ERIAC Welcomes Janush Panchenko as Romani Language Section Coordinator

The European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture (ERIAC) is pleased to announce that Janush Panchenko has been appointed as the new Thematic Section Coordinator for Romani Language. Thematic Section Coordinators play a vital role in supporting ERIAC’s mission and strengthening engagement across our membership community. They foster dialogue and cooperation among members, encourage active participation within their respective thematic fields, and contribute to advancing ERIAC’s strategic priorities.

Acting as a bridge between ERIAC’s management, the membership community, and the ERIAC Barvalipe Academy, the Coordinators facilitate meetings, gather feedback, and support collaborative initiatives that strengthen ERIAC’s work across Europe.

We warmly welcome Janush to this role and look forward to working together to further strengthen ERIAC’s work on Romani language, its preservation, development, and use in contemporary cultural and educational contexts.

• Arts and Culture – Miguel Ángel Vargas
• Media and Information – Dalibor Tanić
• Research and Publication – Maria Bogdan, Ph.D.
• History and Commemoration – Tetiana Storozhko
• Romani Language – Janush Panchenko

Janush Panchenko is a specialist in Romani history, culture, and language and a research associate at the Institute of Ethnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences. A native speaker of the Vlaxicko dialect, he is fluent in four additional Romani dialects. His work combines academic research with practical efforts to preserve and develop the Romani language, including research on the Romani dialects of Ukraine and the preparation of a dictionary of the Vlaxicko dialect.

Janush heads the subgroup on writing systems within the working group on the codification of the Romani language at the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience. He is also the founder of the Romani organisation Romano Than and co-head of the Ukrainian Centre for Romani Studies and the Ukrainian Roma Advocacy Alliance (AURA).

His work extends from research and language preservation to education, media, and cultural production. He has led field research teams documenting Romani dialects across Ukraine and has developed bilingual educational materials in Romani that have been recommended by UNICEF and the Ukrainian Institute of Education Development for use in formal education in Ukraine. He has also translated a children’s Bible into Romani and creates fairy tales, radio plays, and other media content in the language.

As a poet and translator working in the Vlaxicko dialect, Janush translates world poetry into Romani and writes original literary works. In 2021, he won first place at the Bronisława Wajs (Papusza) International Competition of Romani Poetry and Literary Translation. In 2023, he received the Ronald Lee Award in Montreal for his contribution to the preservation and development of the Romani language.

Janush has also contributed to monitoring and advocacy work, including serving with the OSCE/ODIHR as a monitor of human rights violations against Roma in Ukraine during the Russian-Ukrainian war. He regularly speaks at academic and public events and runs a blog dedicated to the Romani language.

As Romani Language Section Coordinator, Janush aims to bring together native speakers, researchers, teachers, and cultural practitioners from different countries around practical efforts to preserve and develop the Romani language, from documenting dialects and developing writing systems to creating educational and media content that keeps Romani present in everyday life.