Deutsche Übersetzung (gekürzt) erschien in Missy Magazine (Printausgabe, Mai 2013) und wurde auf der Webseite der Initiative Schwarze Menschen in Deutschland veröffentlicht.
Change is
coming to Germany.
This time
last year, the Berlin-based Deutsches
Theater had just decided to stop using Blackface in the Thalheimer
production of Dea Loher’s Unschuld.
This historic event followed weeks of campaigning by outraged critics,
concerned theatre-goers as well as other Black, of color and white activist members
of the then newly-formed anti-racist initiative Bühnenwatch. Now, just one year later, a similarly heated debate
has broken out over the use of racist vocabulary in children’s literature.
Emotions are running high and the terrain feels strangely familiar: angry blog
posts, heated public debates, furious Facebook discussions and incensed Tweets.
White media commentators speak of “censorship” and “political correctness” but in
reality the battle is about power: who should have the final say about the
representation of Black people and people of color in German culture? Until
now, white Germans have claimed this right for themselves. Yet slowly but
surely, this privilege is slipping through their fingers. For many this just
doesn’t feel good.
“Without a vision, every social change feels
like death”
Their
concern is well rehearsed. Childhood books are to be treasured, not revised!
Cultural traditions are to be preserved, not criticised! And the word “racism”
should only be reserved to describe the most heinous of crimes – those
involving Nazis or right-wing extremists! And yet, for increasing numbers of Black
Germans and Germans of color, these “truths” are inadequate. The everyday lived
experience of those of us who are often not recognised at first sight to be
German is typically marked by exoticism, contempt or fear – and sometimes all
three. The idea that one can tell who is not German simply by assessing the
skin colour is ridiculous but pervasive. It allows some people to question
others about where they come from, or to congratulate them on their accent-free
language skills or to demand to see their identity papers. Audre Lorde, an
African-American lesbian, feminist, poet, activist, scholar and mother who was
instrumental in igniting the recent Black German political movement in the
1980s, identified the need for Black people in general and Black women in
particular to support each other. It is Lorde who wrote: “without a vision,
every social change feels like death.”[1]
In order to create a vision of the future in Germany, it is necessary for
us to revisit the past.
All the Blacks are men, all the women are
white…
In global
contexts, Black women have historically been rendered invisible both within
(white dominated) feminist movements and within (male dominated) Black power
movements [2]. In Germany, this situation has been no different. Despite the
fact that Black people have been living on German soil, longer than Germany itself
has existed, most white Germans have astoundingly little knowledge regarding
the Black presence and influence in this country. And even among Black
communities in Germany, the most well-known examples of Black German self-determination
and resistance against racism prior to the mid-1980s are typically male: for
example, Anton Wilhelm Amo, a Black man who in 1736 became the first Professor
of African descent at a German university; and Rudolf Duala Manga Bell, a
Cameroonian-born king and activist who resisted German colonial rule in
Cameroon at the beginning of the 20th century and was therefore
executed for high treason in 1914. Similarly, Simone de Beauvoir and Clara
Zetkin are well-known and respected figures within the German feminist movement
and, for the most part, in mainstream German society. These ladies are both
white. However, for their respective contributions to the anti-racism movement
and the women’s movement in Germany, Black women like Emily Duala Manga Bell
(an anti-colonialist activist who survived her husband named above) and Fasia
Jansen (a peace activist and survivor of the Neuengamme concentration camp) also deserve credit and recognition.
The German
context is one which has in the past legally denied the existence of Black
Germans; one in which countless numbers of Black children were raised with only
negative terms to describe them; one in which many of these same children were
sterilised due to racist Nazi miscegenation laws; and one where Black
individuals have often lived their entire lives with no knowledge of the
existence of other people who look just like them. In this context, where
cultural representations are dominated by the ideals of white and male, and
where typical critical positions to these were either Black male or
white female, Black German lesbians and women have faced multiple hurdles. It
was within this context that Audre Lorde first visited Berlin in 1984 to
lecture at the Free University and to connect with young Black women living
there.
“First,
we must recognize each other”
A valuable
testament of this early phase of the Black (women’s) movement is provided in
the anthology “Euer Schweigen Schützt
Euch Nicht” edited by Peggy Piesche and published in Orlanda Verlag. In this book, activists like Katharina Oguntoye and
Katja Kinder discuss the beginnings of a process, which was to result in the publication
of “Farbe Bekennen,” a unique
collection of testimonies of Black German women combined with a historical
documentation of Black Germany [3]. Additionally, the various activities at
this time led to the formation of the new Black German organisations the Initiative Schwarze Deutsche (now called Initiative Schwarze Menschen in
Deutschland) and ADEFRA Afro-Deutsche
Frauen (now ADEFRA Schwarze Deutsche
Frauen und Schwarze Frauen in Deutschland). Prior to this, many of the
women had been active in, yet ultimately disappointed by, the German women’s
movement.
In her
introduction to “Farbe bekennen”
Lorde writes: “first, we must recognize each other” [4]- no small task in a
country where one had been taught that being Black was something shameful, ugly
or to be pitied. And due to internalised
beliefs regarding skin color and appearance, many Black Germans may not have
been seen as being Black at all. A major hurdle therefore was to actively live
against the denial and isolation: to approach other Black women in the street,
to meet with them socially and to organise with them politically. Credit is
also due to women like Jasmin Eding and Ina Röder-Sissako, who were also active
during those times, organising meetings in Munich and Dresden respectfully.
These initial get togethers grew to become regional political groups and,
parallel to this, annual national meetings or Bundestreffen were organised which still continue to take place for
one long weekend every summer.
“…but some of us are brave”
There is a picture
of a young white German woman participating in the 2012 Sl*twalk Berlin demonstration
– it is famous by now. In it, the young woman is carrying a placard with the
slogan: “Unveil women’s rights to unveil” [5]. In the picture she is topless
and, except for a rectangle-shaped area across her eyes, her body is painted
entirely black. There are other white women in this picture too - in fact two
of them have also painted their bodies black. Clearly, the other women
demonstrating find the slogan and imagery acceptable, even if they do not
wholeheartedly support the political statement. However, this image is
problematic for many reasons and in the weeks following the demonstration many
protestors articulated their criticism in the form of blog posts, tweets,
emails and commentaries at public debates.
In fact, the image described above is a stunning demonstration of white
privilege in the feminist movement. It is another attempt by white women to
claim the competence to speak for women of color using racist, oppressive and
discriminatory tools to do so. In order
for Black women and women of color to be able to walk side by side with their
white sisters in the women’s movement, the specific oppressions we experience
need to become visible and taken seriously. And it is not the work of the
oppressed to educate others about this. The use of Blackface has a specific
racist tradition and cannot be reclaimed by white people, no matter how worthy
the aim. And the use of the veil as a battleground to assert women’s rights is
not the business of non-Muslim women. Such behaviour is patronising and
perpetuates the ill-informed and islamophobic belief that women of color do not
make conscious decisions to wear a hijab,
niqab or burqa. We can speak for ourselves.
Much is
owed by the recent organisation of Black people in Germany to the courage, hard
work and tenacity of Black women and lesbians who were active during the 1980s.
Similarly, advances in the current discourse on diversity in Germany are built
on the teachings and academic research of Black women like Professor Dr.
Maureen Maisha Eggers, Professor Dr. Grada Kilomba, Professor Dr. Fatima
El-Tayeb, Peggy Piesche, Nicola Lauré Al-Samarai, Natasha A. Kelly, Nadja
Ofuatey-Alazard as well as the professional expertise and activism of Black
women like Lara-Sophie Milagro (actress and opera singer), Noah Sow (author,
musician, founder and management committee member of Der Braune Mob, media watch organisation), Sandrine Micossé-Aikins
(artist and curator) and Sheila Mysorekar (author and journalist). The list is
by no means exhaustive, but intended to provide an idea of wealth of resources
at Germany’s fingertips – if only one will take the time to access them.
True
anti-oppressive activism means sharing your power and working in partnership
with Black women and women of color: not speaking for us, but promoting our
platforms and sharing your platforms with us, in order that we may speak and be
heard on our own terms. In order that
our names may be suggested for renamed streets, in order that our histories may
be studied in school, in order that we may be asked to comment on current
affairs. In a recent personal
conversation, one Afro-German journalist for Die Zeit confided in me that she is quietly optimistic that this is
finally happening. She remarked that the number of Black women interviewed for
mainstream media outlets during the current debate about racist language in
German children’s books - although pitifully small in number - was
significantly more than the number of contributions during the Blackface
debate. And it will get better. Especially if we Black women continue the path
of social activism established by those who preceded us.
Change is
coming to Germany. It is slow, but we are getting there.
Notes
[1] Quoted
in Piesche, Peggy (Hg.) (2012) ‚„Euer Schweigen Schützt Euch Nicht“.
Audre Lorde und die Schwarze Frauenbewegung in Deutschland‘ (Berlin: Orlanda
Verlag), p82
[2] The
name of this article is borrowed from the anthology ‘All the Women are White,
All the Blacks are Men, But Some of Us are Brave’ edited by Gloria T. Hull, Patricia
Bell-Scott and Barbara Smith (New York: Feminist Press, 1982) which examines
Black Feminism in the United States.
[3] Oguntoye, Katharina; Ayim, May und Schultz, Dagmar (1986)
‚Farbe Bekennen, Afro-deutsche Frauen auf den Spuren ihrer Geschichte‘ (Berlin:
Orlanda Verlag)
[4] Quoted
in Piesche, Peggy (Hg.) (2012) ‚„Euer Schweigen Schützt Euch Nicht“.
Audre Lorde und die Schwarze Frauenbewegung in Deutschland‘ (Berlin: Orlanda
Verlag), p80
[5]
http://static0.demotix.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/a_scale_large/1400-9/photos/1347729784-slut-walk-berlin-demonstration-takes-place-in-brandengurger-gate_1449559.jpg
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