. Then Django's parents were not immigrants but french, the fact that they had no fix address but were nomads or wanderers made that they were submitted to vexiatous measures like frequent controls and a handbook they had to present to the police authorities whenever they arrived in a new town.

In those days many french people did not speak french at home, but regional languages or dialects (like breton or basque or alsacien or occitan or ch'ti). It is the school which uniformized things and made almost disappear these regional languages. Now many gypsies (in those days) and especially Django had distant relation with school.

Dennis, you mention the word used by the Roma lawuta to nam a violin, does it have any relation with the name of the 'gypsy' tribe named Lautari and specialized in music? Your family and personnal history made me think of the words of a chinese writer (I believe it is Cao Xueqin) who said something like : "each man must roam until he finds a strange country he calls home".

Best

François RAVEZ