Black American Feminist Struggle in Contemporary Berlin: An Example of Nkwaethnography in German Studies

Recent calls for social justice in Berlin have been fueled in part by the #BlackLivesMatter movement, the "official" acknowledgment of the Afropean population(s) through the Afrozensus, and calls to rename colonial references on buildings, street signs, and UBahn stations. Further, warped perceptions of risk grafted on political correctness enable a resistance to acknowledging racism. This article engages both autoethnographic and autotheoretical practices through a presentation of Nkwaethnography, an "Africancentered ethnographic research approach" (Allen-Handy). In this mixed genre of writing, I merge a firsthand account of experiences in Berlin in August 2023 with autotheoretical approaches, analyzing power negotiations, tokenism, and being perceived as a "model minority" in contemporary Berlin. The text exemplifies how Black women, through the example of an African American woman in a European context, are called (or confined) to occupy a certain perceived safe space where "well-meaning" White interlocutors can work through their prejudices, frustrations, and confusion.