Mapping Romani futures: Connected local histories and global realities
Date and Time: Friday, April 10, 2026 at 12:30pm – 6:45pm EDT. Reception to follow at 7:00pm EDT.
Location: 110 Thompson Room, Barker Center, 12 Quincy St, Cambridge MA 02138 (Harvard University) and online on Zoom
Background information about International Roma Day (April 8):
Romani people worldwide have celebrated International Roma Day on April 8 for decades. This year marks the 55th anniversary of the First World Roma Congress, a historic milestone when Roma Day, the flag, and the Gelem, Gelem anthem were adopted as symbolic markers of the global Roma diaspora.
Some neighborhoods, organizations, and institutions have used the anniversary to showcase their heritage via concerts, exhibitions, film screenings, conferences, and media events. Others, including leaders and academics, have observed Roma Day with remembrance events to reflect on anti-Roma racism and progress across social, political, cultural, and economic sectors.
Conference overview:
Since 2013, the annual Roma conference at Harvard has served as a forum to examine and address anti-Roma racism, including its origins, history, major underpinnings and protectors, and manifestations worldwide, especially as it relates to children and youth. We have aimed to improve data collection related to Roma, particularly youth and children, enhance research methods, focus on participatory action research with Roma youth, and revisit and inform the histories, policies, and practices concerning Romani people. Additionally, the Harvard Roma conference has actively sought to amplify and center the voices and experiences of Romani individuals and young people within global scholarship.
On April 10, 2026, we will once again observe Roma Day with the 14th Harvard Roma conference, Mapping Romani futures: Connected local histories and global realities.
This year’s event examines Romani histories and realities with the aim of informing more equitable futures for Romani children, youth, and future generations. We will situate these within a global context marked by increasing human rights abuses, wars, extremism, climate and digital threats.
The conference features a keynote panel on global and regional trends and threats affecting children and youth and their futures, especially amid escalating human rights abuses, wars, extremism, climate and digital threats.
This will be succeeded by two subsequent panels. The first panel, Connected futures, histories, and realities, will explore connections and continuities in Romani histories and realities, examining how these shape lives, inequities, and identities of Romani children, youth, and future generations. The second panel, Intersectionality and intersecting stories, will unpack typically overlooked and peripheral axes of inequity in the narratives of Romani histories, realities, and futures. Finally, following a tradition established in recent years, the conference will include a book talk featuring recent monographs about Romani people, with particular attention to works that advance global scholarship.
Agenda
12:00pm – 12:30pm: Gathering
12:30pm: Greeting from the Master of Ceremonies
Rayna Emilova, MEd
whose work sits at the intersection of educational equity, anti-racism, and social transformation.
Rayna has several years of experience in education and continues to engage with teaching and research as interconnected forms of advocacy. Her work is rooted in the lived realities of
Roma communities in Europe and shaped by a deep commitment to challenging anti-Roma racism, structural exclusion, and the normalization of inequality across institutions. A central thread in her scholarship and practice is the question of belonging, particularly how Roma
students, and Roma women in particular, navigate educational spaces where they are often
positioned as outsiders. She is especially interested in how belonging is shaped (or denied) in white-dominant classrooms across Europe, and what it means to move beyond “inclusion” toward environments where Roma students are genuinely protected, respected, and able to thrive without self-erasure.
12:30pm: Welcoming remarks
Jorge E. Chavarro, MD, DSc
Dr. Chavarro’s research focuses on understanding how nutritional, lifestyle and metabolic factors impact human reproduction and reproductive milestones throughout the life course, and how these events impact other aspects of health.
12:40pm: Framing the conference topics
Margareta Matache, PhD
Dr. Matache’s research focuses on the manifestations and impacts of racism and other systems of oppression in different geographical and political contexts. Her research examines discrimination, reparations, social determinants of health—including education and social and economic disparities—and their nexus with the historical past and contemporary public policies, with a particular focus on anti-Roma racism.
12:45pm: Keynote speech – Growing up in an age of crises: Global trends shaping the future of children, youth, and next generations
Jacqueline Bhabha, JD, MSc
2:00pm: Panel 1 – Connected futures, histories, and realities
Jehane Sedky
Judit Ignacz
analysis, qualitative research, human rights education, and advocacy at national and
international levels. She regularly presents, writes, and delivers interactive trainings on
psychological safety, strategic equality, and intersectional justice.
As a co-founder of a Roma collective of knowledge producers and co-author of their book on Roma representation and inclusion, Judit is dedicated to challenging harmful narratives and encouraging individuals and organizations to move beyond passive support toward conscious, informed, and proactive actions. Her work confronts systemic racism and advocates for equitable opportunities, representation, and decision-making, particularly for Romani women,
whose lived experiences and needs are still too often overlooked, even within mainstream antiracist and feminist spaces.
3:45pm – 4:00pm: Break
4:00pm: Panel 2 – Fire-side chat: Intersectionality and intersecting stories
Alba Hernández Sánchez
knowledge production with advocacy, ensuring that Romani feminist voices shape
both political narratives and institutional change. Her activism bridges research,
community-driven action, and racial and gender justice.
6:00pm: Book talk
Maria Dumitru, MA
Dumitru has worked for the World Bank in Romania, the Roma feminist theatre Giuvlipen and organisations in Oslo working with undocumented migrants who performed informal work. Area of interest: enslavement, homelessness, intersectional feminism, gender studies, and Romani studies.
Margareta Matache, PhD
Dr. Matache’s research focuses on the manifestations and impacts of racism and other systems of oppression in different geographical and political contexts. Her research examines discrimination, reparations, social determinants of health—including education and social and economic disparities—and their nexus with the historical past and contemporary public policies, with a particular focus on anti-Roma racism.
7:00pm: Reception
Please direct any questions about this event to Claire Street at cstreet@hsph.harvard.edu.
Speakers’ remarks are based on their own scholarship and experience. As such, they speak for themselves, not for Harvard University.