Nina Alexandrovna Dudarova (Russian: Нина Александровна Дударова;

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

, 1903 –

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

, 1992) was a

Roma Roma or ROMA may refer to: Places Australia * Roma, Queensland, a town ** Roma Airport ** Roma Courthouse ** Electoral district of Roma, defunct ** Town of Roma, defunct town, now part of the Maranoa Regional Council *Roma Street, Brisbane, a ...

poet, teacher, writer and translator. She was born in Saint Petersburg to a Roma mother (who was a singer and dancer in a Roma

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

) and a Russian stepfather, both of whom raised Dudarova as their own child. After studying teaching and

pedagogy Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken as ...

, in 1925 she joined the then-recently founded All-Russian Union of Gypsies in Moscow. One aim of the union was to fight against illiteracy and for the formation of schools in the

Romani language Romani (; also Romany, Romanes , Roma; rom, rromani ćhib, links=no) is an Indo-Aryan macrolanguage of the Romani communities. According to '' Ethnologue'', seven varieties of Romani are divergent enough to be considered languages of their ...

. In 1926, she was commissioned with fellow Roma poet and translator Nikolai Pankov, to work out an alphabet for Romani. Dudarova and Pankov's final

Cyrillic , bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця , fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs , fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic , fam3 = Phoenician , fam4 = G ...

transcription was based on the dialect of the

Ruska Roma The Ruska Roma (russian: Руска́ Рома́), also known as Russian Gypsies (russian: Русские цыгане) or ''Xaladitka Roma'' (russian: Халадытка Рома, translit=Khaladytka Roma, ''i.e.'' "Roma-Soldiers"), are the ...

. There was a large amount of Romani literature written in this alphabet (over 300 books between 1927 and 1938); however, this influence fell in a comparatively limited circle, mainly in

and several towns in the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

, and ended in 1938 when the official Soviet Roma policy changed from treating the Roma as a separate people who should develop as a constituent element of Soviet society to integrationism. In the early days of the Soviet Union, many primers were published on the subject of Roma education for use not only in Roma schools, but also for the adult illiterate Roma population. Dudarova's primer ''Nevo Drom: Bukvaryo Vash Bare Manushenge'' was one of the first. Dudarova and Pankov were editors of the literary and social review ''Nevo Drom'' ("New Road") and participated in the publication of popular

almanacs An almanac (also spelled ''almanack'' and ''almanach'') is an annual publication listing a set of current information about one or multiple subjects. It includes information like weather forecasts, farmers' planting dates, tide tables, and other ...

wherein Dudarova published children's poems imbued with

socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...

ideology. At this time, she also helped translate the works of

Alexander Pushkin Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin (; rus, links=no, Александр Сергеевич ПушкинIn pre-Revolutionary script, his name was written ., r=Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin, p=ɐlʲɪkˈsandr sʲɪrˈɡʲe(j)ɪvʲɪtɕ ˈpuʂkʲɪn, ...

into Romani and directed the ''Loly Cheren'' (Red Star) cultural and social club. She travelled the country to give lectures on education, the alleged misdeeds of religions, hygiene and women's rights. From the 1930s she taught Romani at the

Romen Theatre Romen Theatre (russian: link=no, Московский музыкально-драматический театр "Ромэн") is the oldest and the most famous of Romani theatres in the world. The theatre is a key object of Romani culture in Ru ...

in Moscow and worked as a literature editor for children. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the Soviet Union renounced all programs in Romani and Dudarova fell into anonymity.

References

Citations

Sources

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Dudarova, Nina 1903 births 1992 deaths Romani-language writers Romani poets Soviet Romani people Soviet poets Soviet educators