On the occasion of August 2. Roma Holocaust Memorial day, Phiren Amenca and ternYpe organized a webinar in co-operation with E-Romnja from Romania to discuss the Roma Holocaust with six Roma women from different perspectives, such as historical, local, academic or institutional.
This was an important moment in Romania as the government officially recognized August 2 as Roma Holocaust Memorial Day. The webinar was organized through Zoom, and livestreamed online on the E-Romnja Facebook page, on August 2, from 6pm. It was important to livestream it through a Romanian organization Facebook page, as the discussion was about the Romanian context and in Romanian. If the discussion would have been in English, it would exclude experts, communities and young people from the discussion and would mostly reach people on international level. We choose E-Romnja as they have a big number of followers (more than 6000) and it was important to include Roma women perspectives in the topic. E-Romnja is an association that advocates for a public agenda that must include Roma women’s issues and advocates for the respect, integrity, and dignity of Roma women.
Speakers of the webinar were:
Ioanida Costache – PhD student in ethnomusicology at Stanford University Ioanida talked about the history of the Roma Holocaust and the struggle for the collective memory of the Holocaust.
Roxana Oprea – Gender expert She raised the issue of invisible Roma women in the history of the Holocaust, the legitimacy of different perspectives, when we discuss Roma history and its consequences in different areas.
Anca Nica – Project coordinator on Roma women and participation She spoke about the control of the sexual and reproductive rights of Roma women as a result of Nazi policies, and about this topic today.
Delia Grigore – Lect. Univ. Dr. and president of the Roma Center “Amare Rromentza” Introduced the types of remedial measures adopted by the Romanian state after the Holocaust and discussed how much Roma history is part of the curricula and known by Roma communities.
Mariana Sandu – Sociologist Marina bring a local perspective on how Roma history is teached in schools based on her own experience as a Roma teacher and contributor to a textbook on Roma history.
Cătălina Olteanu – Member of the Board of Directors of the National Council for Combating Discrimination She talked about the advocacy and steps taken by civil society to include Roma history, the Roma Holocaust and Roma slavery, in the curricula.
The moderator of the discussion was Georgiana Aldessa Lincan, feminist activist, Romanian country coordinator of the Roma Youth Voices Project.
The webinar was financed through the Roma Youth Voices Project, funded by the European Union’s Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme (2014-2020).
