Moji lidi (My People)

Jan Hauer (1947-2022) was born to parents whose closest relatives, including their pre-war children, had perished in the concentration camps at Lety u Písku and Auschwitz-Birkenau. Together with his father, he searched for their fate, listened to the stories of the older generation, and later started collecting old family photographs and historical documents. The result of the many years of his effort is an extensive personal archive, a unique photographic collection, and vast genealogical knowledge about the families he considered part of his own lineage, thus for the first time opening up to public about the community of Czech Sinti. Although Sinti families helped shape the history of the Czech lands for several centuries and their historical roots firmly connect them to the countries of Central and Western Europe as well as overseas, their survivors struggled to rebuild their original lives against the backdrop of the new, communist Czechoslovakia. The book My People is therefore not only a celebration of life and hope, but also a reflection on the dark side of Czech history.

The book, co-edited by Renata Berkyová, Kateřina Čapková, and Helena Sadílková, was produced in collaboration with the Faculty of Arts of Charles University in Prague and the Institute for Contemporary History of the Czech Academy of Sciences. Its publication was also possible thanks to the financial support from the Czech-German Future Fund and Bader Philanthropies, Inc.