Remembrance and education: Learning platform on the genocide of Roma and Sinti presented by the OeAD – romasintigenocide.eu

To mark the International Roma/Romnja Day the Austrian Parliament, in cooperation with Austria's education agency OeAD, organises a commemorative event on 8 April 2024. Following this, the 12-language information and learning website romasintigenocide.eu will be presented as part of a webinar of the OeAD programme ERINNERN:AT – a comprehensive educational offer to raise awareness of the genocide of Roma and Sinti during the Second World War. The website aims to impart knowledge and promote recognition of the victims while also drawing attention to the ongoing discrimination. It was launched on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research with new content and new features.

About the learning website romasintigenocide.eu

The website romasintigenocide.eu is a learning platform that provides basic knowledge about the genocide of the European Sinti, Sintizze, Roma and Romnja. It is aimed at schoolchildren aged 14 and over as well as teachers and anyone who would like to find out more about the history of the genocide of the Roma and Sinti. The website is available in 12 languages, including the two Roma languages, Romani and Kalderash. In more than 70 compact and freely combinable worksheets various aspects of the genocide, its aftermath and coming to terms with it are addressed. As part of a redesign new content has been added to the website and the user interface has been optimised – all materials can be edited online or downloaded as PDFs for use in the classroom.

Learners will deal with a wide variety of sources, individual biographies and places of persecution and extermination and receive country-specific information about the history. The topics were selected and translated in close cooperation with representatives of numerous European Roma and Sinti organisations and with the help of specialist historians from the countries concerned.

The entire development of the website was accompanied by an international steering committee, in which the commissioning and funding organisations were represented: the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA Committee on the Genocide of the Roma), the Fondation pour la Mémoire de la Shoah and the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research (BMBWF).

"We have enshrined the strengthening of the culture of remembrance at schools in the government programme. The educational website romasintigenocide.eu makes a valuable contribution to this, for example by sharing the life story of the Austrian Auschwitz survivor Ceija Stojka, who was active at schools for many years as a survivor and witness of national socialism and the holocaust. However, the International Roma Day also has a relevance for today: the BMBWF is clearly committed to minority education and teaching Romanes. Discrimination against Roma and Sinti has no place in education today and I am committed to this," said the federal minister Martin Polaschek.

Teaching about the genocide at schools takes centre stage
Around half a million Roma and Romnja as well as Sinti and Sintizze were murdered by the National Socialists and their allies. However, this ethnic group was only recognised as victims of the Nazi era at a late stage. In 2024 the OeAD programme ERINNERN:AT will dedicate an annual focus to the genocide of the European Roma and Sinti and the teaching of this topic at schools. The learning website romasintigenocide.eu was also redesigned as part of this special focus.

"Very little is still known today about the genocide of the Roma and Sinti, and it is too rarely addressed in educational contexts. With our ERINNERN:AT programme we are addressing this gap in the education system and want to raise awareness of the history of the genocide – it is also about countering today's discrimination against Roma and Sinti," emphasises Jakob Calice, managing director of Austria's education agency OeAD.

Over the course of 2024 the OeAD will develop and organise further events and educational programmes on the topic of the genocide of the Roma and Sinti with our ERINNERN:AT programme. All information about the annual focus: https://www.erinnern.at/themen/jahresthema-2024-genozid-an-den-roma-sinti

With our ERINNERN:AT programme the OeAD focuses on teaching and learning about National Socialism, the Holocaust and the prevention of antisemitism through education. More information at www.erinnern.at