Romani are Romanians, per Reuters

The article in the link seems to indicate that those particular Roma individuals were from Romania, not necessarily detailing the origins of the culture or suggesting that all Roma are Romanian citizens. And they’ve now come to Mexico by way of Paris, a roundabout way of reaching the U.S.A. from Romania.

I see your point, Cyn, but Reuters could have done more to dispel confusion. The people to whom they refer might have most recently come from Romania, but that's just a coincidence. As an ethnic group, that's not the place from which they originate. Maybe they should have referred to Romani by the "generic" term Gypsy, instead of using Roma, which was too easily confused with Romanian. And I don't really believe that discrimination against Romani is limited to Romania.

Very true, Lee. Interesting, on some level, that the American border agents immediately addressed them in Spanish, apparently assuming that anyone approaching the southern U.S. border spoke Spanish.

And the article suggests that jeans versus a track suit is an obvious indicator of a difference in nationality.

Much to my surprise, I learned that Gypsy is the term used by academic researchers, some of whom are of Gypsy origin. Although in recent years in general culture we’ve started saying that use of the name is offensive, it is what the experts say is the correct term. Yes, I was surprised too because I’d heard what emma said.

I learned that the term is correct at a large exhibit on the history, present day living situations, trades, geographical locations, integration of the various groups at the Musée national de l’histoire de l’immigration in Paris.

BTW, the exhibit showed that members of various groups have been in the Western Hemisphere for a couple of centuries.

Isn't "gypsy" an english word? Other languages have other words for these people, so its not that straightforward. Roma being the word for Rome in many languages makes it less helpful. But it seems in the US, we have a hard time making distinction between ethnicity and nationality. Where are you from? versus who are you? Which question did the border guards ask?

In Spain we call them Egyptians, or Gitanos, derived from old Castellano, "Egiptano". Perhaps this is also where the English term gypsy or (e)gypsy is derived from as well?

I don't think you can use the term Gypsy interchangeably in the UK. We have two extremely different groups of mobile people here - the Irish Travelers mentioned above (often why the term traveler/traveller is understood differently on the two sides of the Atlantic) and the usually very differently dressed Roma virtually all of whom here are from Romania.

Both groups have different ways of raising money in many cases.

Neither would want to be identified with the other group in my experience.

Perhaps things are different on the Mexican border.

I think you might be very surprised at the long history of different Gypsy groups living in Western Europe and the UK with various levels of integration into the society. These are not the people who have come west after the Wall/Iron Curtain came down in 1989.

We have Irish Travelers in the US, too. Where I live, they go door-to-door offering to do house repairs...just as they do in France. I can't vouch for the rest of Europe.