Category Archives: Czech Republic

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Patrik Bartko Interview

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Patrik Bartko Interview

Patrik Bartko, one of the leading Czech guitarists and a member of Marek Ztracený’s band, gave an interview to the first Romani internet television channel ROMEA TV. In the pre-Christmas interview, he talked about his musical life, the influence of family tradition and how his music connects with Romani culture.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Czechia: Paramisja

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Czechia: Paramisja

The Pig Bride and the Talking Horse is a book of Romani fairy tales: far from the first to be published in Czechia, but in many ways the best so far, because the most thorough. It is intended primarily for adults, both researchers and ordinary readers – they will find amusement and many surprises in it.  It is now a well-known fact that traditional Romani folklore is not for young ladies.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Lety Exhibition

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Lety Exhibition

The Museum of Romani Culture opened the long-awaited Holocaust Memorial of the Roma and Sinti in Lety u Písku in 2024. The exhibition tells many powerful stories of families and young children who went through the local concentration camp or died in it. The fate of the Roma also significantly affected the life of the curator of the exhibition, who was working on the exhibition at the time her child was born. An interview with Anna Míšková, curator of the exhibition of the Roma and Sinti Holocaust Memorial in Lety u Písku.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Moravian Theatre

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Moravian Theatre
The Moravian Theatre Olomouc will present a Romani fairy tale inspired by a story recorded by Milena Hübschmannová, a prominent romologist in Czechia. It is a unique music and dance production called The Fairy Tale Enchanted by the Cimbalom. The project is directed by Dana Račková in collaboration with Romani musician Michal Taragoš and connects children’s imagination with the rich tradition of Romani music. The premiere of the production is scheduled for January 26, 2025.
Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Romano Suno: Roma Dream

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Romano Suno: Roma Dream

Almost 200 Romani texts were submitted to the Romano Suno competition this year and sent entries to the literary and audiovisual. The quality of the submission was greatly improved and even children were better than adults this year. The competition is organized by the organization Nová škola, which also offers seminars on Romani and Romani literature, creative writing workshops in Romani, Romani language courses and much more.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Czechia: Fundraising

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Czechia: Fundraising

On Wednesday, December 18, a thank-you concert was held at the Nuselská Town Hall in Prague in support of Nela Charchoňová, a ROMEA scholarship recipient who lost her hand after a car accident. The event was organized by students of the ROMEA Scholarship Program under the leadership of Natália Kuchárová and they wanted to thank everyone who contributed to the collection for a bionic hand. The ROMEA organization announced this on November 1, 2024 and over 2.3 million crowns (around 91’000 euros) were raised to support Nela.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Czechia and Anti-Roma Racism

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Czechia and Anti-Roma Racism

The Czech parliament adopted the IHRA non-binding definition of antigyspyism. Now, a charter against Antigypsyism is being created in the Czech Republic. Those who can sign up include firms, local governments, nonprofit organizations, public authorities and schools. This proposal is pushed by the Czech Govt Commissioner for Roma Minority Affairs Fuková, but the Czech official Ombudsman Stanislav Křeček, not all negative behaviour toward Roman can be considered antigypsyism. As an example, he mentioned the case of the doctor in Aš who refused to register Romani patients. Well that one was definitely racist …

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Reimar Lust Award

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Reimar Lust Award

The historian Kateřina Čapková is a leading expert on modern Jewish history in Central and Eastern Europe, the history of the Sinti and Roma, and on flight and migration in the 20th century. She teaches at the Institute of Contemporary History of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. The central focus of her research is on the experiences of Jewish communities in what was then Czechoslovakia during and after World War II. Čapková opens up new perspectives on the interactions between nationalism, minority policy, and transnational networks in Europe. The Reimar Lüst Prize will enable her to conduct research at the Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow in Leipzig.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Roma Children Books

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Roma Children Books

The Czech Roma Literature Publishing House “Kher” published a unique book for children aged four and up this year. It was written by Romani author Eva Danišová, winner of the Milena Hübschmannová Award. For the youngest readers, the book presents a Romani peer as the main character for the first time in everyday life situations and during preparation for first grade.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Forced Sterilisation

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Forced Sterilisation

The Czech government has finally agreed to extend the deadline for submitting their claims for forced sterilisation by two years to January 2027. The deadline was originally set to January 2025, but the authorities raised so many hurdles for Romnja, that is was almost impossible to get these sterilisations acknowledged (even when there was some written evidence).

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Research Grant

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Research Grant

Ethnographer Martin Fotta from the Institute of Ethnology of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic has received a prestigious grant from the European Research Council (ERC). His project, entitled “Roma Family in the Period of War” (RAW), received financial support of 2 million euros, or approximately 51 million crowns. The aim of the research is to understand how war conflicts and their consequences affected Roma kinship ties, family structures and community cohesion in different parts of Europe and the Middle East.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Doctors and Roma in Czechia

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Doctors and Roma in Czechia

A paediatrician in the Czech town of Aš posted on his door: “In view of the increasing aggressiveness of the Romani people, I am not registering them with immediate effect.”

Apparently, several Roma were in his waiting room without an appointment and behaved aggressively. What really happened remains to be seen.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Czechia and the Holocaust

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Czechia and the Holocaust

The Czechs’ awareness of the genocide of the Roma during the Holocaust remains low, although the situation has been improving in recent years thanks to media coverage. But teaching about the history of the Roma in schools is still insufficient. In an interview with ČTK, historian and director of the Museum of Roma Culture Jana Horváthová said this. She believes that the topic needs to be included in the curriculum.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Public Collection

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Public Collection

The Brno Museum of Romani Culture launched a public collection on Monday, the aim of which is to raise money to acquire a portrait of Romani singer Věra Bílá. It wants to buy the portrait because it sees Bílá as an exceptional personality who has appealed to a wide audience with her art. The collection will last 60 days, and the aim is to raise 70,000 crowns. Bílá died on March 12 at the age of 64 in a Pilsen hospital. The Rokycany native was probably the most famous Czech singer in the world at the turn of the millennium, and years ago she sold out the Paris Olympia.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

House without an Exit

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Tomáš Hlaváček, director of the film House Without an Exit explains that his documentary shows that since the state and its institutions leaves the Roma to fend off by themselves, they rely on the family. But this is not always an advantage, as it keeps the families in a spiral of exclusion and poverty.

 

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Roma and the Velvet Revolution

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Roma and the Velvet Revolution

On November 25, 1989, Emil Ščuka and Jan Rusenko spoke to a crowd of hundreds of thousands in Letná in Prague. They also reached most households through television cameras. At the same time, a Roma group unfurled the Roma flag on the Letne plain, and a huge crowd chanted “Long live the Roma”.

Prior to that, Czech Roma dissidents were practically inexistant. The only notable exception was Karel Holomek, a signatory of the Movement for Civil Liberties (HOS), established in 1988. Holomek, expelled from the military college after 1968 and expelled from the Communist Party of the Czech Republic, was detained and interrogated as early as 1981 for “subversion of the republic.”

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Czechia: Documentary

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Czechia: Documentary

The documentary Dajori [small mother in Romanes], which won the audience award at the Jihlava Film Festival, is now in theatres. The film is ostensibly a story about a Roma foster family, but it also reveals the housing crisis, the trade in poverty and racism rooted in society.

The foster mother, Dajori Marie Hučkova, in the movie says “Ravens are like Roma. There are many of them and they are roaring. People don’t mind, so shoot them. An animal can take care of its children, and my sister, the mother, cannot take care of her children.”

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