Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores the contribution of social psychological theory to understand prejudice as an interpretive concept. For social psychologists, prejudice is both a natural and universal fact of life, which reflects inner psychology as well as exceptional, particularistic, and unique. The book explains researches and responds to prejudice as social and cultural product. The tropes of intolerance and tolerance are cultural/societal tropes. The theoretical scaffolding of social identity theory (SIT) and self-categorization theory (SCT) starts from the idea that society is constructed and structured along the lines of discrete social categories in relations of power, status and prestige with one another. The idea of prejudice as indignity is not about the forms and consequences of extreme forms of social hostility. The book considers the critical analysis to the test by exploring, and offering a commentary on, the complexity of anti-Roma prejudices in Europe.