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Afro-Americans In West Germany

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Afro-Americans in Germany
The free-of- Jim-Crow ambience in Germany had influenced Afro-American soldiers so much that their “experiences in postwar and Cold War West Germany thus proved pivotal in the struggle against racial discrimination in America” (Hön and Klimke 1). America’s contradictory attitudes of leading the free world and at the same time hosting institutionalized racism was targeted by “the Soviet and Eastern German propagandists” (Hön and Klimke 2). What worsened matters, Jim Crow segregations were carried out in German communities. “The failure of African-American units thus were attributed to the African-Americans, and in the cases where black units achieved successes, credit went to the white officers leading them” (Schroer 47). However, “in May 1946, for the first time a majority of white Americans polled agreed that “Negroes are as intelligent as white people”” (Schroer 71). 1964 showed examples of the American government’s handling of the problem of racism producing “The President’s Committee on Equal Opportunity in the Armed Forces, Final Report: Military Personnel Stationed Overseas” (Hön and Klimke 3). One of the most important examples of collaboration between GIs and civilians in fighting for racial equality was “the “Call for Justice” meeting …show more content…
“Her poems were often dialogues, sometimes with white Germans whom she mirrored and gently critiqued. For example, in her poem “afro-deutsch I,” she mocked the everyday racism she encounters” (Gerlind). In her speech “May Ayim Teil1” she recites “afro-deutsch” and comments on this giving a briefing on her background. May Ayim’s poems “afro-german I” and “afro-german II” feature a conversation between a white German and an Afro German, which highlights annihilation of Afro-German identity. The poems stress continuous misreading and redefinition of Afro-Germans as Africans. In the first lines of “afro-deutsch I,” the white German

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