The ROCIT team participated for the third consecutive year in the annual RUTA Conference, 12-15.07.2026, held in Uzhhorod under the theme “Rooted Knowledges and Dialogues for Change.” Bringing together more than 200 researchers, practitioners, and activists from across the world, the conference provided an important forum for discussing critical perspectives on war, displacement, decolonisation, and collaborative knowledge production.
This year’s edition marked another significant contribution. ROCIT Principal Investigator Kamila Fiałkowska organised and chaired the panel “Collaborative Methodologies in Forced Migration Research: Ethical and Epistemic Challenges”, which brought together four presentations reflecting the project’s ongoing work on unequal citizenship, forced displacement, and participatory research with Romani communities affected by the war in Ukraine.
The panel featured the following presentations:
- Kamila Fiałkowska – Reimagining Fieldwork: What Ethnography in Forced Migration Research?
- Ignacy Jóźwiak – On the Difficult Task of Doing Inclusive and Participatory Ethnography With, About and For the Roma Communities in Ukraine
- Elżbieta Mirga-Wójtowicz & Monika Szewczyk – Kher na Kher. Collective Accommodation Centres: Home or Stopover? Reciprocal Ethnography and Reflections of Ukrainian Roma on the Category of Home in Conditions of Forced Migration
- Tetiana Storozhko – Agency Against Oblivion: Romani Youth’s Oral History Testimonies as a Practice of Memory and Shifting Societal Narratives
Together, these presentations explored innovative ethnographic and collaborative methodologies, participatory approaches to research with displaced Romani communities, questions of home and belonging in collective accommodation centres, and the role of oral history in challenging dominant narratives and strengthening community memory. The panel showcased how the ROCIT project combines rigorous academic research with long-term community engagement and reciprocal knowledge production.
In addition, Monika Szewczyk contributed to another conference panel organised by Katarzyna Kubin, “Postsocialist spaces in the global knowledge economy: A Dialogue about the Challenges of Registering Local Knowledges in Cooperations between Scholars of and from Postsocialist Regions and Scholars of but Not from Them” presenting Sam Maškar – Being In-Between. Roma Emotional Methodology in Times of War: Challenges and Potentials of the Insider Position in Research on Roma Refugees from Ukraine. Her presentation reflected on the opportunities and ethical challenges of insider research conducted within Romani communities during wartime displacement.
We are grateful to the organisers for creating a vibrant interdisciplinary space that fosters dialogue between scholars, practitioners, and community partners, and we look forward to continuing these conversations in future editions.