Roma’s Identities in Southeast Europe: Macedonia Working Paper May 2005 9 ETHNO BAROMETER The Ethnobarometer Working Paper Series Roma’s Identities in Southeast Europe: Macedonia by Azbija Memedova, Shayna Plaut, Andrea Boscoboinik, Christian Giordano ETHNOBAROMETER © Ethnobarometer 2005 All rights reserved Designed by Utta Wickert-Sili, Rome ISBN Keywords: Roma, Macedonia, minorities, perceptions, identity, social organization, Southeast Europe Ethnobarometer Via Brescia 16 00198 Rome Italy
[email protected] www.ethnobarometer.org Contents Introduction: Roma’s Identity and the Political Arena Andrea Boscoboinik, Christian Giordano Blank Face, Private Strength: Romani Identity as Represented in the Public and Private Sphere Shayna Plaut, Azbija Memedova The Authors Roma’s Identity and the Political Arena Introduction Andrea Boscoboinik and Christian Giordano Introduction Like most countries in the Balkan region, Macedonia1 is a multiethnic state. Macedonians, Albanians, Roma, Turks, Vlachs and Serbs, with Roma constituting the third largest group, coexist in this land. The research project “Perceptions, self- perceptions and social organization of Roma in Central and East European countries” was conducted in this context. Macedonia is the second country concerned by this project, the first one being Bulgaria2 where the research was conducted in 2002. In the meanwhile, Europe underwent an important event: ten Central and East European countries have become members of the European Union. With the accomplishment of this latest EU enlargement, Roma communities appear as a significant minority in the European Union. This means that Roma identity question is, today more than ever, a political question. This is one of the reasons why our report emphasizes more on politics and on the political aspect of Roma in Macedonia than our reports concerning Roma in Bulgaria.