Internet Learns Romani

Background

One of the largest minorities in Europe do not have their language translated by Google The Roma minority is one of the largest ethnic minorities in Europe. There are an estimated 12 million Roma living in Europe and they are among the most impoverished populations in the EU, being faced with social exclusion, unequal access to education, employment, housing and medical services*. Romani is a mostly spoken language, there are hardly any books, there is no press in Romani, therefore, the Roma people don’t learn, read or write in Romani.

Idea

Vice, the international publication that has always fought the anti-discrimination war, together with Aresel Civic Platform in Romania, launch “INTERNET LEARNS ROMANI”, a campaign that aims to hijack Google, by uploading written content in Romani language on the internet. If there is enough content, Google will recognize the Romani language and will offer translations to and from it. Read the first articles published in Romani by Vice here: https://www.vice.com/ro/topic/vice-in-limba-romani Watch the campaign film here: https://youtu.be/UgUJ1jvDJGk But why is it important to have content in Romani language? According to a study done by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights*, in the EU, only 15% of Roma children ever graduate from high school. Even worse, 20% of the Roma people over 16 yo included in the study are illiterate. “Everybody should have the right to learn in their native language. If that is too much to ask at this point in our history, then at least everybody should have the right to access to content in their native language. That will give people another reason to learn how to read and write. We do think that there is a connection between the fact that there is no written content in Romani and the high numbers in terms of illiteracy and school dropout among Roma people. Having access to written content in their mother tongue could avoid the grim statistics in the future. We must start somewhere, and we decided to start with Google. We are offering a solution that so many online publications, schools, websites can also adopt. There is a huge effort behind translating the content into Romani, as there is a small number of translators from and to Romani. But it can be done, and we are not stopping here”, stated Ciprian Necula, Aresel Civic Platform Coordinator “We discovered that if there is enough translated content online, the translation AI learns it. With any mirrored content in a language Google understands, it analyses linguistic patterns and is able to learn a new language altogether. That new language becomes a new one indexed by the translating machine and is perfected over time. This would be a tool for culture legitimization, making things as learning in Romani, finding entertainment in Romani, games, articles at hand and eliminating the stigma put on the culture”, stated Ioana Zamfir, ECD MRM Romania „Technology is amazing because it accelerates progress. This time we aim to use it to put integration on a fast track. Google proved it plays a role in shaping up the world and in supporting cultures. Now, by integrating the Romani language in Google Translate, it can help a culture grow and make a difference in the lives of more than 12M people.”, stated Catalin Dobre, CCO McCann Worldgroup Romania & Regional CD McCann Central Eastern Europe “This has to happen not only in Romania, but in all countries that have Roma communities. Bulgaria, Spain, Italy, the UK, Greece, to name a few. We need as many bilingual translations as possible. If anybody wants to submit for translation articles, website content, online books, restaurant menus, they can easily upload text on the campaign page – https://internetlearnsromani.com If anybody who speaks Romani wants to help us translate, they can do so by registering on the website. Soon, if there is content online, the machine will know what to do with it and we will soon have Romani language translated by Google”, stated Adrian Tudor, Campaigner Aresel.