Constructing the Roma audience: public health communication and intervention in contemporary Romania

Abstract

This study investigated health promotion materials targeting a group historically conceived as problematic, the Romanian Roma. It examined how recent campaigns of interventions, funded by the United States and Western non-profits, understand their audience and how such constructions relate to larger political dynamics in Europe. Focusing on how practitioners conceptualized the Roma audience, as entities to be communicated with and about, in order to affect their behavior, it provides an insight regarding health communication as a political endeavor, as well as current institutionalization of cultural and ethnic differences in Romania. The analysis revealed cause for concern and also evidence of progressive thinking.

Keywords:

• health promotion
• ethnicity
• health inequalities

Acknowledgments

The author thanks Dr Brian G. Southwell for his contribution and comments to earlier drafts of this manuscript.

Notes

Notes

1. See a review of the concept in Southwell (2000).

2. For lengthier discussions of paradigm shifts, see Dutta (2007) or Sparks (2007).

3. The Roma are called by many names in various European countries and worldwide. Some use their tribal name (such as the Romanian Căldăraşi), others adopt wider group names (such as the British Travellers), and yet others opt for the more recent ‘Roma’ (or, ‘Rroma’ in Romania), used in national and international discourse and currently regarded as politically correct.

4. Reasons for such different statistics can be traced to political interests to discursively minimize the size of the ethnic minority group that must be served (on the official side) and, conversely, to maximize the Roma community size in order to gain the international attention necessary for obtaining political and social legitimacy and state aid (on the activist side).

5. See, for instance, the 2000 EU Race Equality Directive or the recent press releases by both the EU and the Council of Europe (Europa 2009).

6. All documents had external funding. The Guide and the Manual were funded by the JSI Research and Training Institute and the Romanian Family Health Initiative, with assistance from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Romanian MOPH. PHARE funds were used to draft the poster and brochure.

7. In Romanian, Diversitate culturală pentru medicul de familie: Ghid introductiv în diversitatea culturii Rome.

8. In Romanian, Manual pentru participanţi: Atelier de instruire a Mediatorilor Sanitari Romi în domeniul Sănătăţii Reproducerii.

9. The document uses a transmission model of communication, focused on sender, receiver, message, channel, code, and feedback (Carey 1992).

10. ‘Planificarea familială; dacă nu doriţi să aveţi copii, nu vă lăsaţi pe seama întâmplării!’ The brochure is about 5½′′ × 8¼′′ in size.

11. ‘Copiii tăi pot avea o viaţă mai bună, DACĂ ŞI TU AI GRIJĂ să fie curaţi, să mănânce bine, să fie vaccinaţi, să ajungă la medic când sunt bolnavi.’ The Romany translation reads ‘Te tre băieti şai jiuven mai mişto DACHE TE TUT GRIJA LENDAR te avenle tistaşi, te chan mişto, te avenle vaccinimen, te ghizanlem co doftori cana nine nasfale.’ Emphasis in the original. The poster is about 27′′ × 19′′ in size.

12. For example, European NGOs part of the movement for Roma rights document poverty, illiteracy, and physical self-marginalization.