1. Analytical Reathics, Values & Effective Citizenship
Unit 7: Roma and Human Rights
Romania has a Roma challenge. Just what is meant by that word? How, if at all, are Romanians
facing
this challenge? Do Roma children have consOtuOonally protected rights in Romania? If so, what
are
they? If not, should children be a consOtuOonally protected class in Romania? Is there an
internaOonal
charter that explicates the rights of children? If so, what is it? What are its origins and
limitaOons? In
an essay not exceeding ten single spaced pages, document your answers (using 10 sources or
more;
only two of the sources can be internet sources and none can be Wikipedia) and review your
essay with
a member of your learning community. Redrah the essay and submit it to the instructor. Place
the
graded essay in your wriOng porLolio.
Unit Descrip?on:
The unit will explore the Roma disOncOves which will aid the students in discovering the
commonaliOes
that connect all humans. The study of the Roma challenges will strengthen the understanding
of the
underlying factors that influence the survival of enOre communiOes. The unit is designed to
help students
redefine ethics, values, and effecOve ciOzenship by the applicaOon of analyOcal reasoning.
Unit Narra?ve:
The United NaOons OrganizaOon’s Universal DeclaraOon of Human Rights (1948), defines
Human Rights
thusly: “RecogniOon of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all
members of
the human family is the foundaOon of freedom, jusOce and peace in the world, and disregard
and contempt
for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of
mankind,
and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and
freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiraOon of the common
people.”
Yet, it is documented that suppression, oppression, segregaOon and discriminaOon are some of
the

2. atrociOes that humankind subjugates fellow beings to. Race, caste, creed, and religion are a few
of the
major categories on which many of the injusOces are based, despite the universal acceptance
of the
declaraOon of human rights and the vigil kept by nongovernmental organizaOons to protect the
interests
of the suffering. The Roma are one such people, whose cause, suffering and idenOty seem to
create
a huge quesOon to be explored in terms of human rights violaOons. Tracing the Roma origin
will
create an interest in the students to compare it to the slave migraOon route and will lead to
developing
analyOcal skills of reasoning. Roma discriminaOon in Europe, specifically in Romania, will enable
the
students to understand the violaOon of human rights and also realize the prominence of having
a universal
human rights iniOaOve supported and governed by the United NaOons.
43
SCHEDULE
8 class module or 4 week module:
Week 1: INTRODUCTION
Class 1: IntroducOon & Overview
Class 2: Culture – Roma: The Music Heard Around the World (PowerPoint
and Videos)
Week 2: DISTINCTIVES
Class 1: DisOncOves
Class 2: Language
Week 3: CHALLENGES
Class 1: PoliOcs
Class 2: Economics & Health
Week 4: ASSESSMENT
Group PresentaOons
Class 1: Social
Economics
PoliOcs
Class 2: EducaOon
Health
Week 1: INTRODUCTION
Class 1: Introduc?on & Overview
There has been much debate about the Roma, their origin and history for many years. Research
indicates
that Roma have had their share of displacement in spite of their nomadic ways of the past,

3. faced
persecuOon, racial intolerance, harassment, segregaOon, oppression, racial prejudice and
hatred. As
Americans, gearing up for greatness, it is of utmost importance to study the origin, history,
struggle of
44
the present day Roma to view the significance of their idenOty while analyzing the true
meaning of ethics,
values and effecOve ciOzenship.
The introducOon
1. Origin
2. MigraOon
3. PersecuOon
4. Significance
Iovitã, R., & Schurr, T. (2004). ReconstrucOng the
Origins and MigraOons of Diasporic Popula
Oons: The Case of the European Gypsies.
American Anthropologist, 106(2), 267‐281.
Retrieved from Academic Search Premier
database.
David Gresham, BharO Morar, Peter A. Underhill,
Giuseppe Passarino, Alice A. Lin, Cheryl
Wise, Dora Angelicheva, Francesc Calafell,
Peter J. Oefner, Peidong Shen, Ivailo Tournev,
Rosario de Pablo, VaiduOs Kuĉinskas,
Anna Perez‐Lezaun, Elena Marushiakova,
Vesselin Popov, Luba Kalaydjieva. (2001).
Origins and Divergence of the Roma (Gypsies).
The American Journal of Human Gene
Ocs ‐ 1 December 2001 (Vol. 69, Issue 6,
pp. 1314‐1331)
Ian Hancock (2002). We are the Romani People. University of HerLordshire Press
Class 2: Culture
Roma: The Music Heard Around the World (PowerPoint with videos)
Week 2: DISTINCTIVES
Class 1: Roma Cultural Dis?nc?ves
Using clues in the development of the Romani language, geneOcs, and the historical record,
scholars have reconstructed the exodus of the Roma from India shortly aher 1000 AD. It
appears the
45
Romani traveled over the Silk Road to Anatolia and then to Eastern Europe, before moving on
to the
rest of Europe and beyond. They brought with them a unique culture and borrowed elements

4. of the
surrounding cultures to construct a new culture that has global influence. Europeans first found
the
Roma mysterious, mislabeling them Gypsies as if they had come from Egypt (Hancock 2002).
But then
the Roma were enslaved in Eastern Europe, not to be emancipated unOl the same Ome slaves
were
emancipated in the United States. The Roma endured harsh discriminaOon leading to severe
poverty
and social exclusion in many countries. Nazi Germany and its allies aIempted to exterminate the
Roma
in what contemporary Romani’s call the Porajmos (‘devouring’ in some dialects of Romani).
The Roma culture maintains its disOncOveness in language, music, cuisine, dress, and social
norms. The Romani language has roots in Sanskrit, but it has added new words as the Roma
moved
through Europe.
TradiOonal Roma society maintains the purity taboos that regulate life (Hancock 2002). Roma
individuals have been denied educaOon, and very few ever went to university. Roma scholars
and acOvists
are working to redefine the Roma idenOty, reframing Roma culture as a posiOve source of
strength.
QuesOons:
• How does the Roma experience in Europe aher leaving India both parallel and diverge from
the experience
of the African Diaspora to the Americas?
• What are the similariOes and differences between the challenges faced by scholars in the
Roma and
African American communiOes?
• What role has higher educaOon played in keeping the Romani community from redefining its
iden‐
Oty in posiOve terms and advocaOng for its rights? How is this changing?
Class 2: The Roma Language
Language is an essenOal part of the Romani idenOty. Speaking a common language both
unified the Romani people and set them apart from the surrounding populaOons they moved
through.
The Romani language retains the history of the Roma people, from their origin in India through
their
travels to Europe. The Roma are descendants of a warrior caste originally recruited from
various tribes
to fight the Ghaznavid invasion of northern India, and the Romani language evolved as a lingua
franca
that became the language of the Roma people (Hancock 2002). This warrior experience in India
is reflected

5. in the Romani words for weapons that are similar to words in the Indian languages. The Romani
obviously leh India aher 1000 AD when Indian languages lost the neutral gender, since Romani
only has
the feminine and masculine genders, as does English (Hancock, Dowd, and Djuric 1998).
QuesOons:
• Romani existed as an oral language for centuries with its own stories, songs, jokes, and wise
sayings
that were passed from one generaOon to the next. IdenOfy pieces of oral culture in your family,
your friendship groups, or your culture or subculture that you and other group members use to
com‐
46
municate your membership in the group and strengthen group idenOty. For instance, this can
be a story
about the Ome someone in the group did something either wonderful or foolish, or an inside
joke, or a
special or slang term that only your group knows. How does your group use oral language to
maintain
the idenOty of group? How does your group use oral language to maintain the separaOon
between inand
out‐group?
• Compare the Romani experience with the experience of other peoples who maintained their
dis‐
OncOve idenOty and culture, both peoples with and without their own languages. What role do
you
think language plays in group idenOty? Give detailed examples to support your opinion.
• Using these comparisons, think about how the Romani experience might been different if
they
had not developed their own language. Develop an alternate history scenario that might have
happened,
with an explanaOon of why this alternaOve would be reasonable.
Week 3: THE CHALLENGES
Class 1: Poli?cal Aspects of Roma Society in Europe
One of the greatest challenges during the enlargement process of the European Union towards
the east is how the issue of the Roma is tackled. This ethnic minority group represents a much
higher
share by numbers, too, in some regions of Europe and in Romania parOcularly.
The “Roma quesOon” represents a challenging social and poliOcal case across Europe in
general,
eastern and southern Europe in parOcular, and Romania in special regard. Key poliOcal issues
about the
Roma include the issues of slavery, the process of integraOon and assimilaOon into the majority
popula
Oon, the marginalizaOon of the Roma society across most socieOes of Europe, and the process

6. of
Roma emancipaOon. UnOl emancipaOon on February 20, 1856, most Roma in eastern Europe
lived in
slavery. They could not leave the properOes of their owners.
Issues of Poli?cal Representa?on
PoliOcal representaOon for the Roma across Europe has never really been recognized
anywhere,
not even in Romania. Apparently, across all the socieOes in which they have some noOceable
presence,
the Roma can “vote for, but not be voted for.” In fact, Roma representaOon has only be
caricatured by
any or some of their own members who happen to rise up from Ome to Ome to proclaim some
form of
individual leadership aspiraOons or recogniOons. And there is no record of the Romanian
government
or any other government recognizing such proclamaOons. For example:
• Issues of Recogni?on and Discrimina?on
• Roma Popula?on and Integra?on
Class 2: Economic Challenges of the Roma Community
The issue of data incompleteness and accuracy is pervasive in any study of the economic
condiOon
of Roma people. Such problem comes from two sources: the methodology used for collecOng
data
and the enOty collecOng data. TradiOonally, census data are used to establish Roma idenOty.
However, it
has been found that Romani are unlikely to reveal their idenOty for fear of discriminaOon or
simply
because they have been assimilated. Also, it is well‐documented that under socialist regime,
several
countries (e.g. Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria) with high concentraOon of Romani rouOnely
manipulate
47
census data to promote ethnic assimilaOon or for poliOcal reasons. In order to miOgate
problem associated
with collecOng data on Romani, the Sociology Department of Yale University conducted a
survey
in 2000 in which they adopted a mulO‐faced approach to ethnicity. Their survey included
quesOons on
self‐idenOficaOon, visual idenOficaOon by the surveyor of the interviewee, language, parents’
language,
appearance and family name. Most contemporary analysis of poverty amongst Romani relies on
the

7. 2000 Yale dataset. However there is an ongoing project by the Open Society InsOtute
(hIp://www.soros.org/about) on collecOng reliable data on Romani.
Biased or corrupted data are not the only obstacle one faces when aIempOng to measure and
analyze poverty in Romani society, methodology is also an issue. TradiOonally, poverty is
measured using
a naOonally representaOve household survey which gauges the populaOon welfare.
Welfare indicators comprise poverty rates which are computed using either household
consumpOon
or household income. Income data is usually less reliable than consumpOon data since
individuals may
be reluctant to declare income from informal acOviOes for fear of taxes. ConsumpOon data
may also be
problemaOc: How do we decide what to include as expenditures? How do we deal with the fact
that
some respondent may not recall household expenditures? However, most analysis of Romani
poverty
relies on consumpOon data. Once the welfare measure is defined, poverty rate is defined as the
percentage
of the populaOon leaving below a designated poverty threshold. Owing to the problems
associated
with the tradiOonal measurement of poverty, one has to use data from sources such as educa‐
Oon, health and housing to improve our perspecOve on Romani poverty. Also, a qualitaOve
analysis to
idenOfy non‐measurable facets of welfare may be helpful.
No maIer which poverty metric is used, Romani are the most affected in many countries of
central
and Eastern Europe. In some cases, Romani poverty rates are more than tenfold that of non‐
Romani.
According to Ringold et al (2005), in Bulgaria and Romania, 80 percent of Romani are living
on less than
$ 4.30 per day. Even in more prosperous countries such as Hungary, 40 percent of Romani leave
under
poverty line.
The economic woes of Romani have diverse causes that vary across naOons. However the
common
causes of Romani poverty are discriminaOon in all aspect of social life, low educaOon, poor
health
and high unemployment rate. In Romania only 1 in 2 Romani of working age is employed and
the situa‐
Oon is even bleaker in the Czech Republic, Bulgaria and Serbia (see for instance de Laat 2010).
Also, the
transiOon to market economy in many Central and Eastern European countries has exacerbated
some
Romani economic problems.

8. An aIempt to esOmate the economic cost of Roma exclusion was undertaken by de Laat (2010).
For
instance a conservaOve esOmate in annual producOvity losses due to Romani exclusion was
from 367
million Euros in the Czech Republic, 526 million Euros in Bulgaria to 887 million Euros in
Bulgaria.
Data is lacking on the key economic indicators such as the unemployment rate, labor market
par‐
?cipa?on rate, average income levels, and wealth ownership levels among the Roma
(relaOve to the
general populaOons of the various countries in Europe). Thus, with relaOvely higher poverty
rates, there
is no doubt that the economic status of the Roma is less than preferable in Europe.
Wri?ng Prompts:
1. Why are poverty rates so different between Romani and non‐Romani household?
2. What is the impact of low educaOon on Romani welfare?
48
3. Is assimilaOon or sedentary a viable soluOon to the Romani poverty?
Reading List
Achim, Viorel, The Roma in Romanian History, London, Berlin: CEU Press, 2007.
Dragomir, Marius, “Europe’s Beggars: Romania’s Roma”, Center for European Research (CER)
Archives
on ArOcles on Romania, November 22, 2000.
De Laat, J 2010 .2010. Economic costs of Roma exclusion, Human Development Department,
World
Bank.
McDonald C, Negrin K .2010. No data – no progress, Roma IniOaOves, Open Society InsOtute.
Ringold D, Orenstein M A, Wilkens .2005. Roma in an expanding Europe – breaking the poverty
cycle,
Washington DC: The World Bank.
Online Resource
hIp://fastcharity.ro/?nr=0&lb=2&mod=subdom&id_subdom=27
Week 4: ORAL GROUP PRESENTATIONS
Students will be placed into five cooperaOve groups. Each group will be required to research
one of the
challenge areas of the Roma in Europe. The challenge areas of the Roma are listed as follows:
1) social,
2) economics, 3) poli?cs, 4) educa?on, and 5) health.
Each group will be responsible for creaOng an oral presentaOon which is guided by an
electronic visual
aid (such as PowerPoint) exploring challenges of the Roma covered in this unit of the course.

9. Each
group will have 10‐15 minutes to showcase their oral presentaOon. Groups will also be required
to
submit a hard copy of their full presentaOon to the course instructor.
Students will be scored in the areas of parOcipaOon, understanding of subject maIer, oral
communica‐
Oon skills, quality of electronic visual aids, and presentaOon of research. Both the oral
presentaOon and
the wriIen copy will be scored.
49
ROMA UNIT: Weekly Blog/Journal Reflec?ve Wri?ng Assignments:
Each student will produce 3 reflecOve wriIen responses of 250 or more words. ComposiOons
must be
directly related to informaOon provided in the unit of the course. Topics for each week are
presented
below.
Week 1: Who are the Roma?
Week 2: Discuss cultural dis?nc?ves of the Roma? Consider the areas of music,
language, and
educa?on.
Week 3: Discuss the challenges faced by the Roma in Europe regarding health, poli?cs,
and economics.
50