Research
About research
Roma Research Centre operates at the interface between the social sciences (education, psychology, sociological sciences, politics and administration) and the humanities (philosophy, history, culture and religion studies, linguistics, literary studies).
In our research, we deal with the participation of the Roma in education as well as the particular socio-professional activity of members of this ethnic group, and we substantiate the need to construct local programmes, projects and policies towards the Roma. When evaluating regional policies, we also refer to the specificity of the Roma communities in the countries where we conducted the research, pointing to the elements of identity, language, culture, education and participation, or rather its level, in the context of, as it seems, still incomplete integration with the societies of culturally dominant majorities.
In addition, we deal with the cultural and cognitive contexts of perceiving Others/Otherness in general. In particular, we focus on working with people who are culturally different and with special educational needs. Moreover, we address the issues of multiculturalism and interculturalism, national and ethnic minorities, identity, intercultural education, and minority culture, with special emphasis on the problems of Roma communities in Poland and in the world.
Comparative studies on the Roma in Europe and India will also be an important area of research.
Members of the Roma Research Centre team publish in leading scientific journals, participate in research internships abroad, take active part in the domestic and international scientific conferences, as well as in the international research projects. For many years they have been performing advisory and expert functions in local government units, at the regional level and in state institutions, as well as in non-governmental organisations. Thanks to the cooperation with Lincom Academic Publisher, scientific and research work on the situation of the Roma in Central European countries is carried out in an international consortium, the result of which is the “Romani Series”. In the years 1989–2019, our team carried out plenty of domestic and foreign research and made numerous expert opinions in the area of the Polish-Czech, Polish-Slovak, Polish-German, Polish-Ukrainian and Polish-Belarusian borderlands, which were published, among others, in the series “Edukacja Międzykulturowa” (“Intercultural Education”), currently consisting of 80 volumes.
Research interests
The leading area of our research interests concerns the issues of the identity and culture of the Roma, their participation in education and the special socio-professional activity of members of this ethnic group.
Three specific thematic areas can be identified:
- theoretical studies on the sense of identity, identity behaviour and Roma culture;
- theoretical and methodological proposals based on specific research projects on the Roma education;
- the issue of adopted culturalisation strategies (adaptation, integration, participation) within the societies of the culturally dominant majority.
The second area concerns whether the cultural and cognitive contexts of perceiving Others/Otherness are exposed in general, in particular in relation to people who are culturally different, with special educational needs, the issues of multiculturalism and interculturalism, national and ethnic minorities, identity, intercultural education, and minority culture, with special emphasis on the problems of Roma communities in Poland and in the world.
Comparative studies on the Roma in Europe and India will also be an important area of research. ICCR is also interested in research into the Indian diaspora in Europe.