International Conference #RememberanceResponsibilityFuture
International conference will take place on 9 November, hotel “Novotel”. The major goal of this conference is to come up with viable recommendations about how to combat anti-Semitism and prejudice against Roma in Lithuania. This conference will highlight the intersections of historical memory and current prejudices in Lithuania, attempting to challenge the borders of what Etkind has called memory communities and revealing some less known stories of the Holocaust. Specifically, the Roma Holocaust experiences in Lithuania will be part of the discussions. These experiences, horrid as they are, are still little known and little discussed in Lithuania and abroad. Also known as Samudaripen, “mass killing” in the Roma language, and Pharrajimos, “tearing up, slicing up or desecration” in the Roma language, these experiences have not yet become a constituent part of Holocaust memory in Lithuania. Revealing these experiences may be a first step toward highlighting prejudices against Roma today. As in the past, today in Lithuania the Roma community is still marginalized and associated with criminality. Learning about the Holocaust and about the criminalization of various communities can definitely help us to understand the dangerous potential of stereotyping in today’s world.