Pastora Filigrana (born,

Seville Seville ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Spain, Spanish autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Andalusia and the province of Seville. It is situated on the lower reaches of the Guadalquivir, River Guadalquivir, ...

, 26 May 1981) is a Spanish

Labour law Labour laws (also spelled as labor laws), labour code or employment laws are those that mediate the relationship between workers, employing entities, trade unions, and the government. Collective labour law relates to the tripartite relationship be ...

yer,

trade union A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

ist,

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...

columnist A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (periodical), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the ...

, and

human rights activist A human rights defender or human rights activist is a person who, individually or with others, acts to promote or protect human rights. They can be journalists, environmentalists, whistleblowers, trade unionists, lawyers, teachers, housing campai ...

Roma Roma or ROMA may refer to: People, characters, figures, names * Roma or Romani people, an ethnic group living mostly in Europe and the Americas. * Roma called Roy, ancient Egyptian High Priest of Amun * Roma (footballer, born 1979), born ''Paul ...

origin.

Early life and education

Pastora Filigrana García was born in the Triana neighborhood of Seville. At the age of nine, it was already said the child was going to be "the gypsy lawyer". Growing up "in a

ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...

" gave her a lot of social sensitivity towards issues related to equality from a young age. She learned what the

class consciousness In Marxism, class consciousness is the set of beliefs that persons hold regarding their social class or economic rank in society, the structure of their class, and their common class interests. According to Karl Marx, class consciousness is an awa ...

of grandmothers is "with their example of life" and labor law in the Andalusian Workers' Union. After participating in the creation of the (Association of University Gypsy Women) (Amuradi), she graduated in law at the age of 23 from the

University of Seville The University of Seville (''Universidad de Sevilla'') is a university in Seville, Andalusia, Spain. Founded under the name of ''Colegio Santa María de Jesús'' in 1505, in 2022 it has a student body of 57,214,U-Ranking Universidades español ...

Career

Filigrana's career began as a legal adviser for the Villela Or Gao Caló, a Roma association in the Seville neighborhood of Las 3000 Viviendas, also working with the migrant population. Later, she completed a Master's in Human Rights, Interculturality, and Development taught by the Pablo de Olavide University. As a lawyer, Filigrana had an important role in the media in the struggles of the Moroccan strawberry harvesters of Huelva during 2019, at the same time that she warned of the causes of the electoral rise of the

far-right Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on the far end of the ...

. In 2020, she published the book ''El pueblo gitano contra el sistema mundo. Unas reflexiones desde un activismo feminista y anticapitalista'' (The Gypsy People Against the World System. Some reflections from a feminist and anti-capitalist activist), in which she argues that the persecution of the Roma people has to do with their forms of community resistance through cooperation and

mutual aid Mutual aid is an organizational model where voluntary, collaborative exchanges of resources and services for common benefit take place amongst community members to overcome social, economic, and political barriers to meeting common needs. This ...

, and their opposition to adapting to "

salary A salary is a form of periodic payment from an employer to an employee, which may be specified in an employment contract. It is contrasted with piece wages, where each job, hour or other unit is paid separately, rather than on a periodic basis. ...

blackmail Blackmail is a criminal act of coercion using a threat. As a criminal offense, blackmail is defined in various ways in common law jurisdictions. In the United States, blackmail is generally defined as a crime of information, involving a thr ...

Selected works

* 2019: Descolonizar y despatriarcalizar Andalucía. Una mirada feminista gitana-andaluza en Miradas en torno al problema colonial. * 2020: ''Desafío, el virus no es el único peligro,''

Ediciones Akal Ediciones Akal is a Spanish publisher founded in Madrid in 1972 by Ramón Akal González. It consists of a catalogue of three thousand works in forty collections which includes fields like Humanities, classic texts, modern literature, etc., and ...

* 2020: ''El pueblo gitano contra el sistema mundo. Unas reflexiones desde un activismo feminista y anticapitalista'', Ediciones Akal,

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Filigrana, Pastora 1981 births Living people Spanish Romani people 21st-century Spanish journalists 21st-century Spanish women journalists 21st-century Spanish women writers Women human rights activists Lawyers from Seville Labour lawyers 21st-century Spanish lawyers Spanish trade unionists Spanish feminists Spanish columnists Spanish human rights activists University of Seville alumni Spanish women trade unionists Romani women Romani writers Romani feminists Calé people