Gender and German Colonialism (Routledge Research in Gender and History) [1 ed.] 1032458550, 9781032458557

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Routledge Research in Gender and History

GENDER AND GERMAN COLONIALISM INTIMACIES, ACCOUNTABILITIES, INTERSECTIONS Edited by Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang

Gender and German Colonialism

This book addresses the intersection between gender and colonialism primarily in German colonialism. Gender and German Colonialism is concerned with colonialism as a historical phenomenon and with the repercussions and transformations of the colonial era in contemporary racist and sexist discourses and practices relating to refugees, migrants, and people of non-European descent living in Europe. This volume contributes to the broader effort of decolonization, with particular attention to concepts of gender. Rather than focus on only one European empire, it discusses and compares multiple former colonial powers in context. In addition to German colonialism, some chapters focus on the role of gender in Dutch and Belgian colonialism in Indonesia, Africa, and the Americas. This volume will be of value to students and scholars interested in women’s and gender studies, social and cultural history, and imperial and colonial history. Elisabeth Krimmer is a Professor of German at the University of California, Davis. She is the author of five monographs, including German Women’s Life Writing and the Holocaust: Complicity and Gender in the Second World War, and the editor of fourteen volumes, including Realities and Fantasies of German Female Leadership: From Maria Antonia of Saxony to Angela Merkel. Chunjie Zhang is an Associate Professor of German at the University of California, Davis. She is the author of Transculturality and German Discourse in the Age of European Colonialism (2017) and the editor of Composing Modernist Connections in China and Europe (Routledge, 2019). She co-edited journal issues on world literature, the Enlightenment, and Asian German Studies.

Routledge Research in Gender and History

46 Oral Histories of Tibetan Women Whispers from the Roof of the World Lily Xiao Hong Lee 47 Women in the French Enlightenment From Femme Savante to Mother of the Family Anna Maria Marchini 48 The Life and Turbulent Times of Clara Dorothea Rackham Suffragist, Socialist, and Social Reformer Maroula Joannou 49 Transnational Modernity in Southern Europe Women’s Periodicals and Salon Culture (1860–1920) Christina Bezari 50 Ida Greaves A Pioneer Development Economist Barbara Ingham 51 History and Legacy of the Suffragette Fellowship Calling all Women! Eileen Luscombe 52 Women’s Amateur Theatre in Rural Britain, 1919–1945 Bonnie White 53 Gender and German Colonialism Intimacies, Accountabilities, Intersections Edited by Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge. com/Routledge-Research-in-Gender-and-History/book-series/SE0422

Gender and German Colonialism Intimacies, Accountabilities, Intersections Edited by Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang

First published 2024 by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 and by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2024 selection and editorial matter, Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. ISBN: 978-1-032-45855-7 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-45856-4 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-37899-0 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990 Typeset in Sabon by MPS Limited, Dehradun

Contents

List of Figures List of Contributors Introduction

viii ix 1

ELISABETH KRIMMER AND CHUNJIE ZHANG

PART 1

Intimacies 1 Farming Frontiers: The German Woman Pioneer

27 29

PATRICIA ANNE SIMPSON

2 Working for Weihnachtsstimmung: German Women’s Role in Recreating German Culture and Identity in German Southwest Africa and German East Africa, 1894–1906

49

KATE McGREGOR

3 Colonialism and the Politics of Gender and Literature in the Netherlands Indies: The Story of the Nyai

66

CARL NIEKERK

4 Repairing Relations: Gendered Encounters in the Dutch East Indies in Wilhelmina Kruijtbosch’s Novel Het witte doek SIMON RICHTER

85

vi

Contents

PART 2

Accountabilities 5 Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) as a Pioneering Literary Denouncement of Dutch Colonialism

107

109

JEROEN DEWULF

6 German Women and the Dissemination of Colonial Ideology (1907–1920)

128

ADÈLE DOUANLA AND ÉSAIE DJOMO

7 White Women Saving White Men: Women Writers in Belgian and German Colonial Literature

144

ROBRECHT DE BOODT AND ANKE GILLEIR

8 Colonial Revisionism and German Imperialism in Senta Dinglreiter’s National Socialist Writings

162

JOSEPH KEBE-NGUEMA

9 Fire, Savannah, and Passion: The New Africa Novel and the Construction of White Femininity

187

VERENA HUTTER

PART 3

Intersections

205

10 Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries: Kā lidā sa’s Ś akuntalā in Germany

207

TANVI SOLANKI

11 Völkisch Nationalism and Its Unfolding in the Colonial Context: Adda von Liliencron’s Historical Novels Giovanna (1881) and Nach Südwestafrika (1906)

226

AYLIN BADEMSOY

12 Maria Theresia Ledóchowska as an Activist in the Religious Colonization of Africa ESAIE DJOMO AND DORINE MBEUDOM

245

Contents

13 From Colonialism to Contemporary Racism: Retelling (Male) Master Narratives from the Perspective of Marginalized Women in Sharon Dodua Otoo’s Fictional Texts

vii

260

MARTINA KOFER

14 De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging: Literary and Essayistic Interventions by Otoo and Yaghoobifarah

283

HELGA DRUXES

Bibliography Index

306 330

Figures

3.1

6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 11.1

Source: Rob Nieuwenhuys, Komen en blijven. Tempo doeloe—een verzonken wereld. Fotografische documenten uit het oude Indië 1870–1920 (Amsterdam: Querido, 1998), 95 (public domain) Picture of children admiring soap Picture of two men making fire Picture of African woman doing laundry Picture of three African cannibals Children with white missionary Annelies and Timotheus in Nach Südwestafrika (Public Domain, J.F. Steinkopf Verlag, 1906)

67 133 134 136 137 140 227

Contributors

Aylin Bademsoy is a Ph.D. candidate in the German Department at the University of California, Davis, USA. Her dissertation project is a comparative study of processes of modernization and racialization in the German and Ottoman/Turkish contexts. Other research interests include Marxist theory, Frankfurt School, feminist theory, and psychoanalysis. Robrecht De Boodt (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium) has a background in history and literary studies and is a member of the MDRN research lab at the Faculty of Arts of K.U. Leuven. He is currently completing his Ph.D. on scientific knowledge and epistemic authority in Belgian and German colonial writing (1890–1950). Jeroen Dewulf (University of California, Berkeley, USA) is a Queen Beatrix Professor in Dutch Studies at the UC Berkeley Department of German. He is also the Faculty Academic Director of Berkeley Study Abroad and the Director of the Institute of European Studies. He is associated with the University of Lisbon as a researcher at its Center of History. Esaïe Djomo (University of Dschang, Cameroon) studied Germanic Studies, Comparative Literature, and African Studies at the universities of Yaoundé and Saarbrucken (Ph.D. 1992 and Habilitation 2005 in Mannheim). He is the author of many publications on colonial and postcolonial cultures, in which he focuses on mechanisms of identity construction and development of hegemonic discourses. Adèle Douanla (University of Dschang, Cameroon) was born on April 5, 1989, in Yaoundé, Cameroon. She holds a Master’s degree in German Literature and Culture from the University of Dschang. She is currently in the final stages of completing her doctoral thesis at the same institution on education and identity construction in German Cameroon (1884–1914).

x List of Contributors Helga Druxes is Paul H. Hunn ’55 Professor of Social Studies, emerita at Williams College, USA, and co-author of Screening Solidarity: Neoliberalism and Transnational Cinemas (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023) and co-editor of Digital Media Strategies of the Far Right Across Europe and the United States (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2015) and Navid Kermani (Peter Lang Oxford, 2016). Anke Gilleir is a Professor of German Literature at the Department of Literary Studies at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. Her research addresses modern German literature from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth centuries, with a particular focus on women writers and intellectuals. Together with Barbara Hahn (Vanderbilt/FU Berlin), she recently edited the Gesammelte Schriften of the GermanJewish writer Margarete Susman. Verena Hutter is the German Program Coordinator at the University of Portland, in Portland, Oregon, USA. Her research interests include feminist theory, body theory, memory culture, and German-South Pacific relations. Joseph Kebe-Nguema (Sorbonne Université, France/Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, Germany) is a Ph.D. student interested in the depictions of race, class, gender/genre, and dis/ability in Youth Literature. Dr. Martina Kofer (Ludwig-Maximilans-Universität München/Universität Potsdam, Germany) is concurrently an Academic Assistant for the Pedagogy of Literature at the University of Potsdam and a lecturer for German pedagogy at the LMU Munich. She earned her doctorate in German Literature. Her research interests include multilingualism, intercultural, postcolonial literary studies, and pedagogy, gender as a category of analysis in literary studies and pedagogy, postmigrant literature, and children’s and youth literature. Dorine Mbeudom received her Ph.D. in German Language and Literature from the University of Dschang, Cameroon. She studied Communication Science and German as a Foreign Language at the University of Yaoundé. She is currently a German teacher at a lycée. Her research interests include colonial and missionary literature, intercultural studies, dramaturgy, and religion and gender. Kate McGregor is a Ph.D. student in the Department of History at the University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, Canada. Her doctoral research, “‘There is only one way to be pretty!’ Racialized Beauty Norms in the Global German Empire, 1884–1939” focuses on the connection between race, power, and beauty in the female spaces of the

List of Contributors

xi

global German Empire. She has received several scholarships for her doctoral research, including a Doctoral Fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada in 2020. Carl Niekerk (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA) is, most recently, the author of Enlightenment Anthropology: Defining Humanity in an Era of Colonialism (Penn State UP, 2024) and currently the editor of the Lessing Yearbook. His teaching and research interests include German literature and culture since 1750, the early history of anthropology, (post)colonial theory, the history of sexuality, music, and culture, and comparative Dutch studies. Simon Richter is a Professor of German and Dutch culture at the University of Pennsylvania, USA. His research focuses on cultural aspects of climate adaptation in Germany, Indonesia, the Netherlands, and the United States. Patricia Anne Simpson is a Professor of German at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA. She has published widely in the field of German studies and, most recently, she published the book The Play World: Toys, Texts, and the Transatlantic German Childhood (2020). She is currently completing a book-length study entitled German Empires and Decolonial Fantasies, 1492–1942. Tanvi Solanki is an Assistant Professor of German and Comparative Literature at Underwood International College, Yonsei University, South Korea. Her research focuses on eighteenth-century Germany and is concerned with aural cultural diversity and the cultural aspect of sounds. She received her doctorate from Princeton University and was the Postdoctoral Associate at Cornell University.

Introduction Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang

Gender and German Colonialism: Intimacies, Accountabilities, Intersections explores the nexus between gender and colonialism and the impact of female agency in German, Austrian, Swiss, Belgian, and Dutch colonial and neocolonial history, literature, and culture. Women’s roles in colonial conquest were manifold. Colonized women were made to serve European masters and mistresses as workers, nannies, cooks, and concubines. They were vulnerable to degradation, violence, and sexual assault, but they also developed strategies that allowed them to negotiate and resist exploitation. White women participated, eagerly or reluctantly, in colonial exploits. They were seen as stewards of European morality and potential agents of miscegenation. To some, colonial conquest opened up professional opportunities and freedoms from which they were barred in their home countries. Our volume seeks to explore female agency in multiple colonial and neocolonial contexts. We argue that regardless of any individual woman’s specific position, gender continues to interfere with understandings of colonialism and of political and moral agency on every level. Colonizing nations are coded as masculine, whereas colonized nations are derided as effeminate. Colonial policies are shaped by and play out in the domestic arena, which is traditionally coded feminine. Similarly, guilt and responsibility are often seen as functions of gender: gendered concepts of agency can serve to minimize or erase responsibility for discrimination, political crimes, and even genocide or, conversely, heighten the sense of culpability. This volume shows that a detailed analysis of gender sheds light not only on the colonial past but also on the inextricable link between this past and contemporary racist and gendered discourses and practices in the larger European context. As Ann Laura Stoler argues, “colonial pasts, though effaced, continue to carve out the environmental and psychic debris in which people live, long after colonial polities have been dismantled.”1 In spite of changing demographics and increased diversity in the Netherlands, Belgium, and in German-speaking countries, misconceptions about the colonial ventures of these countries persist. These misconceptions remain DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-1

2 Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang tethered to misapprehensions of gender. Unreflected patterns of racialization merge with sexist stereotypes and affect perceptions and policies surrounding refugees and migration as the effects of Western imperialism and colonialism persist long after or even without an extensive colonial history. We maintain that imperialist structures inform dominant beliefs even today despite the concerted efforts of worldwide decolonization movements.2 The problematic colonial past continues to permeate everyday encounters: immigrants and refugees are perceived as outsiders and/or branded as sexual predators; statues and street signs honor colonial perpetrators; everyday speech, ranging from TV news to advertisements, relies on derogatory racist and sexist terminology. This volume seeks to contribute to the larger effort of decolonization with a focus on gender and colonialism and a shift from studying only one former European colonizer to discussing multiple former colonizing powers, such as German, Dutch, and Belgian colonialisms in Indonesia, Malaysia, Africa, and the Americas. It also ponders the aftereffects of these colonial legacies in contemporary discourses and in the political reality of refugees and migration in these European countries. While Britain and France are generally considered major colonial powers and are often studied and compared, the colonial histories of Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands have received somewhat less attention and have typically been studied in isolation despite the linguistic and cultural affinities between them. Similarly, while pertinent studies of the role of gender in (post)colonialism have been published, the focus is often on one nation-state or on one specific historical period.3 In contrast, our volume casts a wider net across German-language, Belgian, and Dutch contexts to interrogate the nexus of gender and colonialism from a variety of cultural, historical, and theoretical perspectives. All contributors explore the complex roles of women in colonial cultures and commerce along with the multiple links between the colonial past and the neocolonial present. The following sections in this introduction provide the theoretical framework and historical background for the chapters in this volume. We first review major scholarly contributions to German colonialism since the late 1990s and explain the need to connect the colonial past to the most recent decolonization movements in the West since 2020 as well as the benefit of studying gender, colonialism, and contemporary decolonization across European borders. The second and third sections outline the basic parameters of German colonial history and the role of gender in this history. We do so because scholars of gender studies are not necessarily familiar with colonial history, whereas scholars of coloniality are not necessarily familiar with gender studies. In including this dual survey, we hope to open this volume to a large group of diverse scholars.

Introduction

3

An Archeology of the Study of German Colonialism Since the late 1990s, literary and cultural studies scholars and historians have started to engage with German colonialism as a historical phenomenon, which officially ended after the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, and with its repercussions in German society into the present. Article 119 of the Treaty of Versailles demanded that Germany cede its colonial possessions in Africa, China, and the Pacific to Allied Mandate Powers, such as Japan and the United Kingdom. The impact of Germany’s short-lived colonialism, however, extends beyond 1919. Several anthologies have addressed issues of German colonialism and serve as examples for this volume. One of the pioneering publications, The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy (1998), claims a belatedness in the investigation of German colonialism from the perspective of postcolonial theory and analysis, inaugurated by Edward Said’s Orientalism (1978). The editors of the book, Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop, identify three major reasons why postcolonial theories and analyses did not resonate in German studies as early and powerfully as in British and French studies. The relatively short period of German colonialism, the lack of German-language postcolonial literature and cultural products, which were abundant in former British and French colonies, and the intensive focus on the Holocaust in German historical and cultural studies have all caused this neglect of German colonialism and its repercussions in scholarship both in the United States and in Germany. The editors aim to fill this gap and introduce postcolonial approaches to German studies, situating German culture in a larger postcolonial context so that pertinent issues such as equality, justice, race, gender, and nation could be effectively addressed in a more balanced manner. As the title of the anthology suggests, the editors consider the “imperialist imagination” the central category that captures colonialist mentalities during and after German colonialism as well as during the process of German nation building. They claim: “It is our contention that the coincidence of these two desires—for nation and for empire—had distinct and broad ramifications for Germans in their attempts to understand themselves as a political entity. Further, we argue that it was the parallel failure of these dreams that has made the German search for identity, for Germanness, so pervasive and has led to the preoccupation with national identity that has shaped, even plagued, so much of subsequent German history.”4 This focus on the imperialist imagination aligns with the monograph Colonial Fantasies: Conquest, Family, and Nation in Precolonial Germany, 1770–1870 (1997) by Susanne Zantop, one of the editors.5 Tanvi Solanki’s chapter in this volume, “Colonial Philology and its Erotic

4 Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang Imaginaries: Kālidāsa’s Śakuntalā in Germany,” follows this model, parsing the colonial mindset’s eroticizing effect in the works of prominent early nineteenth-century German philologists who were strongly influenced by European colonialism. Departing from the focus on colonial mindsets but changing direction, German Colonialism Revisited: African, Asian, and Oceanic Experiences (2014) foregrounds colonial practice. The editors, Klaus Mühlhahn, Nina Berman, and Patrice Nganang, identified the study of practice as a lacuna in the scholarship of German colonialism, contending that one should highlight “social, economic, political, and cultural practices generated by African, Asian, and Oceanic individuals and groups within the context and aftermath of German colonialism.”6 The editors abandon the ideological focus on imaginations and textual discourses of colonialism that characterized the early phase of postcolonial studies and also avoid making claims about colonial resistance and subversion. Rather they consider “practice theory,” defining practice as a routinized behavior, more pertinent for the study of German colonialism. They argue: “Instead of ‘Manichean allegories’ of division, we find interaction that crosses ethnic and racial lines; instead of hybridity, we can identify coexisting cultural forms; instead of mimicry, we see change and the emergence of new sociocultural structures; instead of the silence of the subaltern, we hear a multitude of voices.”7 The editors thus consider a transnational approach essential. At the same time, they are aware that theoretical models are limited in different contexts: “From a German studies perspective, German interactions with East Africans, for example, may be termed as ‘transnational,’ but these same interactions, from an East African perspective, are ‘non-national,’ and better described as intercultural and transregional.”8 A transnational approach has also informed other monographs and surveys on German colonialism in the last decades. In Alabama in Africa: Booker T. Washington, the German Empire, and the Globalization of the New South (2010), Andrew Zimmerman shows that the Tuskegee cotton expedition to Togo, a collaboration between the German colonial authority and Booker T. Washington, a prominent African American educator from Alabama, illustrates the transnational entanglements of German and American models and ideologies of race and labor. “It brought together the long American history of slavery and emancipation, Jim Crow, sharecropping, and the promises of a ‘New South,’ with the long German history of the colonization of Eastern Europe, the partition of Poland, the end of serfdom, the migrations of Germans and Poles, and the promise of an expert state that used social science to control and develop its territory and population.”9 With this study, Zimmerman intends to show the global connections between German, American, and

Introduction

5

African histories that have been tendentiously separated from each other in the framework of national exceptionalism. Britta Schilling, in Postcolonial Germany: Memories of Empire in a Decolonized Nation (2014), observes that “the German case is important to understanding wider European colonialisms and postcolonialisms because it is at once an example and an aberration.”10 Schilling points out that German colonialism differs from other European countries because Germany did not experience a wave of “the empire writes back” with the decolonization movement after 1945, when a huge group of ex-colonial migrants lived and worked in British and French metropoles.11 The memory of colonialism has been dormant and less discussed in the German discourse than in that of other European countries. Sebastian Conrad, in German Colonialism: A Short History (2008), places German colonialism in a global context and argues that colonialism in German history is more important than has been assumed thus far. He points out that the legacy of colonialism is still with us, not only in the colonies but also in European metropoles: “colonial issues continue to be central to present-day political conflicts. In Europe, reminders of the colonial era are everywhere, from the ban on the hijab in French schools and apologies for slavery in Britain to debates on Dutch ‘excesses’ in Indonesia. In 2005, the French parliament decided that schools must make a deliberate effort to emphasize the ‘positive aspects’ of colonial rule. Simultaneously, uncritical interpretations of colonialism presented in Japanese schoolbooks were provoking violent demonstrations in Beijing and Seoul. The claim for reparations launched by the Herero of Namibia against the Federal Republic of Germany brought the colonial past onto the agenda in German society, too. Across Germany, debates are under way about whether streets with names referring to certain inglorious episodes from the German colonial era should be renamed.”12 Conrad’s statement was published in English in 2008. The most recent decolonization movements since 2020 were more forceful in their demands to reflect on the entanglement between the colonial past and the present condition of people of non-European descent in the West. A recent surge of decolonial efforts among writers and thinkers in Germany has urged us to see the continuation of colonial thinking, racism, racialization, and related issues of social justice. Institutionally speaking, the return of looted objects from German museums to former African colonies, the German government’s 2021 promise to pay 1.2 billion Euros reparations to Namibia, and the 2023 German-language movie “Der vermessene Mensch” (Measures of Men) highlighting German genocide in Namibia indicate an unprecedented move by the German government to recognize the trauma and wounds caused by colonialism.13 It is thus a timely task that our volume has taken up; we seek to build on the most recent wave of decolonization in Germany and link it to the broader global context, thus demonstrating the inextricable relationships

6 Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang between the colonial past and its present repercussions and transformations. Hence, unlike in other anthologies, some authors in this volume discuss contemporary literature and cultural phenomena that do not portray German colonialism per se, but rather echo the colonial past in its current incarnation as extant racism and discrimination. These chapters focus on writers of African descent in contemporary German literature or German literary imaginations of Africa, including Helga Druxes’s “DeNaturalizing Gender and National Belonging: Literary and Essayistic Interventions by Otoo and Yaghoobifarah,” Verena Hutter’s “Fire, Savannah, and Passion: The New Africa Novel and the Construction of White Femininity,” and Martina Kofer’s “From Colonialism to Contemporary Racism: Retelling (Male) Master Narratives from the Perspective of Marginalized Women in Sharon Dodua Otoo’s Fictional Texts.” These scholars call attention to inherent racializations in today’s attitudes, language, and policy toward refugees, migrants, and minorities of non-European descent. While some scholars investigated causal relations between German colonial atrocities and the Holocaust, and the New York Times recently called the massacre in Namibia “Germany’s Other Genocide,” extreme violence, exploitation, and racism were not unique to the German colonies but pervaded in other European colonial practices as well.14 It is important to place German colonialism in the global context and to illuminate other European colonialisms along with the German case. German colonialism and its aftermath resemble but also differ from other European cases. Hence, this volume aims to move beyond the frame of German national literature so as to render visible connections between German and other European colonialism, including Dutch and Belgian colonialism in Africa and Indonesia in four chapters of this volume.15 Robrecht De Boodt and Anke Gilleir’s “White Women Saving White Men: Women Writers in Belgian and German Colonial Literature,” Jeroen DeWulf’s “Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) as a Pioneering Literary Denouncement of Dutch Colonialism,” Carl Niekerk’s “Colonialism and the Politics of Gender and Literature in the Netherlands Indies: The Story of the Nyai,” and Simon Richter’s “Repairing Relations: Gendered Encounters with Non-Binary Gender in a Woman’s Novel of the Dutch East Indies” all analyze unique and fascinating accounts of European or Indonesian women during Dutch and Belgian colonialisms, in relation to German colonialism. After discussing the continuities of coloniality and decolonization in contemporary Germany and Europe, home of the colonizers, we would like to briefly turn to two recently published studies of the former colonies: Michael Ng’s 2022 book Political Censorship in British Hong Kong: Freedom of Expression and the Law (1842–1997) and Valentin-Yves

Introduction

7

Mudimbe’s The Scent of the Father: Essays on the Limits of Life and Science in Sub-Saharan Africa, a classic study first published in French in 1982 and translated into English in 2023. These two books help us put our focus on German colonialism in perspective and, in addition to critiquing coloniality in Europe, also teach us to see coloniality in international politics. The two books challenge and deconstruct the former colonizers’ claim that they are bestowing the “gifts” of freedom, democracy, and civilization to the colonies. Political freedom and national independence motivated movements of decolonization worldwide after the end of the Second World War. Yet the West has used the notion of freedom as a political strategy to counter decolonization efforts, insinuating that local regimes that are established after the transfer of power are politically less liberal—even though colonial regimes ruled with an iron hand. For example, Michael Ng has shown that the British colonial government in Hong Kong imposed strict censorship in media, publication, and labor activism—even the wording of news headlines was scrutinized before publishing so that critiques of the government and broad public dissatisfaction with British rule could be silenced. Ng’s erudite book “challenges the widely accepted narrative—or myth—that freedom of expression is a legacy of British rule of law in Hong Kong, arguing that it simply does not stand up to scrutiny of the archival record.”16 Ng comments that such colonial narratives still prove pervasive and have continued to affect China’s relationship with the world powers from the nineteenth century, when Hong Kong was colonized in 1842, to the present. Elizabeth Buettner also shows that Britain, the Netherlands, and France were reluctant to give up their power in India, Indonesia, and Vietnam. When they had to leave after fierce local resistance and independence movements after 1945, the Europeans claimed that they granted freedom to the colonies.17 Colonial strategies of control did not cease with the end of colonialism. Valentin-Yves Mudimbe calls the legacy of colonialism and the almost unavoidable dependence of Africa on the West “the scent of the father.” When he was “finishing a text in which Michel Foucault describes Hegel’s persistence in contemporary philosophy,” Mudimbe felt that he “was able to understand not only the violence of the Father’s existence, but also the strangeness of his scent … Africa’s dependence vis-à-vis Euro-America.” For Africa, Mudimbe comments, “to truly escape from the West presupposes an exact appreciation of the price we have to pay to detach ourselves from it; it presupposes knowing to what extent the West, perhaps insidiously, has drawn close to us; it implies a knowledge, in that which permits us to think against the West, of all that remains Western; and a determination of the extent to which our recourse against it is still possibly one of the tricks it directs against us, while it waits for us,

8 Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang immobile and elsewhere.”18 The “father” in Mudimbe’s book symbolizes the paternalistic European colonization of Africa. The scent he left behind is the colonial mentality or the auto-colonization of Africans after decolonization, something Frantz Fanon aptly terms “black skin, white masks.” It is an ideological violence inflicted on and at times accepted by Africans. Mudimbe reminds Africans that they should not endeavor to “prove” their intelligence to the Euro-American colonizers, who would, “with skillful contempt, regularly and learnedly” tear the humanity of the colonized “to pieces in the name of a reason and a science utterly at the service of political projects.”19 Mudimbe also opposes the racialization that followed practices of segregation, introduced by Euro-American colonizers, and differentiated and excluded based on racial stereotypes. Rather, he imagines a universal that is “enriched by all that is particular, a universal enriched by every particular: the deepening and coexistence of all the particulars.”20 As the authors in this volume strive to show, the strategy of racialization, used during colonialism to ensure the superiority of the colonizers and the colonization of the mind through political slogans, such as freedom and the rule of law, has never been detached from the political. Racialization has not ceased to whisper to the population in former colonies that the colonial powers were indeed benign and superior; thus they shall be welcomed and emulated, not expelled. Racialization is still firmly rooted in Europe; overtly or insidiously, it justifies discrimination toward non-Euro-American immigrants, refugees, and their children. As the chapters dealing with women and German colonialism in the historical context show, European women, in general, supported maledominated colonialism with various activities and a shared racial ideology. Aylin Bademsoy’s “Völkisch Nationalism and its Unfolding in the Colonial Context: Adda von Liliencron’s Historical Novels Giovanna (1881) and Nach Südwestafrika (1906),” Esaie Djomo and Dorine Mbeudom’s “Get up Europe! Why Do You Sleep So Much!” Maria Theresia Ledóchowska as an Activist in the Religious Colonization of Africa,” Adèle Douanla and Esaie Djomo’s “German Women and the Dissemination of Colonial Ideology (1907–1920),” Joseph KebeNguema’s “Colonial Revisionism and German Imperialism in Senta Dinglreiter’s National Socialist Writings,” Kate McGregor’s “Working for Weihnachtsstimmung: German Women’s Role in Recreating German Culture and Identity in German Southwest Africa and German East Africa, 1894–1906,” and Patricia Anne Simpson’s “Farming Frontiers: The German Woman Pioneer” discuss various aspects of white women’s engagement in colonialism; all women discussed in these chapters actively promoted colonialism either while living in Africa or remotely from Europe. The authors show that German men and women were united

Introduction

9

under the banner of racial difference and shared solidarity and affinity through their ethnic or racial origin during colonialism. In most cases, race was the primary dividing line between colonizers and colonized. Instances of female solidarity beyond racial and ethnic boundaries were few and far between. German Colonialism: Myth and Reality Germany’s colonial empire has often been characterized as marginal when compared to that of the major colonial powers of England and France, and to this day colonialism is often omitted from a discourse on experiences that have defined German identity.21 It is generally assumed that, compared to England’s and France’s colonial reach, the German colonial empire was small in size-there were “never more than 20,000 Germans in Africa”22– negligible in terms of financial yield,23 and short in duration, lasting just over thirty years. While England, France, and the Netherlands held on to their colonies well into the twentieth century, Germany forfeit its colonies when it lost the First World War. In many ways, however, this picture distorts the political, economic, and cultural importance of colonization in imperial Germany and beyond. The German colonial empire was the fourth largest after England, France, and the Netherlands; it encompassed 12 million inhabitants and extended over one million square miles, an area roughly five times the size of Germany proper.24 By 1885, the German acquisitions included South West Africa, Togo, Cameroon, German East Africa, northeastern New Guinea, part of Samoa, the Bismarck, Marshall, Caroline, and Mariana Islands in the Pacific, and Qingdao in China. Even the assumption that German colonization was a financial failure has been called into question. Steven Press, for example, has shown that the diamond business in German South West Africa “yielded something approaching 1.4 billion marks in revenue in 1913. A sum of 1.4 billion marks in 1913 easily surpassed what Germany was said to have spent cumulatively on its colonial governing expenses since 1884.” Press also notes, however, that the profits tended to go not to the state but to private enterprises: “imperialism often had the result of funneling public money into private hands.”25 Although Germany was a latecomer in the European race for colonies,26 initial skepticism soon gave way to popular colonial fervor. Even Bismarck who had opposed the call for colonies eventually warmed to the idea and the Berlin Conference (November 15, 1883, to February 26, 1885) formalized Germany’s entry into the colonial arena. In 1884, the Gesellschaft für deutsche Kolonisation (Society for German Colonization) was founded and began to advocate for settler colonies. In 1887, the

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Society joined forces with the Deutscher Kolonialverein (German Colonial Club) and became the Deutsche Kolonialgesellschaft (German Colonial Society),27 and German colonial holdings soon played a significant role in public and literary discourse both before and after the First World War. Article 119 of the Versailles Treaty, which deprived Germany of its “Schutzgebiete,” was perceived as an insult. The winners of the war denied Germans the right to colonize because they had shown excessive cruelty and thus failed in their mission to civilize.28 Resentment about the outcome of the war—on March 1, 1919, 414 members of the Reichstag voted against Article 119; only 7 were in favor—encouraged colonial nostalgia, which manifested in the Berlin Colonial Week and various exhibitions in the 1920s.29 By April 1919, 3.8 million Germans had signed petitions in protest against the “Raub der Kolonien” (theft of the colonies).30 The commitment to the restoration of a colonial empire persisted into the Nazi era, evident in the “kolonialpolitisches Amt” of the Nazi government. Germans saw themselves as unjustly deprived of their “place in the sun.” Because they did not experience violent conflicts in pursuit of independence, they were able to sustain the fantasy of the “hard-working German colonizer … who … was loved like a father by his ever-grateful native subjects.”31 The colonizing powers justified colonization with references to their supposed mission to civilize their colonial subjects. Bernhard Dernburg defined colonization thus: “Kolonisation heißt die Nutzbarmachung des Bodens, seiner Schätze, der Flora, der Fauna und vor allem der Menschen zugunsten der Wirtschaft der kolonisierenden Nation und diese ist dafür zur Gegengabe ihrer höheren Kultur, ihrer sittlichen Begriffe, ihrer besseren Methoden verpflichtet” (Colonization means the utilization of the soil, its treasures, the flora, the fauna and above all the people for the benefit of the economy of the colonizing nation, and, in return, the colonizing nation is obliged to offer its higher culture, its moral concepts, its better methods).32 The alleged mission to civilize, to instill a German work ethic along with Christian beliefs hid a reality of cruelty and exploitation marked by “systemic violence, extreme brutality, and persistent corruption.”33 Throughout, racism constituted an integral element of colonialism and provided a justification for what would otherwise be an utterly “illegitimate access to property and power.”34 Grounded in a discourse on race, colonization unfolded along four axes: economic, legal, political, and cultural. The economic dimension, that is, the exploitation of native labor and natural resources, including rubber, sisal, cotton, cocoa, coffee, oil, and diamonds, formed the sine qua non of the colonial system of power. The colonies were conceived as markets for German products and as investment opportunities for German capital. Labor meant forced labor, and wages were typically paid in the

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form of goods, not money. Women and children were used as hostages to coerce husbands and fathers to work. Economic exploitation was solidified by the introduction of a legal and political system built on structural inequality. According to Habermas there was “ein wahres Sammelsurium an je nach Rasse unterschiedlichen Rechtsnormen, immer wieder neuen Rechtssetzungen und sich überlappenden Rechtsinstitutionen” (a veritable hodgepodge of different legal norms depending on race, constantly new legislation and overlapping legal institutions).35 The colonized populations were restricted in their mobility and forbidden from purchasing land or owning livestock. Finally, these hard political, legal, and economic realities were accompanied by efforts to convert hearts and minds, i.e., to Christianize native populations, which included a hypocritical promise to fight slavery made by the signatories of the so-called Africa Conference of 1884–1885. At the center of all colonial reign was systemic violence. As Achille Mbembe explains: “Colonialism cannot be understood without the possibility of torturing, of violating, or of massacring.”36 Indeed, such violence was necessary precisely because it served to obfuscate the colonizers’ fundamental dependency on the subjugated populations. The Germans, who for the most part made no effort to learn the local language and communicated via interpreters, needed to rely on local knowledge and skills to navigate the foreign terrain. And yet, in spite of the foundational importance of violence, even critics of colonialism, such as Matthias Erzberger (1875–1921) and Ferdinand August Bebel (1840–1913), often failed to understand that brutality was not a momentary deviation but a structural element of German rule in the colonies. Tellingly, Bebel, who referred to the whip as a “Kulturwerkzeug” (tool of culture),37 thus pointing to the hypocrisy of the “Kulturmission,” continued to believe that colonization as such was a worthy pursuit if done humanely. Paradoxically, by shining the spotlight on a few bad actors, the public condemnation and scandalization of individual cases of crass abuse could serve to obscure the omnipresence of violence in colonial regimes.38 Seen in this light, a critique of individual incidents of abuse props up colonial power, because it refuses to conceive of colonialism as an illegitimate form of exploitation and rather holds out hope that, if done right, colonialism benefits all involved. In light of the potentially obfuscating nature of certain types of critique, it is crucial to differentiate between a critique of specific colonial practices and a critique of colonialism as such and to bear in mind that criticism of methods did not typically imply opposition to colonization as such. One might condemn the brutal genocidal policy against the Herero and Nama in what was then German South West Africa but remain committed to the idea of a German colonial empire. Similarly, the punishment of individual

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officials, such as the acting governor of Cameroon, Heinrich Leist (1859–1910), who was found guilty of “forcing African women into prostitution with himself and other Germans, and of whipping the women in an exceptionally cruel way,” or Governor Jesco von Puttkamer (1855–1917), who was recalled from office because of sexual abuse, did not change the fact that rape and sexual assault were omnipresent in the German colonies.39 Throughout, as Press points out, “the record of German rule was replete with sexual slavery, burned villages, drunken killings of servants, and head-taking familiar to readers of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.”40 Prosecuting individual cases of abuse, while necessary, can serve to affirm a supposed commitment to the norms of civilized behavior and to obfuscate the fact that colonialism is inherently linked to extortion, theft of land, warfare, executions, torture, and rape—and that excessive violence is an integral aspect of colonial relations, not an aberration. The excessively violent cultures of the colonizers were subtended by trickery, manipulation, and highly toxic forms of masculinity. For example, the acquisition of Lüderitzbay, the later German South West Africa, was the result of a crooked deal between the Bremen-based merchant Adolf Lüderitz (1834–1886) and Joseph Frederiks (?–1893), a chief of the Nama, who did not own all of the land he signed over and could not read the documents he signed.41 Similarly, the infamous Carl Peters, founder of the Deutsch-Ostafrikanische Gesellschaft (German-East African Society) and co-founder of the Gesellschaft für deutsche Kolonisation (Society for German Colonization), manipulated local chieftains by getting them drunk; he then gave them worthless presents and, in turn, had them sign over their territories in contracts they could not understand.42 What Peters acquired through deceit and kept through violence became the first German colony as Wilhelm I signed a Schutzbrief in 1885. Peters, who was known for his excessive brutality, was fired eventually but then reinstated. The fact that a man like Peters was reinstated speaks clearly to a lack of oversight on the part of the German authorities. Moreover, even if responsible political bodies in Germany opposed criminal practices, more often than not they were powerless to stop them since communication with the Reich was cumbersome—a letter took two months to reach the metropole—and local actors were free to follow their whims with impunity. The unwillingness to rein in local actors led not only to the brutal abuse of individual colonial subjects but to large-scale slaughter. The death toll of King Leopold’s infamous reign in the Congo is estimated to amount to 8– 10 million.43 Some colonial practices and wars were genocidal and relied on strategies and institutions commonly associated with National Socialism, such as extermination orders, mass starvation, and concentration camps.

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Between 1904 and 1908, the Herero population was reduced from 80,000 to 15,000; of the prewar Nama population of 20,000, only half survived. In contrast, the losses of the Germans amounted to 1,500 out of 14,000.44 The so-called Maji Maji uprising in East Africa in 1905–1907, motivated by forced labor practices for cotton farming, also resulted in an enormous loss of lives: 75,000 Maji Maji died in the conflict, a further one to two hundred thousand died as a result of starvation and scorched-earth policies.45 The disproportionate share of African deaths is due to an asymmetry in military technology, or, as Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) put it: “Whatever happens, we have got the Maxim Gun, and they have not.”46 Violence made minority control possible. It allowed some 240,000 Europeans (0.4% of the local population) to rule over 60 million Indonesians.47 Throughout, the violence of war was complemented by extermination through labor: Almost half of the African workers in the Kolmanskop diamond field died within a 12-month span.48 German Colonization and Gender: Histories and Tropes Initially, colonial conquest was the purview of white men as the colonial environment was seen as too dangerous and generally unsuitable for women. The absence of white women, however, posed its own set of problems for colonizers. White men engaged in sexual or romantic relationships with women of color, who functioned as housekeepers and maids but were also targets of sexual exploitation. Indeed, such intimate relationships were the norm, not the exception. For example, it is estimated that 90% of German colonial officials in Togo had intimate relationships with local women.49 At first, such relationships were frequently condoned as short-term solutions because they were seen to prevent homosexuality. Over time, however, efforts to prevent interracial relationships intensified. Thus, in German South West Africa, interracial marriage was outlawed by an official ordinance in 1905.50 German East Africa and Samoa followed in 1906 and 1912, respectively.51 Numerically, interracial marriages were negligible: there were 40 mixed marriages in German South West Africa and 90 mixed marriages in Samoa. Even so, it was seen as crucial to forbid the practice since a native woman who married a German man gained German citizenship—though she would lose it again if she divorced him. Conversely, a German woman who married a native man would lose her citizenship but could regain it if she divorced him. Here, the colonial context exposes and exacerbates inequalities in gender relations in the metropole, including white women’s secondary standing in the legal system. In the wake of such efforts, the presence of white women was increasingly perceived as necessary to prevent interracial relationships and

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instill German values in white children. In the words of the colonial functionary and principal of the école coloniale, Georges Hardy (1884–1972): “A man remains a man as long as he stays under the gaze of a woman of his race.”52 White women were thus tasked with the preservation of moral order and national honor in the colonies as they shielded white men from “cultural and sexual contamination of contact with the colonized.”53 At the same time, men’s sexual license was also an important reason why the presence of German women was contested. As Wildenthal notes, all too often, a desire “to preserve white German men’s patriarchal sexual liberties” was pitted against “the goal of race purity.”54 As the discourse on interracial relationships shows, concepts of sexuality, intimacy, and domesticity were integral elements in the claim to German racial superiority. Family models and gender roles were tied to notions of Germanness. In this context, a German women author, such as Frieda von Bülow, could claim that the presence of white women in the colonial arena constitutes a matter of national import; only German women could ensure “die Gewinnung und Festigung deutschen Einflusses” (the acquisition and consolidation of German influence).55 Women such as Bülow worked to make the colonial sphere conform to imperial notions of gender, family, domesticity, and sexuality. But the flow of ideas went both ways. As German values were imposed on colonized populations, colonial realities impacted the German homeland, and concepts of race became salient in the metropole. Clearly, the presence of German women in the colonies was infused with a hypertrophied symbolic potency. The female sex was presumed to possess an innate ability to heal cultural and political rifts, and this supposed “superpower” was to be deployed in the colonial context. Woman’s maternal nature and her reputed willingness to sacrifice herself for her loved ones and for the greater good were to provide the social glue that held tensions between colonizers and colonized at bay. Consequently, much like the “Kulturmission,” the discourse on woman’s beneficial influence in the colony was designed to obscure its fundamental function: woman’s feminine, nurturing, healing, and harmonizing, maternal nature was a crucial element in the pursuit of a colonial empire; it complemented and obfuscated the violence that undergirded it. In spite of their perceived moral heft, white women’s institutional power in the colonies was limited. What McClintock notes for the AngloSaxon context also holds for German women: “colonial women made none of the direct economic or military decisions of empire and very few reaped its vast profits.”56 And yet, as McClintock adds, while white women were subordinated to white men, they were afforded a significant degree of power over indigenous populations: “the rationed privileges of race all too often put white women in positions of decided—if

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borrowed—power, not only over colonized women but also over colonized men.”57 Similarly, Pratt argues that the specifically female version of the “Kulturmission” and its attendant social reformism constituted “a form of female imperial intervention in the contact zone.”58 This power over colonized subjects and a certain measure of freedom from European gender norms contributed greatly to the appeal of the colonies for white women. In practical terms, women first gained a foothold in colonial work through traditional women’s professions. The first organization dedicated to promoting women’s emigration to the colonies was the Deutscher Frauenverein für Krankenpflege in den Kolonien (German Women’s Association for Nursing in the Colonies), which later became the Deutscher Frauenverein vom Roten Kreuz für die Kolonien (German Women’s Red Cross Association for the Colonies). By 1914, the organization had 20,000 members.59 Women also found employment as housekeepers, maids, cooks, and teachers, working in kindergartens, orphanages, and schools. Many women were attached to mission stations and recruited to promote the Christian faith abroad. Their efforts were supported by patronesses, such as Countess Martha von Pfeil and her sister Eva, who sought to disseminate the Protestant faith in Africa. Together with von Bülow, the Pfeil sisters founded the Deutschnationaler Frauenbund (German National Women’s League). The first two women were dispatched to the colonies in 1897. The Frauenbund financed the travel costs of 12 domestic servants to South West Africa in 1898. “By 1907 it had given free passage to 111 unmarried German women.”60 As the desire to increase the presence of German women in the colonies grew, incentives were offered: single women received free passage to the colonies and were guaranteed a paying job for two years. Later, a free return passage was added to the package. In spite of such efforts, the number of German women in Africa remained small: “In 1902 there were fewer than 1,034 German women in the entire colonial empire. In 1913, when German settlement and development were at their height, there were still fewer than 4,817.”61 The largest female presence was in German South West Africa, with 2,277 in 1912. On a social and political level, emigration offered a convenient solution to the much discussed and much dreaded supposed “Frauenüberschuss” (excess female population) in Germany. On an individual level, the colonies opened up opportunities from which white German women were barred in the metropole. In the colonial arena, the indigenous populations occupied the lowest ranks of the social hierarchies. Thus, the power that white women held over colonial subjects allowed them to “avoid confronting their own powerlessness and gender oppression at home.”62 Even lower-class white women who worked as domestic servants were paid

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more in the colonies than in the German homeland and they were spared the heaviest, dirtiest work. In the colonial arena, the claim to racial superiority was made to compensate for an all too palpably real class inferiority. Indeed, some considered colonization a remedy against class conflict since it could potentially siphon restive populations away from the German fatherland. Thus, the idea of a German empire served to unite the nation and gloss over class differences. The list of German women who served the colonial cause through various social, political, and literary endeavors is long: In 1907, German women formed their own colonial organ in the form of the Frauenbund der deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft (Women’s League of the German Colonial Society). The list of founders included Louise Weitzenberg; Maria Kuhn (1876–1963), who traveled to South West Africa with her husband Philalethes Kuhn (1870–1937), a doctor and professor of hygiene; and Adda von Liliencron (1844–1913), who also served as its first president. Von Liliencron never set foot in Africa but actively promoted the cause of empire in Germany. In 1908, the Frauenbund was integrated into the Deutsche Kolonialgesellschaft. German women also created institutions where colonial aspirants received an education designed to prepare them for service abroad. Anna von Zech founded the Deutsche Kolonialfrauenschule in Witzenhausen. There was a colonial school in Bad Weilbach and a Kolonial Haushaltungsschule in Carthaus near Trier. And even in the almost exclusively male field of anthropology, two women made contributions to the study of non-European peoples: Johanna Mestorf (1828–1909), a prehistoric archeologist, the first female museum director, and the first female professor in Germany; and Emma von Hochstetter (1864–1941), daughter of the geologist Ferdinand von Hochstetter (1829–1884) and wife of anthropologist Felix von Luschan (1854–1924).63 There is a significant corpus of colonial literature penned by white German women. Helene von Falkenhausen (1873–1945) was a farmer, teacher, and writer in South West Africa; she authored Ansiedlerschicksale: Elf Jahre in Deutsch Südwestafrika 1893–1904 (1905; Fate of Settlers: Eleven Years in German South West Africa). Magdalene von Prince (1870–1935), the owner of a plantation in German East Africa, wrote Eine deutsche Frau im Innern Deutsch-Ostafrikas (1908; A German Woman in the Interior of German East Africa). Margarethe von Eckenbrecher (1875–1955) moved to Namibia with her husband; she gave numerous lectures and published prolifically, including her memoirs Was Afrika mir gab und nahm: Erlebnisse einer deutschen Frau in Südwestafrika 1902–1936 (1913; What Africa Gave and Took from Me: Experiences of a German Woman in South West Africa). Clara Brockmann worked as a civil servant in South West Africa; she is the author of Die deutsche Frau in

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Südwestafrika (1910; The German Woman in South West Africa) and Briefe eines deutschen Mädchens aus Südwest (1912; Letters of a German Girl from South West). Grete Ziemann, the sister of a colonial doctor, wrote Mola Koko! Grüße aus Kamerun (1907; Mola Koko! Greetings from Cameroon). Maria Karow, who lived on her sister’s farm in German South West Africa, published Wo sonst der Fuß des Kriegers trat: Farmerleben in Südwest nach dem Kriege (1909; Where the Warrior’s Foot Used to Tread: Farm Fife in South West after the War). Hanna Christaller, the daughter of a German missionary, penned Alfreds Frauen: Novelle aus den deutschen Kolonien (1916; Alfred’s Wives: Novella from the German Colonies). Lena Haase is the author of Raggys Fahrt nach Südwest (1910; Raggy’s Journey to South West). C. Falkenhorst (1855–1913) published numerous books, including Das Kreuz am Tanganjika: westafrikanische Kolonialgeschichte (1908; The Cross at Tanganjika: West African Colonial History) and Deutsch-Ostafrika: Geschichte der Gründung einer deutschen Kolonie (1890; German East Africa: History of the Foundation of a German Colony). And finally, Frieda von Bülow, the colonial enthusiast and lover of Carl Peters, who sustained an entire cottage industry of colonial novels, including Reiseskizzen und Tagebuchblätter aus Deutsch-Ostafrika (1889; Travel Sketches and Diary Pages from German East Africa) and Im Lande der Verheissung: Ein deutscher Kolonial-Roman (1899; In the Promised Land: A German Colonial Novel). More often than not, these female voices did not critique colonial power differentials but rather condoned or even welcomed them. There is little evidence of female solidarity with non-white women. While white women writers often conceived of the colonies as an “imaginary space for female emancipation,” they tended to portray native women as stupid, ugly, and lazy.64 Clearly, white women’s experiences of oppression and inequality did not typically translate into empathy for those defined as “Other” nor was engagement for (white) women’s rights typically accompanied by advocacy on behalf of colonized populations.65 The inability to see colonized women as fully human could be taken to extremes. Ada Cramer (1874–1962), who owned a farm in South West Africa, for example, went so far as to defend her husband’s violent, abusive behavior, including the murder of indigenous women. More often than not, colonial texts by women authors invert victim and perpetrator categories. Frieda von Bülow opens her Reiseskizzen with accusations of exploitation and ingratitude—made by Europeans and directed against the native population: “Ihr miserable Kerls, schämt Ihr euch nicht, den Europäern das Geld abzunehmen und uns wie Fliegen zu umschwärmen, so lang ihr glaubt, noch etwas aus uns herausziehen zu können, und dann, wenn dieselben Europäer, denen Ihr Euren Lebensunterhalt verdankt, vor Euren Augen bedrängt werden, sie nicht

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mehr kennen zu wollen! Ihr nichtsnutzige Bande! Hat auch nur einer unter Euch Hand oder Fuß gerührt, um Euren Wohltätern zu helfen”66 (You miserable fellows, are you not ashamed to take money from Europeans and swarm around us like flies as long as you think you can still get something out of us, and then when the same Europeans to whom you owe your livelihood are being pestered right before your eyes, you do not want to know them anymore! You useless gang! Did any of you lift a hand or foot to help your benefactors?). In von Bülow’s minds, the colonized take advantage of the colonizers who always get short shrift (“steten zu kurz kommen der Unsrigen”).67 While they offered little room for cross-racial solidarity, colonial spaces allowed for a redefinition of traditional gender roles. Frieda von Bülow, for example, notes proudly that she carried a gun in Africa. Such transgressions appeared all the more possible since traditional African gender roles often differed from European customs. In Africa, women were tasked with agricultural labor, particularly with planting, weeding, harvesting, and selling produce at markets. Native men might be responsible for sewing, weaving, and doing the laundry while medicine women were entrusted with the care of the sick.68 Bülow notes with astonishment that the native male workers in her employ consider fetching water women’s work. On Java, women sold produce at the market and managed tea shops and small businesses.69 Unsurprisingly, many colonized women were not pleased at the prospect of giving up their traditional functions in favor of the role of the European housewife. Moreover, sexual mores might differ. Among the Herero, for example, it was not considered shameful for a woman to have a child before she was married. In some areas, polygyny was common. On the island of Java, women controlled their inheritance and property.70 In this fluid space where gender roles needed to be renegotiated and adjusted, von Bülow’s heroine Eva feels in her full right when she declares: “Ich muß ganz meine eigene Herrin sein” (I must be entirely my own mistress).71 In reading texts written by German women writers who were involved in German colonization, it is imperative to remember that even women who visited colonized countries and were in contact with the local populations do not present unbiased accounts of their experiences but rather stories that are inflected by prejudice, fantasy, and desire. They too were, as Achille Mbembe writes, caught in “a relationship to other worlds that was fundamentally imaginary, even as it sought to develop forms of knowledge aimed at representing them objectively.”72 The most crucial and devastating effect of such a distorted vision is its power to shape reality in its image: “Racism consists, most of all, in substituting what is with something else, with another reality. It has the power to distort the real and to fix affect.”73 Text after text infantilizes colonized populations,

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denies them basic powers of cognition, and portrays them as recalcitrant beasts at worst and guileless imbeciles at best. Both black men and black women are hypersexualized while their willpower is portrayed as deplorably deficient. Colonizers are put upon taskmasters called to guide and protect but also discipline and punish. In this recoding, Europeans are recast as selfless teachers of ungrateful native populations while Africa is seen as both an uninhabitable, disease-ridden death trap but also a paradise, source of rejuvenation and escape from an impersonal, mechanized life in the metropole.74 In every case, race is the engine that repels moral critiques of exploitation and domination. Gender roles impacted the practice, theory, and imagination of colonization at every level. Colonial subjects were often gendered female tout court. The French writer Gustave d’Eichthal (1804–1886), for example, postulated that blacks are a female race: “Just like the woman … the black is deprived of political and scientific intelligence … Like the woman he also passionately likes jewelry, dance, and singing.”75 More often than not, gender served as a privileged signifier in negotiations of power in the colonial context. Resistance and rebellion, for example, became identified with tropes of rape and the desecration of white womanhood so that “English womanhood emerge[d] as an important cultural signifier for articulating a colonial hierarchy of race.”76 If resistance is reconfigured as the rape of white women, one must defeat the insurgents to restore moral order. Conversely, refiguring colonial relations as love stories erases the violence and coercion on which they are founded in favor of an imaginary affective bond. Pratt notes the crucial role of love plots in the workings of European supremacy: “As an ideology, romantic love, like capitalist commerce, understands itself as reciprocal.”77 Because gender can facilitate strategies of concealment, decoding gender dynamics in colonial texts “can reveal the weak links in narratives of colonial legitimation.”78 Throughout, gendered colonial encounters were marked by glaring asymmetries. Colonial discourse betrays an obsession with the rape of white women by Black men. In contrast, Black women were not conceived as possible victims of rape. Consider the following statement by Huber Murray, Lieutenant-Governor of Port Moresby, New Guinea: “Doubtless there are native women who set the highest value on their chastity, but they are the exception and the rape of an ordinary native woman does not present any element of comparison with the rape of a respectable white woman.”79 Consequently, white men were rarely held accountable for rape. Stoler notes that “the ‘revolt against chivalry’—the protest of American Southern white women to lynchings of black men for alleged rape attempts—had no counterpart among European women in Asia and Africa.”80 The omnipresence of sexual violence against Black women in the colonial context in the form of rape and forced prostitution is aligned

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with the pervasive “eroticization of the black female body.” Black women were hypervisible and hypersexualized. As such, they served as foils and discursive contrast to the purported purity of white women, thus promoting “the elevation of European womanhood through the demotion of the black female body.”81 Colonialism and Critique: Challenges The challenges attendant to a volume such as this one are manifold. There is the difficulty of “finding a language that would express the links between race and gender without prioritizing, without oversimplifying.”82 In negotiating the complex relations of gender and race, it is important to bear in mind “the interactive, improvisational dimensions of colonial encounters” which unfold in complex contexts that involve domination and dialog and that cast the imperial claim to superiority against the factual dependence on local knowledge and skills.83 There is also a need to resist the idea that colonialism happened primarily in the colonies. Indeed, since the number of Germans who traveled abroad was exceedingly small, more often than not, Germans encountered the colonial “Other” in the German homeland. For example, Zimmerman notes that “the majority of encounters between German anthropologists and the people they studied occurred in Germany, in circuses, panopticons, and zoos.”84 African men came to Europe to teach languages or to attend educational institutions. Sailors spent time ashore in German ports. The highly exploitative Völkerschauen, such as the Berlin Colonial Exhibition in 1896, brought over one hundred men and women from Africa and the Pacific to Germany. Many stayed and worked in Germany as artists, actors, or dancers. In 1919, the French occupation of the Rhineland brought 200,000 Black soldiers into contact with the local population.85 In other words, most encounters between colonizers and colonizers unfolded in Germany, not in the colonies. Furthermore, there is the need to resist the temptation to construct white women as opponents of male-driven imperialism, to not give in to a “desire to find resistance when, often, we actually find complicity.”86 And there is a search for moments of misalignment even amidst cooptation: Even when they were eager to embrace colonial ideologies, white German women could never fully be integrated into the imperial machinery because they themselves were constructed as “Other” in Western society. Because of this inherent otherness, a female perspective can open “a crack in the concept of Self through which to examine the concept of Other.”87 And there is also the difficulty of reversing the flow of narratives, aggravated by the dearth of written accounts that portray imperial-era colonial encounters from the perspective of the colonized.88 In spite of

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extreme power differentials, it is important to keep in mind that colonial relations were not one-directional. Indigenous populations were agents in their own right, who used their knowledge of regional conditions and languages to their advantage and who shaped colonizers as much as colonizers shaped them. Both knowledge and people moved both ways: from the metropole to the colonies and from the colonies to the metropole. In navigating these complex webs marked by “degrees of sovereignty” and “gradations of rights,”89 it is important not to remain confined solely to the individual level but rather to work toward what Fanon calls a “sociodiagnostics.” While racism attacks individuals, it is not an individual question. Similarly, while intent matters, the way in which racism is woven into our social fabric makes a mere focus on intent problematic: “Yet, we’ll be told, there is no intention to willfully give offense. OK, but it is precisely this absence of will—this offhand manner; this casualness; and the ease with which they classify him, imprison him at an uncivilized and primitive level—that is insulting.” Exploited and exploiter are caught in a Hegelian dialectic: “both the black man, slave to his inferiority, and the white man, slave to his superiority, behave along neurotic lines.”90 Finally, the most important challenge consists in understanding the pervasive long-term effects of colonialism. These effects are visible today in the migranticization of whole segments of the population who, even if they have acquired citizenship, are forever “eingefroren im Zustand der Einwanderung” (frozen in the state of immigration).91 We divide the chapters into three major sections, all of which ponder the colonial past, the lingering presence of colonial thought, and various attempts to overcome this troubling legacy. The first section, Intimacies, is interested in discourses of the body and sexuality and in the nexus of colonial rule and domesticity. The second section, Accountability, parses both the complicity of white women in colonial conquest as well as resistance to colonization. The third section, Intersections, features contributions that explore the various ways in which race, class, and gender intersect and inflect each other in colonial and neocolonial contexts. Notes 1 Ann Laura Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power: Race and the Intimate in Colonial Rule (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), xviii. 2 See Elizabeth Buettner, Europe after Empire: Decolonization, Society, and Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016). 3 Martha Mamozai, Herrenmenschen: Frauen im deutschen Kolonialismus (Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1982); Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2001); Ann Laura Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power.

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4 Sara Lennox Sara Friedrichsmeyer, and Susanne Zantop, eds., The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1998), 19. 5 See Susanne Zantop, Colonial Fantasies: Conquest, Family, and Nation in Precolonial Germany, 1770–1870 (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997). 6 Nina Berman, Klaus Mühlhahn, and Patrice Nganang, eds., German Colonialism Revisited (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2017), 2. 7 Nina Berman, German Colonialism Revisited, 11. 8 Nina Berman, German Colonialism Revisited, 12. 9 Andrew Zimmerman, Alabama in Africa: Booker T. Washington, the German Empire, and the Globalization of the New South (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2010), 1. 10 Britta Schilling, Postcolonial Germany: Memories of Empire in a Decolonized Nation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 4. 11 See Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin, The Empire Writes Back: Theory and Practice in Post-Colonial Literature (London: Routledge, 1989). 12 Sebastian Conrad, German Colonialism: A Short History, trans. Sorcha O’Hagan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 4–5. 13 For the discussion of looted objects, see Thomas Thiemeyer, “Cosmopolitanizing Colonial Memories in Germany,” Critical Inquiry 45, no. 4 (2019): 967–990. 14 See https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/31/movies/measures-of-men-germanycolonialsim.html#:~:text=“Measures%20of%20Men”%20tells%20the,into %20the%20center%20of%20society, last accessed April 18, 2023. Also see Schilling, Postcolonial Germany: Memories of Empire in a Decolonized Nation, 4. 15 Elizabeth Buettner’s book calls for research on European colonialism across national boundaries and for a study of colonial history as part and parcel of a pan-European history. See Elizabeth Buettner, Europe after Empire, 16. 16 Michael Ng, Political Censorship in British Hong Kong: Freedom of Expression and the Law (1842–1997) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022), 5. 17 Buettner, Europe after Empire, 21–163. 18 Valentin-Yves Mudimbe, The Scent of the Father: Essays on the Limits of Life and Science in Sub-Saharan Africa, trans. Jonathan Adjemian (Cambridge: Polity, 2023), xvi. 19 Mudimbe, The Scent of the Father, xvi. 20 Mudimbe, The Scent of the Father, xvii. 21 See Fatima El Tayeb, Anders Europäisch: Rassismus, Identität und Widerstand im vereinten Europa (Münster: Unrast, 2015), 87. 22 Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop, “Introduction,” in The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy, eds. Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1998), 1–29, here 11. 23 See Elisa von Joeden-Forgey, “Race Power in Postcolonial Germany: The German Africa Show and the National Socialist State, 1935–40,” in Germany’s Colonial Pasts, eds. Eric Ames, Marcia Klotz, and Lora Wildenthal (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2005), 167–188, here 167. 24 Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945, 1. 25 Steven Press, Blood and Diamonds: Germany’s Imperial Ambitions in Africa (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2021), 91 and 5.

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26 Before the colonial era, there were brief forays into Africa and South America. Friedrich Wilhelm, the Elector of Brandenburg-Preußen, colonized the Goldküste (Gold Coast, today Ghana), where he erected the fortress Groß Friedrichsburg in 1683. In 1717 he sold his African possession to the Dutch. The Welser banking and merchant dynasty had a presence in Venezuela as of 1528 and in India through the spice trade; Duke Jakob von Kurland claimed the island of Tobago in 1654; and Kasimir von Hanau attempted to found a colony on Guyana in 1669, see Alexander Honold, “Afrikanisches Viertel: Straßennamen als kolonialer Gedächtnisraum,” in Phantasiereiche: Zur Kulturgeschichte des Kolonialismus (Frankfurt/New York: Campus Verlag, 2003), 305–321, here 318. 27 Martha Mamozai, Herrenmenschen: Frauen im deutschen Kolonialismus, 27. 28 Habermas notes that the blue book, which detailed German cruelty, was banned once it had served its purpose of anti-German propaganda because it was feared that it might lead Africans to reevaluate and resist English colonization, Rebekka Habermas, Skandal in Togo: Ein Kapitel deutscher Kolonialherrschaft (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer Verlag, 2016), 21. 29 Dirk van Laak, “‘Ist je ein Reich, das es nicht gab, so gut verwaltet worden?’ Der imaginäre Ausbau der imperialen Infrastruktur in Deutschland nach 1918,” in Phantasiereiche: Zur Kulturgeschichte des deutschen Kolonialismus, ed. Birthe Kundrus (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 2003), 71–90, here 85. 30 Christian Rogowski, “‘Heraus mit unseren Kolonien!’: Der Kolonialrevisionismus der Weimarer Republik und die Hamburger Kolonialwoche von 1926,” in Phantasiereiche: Zur Kulturgeschichte des deutschen Kolonialismus, 243–262, here 244. 31 Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop, “Introduction,” in The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy, eds. Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1998), 1–29, here 20. 32 Cited in Bartholomäus Grill, Wir Herrenmenschen: Unser rassistisches Erbe: Eine Reise in die deutsche Kolonialgeschichte (Munich: Pantheon, 2021), 28. 33 Bradley Naranch and Geoff Eley, German Colonialism in a Global Age (Durham: Duke University Press, 2014), 1. 34 Ann Laura Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power, 24. 35 Habermas, Skandal in Togo, 83. 36 Achille Mbembe, Critique of Black Reason, translated by Laurent Dubois (Durham: Duke University Press, 2017), 108. 37 Bartholomäus Grill, Wir Herrenmenschen, 68. 38 See Habermas, Skandal in Togo, 14. 39 Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945, 46 and 70. 40 Press, Blood and Diamonds, 31. 41 See Press, Blood and Diamonds, 18. 42 Christian Geulen, “The Final Frontier … Heimat, Nation und Kolonie um 1900: Carl Peters,” in Phantasiereiche: Zur Kulturgeschichte des deutschen Kolonialismus, ed. Birthe Kundrus (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 2003), 35–55, here 47. 43 Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghosts: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa (Boston: Mariner Books, 1998), 3. 44 Sebastian Conrad, Deutsche Kolonialgeschichte (Munich: Beck, 2019), 52–53.

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45 Andrew Zimmerman, Anthropology and Antihumanism in Imperial Germany (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2001), 157. 46 Cited in Conrad, Deutsche Kolonialgeschichte, 49. 47 Elsbeth Locher-Scholten, “So Close and Yet So Far: The Ambivalence of Dutch Colonial Rhetoric on Javanese Servants in Indonesia, 1900–1942,” in Domesticating the Empire: Race, Gender, and Family Life in French and Dutch Colonialism, eds. Julia Clancy-Smith and Frances Gouda (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1998), 131–153, here 133. 48 Press, Blood and Diamonds, 123. 49 See Habermas, Skandal in Togo, 59. 50 Helmut Walser Smith, “The Talk of Genocide, the Rhetoric of Miscegenation: Notes on Debates in the German Reichstag Concerning Southwest Africa, 1904–14,” in The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy, eds. Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1998), 107–123, here 117. 51 Pascal Grosse, “What Does German Colonialism Have to Do with National Socialism? A Conceptual Framework,” in Germany’s Colonial Pasts, eds. Eric Ames, Marcia Klotz, and Lora Wildenthal (University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, 2005), 115–134, here 123. 52 Cited in Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power, 1. 53 Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power, 71. 54 Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945, 106. 55 Frieda Freiin von Bülow, Reisescizzen und Tagebuchblätter aus DeutschOstafrika (Berlin: Walther & Apolant, 1889), 195. 56 Anne McClintock, Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (New York: Routledge, 1995), 6. 57 McClintock, Imperial Leather, 6. See also Sharpe who notes that in the colonies “women’s bid for gender power passes through a colonial hierarchy of race,” Jenny Sharpe, Allegories of Empire: The Figure of the Woman in the Colonial Text (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), 12. 58 Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation (New York: Routledge, 1992), 160. 59 Lora Wildenthal, “Rasse und Kultur: Koloniale Frauenorganisationen in der deutschen Kolonialbewegung des Kaiserreichs,” in Phantasiereiche: Zur Kulturgeschichte des deutschen Kolonialismus, ed. Birthe Kundrus (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 2003), 202–219, here 203–204. 60 Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945, 91. 61 Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945, 134 and 243. 62 Mervat Hatem, “Through Each Other’s Eyes: The Impact on the Colonial Encounter of the Images of Egyptian, Levantine-Egyptian, and European Women, 1862–1920,” in Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance, eds. Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), 35–58, here 37. 63 Andrew Zimmerman, Anthropology and Antihumanism in Imperial Germany, 129. 64 Friederike Eigler, “Engendering German Nationalism: Gender and Race in Frieda von Bülow’s Colonial Writings,” in The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy, eds. Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1998), 69–85, here 78. See also Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 168.

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65 See Ruth Frankenberg, White Women, Race Matters: The Social Construction of Whiteness (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), 20. 66 Frieda von Bülow, Reisescizzen, 7. 67 Bülow, Reisescizzen, 13. 68 See Naranch and Eley, German Colonialism in a Global Age, 98; Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 71. 69 Rita Smith Kipp, “Emancipating Each Other: Dutch Colonial Missionaries’ Encounter with Karo Women in Sumatra, 1900–1942,” in Domesticating the Empire: Race, Gender, and Family Life in French and Dutch Colonialism, eds. Julia Clancy-Smith and Frances Gouda (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1998), 211–235, here 218. 70 Frances Gouda and Julia Clancy-Smith, “Introduction,” in Domesticating the Empire: Race, Gender, and Family Life in French and Dutch Colonialism, eds. Julia Clancy-Smith and Frances Gouda (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1998), 5. 71 Frieda von. Bülow, Tropenkoller: Episode aus dem deutschen Kolonialleben (Bad Griesbach, 2018), 241. 72 Mbembe, Critique of Black Reason, 12–13. 73 Mbembe, Critique of Black Reason, 32. 74 Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, translated from the French by Richard Philcox (New York: Grove Press, 2008), 108. 75 Cited in Robin Mitchell, Vénus Noire: Black Women and Colonial Fantasies in Nineteenth-Century France (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2020), 9. 76 Sharpe, Allegories of Empire, 4. 77 Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, 97. 78 Sharpe, Allegories of Empire, 8. 79 Cited in Vron Ware, Beyond the Pale: White Women, Racism and History (London: Verso, 2015), 35. 80 Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power, 60–61; see also 58. 81 Mitchell, Vénus Noire, 7 and 54. 82 Ware, Beyond the Pale, xx. 83 Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, 7. See also Susan L. Blake, “A Woman’s Trek: What Difference Does Gender Make,” in Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance, eds. Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), 19–34, here 22. 84 Zimmerman, Anthropology and Antihumanism in Imperial Germany, 15. 85 Tina M. Campt, Other Germans: Black Germans and the Politics of Race, Gender, and Memory in the Third Reich (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2004), 35. 86 Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel, “Introduction,” in Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance, eds. Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), 1–15, here 4. 87 Blake, “A Woman’s Trek,” 32. 88 See Pratt who notes that “an imperial tendency to see European culture emanating out to the colonial periphery from a self-generating center has obscured the constant movement of people and ideas in the other direction” (Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, 90). Sharpe speaks of the challenge of “finding alternative ways to read the signs of subaltern women’s agency” (Sharpe, Allegories of Empire, 14). 89 Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power, ix.

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90 Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 15 and 42. While Fanon’s thinking on race is as insightful as it is indispensable, his gender politics is in dire need of revision. In particular, Fanon’s statements on rape are highly problematic: “when a woman lives the fantasy of rape by a black man, it is a kind of fulfillment of a personal dream or an intimate wish” (Black Skin, White Masks, 156); “Just as there are faces that just ask to be slapped, couldn’t we speak of women who just ask to be raped” (Black Skin, White Masks, 134). 91 El Tayeb, Anders Europäisch, 30.

Part 1

Intimacies

1

Farming Frontiers The German Woman Pioneer Patricia Anne Simpson

On January 4, 1907, editor A. Herfurth entitled his front-page opinion piece for the Koloniale Zeitschrift (colonial magazine): “Warum müssen wir Kolonialpolitik treiben?”1 (Why must we pursue colonial politics?). He enumerates reasons, but lays blame for diminished masculinity at the feet of a long period of peace, accompanied by a moral decline. With urgency, Herfurth unleashes a tirade against sexual degeneration on the home front, railing against the “Verhimmelung des Sexuellen” (glorification of the sexual), ubiquity of sexual imagery, and the “Wollustdelirium, das die Hetäre und Prostituierte auf den Altar des Glaubens erheben möchte” (1; the delirium of lust that would elevate the hetaera and prostitute to the altar of faith). On every available public surface, from bookstores to house facades and monuments, “macht sich Frau Venus vulgivaga in Stellungen breit, die auf den Lustkitzel berechnet sind” (1; Miss Venus vulgivaga spreads herself into positions designed to arouse lust). To drain this swamp, regain lost German manhood (Männerwürde), and honor “tausende blühender Menschenleben” (1; thousands of blossoming human lives), he calls for a readiness to sacrifice even more; for men to colonize to enhance their own self-worth and that of their people. The path to male salvation lies in battle and/or the colonies. In the colonial context, the toxic femininity of Herfurth’s disapproving optics is recoded in the trope of the Farmersfrau. The German Age of Empire (1884–1918) has often been characterized as a brief historical intervention into imperialism by the relatively new nation-state (1871) to achieve power similar to or exceeding that of European rivals. Following unification, Germany enhanced its national narrative with colonial ambitions. However, as historian David Ciarlo cogently observes, the majority of Germans evinced little interest in the colonies: “despite a brief surge of interest (buoyed largely by the press), the German public seemed, at least to the die-hard colonial ‘enthusiasts,’ to largely ignore Germany’s colonies.”2 Throughout the period, demographic shifts, rapid industrialization, urbanization, and emigration put economic pressure on the nation-state that imperial expansion promised DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-3

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to alleviate by creating new markets, providing raw materials, and absorbing the population overflow. However, violence and war, alongside economic losses deflated unrealistic expectations. The “die-hard” endorsers of the imperialist enterprise pushed back with verve. Driven by a heady combination of economic and nationalist ambitions, colonialists’ identities ranged from armchair explorers and orators to administrators, soldiers, patriotic colonists, and their families, and, depending on the geography, farmers in search of land to cultivate. Around the same time, German-speaking emigrants in the Americas and beyond, however, identified with the expansionist desires of the “motherland,” a term frequently employed to designate the imperial center from outposts on the perceived periphery. Self-defining as colonists and pioneers on selected frontiers, German-speaking emigrants, whose politics aligned as much with those of Berlin as with those of Buenos Aires, Santiago de Chile, or Washington DC, positioned themselves as players in the colonial enterprise. In this way, they assume agency on behalf of a collective national project. Historian H. Glenn Penny formulates the ascent of the national to the hegemonic as the “cunning teleology of national histories.”3 Scholars seeking to decolonize such national histories and the attendant subsumption of all colonized spaces into European hegemony have drawn inspiration from a range of disciplines and positions. The work of Latin Americanist Aníbal Quijano, who articulates modernity with the “colonialidad de poder” (coloniality of power), has exerted considerable influence. He writes that “coloniality of power is based upon ‘racial’ social classification of the world population under Eurocentered world power.”4 In other words, coloniality, as Quijano elaborates elsewhere, revolves around a racialized axis of power; it functions hegemonically, predating and surviving the historical acquisition of official colonies and protectorates. In colonized spaces, the control of one’s own and others’ labor becomes pivotal. The trope of the German worker capable of modernizing the non-white labor force emerged in the Age of Empire. Colonialist and migration narratives and experiences differ across times and places, but, as I contend here and elsewhere, the intersection of demographic changes and the late-nineteenth-century foray into Empire generates a powerful discourse about the essence of German nationalism, a toxic brew of intersectional ingredients that exercise a profound effect on heteronormative gender roles. This era still generates narratives about racial, national, and gendered identities that capture an alignment between provincialism, posited in opposition to cosmopolitanism, and Germanness. At their nexus, such narratives recast the relationship between German identity and the tropes modeled for centuries by the Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, English, French, and Danish and appropriated by the German colonist circa 1900. These

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include the evangelizing missionary savior, the scientist, the explorer, the enterprising adventurer, and the homesteading farmer and his family. All these tropes animate the experiences of German colonists of the nineteenth century, who self-identify as enlightened redeemers, imperial citizen, and ennobled yeoman. In some cases, such discursive identities compensated, even justified, the actual experiences of German colonizers in the country and drove colonial politics at home. Some scholars have rightly pointed out that the colonies cost more than they contributed to the German motherland. Indeed, Togo became the “Musterkolonie” (model colony), in part because it produced more revenue than it consumed.5 In light of its economic unprofitability, it was all the more important that the colonial enterprise be sustained ideologically through tropes that had accrued specific German characteristics. Worthy attempts to understand German identity in global and globalizing narratives, however, tend to occlude important historical patterns. In What Is Global History?, Sebastian Conrad writes that such an approach “tends to downplay the fundamental differences between the various forms of colonial rule, which range from extractive empires of the early modern era to complex structures of informal empire-building in the present day.”6 Conrad’s caution about homogenizing conclusions is welltaken. To avert globalizing overdetermination, I narrow the focus in this chapter to resonances between colonial activism in then German South West Africa (Deutsch-Südwestafrika), today’s Namibia, and the economic and cultural forces that fueled immigration to examine anxiety about European gendered identities. Beginning with the shared classifications of women’s roles in migration and colonial discourses, I examine experiences of colonial frontiers with der Farmer as protagonist. In real existing colonialism, the Farmersfrau (farmer’s wife) emerges as the interlocutor of feminine whiteness. A 1913 memoir by Adelheid (Ada) Cramer entitled Weiß oder Schwarz. Lehr- und Leidensjahre eines Farmers in Südwest im Lichte des Rassenhasses (White or Black, A Farmer’s Apprenticeship and Years of Suffering in Southwest in Light of Racial Hatred) purports to tell the true, personal story behind the legal proceedings against Cramer’s husband, Ludwig Cramer. On April 4, 1913, Ludwig Cramer was charged with inflicting “dangerous physical harm in combination with coercion.”7 His prosecution encompassed a history of violent, vengeful attacks primarily against Black women. Krista O’Donnell cites historical sources about the proceedings that document Cramer’s brutality and unbridled rage directed at victims he considered “poisonous women.”8 While corporal punishment was officially prohibited, it was nonetheless widespread and tolerated. Yet, even against this backdrop, Cramer’s violence stood out. The British, who assumed authority over German South West after World War

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I, cited this case as an example and proof of German imperial failure.9 Exculpatory in intent, Ada Cramer’s life writing illustrates a racialized allegory of a Farmersfrau in the battle for survival against the Eingeborenen (natives) in ways that call attention to the shifting gender roles in colonial epistemics. Though her narrative proffers several vignettes of feminizing outreach and ameliorating solidarity with women, Cramer recuperates moral and racial superiority through recourse to her identity as a colonial wife and reluctant white caregiver. In his work on resistance and hegemony, James Scott elaborated the “hidden transcript” of the disempowered and the “ideological insubordination” found in “rumors, gossip, folktales, songs,” analogous to the resistance practices of peasants and the enslaved, such as “poaching, foot-dragging, pilfering, dissimulation, flight.”10 He contrasts this hidden transcript with the “public transcript,” the “self-portrait of dominant elites as they would have themselves seen.”11 Scott’s model, both persuasive and illuminating, has powerful but not complete explanatory force for the public transcript of the German Farmersfrau, which emerged around 1900 from encounters between German and Anglophone colonizers. These adjacencies inscribe female colonizers into ancillary roles, but historical exigencies of social mobility through immigration and ideological services rendered by colonizing for the German nation-state reinscribe them into political allegories, accessing specific myths of empowerment. The Farmersfrau encompasses the South American immigrant woman as pioneer; the North American as fighting frontierswoman; and the German of colonial South West Africa as the self-sacrificing, hardworking, and gender-fluid caregiver. The word “Farmersfrau” itself garners attention. Ada Cramer’s son, Ernst Ludwig Cramer, published a Nazi-era memoir, narrated in part as a work of mourning for the loss of his son Helmut, Die Kinderfarm (The children’s farm, 1940); it purports to commemorate the stories Helmut would have told his German peers about life in German South West Africa. The memoir perpetuates a myth not only of German colonial maternality, but also advocates an imperial agenda, made legitimate, even imperative, by the intergenerational interwar trauma that aligns the reclaiming of lost colonies with the politics of National Socialist family values. During the Enlightenment, medicalized and epistemological narratives about racial and ethnic identity, driven by ancestral resentment of stronger European powers, had converged in ways that were to reconfigure the German story of coloniality in a different register; one that explicitly entangles the economics of colonial markets and desirable resources, crops, and Indigenous labor and lives with the project of German emigration. Around 1900, key colonial administrators and activists took and switched sides to map the world as German-centric. The

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works I analyze portray the historical and fictional German woman pioneer as she positions her identity in relation to family, German-speaking neighbors, and enslaved or Indigenous people—and finally, against the German administrative authorities, the police; these works invert the image of the European feminine ca. 1900, thereby staking a claim to masculinized whiteness. Tropical Frontiers German studies scholars, among them Susanne Zantop, have illuminated the complicated history of German colonial fantasies predating the Age of Empire, with attention to the legacy of Enlightenment racist theories, gendered identities, and the centrality, rather than contingency, of the prenational, German-language imperial imaginary.12 Historian Lora Wildenthal’s foundational study of German women colonial activists elaborates on the complex relationships between gender, nationalism, and race; in particular, she puts pressure on the notion that female presence mitigates colonial brutality.13 The Cramer case discussed in this essay thematizes gendered roles reversing and transferring in the colony; the feminine gains strength required to prevail in supporting the family and a colony outside the homeland. The entitlements of the pioneer/settler rely on the cultivation of a persecuted heroism in the face of nature, climate, and racialized antagonists. Decolonizing these narratives demands first examining their construction, which, I contend, relies on the gendered division of labor as constitutive of the German beyond Germany. While Germans did not necessarily self-identify as agents in the trans-Atlantic slave trade, they were entangled in trans-Atlantic networks; making these networks legible contributes to the process of decolonizing German studies. Reference to a relatively obscure colonial activist, Gustav Hermann Meinecke (1854–1903), helps frame the analysis of Ada Cramer’s nonfiction prose. Author and colonial politician Meinecke served as editor of the Deutscher Kolonialzeitung (German Colonial Newspaper) as well as director of the Deutsches Kolonialmuseum (German Colonial Museum). In addition, he published the Koloniales Jahrbuch14 (Colonial Yearbook) and endorsed a range of publications from the mainstream media to loftier print venues. Meinecke was a key organizer of the 1896 Colonial Exhibition in Berlin, for which he produced the accompanying catalog—and for which he is best known. Historian David Ciarlo counts him among a group of “professional colonists,” German nationalists who promoted the colonial project around the turn of the century. In 1899, Meinecke founded a publishing house and printed his own work, such as Deutsche Kolonien in Wort und Bild (German Colonies in Word and Image). Meinecke’s earlier work from the early- to mid-1890s exposes an encompassing mental map of the

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world and the place of Germanness in it. He elaborates on research and investment in his Deutsche Kultivation in Ostafrika und der Kaffeebau (German Cultivation in East Africa and the Coffee Farm).15 Ciarlo notes that he sat on the board of the Pangani-Gesellschaft, an East African sugar company.16 Meinecke’s personal and professional interests overlap considerably in his 1895 Zuckeruntersuchungen am Pangani (Sugar Studies at Pangani).17 Beyond the imperial and ideological investments in Africa, Meinecke cast a worldwide net. One example of this expansiveness is Meinecke’s Katechismus der Auswanderung (Catechism of Emigration), which provides a wide readership with a hands-on, how-to guide for Germans who were weighing the pros and cons of migration. This work, unlike any other, forges strong connections between German migration, colonization, and a cosmopolitan worldview. By 1896, the “catechism” had gone into its seventh edition. Perhaps for good reason, Meinecke’s literary prose works have garnered little scholarly attention. In the Katechismus, Meinecke presumes the luxury of agency for the German emigrant. After he describes the factors driving emigration in the late-nineteenth century, including population growth, demographic changes, industrialization, and diminished agricultural production, he praises the Germanic character’s resolve in making the decision to leave. To reduce any cognitive dissonance that might ensue from the dilemma just described—choosing an exit strategy to express nationalism—emigration becomes patriotic. Crucial is the question: “Wohin,” and here, he speaks to the global distribution of Germans and the imperative to form communities in order to attain a critical mass of Germanness and preserve the investment of labor and education: “Damit hängt nicht nur das Wohl der Auswanderer selbst, sondern auch das Interesse des Mutterlandes zusammen”18 (On that depend not only the well-being of the emigrants themselves, but also the interests of the Motherland). Meinecke imputes a national, nearly genealogical teleology to any migration from Germany. Underlining this advice, he paints a dire picture, elaborating the consequences of spreading German selves too thinly: if Germans lose their language, customs, and connections to the homeland, they end up forming “Völkerdünger”19—manure of peoples. Thus emigrating in isolation constitutes emigrating without purpose, a misspent investment of money and education that only serves to “fertilize” other nations and populations. With the world within German grasp, Meinecke broaches the topic of the tropics—climate is everything. In the Katechismus, he connects climate among Argentina, Brazil, South American countries, South West Africa, Central America, and Australia, claiming that “die Jahreszeiten in jenen Gegenden ganz anders fallen, als bei uns oder in den unserem Klima mehr

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entsprechenden gemäßigten Teilen der Vereinigten Staaten”20 (the seasons in those regions fall completely differently than at home or in the more temperate parts of the United States that correspond more to our climate). In the section about the Near East, Africa, the German colonies, Australia, Central America, and Mexico—he considers the latter to be outside the region—he begins to answer the question of where Germans, in fact, can be found. Here he blurs any borders between displacement, migration, and colonization: “Besser könnte man wohl fragen: Wo haben sich Deutsche nicht niedergelassen?”21 (It would be more appropriate to ask: Where have Germans not settled?). Invoking the tropes of German industry and ingenuity, Meinecke makes mobility a German national trait, decentering a narrative about the belatedness of the nation. However, he privileges North America and South America, in comparison to the position of Germans in Central America, due to an inhospitable climate. When he turns his attention to the official German colonies and protectorates, he shifts into a political register. On the African continent more generally, Meinecke questions why any German would want to live under French colonial rule in Algeria. He foregrounds business connections in South Africa. The German colonies, however, must be considered carefully for reasons of climate, for they are “Tropenkolonien” (tropical colonies) and, as such, eine deutsche Auswanderung nach dorthin so gut wie ausgeschlossen, solange nicht nachgewiesen ist, daß der Auswanderer in einer bedeutenden Höhenlage, welche vorläufig für Besiedelung allein in Betracht kommt, gedeihen kann und solange nicht die notwendigen Verbindungen zwischen diesen Gegenden und den ungesunden Küsten geschaffen worden sind.22 German immigration there is virtually impossible as long as it remains unproven that the emigrant can thrive at a significant altitude, which for the time being alone is suitable for settlement, and as long as the necessary connections between these regions and the unhealthy coasts have not been established. Without a critical mass of Germans and development, the only realistic possibility remains German South West Africa, “obwohl man sich auch hier vor Illusionen bewahren muß”23 (although one has to guard against illusions here as well). To dispel those illusions, Meinecke provides an overview of racial stereotypes of the Ovaherero,24 the “yellow” Khokhoi,25 characterizing them as cunning and warlike. First published a decade before the Herero-Nama genocide, Meinecke’s description of the Khoikhoi’s supposedly troublesome character attributes to them an inborn bellicosity, rather than acknowledging the colonial politics that forged

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alliances between the British and local tribal leaders, or the Germans and their allies. Here, Meinecke alludes to the war, which he celebrates as a German victory and returns immediately to the model of investment most suited to German South West Africa.26 Postcolonial scholars, in the aftermath of decolonial movements, have overturned the rhetoric of peaceful restoration that pervades Meinecke’s text; he extols the achievements of German military intervention, taking aim at Hendrik Witbooi (1830?–1905), a descendent of Jager Afrikaner and anti-colonial leader. An ongoing research project investigates Witbooi’s writings from perspectives beyond the polarized interpretations of his life and legacy—he was killed during a battle with the German forces and buried in an unmarked grave; Witbooi has since been lauded as a heroic African activist, and his image appears on Namibian bank notes. According to Hendrik Bosman, Witbooi’s papers provide evidence of his Christianity, with an independent, African-specific identification with the biblical theme of Exodus. Inspired by the divine, he led his people north, into conflict with the colonial powers, accepted a period of non-violence with the signature of a Schutzvertrag, and obeyed the command of providence to rise up against the colonizers.27 Enter the Farmer and the Farmersfrau. The hidden and public transcripts from German South West Africa document the shift in perspective and purpose: from a war with the elements to a race war. In 1913, Meineke published Ada Cramer’s Weiß oder Schwarz. As border conflicts erupted and national lines were drawn firmly, the figurative wilderness of the New World, the unwritten pages of the prairie, the untamed, unowned jungles ready for cultivation, the empty pampas, the arable land of East and West Africa, all entered discursive, transnationally sanctioned German territory and geographic imaginary. The pioneer, farmer, or professional settler as German citizen and colonist assumes agency for the first time in history. Ultimately, however, gender issues disrupt the hegemonic model of German identity. Die Farmersfrau The image of German (white) women in the colonies is refracted through a series of durable and malleable tropes. The nineteenth- and earlytwentieth-century historicizing narratives to legitimize German presence in postcolonial nation-states such as Argentina and Chile look to the early modern conquerors and find German ancestry.28 Riding waves of immigration, factual, and fictional stories of heroine-ism sustain audiences in German-language media.29 The strong woman standing steadfast against the elements and the odds morphs into the Farmersfrau on the colonial frontier. This resonates across the African continent

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between German East and South West Africa. In one example, Magdalene von Prince writes: Jetzt sind es nun schon fast vier Jahre, dass wir als Pflanzer hier leben. Auch heftige Stürme und viele Fehlschläge, die ja bei keiner Gründung fehlen, blieben bei uns nicht aus. Trotzdem möchte ich Euch, deutsche Frauen, auch jetzt locken in das Land wo der Himmel blauer strahlt, wo der Wind linder weht, wo Mond und Sterne noch ganz anders leuchten und funkeln als daheim. Glaubt es mir, es liegt ein besonderer Reiz darin, aus der Wildnis ein Stück Kultur zu schaffen. Aber das gelingt nur und trägt Früchte bei größter, nie versagender Geduld, eiserner Willenskraft und harter Arbeit.30 For nearly four years now, we have been living here as planters. We did not lack for the violent storms and many failures that accompany any foundation. Nevertheless, even now I would like to lure you, German women, into the country where the sky shines bluer, where the wind blows more gently, where the moon and stars shine and sparkle quite differently than at home. Believe me, there is a special attraction in creating a piece of culture from the wilderness. But that only succeeds and bears fruit with the greatest, never-failing patience, iron willpower, and hard work. Von Prince appeals directly to a female audience, tempting her readers with the hardships to be overcome, the bluer hue, and the peculiar accomplishment of creating culture from the presumed ex nihilo of a wilderness. Her self-identification as one of the “Pflanzer” does not necessarily sort for gender (though in an American context, it assumes ownership of land worked by enslaved people). Prince acknowledges hardships and setbacks but makes no reference to armed conflict. Hostile conditions prevailed in East as well as South West Africa. By the time of Prince’s publication, the Maji-Maji Rebellion (1905–1907) against the Germans was over. The “hidden transcript” of the Herero-Nama War, however, shapes events in Ada Cramer’s memoir. The publication of Cramer’s memoir of her family’s colonial experiences in German South West Africa was truly a family affair. Her brotherin-law, husband Ludwig’s younger brother31 and Doctor of Law Otto Cramer, wrote a foreword (March 1, 1913): “Das vorliegende Buch ist von einer Farmersfrau geschrieben”32 (The book at hand was written by a farmer’s wife); and an introduction (March 21, 1913), in which he argues that the German administrators sided with the Blacks against the Farmer, his brother. The crime in question: poisoning. It is widely known that German soldiers, after the initial battles against the Herero-Nama, brutally massacred the enemy; they raped women, experimented on survivors,

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committed thousands to death in concentration camps, and provided German scientists with the remains of the dead for study. They also poisoned wells and livestock to insure death by starvation. The San, also victims in the genocide, traditionally used poison (from beetles) to ensure the lethal effect of their arrows. Explaining their survival of the presumed attempt on their lives, Ada Cramer’s brother-in-law resorts to the superiority of their healthy constitutions: “seiner und seiner Frau zähe Gesundheit überwindet das schleichende, unheimliche Gift, das man ihnen beigebracht hat” (his and his wife’s tough health triumphs over the creeping, uncanny poison they were given).33 As Ada Cramer narrates their story, she includes their dire illnesses and the loss of livestock; both Cramers insist they were poisoned. The economic backstory and dedication to German family and colony drive her husband’s ambition to succeed as a Farmer and his determination to provide for her and their children, according to her testimonial. In the introduction, Dr. Otto Cramer turns away from the Farmersfrau to the vicissitudes of her husband’s biography. His brother turned to farming as he approached 40, with a career as an entrepreneur behind him. At the age of 26, he co-founded the Hamburg trading company Wiskott & Cramer, “das er, als eine auf das Brasilianische Valorizationsgesetz gegründete Spekulation fehlschlug, so liquidierte, daß alle Gläubigen voll befriedigt wurden”34 (which, when a speculation based on a Brazilian valorization law failed, he liquidated in such a way that all creditors were fully satisfied). Frey recounts that Cramer married his cousin Adelheid, 8 years his junior, in 1891.35 She provides more context: though he lost a fortune, Ludwig Cramer had enough money left to start over with his wife as a farmer in the German colonies; they had no previous agricultural experience. They saw this as their personal destiny, independent of external forces. Like so many immigrants and colonists, their daily existence accrued epic significance beyond German borders. But personal aspirations, to farm German land in the African colonies, for example, do not develop outside history. Without drilling down into too many details, after the abolition of slavery, Brazil made a concerted effort to “whiten” the population; this involved recruiting European families to work the land previously made profitable by enslaved African labor. The emergence of cash crops signified an economic shift from extraction to industrialization, with improved infrastructure (British engineers built railroads) and the move of the national capital south. Between 1909 and 1910, coffee prices dropped, and the valorization law kept production low in Brazil to avoid a collapse in prices.36 In the midst of these economic developments, Cramer turned to colonial farming in German South West. And yet, there was no acknowledgment of the geo-political and economic forces that had benefited his Brazilian coffee enterprises; he and his wife insisted on their own

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enterprising agency as Germans as the cause for any success. Bolstered by the rhetoric of patriotic expansion, the Cramers took up farming and set off for the colony. “Ich bin eine schlichte Frau”: Toxic Femininity Ada Cramer opens her narrative with exclamatory remarks about her five years in German South West—“Daß diese fünf Jahre mich nicht zerbrochen haben, daß ich nach dem, was hinter mir liegt, noch hoffe, die geistige Spannkraft zu haben, die Fülle der Bilder und Erlebnisse, welche an meinem geistigen Auge vorüberziehen, niederschreiben zu können, scheint mir fast ein Wunder” (15; That these five years have not broken me, that I still hope, after everything I have been through, to have the spiritual strength to be able to write down the abundance of images and experiences that pass before my mind’s eye, seems almost like a miracle to me). Cramer next insists with self-deprecation: “Ich bin eine schlichte Frau und habe noch niemals die Feder zur Hand genommen” (15; I am a simple woman and I have never before taken up the pen). Cramer’s subtext of religiosity and sacrifice lends a tone of martyrdom to the act of colonization; it drives her to assume agency in the act of writing. For many German emigrants, the fact of leaving ennobles the everyday and reframes the mundane matters of existence with the gild of a hero’s journey. Throughout the memoir, Cramer contrasts the profundity of her feelings with the sense of betrayal of that sincerity. With heartache, the narrator recounts their departure, leaving their four children in safe hands until they could settle, and the verve with which the couple embarked on the “Pionierarbeit fürs Vaterland” (17; pioneer work for the fatherland). From her point of view, readers absorb stories of unfair treatment, the failed purchase of a promised farm, acquiring less land considerably farther afield from Windhoek than planned, along with their numerous encounters with Herero and Khokhoi laborers. Though she begins with the gasping amazement of their survival, Cramer also notes tender moments in recounting their life in “contact zones,” though her point of view remains centered on proprietary relationships to the Indigenous peoples and defensive feints in confrontation with the German authorities. Repeatedly, Cramer reminds the reader and herself of her role as benevolent caregiver. The emphasis on nurturing manifests on the journey to the farm, which unfortunately is farther away from the city than the colonial couple hoped. At one point, their small party camps near a military precinct. Ada Cramer stokes their campfire in the hopes that the soldiers will notice and join them; this transpires, and she offers them tea with rum, describing them admiringly: “alles junge, frische Gesellen mit frohen, erwartungsvollen Augen, frisch von Deutschland gelandet” (28; all young, fresh fellows with

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happy, expectant eyes, freshly landed from Germany). Their enthusiasm for battle impresses her, for they came “um den Erlag mit Simon Kopper klarzumachen” (28; to nullify the defeat with Simon Kopper). Kopper or Kooper (ǃGomxab, *–1913) was a captain of the Frans-Nama, allied with the Ovaherero and Germans in the Mbandero uprising of 1896, though this alliance was strategic; his band arrived after the battle to loot. Later allied with Witbooi against the Germans in 1904, he was taken prisoner and interred at the Shark Island concentration camp. The youthful military spirit of the German soldiers around the Cramers’ bivouac fire gives a glimpse into the hidden transcript of Nama resistance, under the watchful, appreciative eye and writing hand of the Farmersfrau. On the facing page—they are approximately 60 kilometers from Gobadis, the locale of their 20,000 hectares farm Oljifororini—she admires the land itself: “Das Land ist über Erwarten schön und fruchtbar, zum Teil schwerer Weizenboden, üppige Weide und viel Baumwuchs” (29; The land is beautiful and fertile beyond expectation, partly heavy wheat soil, lush pasture, and lots of trees). Her next observation captures the essence of the colonizing gaze: “Doch davon, daß nur vor wenigen Jahren ein zahlreiches Volk das Land bewohnt hatte, war nicht mehr das geringste zu spüren. Nichts, gar nichts zeugte davon, daß dieses Volk je in seinem Leben einen Finger zur Arbeit gerührt hatte, es war über dieses Land dahingegangen wie das Wild über die Weide” (29; But there was no longer the slightest trace of the fact that just a few years ago, a large people had inhabited this land. Nothing, absolutely nothing showed that this people had ever in their lives lifted a finger to work, it had passed over this land like wild animals over a pasture). Her farming eye overtly erases its people and history from what was their land, now hers. The Farmersfrau has maternal moments in the absence of her own children. At times she seems to be seeking common cause with Indigenous mothers, only to be shocked at their indifference, which enables her to regain the moral high ground. She is staffing the farthest outpost, confirmed by the soldiers who report a nearby uprising. Unwilling to let themselves fret about the violence, the Cramers pick up workers from the district, not without complaint about their shabbiness and smell. The women help build the sleeping “Pontok,” completed just before the rain. During a stormy night, some of the livestock break their confinement and escape. The “Kaffer” Jakob is sent after them, but the rain washes away any traces. The same night, three Herero women workers disappear; they leave four small children behind. Ada Cramer describes their plight: “Da saßen wir nun mitten in der Wildnis ganz allein und hatten noch für vier schwarze Kinder zu sorgen” (31; There we sat in the middle of the wilderness, completely alone, and had to care for four Black children). Her resentment does not deter her care-giving instincts: “Der kleinste Affe von

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9 Monaten konnte unheimlich schreien, er bekam allmählich meinen ganzen Vorrat an kondensierter Milch, und wir tranken dem kleinen Schreihals zuliebe unseren Kaffee schwarz” (31; The youngest ape, nine months old, could scream unbelievably; eventually he got my entire supply of condensed milk, and for the sake of the little screamer we drank our coffee black). The almost affectionate, maternal tone suggests a term of endearment in the racial slur (Affe). Cramer tends the home fires, complaining about the mouths to feed: “Um unser Feuer saßen die vier schwarze Würmer, für die ich dreimal am Tag Suppe kochen mußte” (31; Around our fire sat the four Black worms for whom I had to prepare soup three times daily). The emphasis lies on the sacrifices Ada and her husband make and the extra work and food the abandoned children require. The district office assigned workers to farmers, a practice that naturalizes the master–servant hierarchy in which the Cramers participate with a sense of seigneurial privilege. The power structure does not factor in gender roles, and Ada Cramer finds herself practicing maternality with ambivalence, attributed to the race of her wards. Such sacrifices make the betrayals harder to bear, from her perspective. As a Farmersfrau, Cramer casts herself in redemptive female roles as part of her new identity. On a difficult trip to Kehorro, 60 kilometers distance from Gobabis, the Cramers meet with multiple challenges while trying to move eight cows and purchase necessities for the farm. The cows get away (due to negligent oversight); a mule dies of colic. Additionally, Ada Cramer notes the death of a young Herero woman from pneumonia. She writes: “Ich habe sie vier Tage gepflegt und war empört über die Hartherzigkeit ihrer Stammesgenossen. Diese glaubten von Anfang an, daß die Frau sterben würde, und so war sie ihnen keinen Schlug Wasser mehr wert” (30; I nursed her for four days and was appalled at the callousness of her fellow tribesmen. From the beginning they believed that the woman would die, and so to them she was no longer worth even a sip of water). Cramer assimilates gender fluidity into the performative role of the Farmersfrau. Shortly after the grueling trip and having established a household, she notes with amazement in the act of repose and retrospective writing that she had donned “Männerkleidung” (male clothing) to work beside an open flame (31). She celebrates the satisfaction of domestic work: “Mit welcher Freude sah ich den Weißen bei der Arbeit zu” (34; I felt such joy when I watched the Whites at work). When her husband is away, she dedicates herself to passing the time through “fleissige Arbeit” (50; industrious labor). In other words, Ada Cramer resolves any dissonance in her multiple subject positions as wife, mother, woman, caregiver, mistress, boss, and worker, through imperial whiteness. For this reason, she poses the racial question as an either/or. Suspicious from the beginning of the German district authorities, Cramer’s

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perception of their siding with Africans against the farmers only increases her skepticism. Furthermore, she makes multiple allusions to her initial openness to Blacks, whom she purports to give the benefit of the doubt; she ultimately concludes there was collusion between the administrators and Africans against the hard-working, well-meaning community of colonists. Ada Cramer harbors deep resentment toward the colonial authorities for enforcing German laws against abusing workers—she sees this as betrayal. In due course, she makes the reader aware of a growing estrangement between the colonial administrators and the Farmers (52); the former she accuses of siding with the dissembling and duplicitous “natives”: Diesem Volke, dem jede Kultur, jeder sittliche Untergrund fehlt, bei dem man vergeblich ein Gewissen sucht, hat unsre Regierung die gleichen Rechte mit unserem weißen deutschen Arbeiter gegeben. Was unser Volk sich durch Jahrhunderte mit Blut erkauft hat,—vor nicht viel mehr als 100 Jahren herrschte in Preußen noch die Leibeigenschaft— das bekommt dies rebellische Volk als Lockspeise hingeworfen. (52) Our government has given this people, who lack any culture or civilization, any moral foundation, where one searches in vain for a conscience, the same rights as our white German workers. What our people acquired with its blood through centuries—not even 100 years ago, serfdom was still dominant in Prussia—has been tossed to this rebellious people as a sugar plum. Here, Ada Cramer rehearses a familiar refrain in the discourse of German exceptionalism; she equates European serfdom with slavery, sidestepping any issue of racial difference between enslavement and Leibeigenschaft, on which her logic is predicated. The German Farmer, “treuer deutscher Pionier” (53; true German pioneer), does the heavy patriotic lifting of teaching “dieses arbeitsscheue Volk” (53; this lazy/ work-shy people) the meaning of work. Cramer describes her illness (62) and her husband’s grievous near-death experience (67). According to her report, they were poisoned, as were the salt blocks for their livestock and prize animals. One case comes before the authorities: a domestic servant, Lupatine, confesses to poisoning the “Missiß” (107)37 at the behest of Kadwakonda, her husband; she claims that she defended the Baas and the Missiß on the basis of their goodness, to no avail. Driven to get proof, Ernst Cramer goes on a mission: he interrogates Maria, wife of the farmhand July, who confesses, through a Herero interpreter, to the crimes and their planning. In the fog of fear and self-righteous indignation, Ada Cramer addresses her reader directly: “Was hättest du, Leser, getan?” (What would you, reader, have done?). Is

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what her husband was charged with a crime, she wonders: “daß er außer sich geriet, wenn er an seine Frau dachte, die monatelang durch die Schuld jenes Schurken wie tot auf dem Feldbett lag, daß ihn Entsetzen packet, wenn er an jene Nacht dachte, in welcher er sich in dumpfer Verzweiflung fast selbst verstümmelt hätte, um Frau und Kindern wenigstens seine Arbeitskraft zu erhalten” (111; that he was beside himself with rage when he thought of his wife, who for months through the fault of this scoundrel lay like dead on the camp bed, that horror gripped him when he thought of that night when in dull despair he nearly mutilated himself, so that his wife and children at least would still have his labor). These tendentious questions preface the ruthless beating. Ludwig Cramer finds and beats July, the alleged culprit. And he goes after the women in search of the poison. Ada Cramer ties the women’s hands and facilitates a search, the complexity of which Marcia Klotz has analyzed with reference to Klaus Theweleit’s “rifle” or phallic woman.38 Ada Cramer envisions herself at war on the side of justice against the insidious poison and homicidal agency of Black women. While Klotz foregrounds Ada Cramer’s participation in sadistic and erotic fantasies and observes that the latter are not exclusively male,39 I emphasize instead the expansion of female identity construction predicated on the explicit inclusion of white settler agency, the toxic feminine. Ada Cramer pulls herself back from the precipice of guilt by reverting to caregiver roles she cannot seem to shed. The following day, insisting on the essential differences between women and men, Ada cares for July’s wounds: because men and women must behave “ihrer Natur nach” (112; according to her nature). Frey reports testimonies from the victims: in the frenzied search for poison, Ludwig Cramer whipped several female workers; he offered the opportunity to beat another (pregnant) woman to a colonist, also from Bielefeld. Ultimately, two women died as a result of the beatings; his floggings of pregnant woman twice caused miscarriages.40 A missionary documented the crimes; they were brought forth at the trial.41 Ada Cramer alternately abetted her husband’s crimes and sought mercy for his victims. Klotz’s argument highlights a sexual component in Cramer’s cruelty and violence and his wife’s complicity in his apparent arousal. Ada Cramer indulges in violent fantasies of vengeance; and in one search, she knifes open a blouse. Her husband’s excitement prompts his departure, and she continues the search under the woman’s skirts. Of Ada Cramer’s selfdefinition as a woman, Klotz writes: “Her gender seems to slide back and forth from one sentence to the next.”42 Much of Klotz’s analysis is persuasive; she sees in Ada Cramer’s narrative an inconsistency, but I argue that the trope of the Farmersfrau determines this feminine behavior in the settler colony across gendered attributes. Not only does Cramer attribute warrior-like, masculine traits to the Black women, but she also recounts

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the numerous failed attempts she herself undertook to play caregiver, nurse, and comforter to them. Ada Cramer occupies multiple subject positions simultaneously: she is a humanitarian caregiver, ostensibly raceagnostic, yet she vilifies the administrators who grant humanity and human rights to Black Africans. Her discourse dehumanizes Blackness while canonizing German whiteness. To farm is to assert racial superiority. There is more to the story, but let me move to her closing arguments, an appeal to the reader for reason. She implores her readers to think of the weißen Kindern, die nicht zur Schule gehen können, weil sie das Vieh hüten müssen, welches der Schwarze im Stich läßt, von weißen Frauen, die sich die Hände wund und den Leib krank arbeiten, während Hunderte von schwarzen Weibern rauchend in der Sonne sitzen. Von den Farmern, deren Existenz durch die Tücke der Schwarzen bedroht ist, denen sie das Vieh morden und das gesegnete Erntefeld in Brand stecken. (131) white children who cannot go to school because they have to watch the cattle that the Black man abandons; of white women, who work their hands sore and their bodies sick, while hundreds of Black women sit smoking in the sun. Of the farmers whose existence is threatened by the treachery of the Blacks, who poison their cattle and set fire to their blessed fields of harvest. After serving his sentence, Ludwig returned to the farm, where he died in 1917 while dynamiting (some say not an accident); Ada Cramer was deported to Germany after the League of Nations assumed the mandate in 1919; she died in 1962.43 Daughter Hildegard remained on the family farm; her brother, Ernst Ludwig, acquired neighboring land—the setting for his commemorative work, Die Kinderfarm, which I treat briefly in the conclusion. The trope of the ennobled farmer persisted in the ideology of the interwar period, beyond the loss of colonies at the end of World War I. Conclusion: The First Footprint The title of Ada Cramer’s memoir posed the urgent question: white or black. She disparaged attempts of the German colonial administrators to protect Black Africans from criminal abuse at the hands of the Farmers. Her son, Ernst Ludwig Cramer, continued the family tradition of writing about the colonial experience in South West Africa. In Die Kinderfarm, published in Potsdam in 1941, the Cramer son recounts and exemplifies an intergenerational colonial pathology of anti-Black racism. At a time when the country was no longer a German colony, Cramer refers to the land as German South West Africa. Directing his prose at a young German audience

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of “Jungens and Mädels” (boys and girls), he regales them with stories of struggle and self-reliance; of his five children; of Helmut, nicknamed “Goebbels”; of encounters with poisonous snakes, wild boars, and shifty natives. The descent of locusts invokes Old Testament plagues; drought and flooding interweave with domestic servants’ thieving and insubordination. In hard times, the Führer sent food; he supported German schools and held out the promise of a return to German hegemony in Africa. The trope of the Farmersfrau persists, and the original entitlement to German knowledge and adventure also proves intractable. E.L. Cramer writes the early modern history of Cape Cross (Kreuzkap), explored in 1484 by the Portuguese seafarer Diego São: “Mit ihm zusammen betrat als erster Deutscher Nürnberger Forscher Martin Beheim die südwestafrikanische Küste. Vorher hatte noch kein Weißer seinen Fuß auf dieses Gebiet gesetzt”44 (Together with him, the first German, the Nuremberg researcher Martin Behaim set foot on the South West African coast. No white man had ever set foot on this area before). Beheim embodies the courageous German who paved the way for his future Volk—the revisionist footprint of a whiteness on the African coast. The trope of early modern German masculinity is the genealogical forebear of this son of a Farmer and Farmersfrau. With thanks to Hitler for sending food during droughts, Cramer the Younger stakes his identity on the reclamation of today’s Namibia as the German colony of his youth. In broadcasting this legacy, the author and mourning father follows his mother’s footsteps of defining Germans in opposition to blackness. Ada Cramer appropriated serfdom in Prussia as a past enslavement from which the people emancipated themselves—and she identifies with this selfliberating agency—without political assistance. The unproven corollary in toxically feminine racial logic is Black victimization of German whiteness. Notes 1 A. Herfurth, “Warum müssen wir Kolonialpolitik treiben?,” Koloniale Zeitung 1, no. 8 (January 4, 1907): 1–2. Subsequent references to this editorial appear in parentheses. Unless otherwise noted, translations are my own. 2 David Ciarlo, Advertising Empire: Race and Visual Culture in Imperial Germany (Harvard Historical Studies 171. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), 4. Studies devoted to particular extraction industries, mining, for example, shed light on agendas beyond the public eye. See Steven Press, Blood and Diamonds: Germany’s Imperial Ambitions in Africa (Cambridge, MA, and London: Harvard University Press, 2021). Press traces “the transatlantic web that supplied diamond jewelry in the early 1900s—a substantial, if mysterious, market in which Germans came to control between a fifth and a fourth of global production before the First World War” (4). 3 H. Glenn Penny, German History Unbound: From 1750 to the Present (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2022), 3.

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4 Aníbal Quijano, “Coloniality and Modernity/Rationality,” in Cultural Studies 21, no. 2 (2007): 168–178, here 171. 5 Adjaï Paulin Oloukpona-Yinnon has published extensively on German colonialism in West Africa, specifically, the country now Togo, and on the literature and imperial correspondence of the era. His Unter deutschen Palmen is subtitled: Die “Musterkolonie” im Spiegel deutscher Kolonialliteratur (1884–1944) (Frankfurt a/M: IKO: Verlag für Interkulturelle Kommunikation, 1996). 6 Sebastian Conrad, What Is Global History? (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2016), 56. 7 Barbara Frey, “Der Fall Cramer,” Ravensberger Blätter, Organ des Historischen Vereins für die Grafschaft Ravensberg e.V., no. 2 (2011): 40–53, here 40. 8 Krista O’Donnell, “Poisonous Women: Sexual Danger, Illicit Violence, and Domestic Work in German Southern Africa, 1904–1915,” Journal of Women’s History 11, no. 3 (1999): 32–54, here 32. See also K. Molly O’Donnell, The Servants of Empire: Sponsored German Women’s Colonization in Southwest Africa, 1896–1945 (Oxford and New York: Berghahn Books, 2023), Chapter 4, “The Malice of Native Women,” especially 135–141. Here O’Donnell expands the historical context of labor shortages, the brutality directed at Black women, rumors about poisoning, and the Cramer case in the colonial press in greater detail. 9 See Frey, “Der Fall Cramer,” 40n2. 10 James C. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1990), xii. 11 Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance, 18. 12 See Zantop, Colonial Fantasies: Conquest, Family, and Nation in Precolonial Germany, 1770–1870 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997). See also Chunjie Zhang, Transculturality and German Discourse in the Age of European Colonialism (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2017). Zhang engages Zantop’s work to argue for differences among colonial fantasies around 1800, suggesting that the latter runs the risk of imposing a twentieth-century perspective on earlier periods. 13 Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2011): see also her “Race, Gender, and Citizenship in the German Colonial Empire,” in Tensions of Empire: Colonial Cultures in a Bourgeois World, eds. Frederick Cooper and Ann Laura Stoler (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 263–283. 14 Christian S. Davis, Colonialism, Anti-Semitism, and Germans of Jewish Descent in Imperial Germany (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2012), 165. 15 Meinecke, Ostafrika und der Kaffeebau (Berlin: Carl Heymanns Verlag, 1892). The title page informs us that this is a “Vermehrter Sonderdruck aus der Deutschen Kolonialzeitung mit einer kolorie?rten Karte.” 16 Ciarlo, Advertising Empire, 145. 17 Meinecke, Zuckeruntersuchungen am Pangani. Vegetationsbilder von Dr. Otto Warburg 2nd edition (Berlin: Deutscher Kolonial-Verlag, 1909). 18 Meinecke, Katechismus der Auswanderung. Kompaß für Auswanderer nach europäischen Ländern, Asien, Afrika, den deutschen Kolonien, Australien, Süd- und Zentralamerika, Mexiko, den Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika und Kanada. 7th Edition. Vollständig und neu bearbeitet. Mit 4 in den Text gedruckten Karten (Leipzig: J.J. Weber, 1896), 8. Emphasis in the original through letter spacing.

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19 Meinecke, Katechismus, 8. He sketches the sad life of Germans scattered among other people. 20 Meinecke, Katechismus, 32. 21 Meinecke, Katechismus, 35. 22 Meinecke, Katechismus, 45. 23 Meinecke, Katechismus, 45. 24 Meinecke, Katechismus, 46–47. Ovaherero and Herero are used interchangeably. 25 Meinecke, Katechismus, 47. Throughout, I quote the original, which uses a derogatory term for the Khokhoi, also the Nama people, characterized by the hunter-gatherer or nomadic pastoral way of life. 26 Meinecke, Katechismus, 47 27 Hendrik Bosman, “A Nama ‘Exodus’? A Postcolonial Reading of the Diaries of Hendrik Witbooi,” Scriptura 108 (2011): 329–341, here 331. 28 The explorer Ulrich Schmiedl serves as a model in Argentina. Bartolomeo Flores (Blumen) is the explorer associated with the first German in what became Chile. 29 Friedrich Spielhagen’s Deutsche Pioniere features a young female immigrant whose father dies on the voyage to America. A young German emigrant from Canada Creek becomes her protector (Sämtliche Werke VIII. Elibron Classics. Facsimile edition. Berlin: Otto Ranke, 1870), but her support is critical in defending the outpost against the French. In the mid-nineteenth century, letters from a Swabian daughter who emigrated on her own, in advance of her family, serve to recruit others and report on the process of acquiring land and farming it in Chile. See Alexandra Lübcke, “Welch ein Unterschied aber zwischen Europa und hier.” Diskurstheoretische Überlegungen zu Nation, Auswanderung und Geschlechteridentität anhand von Briefen deutscher Chileauswanderinnen des 19. Jahrhunderts (Frankfurt a/M: IKO Verlag für interkulturelle Kommunikation, 2003). For a sustained reading of these texts, see my German Empires and Decolonial Fantasies, 1492–1942 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, forthcoming). This chapter is taken in part from the book. 30 Magdalene von Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau im Innern Deutsch Ostafrikas. Elf Jahre nach Tagebuchblättern erzählt. 3rd expanded edition (Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler und Sohn, 1908), n/p. Projekt Gutenberg, https://www. gutenberg.org/files/53773/53773-h/53773-h.htm. Release date 2016. The quotation is taken from the preface to the second edition, Sakkarani, WestUsambara im Herbst, 1904. 31 For further biographical details, see Frey, “Der Fall Cramer,” 41. 32 Dr. Cramer, “Vorwort,” in Adelheid Cramer, Weiß oder Schwrrarz? Lehr- und Leidensjahre eines Farmers in Südwest im Lichte des Rassenhasses (Berlin: Kolonial-Verlag, 1913), iii–iv, here iii. All subsequent references to this volume appear with page numbers in parentheses. 33 Dr. Cramer, “Vorwort,” iii. 34 Otto Cramer, “Einleitung,” 1. 35 Frey, “Der Fall Cramer,” 42. 36 Werner Baer, The Brazilian Economy: Growth and Development (London: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2008). 37 O’Donnell points out that she had been interrogated and beaten prior to making this coerced confession (referring to her as Rupertine), 35. She refers to this material in Servants of Empire, to “Rupertina,” 136; and “Rupertine,” 137. In an email exchange with O’Donnell about the difference she noted that

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42 43 44

Patricia Anne Simpson her source is the published trial transcripts; and that German call names were not used consistently (August 24, 2023). Marcia Klotz, “Memoirs from a German Colony: What Do White Women Want?” Genders 19 (1994): 154–173, here 162–163. Klotz, “Memoirs,” 163. Klotz, “Memoirs,” 161. Frey, “Der Fall Cramer,” 50. See also O’Donnell, 36; she recounts that he also sought out and beat Konturu, the wife of Katoakonda, whom Lupertine identifies as the ringleader. Konturu had two stillbirths “caused in this manner” (36). O’Donnell concludes: “Cramer’s attacks on his female personnel reveal a brutal antagonism rooted in displaced sexual desire” (36). See also previously noted material from Servants of Empire. There is truth in this interpretation, but I would add that the context of German masculinity in the colonies allows for the displacement of the presumptive “civilizing” obligation; in the colonies, white men are uninhibited, freed to recuperate the savagery of tribal rivalries. Klotz, “Memoirs,” 163. Frey, “Der Fall Cramer,” 52, 53. Ernst Ludwig Cramer, Die Kinderfarm (Potsdam: Rütten und Loening, 1941), 274.

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Working for Weihnachtsstimmung German Women’s Role in Recreating German Culture and Identity in German Southwest Africa and German East Africa, 1894–1906 Kate McGregor

During her first Christmas in German colonial Southwest Africa (today’s Namibia) in 1893, Helene von Falkenhausen declared melancholically that “es war keine rechte Weihnachtsfreude bei uns eingekehrt” (there was no real Christmas joy among us), as she failed to replicate metropolitan traditions in the colonial sphere.1 At approximately the same time in German East Africa (today’s Tanzania, Burundi, and Rwanda), Magdalene von Prince’s celebration was far more joyful as Prince prepared “ein fröhliches Mahl” (a cheerful meal), providing her husband and fellow Germans with the comforts of home.2 No matter the location, it was the duty of German women such as Prince and Falkenhausen to recreate a perfect traditional Christmas as part of a larger effort to shore up their families’ white German identity and cultural heritage. During the initial phase of colonization, beginning in 1884, the German residents of the so-called protectorates were men and a small number of female missionaries and nurses. Gradually, female colonists, such as Prince and Falkenhausen, followed. The primary motivation for the push to send German women to Africa was a concern over racially mixed relationships as white German men started to interact with the local female populations. By engaging in consensual and non-consensual sexual and marital relations with indigenous women, German male colonists threatened the notion of a pure white German identity, especially if they produced mixed-race children whose citizenship status and sense of cultural and national belonging were contested.3 Children born from these relations had the potential to derail German colonial efforts, which relied on a racialized hierarchy. The German colonists intended to inculcate the belief that the Germans were racially and morally superior to the colonized populations in Africa. Gradually, however, the government came to rely on female settlers to solidify its colonial claims and help recreate Germany in Africa. In 1909, for instance, members of the Women’s Association of the German DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-4

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Colonial Society argued that devout middle-class women were the answer to this crisis of Germandom in the colonies: “ohne die Frau wird die Kolonie immer nur eine Fremde sein, in der ein Volk nicht Wurzel fassen kann” (without the woman, the colony will always be just a strange land, in which a people cannot take root).4 Prince’s and Falkenhausen’s memoirs illustrate how seriously they took their responsibilities as bearers of German culture; the African setting, however, often challenged their ability to perform their domestic duties—even as propaganda published in colonial periodicals sought to reassure them of their expertise as German women.5 In addition to different climatic and socio-political conditions, racialized and gendered hierarchies significantly impacted Falkenhausen and Prince’s efforts to recreate a perfect German Christmas abroad. In the colonial setting, German women’s domestic and cultural duties included the preservation of traditions and holidays. For German colonists, Weihnachten (Christmas) was the most important. According to historian Joseph Perry, “the annual celebrations defined … the deepest values that held the German community together.”6 Weihnachtsstimmung (Christmas mood) was conceived as a “feeling only Germans experienced during [the] semi-sacred moments of family festivity.”7 One could achieve Weihnachtsstimmung and join the imagined white national community through the “correct” decorations, food, and festivities. In this chapter, I combine a close reading of the published memoirs of Falkenhausen and Prince with evidence from the periodical, Kolonie und Heimat, to highlight the cultural significance of the holiday in both the metropole and the colonial sphere. I argue that women played a central role not only in fostering a white German identity and a connection to the Heimat (homeland) in German Southwest Africa (Nambia) and German East Africa (Tanzania, Burundi, and Rwanda) but also in “legitimizing” Germany’s claim to possess and rule overseas territories. Christmas allowed white women to buttress their racialized cultural “superiority” by shaping and creating Germanness through perceivable rituals while actively excluding indigenous populations from the festivities. Not every woman, however, considered herself successful in this endeavor, as class differences, geographic location, and availability of resources impacted the realities of a colonial Christmas. The emotional responses of these housewives, ranging from joy to disappointment, regarding their Christmas celebrations, shed light on how they understood their role in the colonies. The self-perceived success or failure of Yuletide celebrations could either solidify or call into question a white German woman’s racial and national character. Thus, the seemingly impossible, almost nonsensical task of recreating a “perfect” German Christmas in Africa could potentially impact the Germans’ self-perceived racial superiority in the colony.

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The German colonial period received little scholarly attention in the initial decades following the end of the First World War. Settler women received even less. Even though Germany was, geographically, the fourth largest colonial power in 1914, many academics perceived the colonies as inconsequential in the grand scheme of German history. This was, at least in part, due to the relatively short period when Germany held territories compared to other European empires, such as Britain and France. Additionally, in the first two decades after the Second World War, historians tended to focus on Hitler’s rise to power, the National Socialist Party, the persecution of the Jewish people and other minority populations, and the Holocaust.8 With the emergence of social history and poststructuralism in the 1960s and 1970s, the German colonies began to receive more attention.9 In the mid-1980s, the emergence of gender theory helped reveal the colonial system’s complexity, as historians such as Martha Mamozai, Krista M. O’Donnell, and Lora Wildenthal explored the connections between gender, race, and identity while highlighting the agency of settler women.10 In the context of British and Dutch colonialism, scholars such as Ann McClintock and Ann Laura Stoler deepened our understanding of gendered and racialized colonial spheres. Drawing on these essential publications, this chapter aims to further our understanding of the intersectionality of gender and race in the German Empire through the lens of Christmas celebrations. In Christmas in Germany, the only monograph on the importance of the holiday for German society, Joseph Perry traced the emergence of modern Christmas celebrations in the nineteenth century. He argues that for Germans, Christmas was more than an ordinary familial celebration—it was in fact “Germany’s national holiday.”11 Originally a middle-class festivity, it united German peoples of various classes and religions, shaping what it meant to be German in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Perry examines how critical political milestones, such as the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), helped create a German national identity and impacted Christmas celebrations. While he devotes attention to the political history of the German metropole, Perry mentions Germany’s colonial ambitions only in passing, even though the quest to acquire colonies was intimately tied to the solidification of nationalism in the first few decades following unification. Forging a German National Character When Imperial Germany first acquired overseas territory in 1884, the country was only recently unified and engaged in a struggle to forge a unified political, cultural, and social identity out of its diverse provincial communities. German nationalists wished to “form [a] national identity

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compatible with Germany’s new boundaries […] and the broader identity of a far-flung Kulturvolk” (civilized people).12 At the same time, some voiced concern that the country’s diversity would foil efforts to define a common Germanness. At the time of colonial conquest, German culture was perceived as “layered, heterogeneous and fractured.”13 Paradoxically, this sense of heterogeneity gradually came to be seen as a uniquely German characteristic as it allowed citizens to retain a degree of individuality while participating in the national narrative. To be sure, the acquisition of overseas territories played a large role in shaping German nationalism in the last few years of the nineteenth century. During this period, as Birthe Kundrus argues, “to be a nation meant owning colonies, owning colonies meant world power and world power was proof of a superior national culture.”14 Seeking to compete with the British and the French, Germany acquired colonies to solidify its status as an important global player. Conversely, on the homefront, the concept of Heimat allowed for regional differences while acting as a unifying idea. According to Alon Confino, the notion of Heimat facilitated the creation of an “ultimate German community—real and imagined, tangible and symbolic, local and national” as it permitted citizens to retain a degree of their regional loyalties while participating in a national unifying project.15 Though originally a bourgeois creation, the idea of Heimat was embraced by all social classes by the 1880s as it evoked a nostalgic sense of belonging in an ever-changing world. This is particularly evident in the colonial sphere as settler women often lamented the loss of Heimat.16 At the same time, such longing for a lost Heimat also appealed to the female readership of colonial memoirs, who may have felt disconnected from their cultural roots by processes of modernization and industrialization. Although Heimat did not originally carry explicitly racist connotations, a xenophobic and exclusionary lens gradually came to be applied to the term. According to Krista O’Donnell, colonial officials in the colonies and settler women used notions of Heimat to foster prejudice against mixedrace children, who they believed threatened the cultural integrity of German colonial ideology.17 In the decades following German unification, the women’s movement argued that women were important to the political well-being of the state, claiming that “a society’s advancement could be measured by the condition of its women.”18 As women were responsible for the upbringing of the next generation (their so-called Kulturaufgabe), they were granted a small degree of power.19 The issue of education was particularly salient in the colonies as many settlers believed a feminine influence would strengthen the national identity of German men and children; indeed, without such beneficent ministrations, German men and children would “go native” and thus run afoul of their home country. Female German

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colonists considered it their duty to encourage German traditions, attitudes, and practices. In this regard, the cult of domesticity was crucial. According to Nancy Reagin, the “articulation of Germanness came to include a particular domestic identity,” which was centered on women.20 Originally a middle-class initiative, the cult of domesticity was “expressed in everyday forms,” including cleanliness and thriftiness, eventually encompassing all social strata.21 The celebration of Christmas fits squarely within the cult of domesticity since “[this] annual celebrations defined and contested the deepest values that held the German community together.”22 Christmas Celebrations in the Metropole Christmas occupied a unique space within German culture and identity in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as it seemingly had the power to transcend modern religious divisions. Since the holiday celebrated national belonging rather than a particular religious affiliation, German Christians of various denominations participated in the festivities; even portions of the Jewish population partook through “Weihnukka,” a merger of Hanukkah and Christmas traditions.23 The cultural significance of the holiday also straddled the divide between the public and private spheres. Even though celebrations occurred primarily in the home, Christmas was a national holiday. According to the novelist I.A.R. Wylie, who experienced German Christmas firsthand in the early twentieth century in the metropole, Weihnachtsstimmung had the power “to unite an immense assembly of strangers in one bond of enthusiasm, of joy” and was achievable through specific tastes, smells, sounds, and sights.24 In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a German Christmas was not complete without decorations, baked goods, and carols, all of which helped to create an ideal sensory environment. Before industrialization, working-class women used readily available and handmade goods, such as “bay and box, holly and mistletoe,” fruit, nuts, and handcrafted items to decorate their homes. In contrast, artisanal decorations were available only to the upper classes.25 Gradually, mass manufacturing allowed certain ornaments to become more accessible as “blown orbs, silver and gold tinsel, metal spirals, artificial lilies, fuchsias and roses” became commonplace.26 In the nineteenth century, composers and poets, such as Hoffmann von Fallersleben, wrote new Christmas songs. One of the most beloved carols to emerge was “Silent Night,” written by Joseph Mohr, a Catholic priest, in 1818. According to an author for the Grantham Journal, “never before [had] any song been so quickly and universally adopted as a national volkslied” (folk song).27 By the colonial period, “Silent Night” had become a “time-honoured classic” that embodied the sounds of Christmas and united the German community.28

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Weihnachtsgebäck (Christmas cookies and cakes), including marzipan and spice cookies, offered the tastes and smells of the holiday. Before the festivities, “homes [were] richly scented with ginger, cardamom, anise, nutmeg, and vanilla,” ensuring coziness.29 The main component of any German Christmas was the Weihnachtsbaum (Christmas tree). Although there are conflicting accounts of the origin of this tradition in the late nineteenth century, the most well-regarded credited its introduction to either Norse or Roman influences.30 According to Alexander Tille, a literary scholar and philosopher, trees, especially “blossoming” ones such as apple trees, had been integral to the holiday season since the Roman festival of Calends in January.31 In the Christian context, Tille traces the origin of the trees back to a story about the eve of an unspecified Nativity, when “trees in [a] forest began to bud and bloom […] despite the ice and snow by which the fields were covered.”32 The story of the miracle of the flowering trees spread throughout Europe and several religious figures, beginning with St. Hadwigis, had visions of such trees.33 Gradually, the association of Christmas with blossoming trees and decorative evergreen boughs resulted in the use of coniferous trees. Germans began to feature coniferous trees in their homes in the nineteenth century, a custom first adopted by German aristocracy and military members and then spread amongst the masses. Thus, in a letter to her husband Wilhelm from 1815, Caroline von Humboldt writes that two small trees adorned her table.34 During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, the popularity of the Christmas tree was enshrined when Prussian officials placed trees throughout the living quarters of German soldiers stationed in Paris during the holidays. Newspapers spread this imagery, and by 1871, the tree, whose scent had the power to transport revelers, had come to represent Germanness and the Heimat.35 By the colonial period, the tree was “a necessity, the very center of the festivity; no one [was] too poor or too lonely to have one.”36 One publication that reinforced the cultural significance of Christmas was Kolonie und Heimat in Wort und Bild, the periodical published by the Women’s League of the German Colonial Society and read in the colonies and the metropole. It was designed to fortify notions of Germanness, whiteness, and domesticity throughout the empire as it specified expectations for colonial women’s actions and behaviors. It achieved this by including photographs, short stories, and recipes. The publication routinely highlighted women’s challenges in the colonies. The December 25, 1910, issue was dedicated to Christmas. It features photographs of white Germans and their subjects in the African, South Pacific, and Chinese protectorates while outlining the prerequisites of a successful, “perfect” Christmas celebration. The cover, showcasing members of the colonial forces in front of a makeshift Christmas tree, was captioned: “Abgesehen

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von der Hitze ist die Illusion des deutschen Weihnachtsfestes umso schwieriger herzustellen, da auch das Hauptwahrzeichen, die deutsche Tanne als Weihnachtsbaum, fehlt” (besides the heat, the illusion of the German Christmas festival was all the more difficult to create because the main hallmark, the German fir tree, was also missing). The author continues, “trotz dieser Schwierigkeiten hält man zah [sic] an unsern alten schönen Gebräuchen fest und gedenkt beim Glanz des Lichterbaums und beim Klang unsrer Weihnachtslieder der alten Heimat und der Lieben zu Hause” (despite these difficulties, we cling tenaciously to our beautiful old customs and remember the old Heimat and the loved ones at home with the glow of the tree of lights and the sound of our Christmas carols).37 Additionally, the issue featured a short story written by Marx Moeller, which sought to reinforce German racial “superiority,” stating that the indigenous populations “auch gewiss noch leben arg in Finsternis” (still live in darkness) and that it was up to the Germans to educate the colonized populations through Christmas.38 The periodical allowed metropolitan Germans to observe their perceived cultural and racial “superiority” in action. Helene von Falkenhausen’s Christmas in German Southwest Africa In her 1904 memoir, Ansiedlerschicksale, alongside descriptions of the Herero and Nama genocide, Helene von Falkenhausen also documents her feelings of inadequacy during her unsuccessful attempts at creating the perfect Christmas celebration, highlighting the importance of the holiday in colonial life. Falkenhausen, née Nitze, was born on June 17, 1873, in Weißenberg bei Gnesen. Her family decided to emigrate shortly after her father returned home from German Southwest Africa in early 1893, which was the only official settler colony of the German Empire at the time. On a steamboat, bound for Southwest Africa in late 1893, Falkenhausen lamented that they had “nun Abschied genommen von allen Lieben, die wir in der Heimat, im deutschen Vaterlande zurücklassen mußten” (now said goodbye to all their loved ones whom we had to leave behind in the homeland, in the German fatherland).39 Falkenhausen was wary of her new environment. When her boat stopped at the market in Mondschein, she observed a wide array of people: there were “schwerfällige dicke Frauen” (sluggish fat women) and “schlanke, lebhafte Kerle mit dunklen blitzenden Auge priesen sich überbietend an Geschrei ihre Waren an” (slender lively fellows with dark flashing eyes extolled their wares with shouts outbidding each other).40 This is one of many prejudiced comments in Falkenhausen’s memoir, as she was a strong proponent of the racial superiority of Germans.41 After a

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long journey, Falkenhausen and her family finally arrived in KleinWindhoek, an hour from Windhoek, on October 18, 1893. Upon their arrival at their new home, they discovered the dwelling in disrepair, but refused to be daunted: “Für uns bot sich nun ein reiches Feld der Tätigkeit: da mußte die Küche, das Haus, die Wäsche besorgt werden, dann wieder gabs im Garten zu tun, nachmittags wurde gestopft und genäht” (there was now a rich field of activity for us; we had to attend to the kitchen, the house, and the laundry, then there was work to be done in the garden, and in the afternoons we darned and sewed).42 Falkenhausen took these tasks upon herself as she believed that the indigenous servants did not know how to care for a home “properly,” a sentiment shared by many white German women in the colony.43 Again and again, she disapproves of the work of her indigenous servants, who, as she believed, failed to meet the standards of (white German) domesticity. Falkenhausen celebrated her first colonial Christmas in 1893. Before the holiday, all the family’s horses vanished due to unexplained circumstances. The lack of reliable transportation forced the family to walk to Windhoek in excruciating heat to procure supplies. Still fairly new to Southwest Africa and unaccustomed to the climate, they found that “es war oft unbeschreiblich heiß, die Fußsohlen brannten uns beim Gehen über die von der Sonne den ganzen Tag beschienenen Steine” (it was often indescribably hot, the soles of our feet burned when we walked over the stones that the sun had been shining on all day).44 The weather in Southwest Africa did not meet their expectations for a perfect Christmas day. In Germany, the holiday fell in winter, with families gathering inside around a fire. In contrast, in the warm temperatures of Southwest Africa, “ist es unmöglich, sich zu einer so frohen Weihnachtstimmung aufzuschwingen, wie zu Hause in Deutschland” (it is impossible to muster a merry Christmas mood as at home in Germany).45 Upon their arrival in Windhoek, Falkenhausen commented on the products available in shops, including “Schuhwaren, Heringe, Bekleidungstücke jeder Art, Seife, Eisen, Holzwaren, Getränke” (shoes, herring, clothing of all kinds, soap, iron, wood, and beverages).46 Although many goods were readily available, a government monopoly inflated the prices so that one pound of sugar, a necessary ingredient for baking, cost one mark, making colonial living quite expensive. There were also frequent supply chain issues so there was often a shortage of consumer goods. To cover the prohibitive costs of the items needed for the Christmas feast, Falkenhausen’s family traded some of their remaining livestock.47 The Southwest African climate also made it difficult to procure a Christmas tree and other decorations. The family could not get their hands on an evergreen tree; instead, Falkenhausen constructed a tree “so gut es möglich war” (as good as was possible), “die Äste und Zweige eines

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hübsch gewachsenen Dornenbäumchens wurden mit wildem Spargel umschlungen” (the branches and twigs of a pretty thorn tree were decorated with wild asparagus).48 Wild asparagus is quite different from cultivated varietals; even if the makeshift tree resembled a traditional Christmas tree, it did not emit the proper scent. Falkenhausen adorned the tree and their home “mit Schilf und Oleanderblüten” (with reeds and oleander blossoms), which bore a faint resemblance to the laurels used in the metropole, but she was not happy with the look of the flowers.49 The family decorated their Christmas tree with one traditional German ornament, tinsel, which they likely brought with them, and which did not offer comfort. They also lit candles to create a cozy atmosphere, but this too had little effect. The somber mood surrounding Christmas 1893 highlights the importance of Yuletide celebrations in defining what it meant to be German, especially in the colonial sphere. Falkenhausen saw her inability to recreate German traditions as a challenge that she needed to overcome, not only as a proper German woman but to help ensure the success of the German colonial project overall. On Christmas Eve, Falkenhausen and her family baked treats, exchanged presents, and sang carols to achieve Weihnachtsstimmung. With the ingredients they purchased in Windhoek, “kleine Kuchen wurden gebacken, gebrannte Mandeln und Konfekt fabriziert” (small cakes were baked, roasted almonds and confectionaries were made), but Falkenhausen was not happy with the outcome of their culinary efforts.50 At the end of the evening, the family gathered around the lit “tree” to sing “Silent Night.” Then they moved “auf die Veranda und saßen still beieinander auf den Stufen der breiten Treppe, die in den Garten führte” (out to the porch and sat together quietly on the steps of the wide staircase that led to the garden); they spent the rest of the evening in “wehmütiger Stimmung an vergangen Christfeste in der Heimat denkend” (a melancholy mood thinking about past Christmas celebrations in the homeland).51 In that first year, Falkenhausen and her mother failed in their duty as domestic custodians of German culture, evidenced by their inability to celebrate Christmas traditionally. Tellingly, the family’s indigenous servants are barely mentioned in Falkenhausen’s description of Christmas 1893. In light of her perceptions of the colonized populations, evident in her account of the family’s journey to the colony, it is likely that this absence reflects their active exclusion from many of the festivities. The only effort to include them consisted in the gifting of “Kleidungstücke, Kuchen, Süßigkeiten und eine Flasche Schnaps, die stets schon von ihrem Eintritt an der Brennpunkt ihrer begehrlichen Blicke war” (clothing, cakes, sweets, and a bottle of liquor, which was the focus of their covetous glance from the moment they entered).52 The family did not feel a sense of comradery with their servants

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but rather looked down on them, as documented by Falkenhausen. Earlier that December, for example, she declared their Nama washerwoman, Galatea, to be “ein Bild der Häßlichkeit” (a picture of ugliness).53 Eventually, Falkenhausen moved out of her parent’s home and married Friedrich Ernst Alexander Konrad Freiherr von Falkenhausen in 1899. Shortly thereafter, she gave birth to their first child, Friedrich Ernst Konrad, which made her role as a “custodian of culture” even more imperative. As evident in her memoir, she was not fully prepared for her new role as a housewife. Her living conditions changed drastically as her husband was a merchant and needed to travel throughout the colonial countryside. Due to his itinerant career, the couple lived in a covered wagon and made camp every evening. For the duration of her marriage to Friedrich, Falkenhausen documented only two Christmas celebrations. The excessively detailed account of the family’s Christmas festivities in 1900 further underlines the severity of Falkenhausen’s domestic shortcomings. After an exhausting journey, the Falkenhausens arrived in Otjihaenena, a Herero community near the river Wit Nossob. Falkenhausen describes the Hereros’ way of life in detail; her observations are derogatory and in line with her earlier comments on the indigenous populations. She disapproved of the Herero women because they failed to meet her expectations of proper domesticity. She notes that they spend the entire day chatting among themselves, “nur morgens und abends … sahen wir sie beim Melken tätig” (only in the morning and evenings did we see them milking [cows]).54 She also noted that they were “zum größten Teil Christen und beinahe sämtlich europäisch gekleidet, doch boten mir ihre noch ganz ursprünglichen Sitten und ihre Lebensführung viel Neues” (for the most part, Christians and almost all dressed in the European style, but their still entirely traditional customs and their way of life offered me a lot that was new).55 By casting aspersions on how Herero men and women conducted themselves, Falkenhausen attempted to shore up German cultural and racial superiority and justify her presence in Southwest Africa. The indigenous men and women did not carry themselves in an “appropriate” manner and, thus, needed “guidance” from their German colonizers. Even though Falkenhausen lived among the Herero, many of whom may have been familiar with the traditions of Christmas due to contact with missionaries, she made no effort to include them in her family’s celebrations. It is likely that she did not consider them worthy of a German Christmas. When she traveled with her husband, Falkenhausen did very little to prepare for Christmas, and her lack of enthusiasm correlated directly with her mobile lifestyle. Although a German home, especially in the colonial context, was seen to represent the Heimat, Falkenhausen’s mobile homemade it difficult to prepare Christmas dishes

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or decorate a tree. Presumably, this could have been especially concerning for Falkenhausen since her young son had yet to celebrate a perfect German Christmas, and his identity as a German citizen would likely have been perceived as unstable as he was born and raised in the colony. And yet, if Falkenhausen failed to perceive her domestic shortcomings and imperfect Christmas celebration as a threat to the family’s white German identity and connection to the Heimat, it was precisely because she felt secure in her sense of racial superiority over her indigenous servants, including her Nama washerwomen, Galatea, and the Herero men and women she encountered. Magdelene von Prince’s Christmas in German East Africa Magdalene von Prince’s colonial Christmas experience differed significantly from that of Falkenhausen, as demonstrated in her memoir, Eine Deutsche Frau im Innern Deutsch-Ostafrikas. Her social connections and residence in East Africa resulted in generally successful festivities. Prince, neé von Massow, was born in 1870 in Silesia. Her father was a wellconnected military captain who introduced his daughter to high society. Prince met her future husband, Tom, through her father when she was a teenager. Following this initial interaction, Tom traveled to German East Africa for the first time with the German army.56 Years later, in 1896, Magdalene and Tom married and subsequently left Germany for German East Africa as he needed to return as a member of the Wissmanntruppe, later Schutztruppe, a unit of the German colonial army that gained a reputation for resorting to violence and cruelty to maintain control. In their first few years in German East Africa, the Princes played a significant role. As a government commissioner, Tom often met with African dignitaries throughout the region to ensure the colony’s “smooth” operation. The local white German population was small and heavily relied on indigenous officials to “help” run the territory. The colony’s purpose was to produce raw materials to bolster the German economy, and German plantation owners utilized and exploited indigenous labor to fulfill their needs. As the wife of a vital functionary, Prince was expected to organize the couple’s social life to improve diplomatic relations. Prince’s perceptions of the indigenous populations were slightly less disparaging than those of Falkenhausen, but she too was convinced of white German racial superiority. During their first Christmas in East Africa in 1896, Prince’s skills as a housewife were put to the test. Tom was to meet with Sultan Mpangire and other delegates. Following their encounter, the sultan swore allegiance to the German Empire—much to the chagrin of the local population.57 Prince did not participate in the meeting but instead went to prepare for the holiday festivities. In an extraordinary feat, she managed to cook

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Christmas dishes to share with her guests in one and a half hours; traditionally, the preparation for the festivities took weeks. One of her male German guests could not believe that she had accomplished so much, wondering in astonishment, “Wie haben Sie das alles möglich gemacht? Sie waren doch bei allem dabei?” (How did you make all this possible? And yet you were here for everything?).58 Prince even made homemade marzipan, noting “ich sah mit dem Stolze, der jeder Hausfrau verständlich sein wird, dass mein eigenhändig gebackener Marzipan bis aufs letzte Krümelchen aufgegessen wurde” (I saw with the pride that every housewife will understand that the marzipan I baked myself was eaten down to the last crumb).59 Importantly, Prince, unlike Falkenhausen, obtained the necessary ingredients; Tom’s military colleagues brought her goods from the homeland and shared the ration boxes they received throughout the year. Prince’s determination to provide her fellow Germans with the comforts of homemade her an ideal wife for a colonial official. Yet she too made no effort to include local leaders in the celebrations even though Tom spent Christmas morning with the Sultan Mpangire and other dignitaries. The Princes did not consider Christmas an opportunity to “civilize” the colonized populations through culture because they had no apparent intention of integrating themselves into the local culture and society. They believed that their role was to rule rather than educate. Prince relied on a combination of imported, local and homemade items to adorn her home. She decorated the table with local flowers. Whereas Falkenhausen’s perception of native flora instilled a sense of alienation, Prince was reminded of the flowers used to decorate German houses back home. The Princes also procured an evergreen tree, which they set up in the garden as “im Zimmer war es zu gefährlich” (it was too dangerous in the room) since it was decorated with “selbst fabrizierten Lichtern aus Honigwachs und Silberpapier” (lights that we made ourselves out of beeswax and silver paper).60 To wrap up the evening, one gentleman sang “Silent Night,” which had a transformative impact on the group.61 “Nach einer feierlichen Stille, die von der vorhergegangenen Lustigkeit abstach” (After a solemn silence that contrasted with the previous merriment), he intoned “das heilige Lied” (the sacred song), which touched all the guests deeply; “es dauerte ein Weilchen, ehe wir uns wieder in die Wirklichkeit zurückgefunden hatten” (it took a while until we had found our way back to reality).62 Although it concluded melancholically, Prince believed her first Christmas in East Africa was a resounding success. Not only did she recreate the comforts of the Fatherland and a cheery atmosphere for all her German guests, but she also reinforced their sense of cultural superiority through the active exclusion of the local populations. Like many other settler women, her intention was not to integrate into local African society but to differentiate herself as a European colonizer.

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Prince’s second colonial Christmas in 1897 does not receive as much attention in the memoir. In the weeks leading up to the holiday, Prince anticipated that she would have to spend Christmas alone as Tom was to be away on business, a predicament that she had come to accept: “um dem Ruf in die Kolonien zu folgen, muss die Frau stark sein” (to follow the call to the colonies, the woman must be strong).63 Due to a change in his schedule, however, Tom was home for the festivities. Moreover, even if her husband had been away, Prince would likely not have been alone since she lived with indigenous servants and an adopted local child—though she does not acknowledge their presence in this context. In the weeks leading up to Christmas, the governor of German East Africa sent her an iron stove with a chimney, which pleased her greatly: “so etwas hat die afrikanische Sonne in diesen Breiten sicher noch nicht beschienen” (the African sun has certainly never shone on anything like this at this latitude).64 The stove changed how Prince cooked as she could now prepare traditional German dishes more accurately: “nun macht das Kochen noch einmal so viel Freude” (now cooking is so much more fun again).65 Once again, she procured an evergreen Christmas tree. Earlier that year, she had ordered gifts for her husband from Germany, but unfortunately, they had not arrived in time for Christmas Eve. Still, this mishap did not dampen her Christmas spirit; she sent “Marzipan, Kuchen und Pfeffernüsse” (marzipan, cakes, and peppernuts) to members of the German military and dispatched “an den Leutnant Kuhlmann eine gebratene Ente” (a roast duck to Lieutenant Kuhlmann).66 The recipients of her beneficence resided at various outposts throughout the territory and would not have been able to enjoy a traditional home-cooked German Christmas feast without her help. Christmas Day was spent at the officer’s mess hall “mit besonders dankbarem Herzen” (with an especially grateful heart).67 Prince’s emphasis on sharing the joy of Christmas with Germans throughout the colony reflects a larger effort by government officials and colonial officials to ensure the racial purity of the empire. Prince sought to enhance the emotional contentment of these men, despite their isolation, with the intention of preventing relations with the indigenous women. There was, however, one Christmas in German East Africa when Prince was unable to live up to domestic expectations. Unlike in previous years, she paid little attention to this holiday in her memoir, summarizing it only briefly. In 1899, the family spent a quiet Christmas Eve as Tom had a myriad of social and political obligations. They passed Christmas Day with the local German Catholic mission, “wo die erste Taufe an erwachsenen Eingeborenen stattfand” (where the first baptism of indigenous adults took place).68 The Princes were saddened as the baptism reminded them of the joyous Christmas Eve the year prior when they baptized their firstborn, who died shortly thereafter. The nuns attempted to bring some joy as they

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decorated a tree in anticipation of the Princes’ arrival and presented them with “geschnitzten Holzgeräten, wie Näpfe, Löffel und dergleichen” (carved wooden utensils, such as bowls, spoons, and the like) in an attempt to cheer them up.69 In spite of this effort and even though they exchanged gifts, the Princes lamented the lack of Weihnachtsstimmung that year. This feeling of inadequacy reminds us of the importance of holiday traditions to German settlers as they sought to retain their European identity while in the colonies. Conclusion Evidence from women’s memoirs and colonial periodicals provides important insights into the lived experiences of white settlers in the African colonies at the turn of the twentieth century. In colonial Southwest and East Africa, both sites of mass violence during this period, Falkenhausen and Prince placed importance on preserving German cultural traditions. As self-declared custodians of German culture and morality in the geographically diverse reaches of empire, the women took seriously the responsibility of differentiating their white families from the majority Black population. Falkenhausen’s repeated lamentations about her “failures” in trying to achieve this task must be understood in this context. Whether because of the warm weather that diminished her sense of coziness, her lack of an evergreen Christmas tree, or her inability to recreate the “ideal” scents, tastes, sights, and sounds associated with a traditional German Christmas, Falkenhausen’s disappointment went beyond nostalgia or homesickness and instead indicated the pressure she felt to create a “little Germany under the sun.” Prince’s memoir is more optimistic about her domestic “successes” during the holiday seasons she spent as a settler. Apart from Christmas 1897, she frequently notes with pride how she created Weihnachtsstimmung for herself, her family, and her fellow Germans, on several occasions in East Africa. As the wife of a government commissioner, Prince had connections that allowed her to procure the goods necessary to ensure a “successful” Christmas celebration and to go above and beyond in imparting the joys of Christmas through meals and gift-giving. She faithfully fulfilled her duty as a German housewife and curator of German culture and domesticity. Both memoirs illustrate the importance settler women placed on their imperial roles—and the pressure they felt to represent “whiteness” in front of both their fellow Europeans and the African peoples over whom they held power. It was their obligation to “keep” settler men happy, through Christmas celebrations, to prevent them from turning to colonized women for “comfort.” The threat of miscegenation played a role in shaping the colonial experience, even when it is not explicitly stated. The active exclusion of their African employees and neighbors from the festivities

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reminds us that most Europeans were in Africa to dominate the people and the lands, rather than integrate into existing communities. During the colonial period, Christmas was not only a Christian holiday but an embodiment of white superiority. The seemingly impossible task of recreating metropolitan traditions in the colonial sphere and the emotional investment of these women into their self-perceived success and failures reveal that Christmas was of symbolic importance for the German colonial identity in Imperial Germany. The case study of Christmas in the colonies reflects larger German women’s efforts at creating and maintaining their empire. Notes 1 Helene Nitze von Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale: Elf Jahre in DeutschSüdwestafrika 1893–1904 (Berlin: Verlag Reimer, 1904), 32. 2 Magdalene von Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau im Innern Deutsch-Ostafrikas (Berlin: Mittler and Sohn, 1903), 66. 3 Sebastian Conrad, German Colonialism: A Short History (Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 119. 4 Pauline Gräfin Montgelas, “Die Frau in den Kolonien,” Kolonie und Heimat in Wort und Bild 3, no. 01 (October 1, 1909): 8. 5 Montgelas, “Die Frau in den Kolonien,” 8. 6 Joseph Perry, Christmas in Germany: A Cultural History (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2010), 1. 7 Perry, Christmas in Germany, 3. 8 Sara Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne Zantop, eds., “Introduction,” in The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1998), 4. 9 For further information, see Wolfe W. Schmokel, Dream of Empire: German Colonialism, 1919–1945, Yale Historical Publications 78 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1964). 10 Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1945 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001), 1; Martha Mamozai, Schwarze Frau, weisse Herrin: Frauenleben in den deutschen Kolonien (Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch, 1982), 1; Krista O’Donnell, “Poisonous Women: Sexual Danger, Illicit Violence, and Domestic Work in German Southern Africa, 1904–1915,” Journal of Women’s History, no. 3 (1999), 32. 11 Perry, Christmas in Germany, 3. 12 Nancy R. Reagin, Sweeping the German Nation: Domesticity and National Identity in Germany, 1870–1945 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 2–3. 13 John Phillip Short, Magic Lantern Empire: Colonialism and Society in Germany (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2012), 81. 14 Birthe Kundrus, “Blind Spots: Empire, Colonies and Ethnic Identities in Modern German History,” in Gendering Modern German History: Rewriting Historiography, eds. Karen Hagemann and Jean H. Quataert (New York, NY: Berghahn Books, 2014), 87. 15 Alon Confino, Germany as a Culture of Remembrance: Promises and Limits of Writing History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006), 35.

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16 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 1. 17 K. Molly O’Donnell, “Home, Nation, Empire,” in The Heimat Abroad: The Boundaries of Germanness, eds. Renate Bridenthal and Nancy Reagin (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2005), 44. 18 Silke Wenk, “Gendered Representations of the Nations, Past and Future,” in Gendered Nations: Nationalisms and Gender Order in the Long Nineteenth Century, eds. Ida Blom, Karen Hagemann, and Catherine Hall (Oxford; New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2000), 63. 19 Daniel Joseph Walther, Creating Germans Abroad: Cultural Policies and National Identity in Namibia (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2002), 47. 20 Reagin, Sweeping the German Nation, 5. 21 Reagin, Sweeping the German Nation, 1. 22 Perry, Christmas in Germany, 1. 23 Joshua Eli Plaut and Jonathan D. Sarna, A Kosher Christmas:’Tis the Season to Be Jewish, First edition (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2012), 5; Paul Reitter, Bambi’s Jewish Roots and Other Essays on German-Jewish Culture (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2015), 13. 24 I. A. R. Wylie, My German Year (London: Mills & Boon, 1910), 70. 25 Alexander Tille, Yule and Christmas: Their Place in the Germanic Year (Whitefish, Montana: Kessinger Publishing, 1899), 174. 26 Tille, Yule and Christmas, 174. 27 “German Christmas Trees,” Grantham Journal, January 19, 1895, 7, https:// www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/. 28 Wylie, My German Year, 76. 29 Mimi Sheraton, The German Cookbook: A Complete Guide to Mastering Authentic German Cooking (New York, NY; Random House Publishing Group, 1965), 14. 30 Hugo Elm, Das Goldene Weihnachtsbuch: Beschreibung und Darstellung des Ursprungs, der Feier, der Sitten, der Gebräuche, Sagen und des Aberglaubens der Weihnachtszeit und gleichzeitig Anleitung zur sinnigen Schmückung des Christbaumes, der Pyramide, sowie zur Anlegung der Krippen und Weihnachtsgärten (Berlin: C.A. Schwetschke & Sohn, 1878), 20. 31 Tille, Yule and Christmas, 174. 32 Tille, Yule and Christmas, 170. 33 Tille, Yule and Christmas, 171. 34 Caroline to Wilhelm von Humboldt, December 23 and December 29, 1815, in Wilhelm Humboldt and Caroline Friederike von Humboldt, Wilhelm und Caroline von Humboldt in ihren Briefen (Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler und Sohn, 1910), 163. 35 “The Germans’ Christmas Eve in France,” The Illustrated London News, January 14, 1871, 4. https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/. 36 Miles, Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, 264. 37 “Unteroffiziere der Schutztruppe in Südwest feiern Weihnachten,” Kolonie und Heimat in Wort und Bild 4, no. 14 (December 25, 1910), 1. 38 Marx Moeller, “Weihnachten in den Kolonien,” Kolonie und Heimat in Wort und Bild 4, no. 14 (December 25, 1910), 4. 39 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 1. 40 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 3. 41 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 100. 42 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 20.

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43 For similar sentiments, see also Margarethe Hopfer von Eckenbrecher, Was Afrika mir gab und nahm: Erlebnisse einer deutschen Ansiedlerfrau in Südwestafrica (Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler und Sohn, 1908). 44 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 31. 45 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 32. 46 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 31. 47 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 31. 48 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 32. 49 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 32. 50 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 32. 51 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 32. 52 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 32 53 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 22. 54 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 107. 55 Falkenhausen, Ansiedlerschicksale, 106. 56 Philippa Söldenwagner, Spaces of Negotiation: European Settlement and Settlers in German East Africa 1900–1914 (Munich: Meidenbauer, 2006), 57. 57 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 64. 58 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 66. 59 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 66. 60 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 66; It is unclear if this tree was imported from the metropole or grown in the colony itself. The Germans planted many trees throughout the colony as part of forestry reserves. Felicity Rash suggests that the Princes may have procured the tree from the metropole as the trees the Germans planted were typically rubber and coffee. 61 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 66 62 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 66. 63 Montgelas, “Die Frau in den Kolonien,” 8; Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 150. 64 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 150. 65 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 150. 66 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 151. 67 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 151. 68 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 203; For further information on indigenous baptisms, please see Jeremy Best, Heavenly Fatherland: German Missionary Culture and Globalization in the Age of Empire (Toronto; Buffalo; London: University of Toronto Press, 2021). 69 Prince, Eine Deutsche Frau, 203.

3

Colonialism and the Politics of Gender and Literature in the Netherlands Indies The Story of the Nyai Carl Niekerk

Little is known about the photograph accompanying this essay. It was made on New Year’s Day 1898 somewhere in the vicinity of the city Banjarmasin on the island of Borneo in what at the time was called the “Netherlands Indies.” The German text on the photograph, “Wir gratu­ lieren!,” meaning “we congratulate!” or simply “congratulations!,” leads us to assume that the man in the photograph was probably from a German-speaking country and the photograph was meant to be sent to his relatives in Europe. The woman in the picture, apparently a native of the Netherlands Indies, does not look happy. She is dressed in a batiked flower-patterned “sarong” or “saroeng,” a locally fabricated piece of cloth, in combination with a white European-style blouse. The blouse, called a “saroeng kabaja,” or in Dutch “kabaai,”1 indicates the woman’s social status in colonial society. A white-color “kabaja” signifies that its wearer is a nyai (njai or njahi)—a European man’s housekeeper. The nyai typically worked around the house, cooked, familiarized her employer with local languages and practices, functioned as a cultural mediator and language teacher, “a walking dictionary,”2 and also served as his sexual partner (Figure 3.1). The figure of the nyai in colonial and postcolonial literature of the Netherlands Indies is the focus of my chapter. A focus on the nyai in colonial discourse makes it possible to understand the history of gender and sexuality as integral to colonial ideology and practice, and it enables a more complex view of power relations in the colony (moving beyond seeing the relationship between Europeans and Natives primarily as one between employers and employees).3 The term nyai came to signify “concubine,” but originally was a polite way to address a young woman and meant “younger sister”; it was also used for older women with no other title.4 The nyai is a figure specific to the colonial society of the Dutch Indies, although her role resembles that of the “congai” in Indochina or the “petite épouse” in the French colonial empire.5 Until approximately DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-5

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Figure 3.1 Source: Rob Nieuwenhuys, Komen en blijven. Tempo doeloe—een verzonken wereld. Fotografische documenten uit het oude Indië 1870–1920 (Amsterdam: Querido, 1998), 95 (public domain).

1900, the Dutch government barred single European women from tra­ veling to the Indies while most European men were hired by government and companies under the condition that they were and would remain unmarried; prostitution was discouraged as well. Colonial society did, however, tolerate and, to some extent, encourage European men taking on a nyai (njai). The term nyai is hard to translate because it is quite specific to the Netherlands Indies. The European habit of having a nyai duplicated a practice already existing among high-class (aristocratic) Native men in the Indies, who, before marrying a woman of suitable rank, were permitted to maintain “practice wives,” often poor girls from the countryside who were bought at a young age from their parents.6 The institution of the nyai fur­ thermore is linked to the history of Europeans enslaving Natives in the Indies. Before the abolishment of slavery in 1860,7 European men could buy Native women to serve as their nyai. After 1860 the nyai was paid a salary to

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work as a “housekeeper”; in theory, she served voluntarily, yet in reality, this was rarely if ever the case: often nyais had no choice because they were bought at a young age from their impoverished rural families or sometimes even from their husbands and were dependent on their “masters.”8 Such relationships were often arranged through the European man’s personnel or by family friends. One example of this can be found in the autobiographical novel Het land van herkomst (1935; Country of Origin) by E. du Perron (1899–1940), which describes the visit of a prospective nyai—arranged by a Native friend of the family—to the protagonist’s house. Laughingly, his mother asks the 17-year-old boy whether he doesn’t want to have a look at the girl who is introduced as a “speelkameraadje” (playmate): “Wil je niet gaan kijken?” (Don’t you want to go and have a look?). The boy rejects the offer indignantly, even though he knows his older brother had been living with a nyai before getting married.9 The status of the nyai in colonial society was highly ambiguous. Her public image was predominantly negative, both in the European and Native communities. And yet, in the European man’s household, she was quite often indispensable: not only did she take care of the man; she might be important for his business as well. In spite of her crucial contribution, she and any children from the relationship could be discarded at any time, for instance, if the European man intended to marry a European wife. From its very beginnings, Dutch colonial society in the Indies did not ban marriages between European men and Native women (although they were discouraged for certain groups of employees). In fact, some of the colony’s governors-general and other men among the colony’s administrative elite married Native or Eurasian women.10 Marriages between (Christian) Europeans and (non-Christian) Natives had been permitted by law since 1848 (before 1848 Native women had to convert), and some of the re­ lationships between European men and nyais ended in marriage, often advertised in newspapers as Mr. X has married “the mother of his chil­ dren.”11 While such a prospect did indeed exist, the majority of these relationships did not lead to marriage; rather, the nyai was sent back to her family with her children—or without them, if the European father had officially acknowledged and registered them as his children, in which case such “voorkinderen” (pre-children) might become part of his new family. The nyai plays a crucial role in colonial and postcolonial literature, especially in and for the emergence of literature as a genre in the Netherlands Indies and Indonesia. Postcolonial studies enables us to gain a global outlook with an ambition to pay attention to local histories.12 Postcolonial studies demonstrates that local stories and history are always entangled in global power dynamics. Therefore, postcolonial studies presents a refreshing alternative to the nation-based approach to cultural studies that had long dominated German studies. In addition, postcolonial

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studies forces scholars to reflect on their own positions. Every scholar and author is what Michael Rothberg has termed an “implicated subject”: by being part of a specific history, one is entangled in “events that at first seem beyond our agency as individual subjects.”13 One may be “aligned with power and privilege” and even profit from them, without seeing oneself among the “agents of harm.”14 This is certainly true for those who wrote during the colonial period—regardless of whether or not they were critical of the theory and practice of colonialism—but it is also true for scholars who approach this material from a postcolonial perspective. One can deal with one’s status as an implicated subject in different ways, but ideally, the recognition of one’s unavoidable entanglement would foster an awareness of how the past works itself into the present.15 As an implicated subject, one can be part of a history of colonialism in which one does not seem to have any personal involvement, but which nevertheless belongs to one’s historical and cultural baggage. To me as a scholar, this means that one has a responsibility to work through that past and to share the insights derived from such memory work. I teach courses in German and Comparative and World Literature at a public university in the United States, but I grew up and lived until age 23 in the Netherlands. To some extent, this background has shaped how I look at the debate about postcolonialism. In my own work, for instance, I have used the terms “colonial” and “postcolonial” in a relatively narrow sense, to refer to geopolitical relationships between colonizers and colonized peoples, or to the permutations of those relationships after a colony gained political independence. In German studies, in particular, the terms “colo­ nial” and “postcolonial” have come to refer to a wide variety of phe­ nomena, broadly related to globalization and the inequities it has created.16 Importantly, the terms allow a critical perspective based on the relationship between the two—they may refer to the same historical reality but from different perspectives. Thus, a postcolonial perspective can enable a counterreading of the colonial narrative. A significant difference between Dutch and German postcolonial studies is that a substantial Indonesian cultural tra­ dition exists that directly comments on the colonial era and thus allows for a counter-reading of past colonial ideology and practice. My interest in postcolonial approaches has been shaped by my back­ ground. When I first took an interest in the topic, in the 1990s after I had moved to the United States, I soon became aware that the field had developed its own canon. In practice it tended to privilege cultural com­ munities that had ties to one of the major colonial powers, a tendency also noted by scholarship.17 Little work had been done in English, for instance, on literature from Indonesia or the considerable body of colonial texts from the area. In particular, the work of Indonesian author Pramoedya Ananta Toer (1925–2006) offers an important access point to the

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problems that interest me, such as the figure of the nyai, especially because it allows us to read colonial literature in tandem with a postcolonial response to this literature. A Postcolonial Perspective: Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s This Earth of Mankind The nyai is not only a fixture of colonial society in the Netherlands Indies, but also a literary figure, as scholarship has noted.18 A nyai plays a prominent role in This Earth of Mankind (originally: Bumi manusia, 1980), the first volume of Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s Buru Quartet, a series of novels first narrated and then written down in the Buru peni­ tentiary colony, where Pramoedya was imprisoned by the Suharto regime between 1969 and 1979, after having been arrested by Suharto’s people during the military coup of 1965 because of his left-leaning politics. The four novels were published in Indonesia between 1980 and 1988 but banned briefly after publication. Pramoedya himself remained under house arrest in Jakarta until the end of Suharto’s reign in 1998.19 This Earth of Mankind is the coming-of-age story of Minke, who in 1898, when we are introduced to him at the beginning of the novel, is 18 years old and one of very few Native students at HBS, a prestigious Dutchlanguage high school in Surabaya. Minke will go on to become a writer, journalist, and activist for Indonesian independence until he is arrested and sent into exile by the colonial authorities. The name “Minke” itself is a reminder of the racist agenda underlying colonial practice: it is a nickname bestowed on him by a teacher, who wanted to call him “monkey” but, realizing that this was problematic, stopped short of doing so and called him “Minke” instead, a name his classmates continue to use after the incident.20 For our purpose, This Earth of Mankind is relevant because it attempts a re-evaluation of the nyai by correcting her predominantly negative image in the public imagination around 1900. While Minke is initially primarily shaped by his European-style education, gradually nyai Ontosoroh,21 the mother of his love interest, Annelies, becomes formative for his develop­ ment, offering a very different and far more critical vision of colonial society than he receives in school. Nyai Ontosoroh herself is highly lit­ erate, as Minke recognizes. In the early stage of their relationship, Annelies’s father, Herman Mellema, provided her with a broad general education, taught her how to run a business, and at one point called her “far more capable than the average European woman” (92). In the beginning, Herman Mellema is not a cruel colonizer, but a reform-minded and somewhat idealistic businessman with intellectual interests, who sees himself as acting in nyai Ontosoroh’s interest. He is driven by a philos­ ophy that Mary Louise Pratt has described as “anti-conquest,” a term that

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refers to “the strategies of representation whereby European bourgeois subjects seek to secure their innocence in the same moment as they assert European hegemony.”22 By the time Minke gets to know Annelies and her mother, Annelies’s father is no longer part of her and her mother’s daily life but spends much of his time in a Chinese-owned brothel in the area. His very successful agricultural business is entirely run by nyai Ontosoroh and Annelies with the help of a mostly female workforce. The text explicitly thematizes Minke’s changing perception of nyai Ontosoroh and also how his environment responds to his interactions with her, once these become public. Well before they get to know nyai Ontosoroh personally, the European teachers at Minke’s high school, his Eurasian friends and acquaintances, and his Native family all respond negatively to his interactions with her. Minke himself, in contrast, admires her, although he too has to overcome his prejudices.23 Nyai Ontosoroh insists on others addressing her as “nyai,” for instance, when one of Minke’s teachers visits her. She also speaks of the father of her children as her “master” (228), thus forcing visitors to acknowledge the relationship of concubinage—and therefore: dependence—in which she lives. This Earth of Mankind shows colonial society in the Netherlands Indies as organized by racial categories: whether one is European, has European heritage, or is Native determines one’s position and opportunities in society. Annelies’s brother, Robert, has raped his sister Annelies—something that may be linked to the fact that he, in the words of Annelies, “hates everything Native, except the pleasure he can get from them” (66). Annelies and Robert are both Eurasian. But while Robert feels that he is held back by the Native background of his mother, Annelies, in contrast, embraces being half-Native and bonds with her mother. She seeks out a relationship with Minke among other reasons because he is Native. The novel ends catastrophically: After Herman Mellema is poisoned and has died in the brothel that has more or less turned into his permanent place of residence, Maurits, his oldest son from a legal marriage in Europe, not only claims ownership of the agricultural business and evicts nyai Ontosoroh, but also can assume guardianship over her children, since they have been officially acknowledged and registered by their father. He sends Annelies to the Netherlands ostensibly for her education. The fact that by this point Minke and Annelies are married does not prevent her forced exile, since their marriage is recognized only by Islamic law and not by the Dutch state. Nyai Ontosoroh and Minke consult a European lawyer, provided by Europeans sympathizing with their plight, but there is nothing he can do to help. In the end, the economic interest of the colonial power overrides all other concerns. In an exemplary way, This Earth of Mankind demonstrates that the politics of race, class, and gender intersect with one another. While the

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Dutch colony’s politics of race suggest a clear division of power and labor in colonial society, in practice such divisions are not clear-cut: all of the main characters of the novel find themselves in between groups. Remarkably, Pramoedya identifies the politics of gender and sexuality as central to colonial society, as one of the areas in which its violence is at its most obvious. In the colonial context, European, Eurasian, and Native men band together against the interests of women. At the same time, it is here that we also find a potential site of resistance. His novel breaks with a fundamentally masculine gaze:24 it not only points to the complex and contradictory expectations imposed on nyai Ontosoroh and Annelies, but also organizes the plot around events that happen to these two women and imagines new forms of solidarity. At least for a moment, a communicative community takes shape that includes figures as diverse as Magda Peters, Minke’s progressive Dutch teacher who supports his writing and has a bit of a crush on him (she once kisses him; 217); Minke’s mother who in spite of her aristocratic background has reluctantly come to accept that Minke will marry the daughter of a nyai; the sisters Miriam and Sarah de la Croix, the daughters of the Dutch colonial official (assistant resident) Herbert de la Croix who sympathize with Minke, but also the one-legged former colonial soldier Jean Marais and his Eurasian daughter, May, and the eccentric Dr. Martinet, who is interested in theories about psychosexual development in the colony (259). It is a community of outcasts who, in the end, cannot change what happens to Annelies. Malay Origins: G. Francis’s Nyai Dasima In This Earth of Mankind nyai Ontosoroh at one point asks Minke whether he has ever read anything by G. Francis. She does not know much about the author or whether he is European or Eurasian, but she is aware that he has written a “European-style novel” in Malay (110), the language of the common people on Java. A nyai is the protagonist of the short novel Nyai Dasima, published by a Chinese-Indies publishing house in 1896 and written by Gijsbert Francis (1860?–1915/1917?) of whom indeed little is known: he worked as a journalist for a number of Malay-language pub­ lications, published a biography of Napoleon, was associated with a theater group, and his last name indicates that he may be of English descent.25 By means of this reference, Pramoedya’s novel creates a gene­ alogy for the nyai-narrative—and with it: for Indonesian literature—by pointing to its origins in Malay-language literature. Moreover, the author also notes that, in spite of its local origins, this type of literature is a European invention. Nyai Dasima is set in 1813, during the period in which the English ruled the Netherlands Indies under the leadership of Thomas Stamford

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Raffles (1811–1816) while the Dutch Republic had become a monarchy in Napoleon’s empire. While in charge, the British clashed with the local European and Eurasian populations: they were highly critical of the slavery that existed in the Indies and of marriages and concubinage between Europeans and Asians; instead they insisted on the colony’s European identity (although in practice British men too lived with nyais).26 In the novel, nyai Dasima lives happily with her “master,” the Englishman Edward W., and their daughter Nancy, first at a plantation and later in Batavia. She is treated well by the Englishman who gives her many gifts and, it becomes clear eventually, had hoped that she would convert to Christianity and they would be able to marry.27 The fact that she is Muslim attracts the attention of Samiun, a young Muslim man who wants to marry her for her beauty and, more importantly, her material possessions. He slowly infiltrates her environment, making her feel bad for having forsaken her religion. Eventually, he convinces her to move in with him, telling her that he will divorce his first wife, but he never does. Subsequently, nyai Dasima is abused not only by her husband, but also by his other wife and her mother-in-law. When nyai Dasima indicates that she wants to divorce Samiun and go back to the Englishman, Samiun arranges for her murder. Soon after he is arrested. Ideologically, Nyai Dasima is a text full of anti-Islamic xenophobia and racism: Samiun is portrayed in a very negative way; he socializes with opium dealers and thieves and sells stolen goods; his skin is especially dark; and in general, he cannot be trusted (7). The novel defends concu­ binage as an institution: nyai Dasima is better off in a relationship of concubinage with her kind and understanding Englishman, who is por­ trayed as a benevolent “master,” than with her polygamic Muslim hus­ band. And yet, the text also problematizes concubinage. Speaking about her “master,” one of Samiun’s people points out to nyai Dasima that she is “neither his wife, nor his servant” (9). While their intention is to alienate nyai Dasima from her “master,” these words describe her position accu­ rately. Gradually, nyai Dasima develops her own voice in the text: “You could marry someone of your own race,” she tells Edward, “or go back to your own country, and I’d be stranded” (19). In spite of her naiveté, nyai Dasima is the moral center of the story, and yet this does not translate into any private or political rights. The Nyai Dasima material was picked up by many other authors writing in Malay, among them Tirto Adhi Soerjo (1880–1918), the his­ torical model for Minke in Pramoedya’s Buru Quartet, who wrote a story, “The Yellow Ghost” (1906). In it a nyai called Mina collaborates with her Dutch “master,” Van Sloot, to trick an Arab merchant, to whom she and Van Sloot owe money. She lures him into bed with her, only to cheat him out of 500 guilders and expose him publicly by making him look like a

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yellow ghost through the application of a lotion.28 Herman Kommer (1873–1924), a journalist who under his own name is also a character in the Buru Quartet, wrote “Nji Paina” (1900), in which a Native woman is forced to become the nyai of the European bookkeeper at her father’s place of employment, but avenges herself by intentionally infecting him with smallpox; the man dies, while she lives a happy life afterward.29 In Child of all Nations (1980; Anak semua bangsa), the second volume of the Buru Quartet, Pramoedya adopts this plotline: here, nyai Surati, a niece of nyai Ontosoroh, infects a European, Minke narrates these events, and Kommer reads Minke’s text after it is finished.30 All these Malay texts portray the nyai-figures in a sympathetic light, while at the same time addressing the hardship they suffer. Remarkably, in these texts, the col­ ony’s politics of gender, and in particular the practices accompanying these politics, are used to indict colonialism: colonialism is wrong because it cannot protect the rights of Native and Eurasian women. Native and Eurasian women in particular carry the burden of colonialism; they are the victims of European men, and sometimes also of Native men who, con­ sciously or unconsciously, seek to profit from colonial power structures. Colonial Perspectives: P.A. Daum and Carry van Bruggen Unlike Malay literature, Dutch-language colonial literature of the Netherlands Indies around 1900, in which the figure of the nyai is promi­ nently present as well, wages no such moral campaign on behalf of these women. In colonial texts, the portrayal of the nyai is predominantly nega­ tive: she is seen (by author, narrator, or character) as a competitor who does not play by the same rules that confine European and respectable IndoEuropean women and therefore has an unfair advantage that she uses to corrupt European men. This is representative of the time: around 1900 the image of the nyai turned increasingly negative, as colonial policy increas­ ingly emphasized the importance of “Europeanness” and the ban that barred European women from traveling to the Indies was lifted. The novel “Nummer elf” (“Number Eleven”; 1889/1893) by P.A. (Paulus Adrianus) Daum (1850–1898) exemplifies this shift. Daum, a critical journalist of Dutch-German descent, came to the Indies in his late 20s to improve his socio-economic situation. He was born out of wedlock and his mother never married, which mattered a great deal in the Netherlands, but less so in the colonies. Initially, Daum lived in Semarang, later in Batavia, where he worked as a newspaper editor. The protagonist of “Nummer elf” is the Englishwoman Lena Bruce who under difficult circumstances takes care of her dying mother who needs constant atten­ tion, a series of younger siblings who depend on her for their everyday needs, and her up-to-no-good father, a long retired, former low-ranking

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government official in his 60s who spends his day drinking and playing cards at the local club for Europeans. Lena Bruce is surrounded by two men: George Vermey, a 32-year-old European friend of her father, and Jan Voirey, Lena’s cousin who has been a successful businessman in America and has now come to the Netherlands Indies to try his luck. George Vermey asks for Lena’s hand in marriage. He is motivated by her relative wealth, which her mother has kept out of the hands of her father, and which, after the mother’s death is transferred to Lena. Lena refuses, initially, citing the fact that until recently Vermey has lived with a nyai31 called Yps (Ypsilanti) Nesnaj. Nesnaj is the name “Jansen,” but spelled backward, indicating that Yps is Eurasian, and has been recog­ nized by her European father, but only in this indirect manner (see 217). Later, Lena, obeying her dying father’s last wish, agrees to marry George after all. Both live relatively happily until Lena is poisoned through the machinations of George’s former nyai, Yps. The novel’s title refers to the poisonous pill presumably used to kill the wife of her former lover. Reggie Baay has pointed out that this portrayal does not correspond to any his­ torical reality: only one legal case can be documented in which a nyai was accused of poisoning someone, but she was released for lack of evidence.32 Daum’s journalistic works evince sympathy toward the Indies’ Eurasian population who were an important part of the readership of the news­ papers he edited and an important focus in his novels.33 He addressed colonial abuses and spoke out on behalf of the Native population.34 Nevertheless, his texts rely on racial and ethnic stereotypes about Natives, Eurasians, Arabs, and the Chinese, who are portrayed as dirty, lazy, and materialistic. Such representations, however, are contextualized in a variety of ways: Daum’s naturalist style, modeled after Zola,35 seeks to explain all human behavior on the basis of environmental and material conditions, leaving no doubt that poverty among the lower classes and corruption, in particular among Europeans and Eurasians, motivate some of the societal abuses analyzed in “Nummer elf.” Furthermore, Daum uses a third-person narrative voice—which is omniscient at times but becomes increasingly personal and linked to a specific character’s point of view,36 thus suggesting that stereotypes and any other opinion are also a matter of perspective and linked to a person’s life story. At times the text highlights such differences of perspective. In Chapter 10, Jan Voirey, who has only recently arrived in the Indies, complains about the local population and their “apenland” (291; monkey-land). Lena Bruce corrects him: She takes him outside and points to 40 Native men walking along the street, claiming that only 10 of them have been able to find hard work for little compensation, which they nevertheless share with the entire group so that all of their families will have some rice to eat (292). Still, Jan criticizes the Native population’s passivity and unwillingness to grow crops

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that are more profitable than rice (conveniently forgetting that rice is the most basic food source for the population). Lena counters that the passivity of the Natives is caused by centuries of repression, not only by the Europeans but also by their own people (294).37 It is the dialogic nature of “Nummer elf,” its ability to offer multiple perspectives, even if some perspectives are excluded, that makes this novel a useful object for post­ colonial analysis. A nyai also plays a role in the novel Goenong-Djatti (1909) by the Dutch feminist author Carry van Bruggen (1881–1932). Of orthodox Jewish descent (she is the sister of the publicist Jacob Israel de Haan, 1881–1924), Carry van Bruggen self-identified as a feminist and socialist. She and her husband came to the Indies to work as journalists (1904–1907), but left after they had gotten into trouble with the colonial authorities. The novel’s title refers to the estate, in the northeast of Sumatra, of a plantation owner in Deli, Hans de Klerk, commonly referred to as “father Hans.”38 For the most part, the novel, narrated in the third person, follows the perspective of Charlotte (Charlie) van der Hoeff, a European woman, who stays with her sickly baby at Goenong-Djatti in order for the two of them to recover their strength, while temporarily separated from her husband William who is traveling around Java for work. Charlotte observes the society in the Netherlands Indies as a critical outsider. She admires father Hans, looking with a friendly eye at his wife Nelly whom she finds by nature childishly happy and naïve, kind and well meaning, but also lazy and eating too much (4). We never learn whether Nelly is European or Indo-European, but she is “erg verindischt” (78; very much part of the Netherlands Indies): she lived and was educated in the Netherlands (4) and is from a “deftige familie” (70; distinguished family), but she also likes to walk around in “sarong” and “kabaaj” and speaks Malay (43). Nelly dislikes the Japanese (61), but insists that her daughter politely thank a Chinese shop owner who has given her candy and not despise him for having a queue, a typical hairstyle of men in the Qing dynasty–this annoys Nelly’s live-in cousin Amelie (59). While Nelly has navigated colonial society successfully, Amelie, who is Indo-European (she has the thick lips of her Native grandmother; 16), has not been able to do so. Trained as a teacher in the Netherlands (15), she has, at age 27, not yet been able to find a suitable husband (16) although she desperately wants to get married; she has even tried to seduce de Klerk himself who firmly rejected her (19). One possible candidate is Herbert Kolff, a rich and successful administrator who lives, with his nyai Amia, as it turns out, at a neighboring plantation. Initially, Amelie’s efforts to interest Kolff in a relationship with her seem promising: they talk, exchange letters and photographs, and it is suggested (though not confirmed) that they secretly engaged in intercourse. But their budding relationship comes to an

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abrupt halt once a European woman, Henny Donker—skinny, tall, blond, self-confident, looking down on Indo-Europeans, and mostly interested in money (76–77)—joins the small colonial society at Goenong-Djatti. Charlotte intuits immediately what is going to happen (81). And indeed, Herbert Kolff starts to ignore Amelie, and soon he and Henny Donker are engaged and married. Amelie looks for revenge, as does Kolff’s former nyai Amia who, after a conversation with Amelie, the precise content of which remains unclear, has Henny Donker poisoned. At the end of the novel, Amelie, afraid that her complicity in these events will be discovered, com­ mits suicide by throwing herself into the river behind Goenong-Djatti. Both Daum’s and van Bruggen’s female protagonists challenge what Ann Laura Stoler has called the “universally negative stereotype of the colonial wife” who was presumed to be racist, intolerant, and abusive toward per­ sonnel.39 Lena Bruce and Charlie van der Hoeff are portrayed as compas­ sionate characters: sharp observers who are concerned about injustice and abusive colonial practices. While colonial society is portrayed as highly segregated, the representation of the nyai and of Eurasian women suggests multiple points of contact and complex alliances. These novels sketch sce­ narios of decline and degeneration,40 for which they hold European men responsible since they use the services of the nyai, which implies that the nyai herself is also blamed. Most of these men look down on Native life, but long to be part of it in matters of sexuality. The colonial hierarchy collapses because their sexual behavior erodes it. Much is wrong in the relationships between men and women in these texts. Even father de Klerk, it is suggested in Goenong-Djatti, lived together with a nyai before letting Nelly come over from the Netherlands, but did so prudently and discreetly (71), and perhaps the “hartelijke intimiteit” (heartfelt intimacy; 103) between de Klerk and Charlotte is not entirely innocent either. In “Nummer elf,” Jan Voirey secretly sees a nyai as well, as Lena discovers to her dismay (303). While these texts lend themselves to a critique of colonial policies and practices, they also shed light on a lack of communication in the colony: Lena and Charlie have never met or talked to a nyai and only know of them from what others say. This lack of direct communication also characterizes the reception of the novels: because they were published in Dutch, they were likely to be read by the European and Eurasian popu­ lation in the Netherlands Indies and by readers in the homeland, but only in exceptional cases by the Netherlands Indies’ Native population. While Het land van herkomst, published in 1935, in which, as we saw, the protagonist rejects the services of a nyai, would suggest that the institution was no longer acceptable to du Perron’s generation (born around 1900), the novel Rubber (1931) by Madelon Székely-Lulofs (1899–1958) ends with the reconciliation between John van Laer and his Japanese nyai, Kiku San, after his marriage with a European woman has failed,41 suggesting

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not only that the institution is still alive, but that a younger generation had started to idealize it. Postcolonial Studies and the Colonial Archive To my mind, a postcolonial exploration of colonial literature from the Netherlands Indies should begin and end with texts of authors such as Pramoedya Ananta Toer. We can only make sense of colonial literature if we read it with an eye to postcolonial literature and theory. One important question to ask of colonial literature today is: what does colonial literature tell us about the complicity of European intellectuals in the colonial enterprise? This may seem like a simple question, but it is not. The first major novel about the Netherlands Indies is Max Havelaar, of De koffijveilingen der Nederlandsche handel-maatschappij (1860; Max Havelaar or the Coffee-Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company), a text that is highly critical of Dutch colonial policies and practices, written by Multatuli, pen name of Eduard Douwes Dekker (1820–1887). Dekker had been a colonial official working for the Dutch government but asked for dismissal when authorities refused to address the abuse of the local population he had wit­ nessed in his district. Before 1940, Max Havelaar, a fictionalized but auto­ biographical report on these events, was part of the canon of world literature at European high schools,42 often in tandem with Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852), since both texts address racial injustice. Daum and van Bruggen consciously position themselves within this tra­ dition: their texts are also critical of the colonial authorities, and the authors themselves were engaged in conflicts with these authorities at times. Within the colonial system, they are, however, also implicated subjects. Within the colony, they occupied a privileged position and, even if punished, the punishments meted out to them were relatively mild in comparison to those inflicted on Natives. While their criticism of colonial politics was severe at times, they did not oppose colonialism as such, but rather lamented its excesses. Indeed, the strategy of “anti-conquest,” as laid out by Mary Louise Pratt, characterizes much of Dutch colonial literature about the Indies. How colonial authors position themselves politically is of course rele­ vant, but Pramoedya is not very concerned about the authorial intent behind a text or the ideologies that inform it (although, to the best of my knowl­ edge, he has never engaged with Daum or van Bruggen). While some postcolonial scholars criticize Multatuli’s Max Havelaar for being ambig­ uous on the issue of colonialism,43 Pramoedya is remarkably unambivalent in his endorsement of the text, to which he refers as “the book that killed colonialism.”44 The problem Pramoedya identifies is not the ideology of its author, but rather the content of the colonial archive. In the final volume of the Buru Quartet, House of Glass (1988; Rumah kaca), Minke has

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disappeared from view. Instead, we follow Jacques Pangemanann, a Native police commissioner in charge of Minke’s arrest and exile, who documents his case and in the end delivers his papers, which constitute the first three volumes of the Buru Quartet, to nyai Ontosoroh. Thus, the novel illustrates how historical events are turned into writing and become part of the colo­ nial archive, but also how much is left out.45 A similar dynamic characterizes Child of all Nations. Here, readers witness both the writing of a nyai-story and the integration of this story into the colonial archive. As we saw, Minke writes the story of nyai Surati (nyai Ontosoroh’s niece), and the journalist Kommer reads it and com­ ments on it. He is full of praise but also exhorts Minke to expand his scope: “you must look for the aspect that isn’t mentioned.”46 It remains unclear precisely what it is that is unmentioned. In the same context, however, Minke is criticized for focusing too much on his writing and losing touch with society, and Kommer tells him to look at French writing as a model. The principal point being made here is clear: the colonial archive is by necessity incomplete and does not adequately represent the lived experiences of the inhabitants of the colony. The Buru Quartet is often read as a text that documents the emergence of Indonesian nationalism and as formative for a national Indonesian literature. But it also offers a statement about the rise of literature as a medium for public discourse. Precisely by linking the story of the nyai to the emergence of literature as a medium in the Netherlands Indies, Pramoedya breaks with the idea that literature exists and has existed everywhere in more or less the same form.47 Instead, he emphasizes the medium’s links to specific times and spaces. As we saw, nyai Ontosoroh insists that Nyai Dasima was written in a style imported from Europe, although the text’s language is Malay. There are indications that the story was popularized through performances by a Malaylanguage opera group, Komedie Stamboel, that staged tales from 1001 Nights and other popular texts from world literature and for which Gijsbert Francis worked as a writer (E. du Perron first learned about Nyai Dasima through a childhood song adapted from the opera).48 But why is it exactly that the figure of the “nyai” comes to embody the emergence of literature in the Netherlands Indies? By positioning the nyai at the center of the new medium, Pramoedya uses a figure who functions as a mediator or transcultural communicator—one of the principal reasons cited to legitimate the cohabitation of Dutch men with Native or Eurasian women. To be sure, literature has the potential to communicate and mediate. But in aligning literature with the nyai, Pramoedya also casts the new medium as an instrument of concubinage—a tool in a relationship characterized by a fundamental and often exploitative power differential. Herman Mellema, her “master,” who believed in the importance of giving Nyai Ontosoroh a European education, taught her to read and write. But

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while literature as a medium is thus compromised, it can nevertheless also be used as a means of resistance, as Francis’s Nyai Dasima and Pramoedya’s Buru Quartet show. It is through literature that Annelies’s, nyai Ontosoroh’s, and Minke’s stories are made public. Literature has the ability to document what is lost in the colonial archive. And in doing so literature presents a way of participating in a global sphere,49 a priority for Minke and Pramoedya himself, as is illustrated by the titles of the first two volumes of the Buru Quartet: This Earth of Mankind and Child of all Nations. ∗∗∗ My analysis of postcolonial and colonial literature from what today is called Indonesia sheds new light on the picture discussed at the beginning. In particular, Daum’s novels show that some of the young European men who came to the Indies did not do so entirely voluntarily: they may have been outcasts in Europe, high school dropouts, or have run into trouble with the law, and their family thought it best to send them to the colonies to straighten them out. The photograph in question may look like a casual snapshot, but it is in fact carefully staged. It certainly suggests that the (German speaking) man in the picture wants to give the impression of having embraced Native culture. He engages in a form of ethnic drag or cultural masquerade. Perhaps he can do so, because, as a German, he does not need to follow the rules of Dutch colonial society. He is wearing a cepi, a piece of headgear traditionally worn by those who had made the pilgrimage to Mecca. The tobacco pipe he is smoking has a small container under its bowl that may serve to store opium. Black is perhaps not the man’s natural hair color. While European men tended to hide nyais from public view, this man does not. And the little orangutan on his lap? From our readings, we know that in the colonial context “aap” (a word that in Dutch means both ape and monkey) was often used as a racial slur. In this picture, the man holds the orangutan as if it were a child—their child? This would also explain the “Wir gratulieren!” (Congratulations!). Is the postcard meant to congratulate a European relative or friend on the birth of a child, simultaneously showing one’s own offspring? While we can reconstruct the intentions of the young German man in this picture, our understanding of the woman remains remarkably vague. Her social position is defined by the clothes she wears, but beyond that, we do not know anything about her. The woman most likely grew up in poverty; agreeing to serve as a nyai to a European man in a remote (and war-torn) area of Borneo was one of very few ways out of it. It is as if she walked into a carefully staged scene. In an exemplary way, she illustrates the “challenge to locate women as subjects” in the colonial archive.50 And yet, she is there—in the picture—as a reminder that she did exist in the margins of colonial society, and yet was also central to its functioning.

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Notes 1 See Rob Nieuwenhuys, Komen en blijven. Tempo doeloe—een verzonken wereld. Fotografische documenten uit het oude Indië 1870–1920 (Amsterdam: Querido, 1998), 87–88. 2 See Elsbeth Locher-Scholten, “The Nyai in Colonial Deli: A Case of Mediation,” in Women and Mediation, eds. Sita van Bemmelen et al. (Leiden: KITLV Press, 1992), 265–280, here 266, 272. Locher-Scholten shows how the idea of “mediation” itself is quite a problematic colonial invention: it covered up abusive practices, is mostly about access to resources, and there is little evidence “mediation” helped Natives (272–273). 3 Regarding this epistemological point, see the “Introduction” to Domesticating the Empire: Race, Gender, and Family Life in French and Dutch Colonialism, eds. Julia Clancy-Smith and Frances Gouda (Charlottesville/London: University of Virginia Press, 1998), 1–20, here 2–3, 15. 4 See E.M. Beekman, Troubled Pleasures: Dutch Colonial Literature from the East Indies 1600–1950 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1996), 326; Locher-Scholten, “The Nyai in Colonial Deli,” 266. 5 See Ann Laura Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power: Race and the Intimate in Colonial Rule (Berkeley: U of California P, 2002), 48. 6 See Pramoedya Ananta Toer, The Girl from the Coast, trans. Willem Samuels (New York: Hyperion, 2002). The novel is a fictionalized account of the life of the author’s grandmother, a Native nobleman’s practice wife, who was rejected after giving birth to her first child. 7 See Reggie Baay, De Njai. Het concubinaat in Nederlands-Indië (Amsterdam: Athenaeum-Polak & Van Gennep, 2009) [e-book], 48–49, 52. 8 See Baay, De Njai, 93–96. 9 E. du Perron, Het land van herkomst, 15th ed. (Amsterdam: G.A. van Oorschot, 1997), 253. 10 Baay, De Njai, 19–20, 28–29. 11 See Stoler, Carnal Knowledge, 101–106, for a legal history of such intercultural marriages, and Baay, De Njai, 44–45. 12 When I first became interested in postcolonial studies in the 1990s, my views were shaped in particular by Ania Loomba, Mary Louise Pratt, and Ann Laura Stoler. 13 Michael Rothberg, The Implicated Subject: Beyond Victims and Perpetrators (Palo Alto: Stanford UP, 2019), 1. 14 Rothberg, The Implicated Subject, 1. 15 Rothberg, The Implicated Subject, 18–19. 16 See for instance Regine Criser and Ervin Malakaj, “Introduction: Diversity and Decolonization in German Studies,” in Diversity and Decolonization in German Studies, eds. Regine Criser and Ervin Malakaj (Cham, CH: Palgrave MacMillan, 2020), 1–22; see also their criticism of the term “postcolonial” (5). 17 See Ania Loomba, Colonialism/Postcolonialism, 2nd ed. (London/New York: Routledge, 2005), 19, 84. 18 See Christopher GoGwilt, “The Vanishing Genre of the Nyai Narrative: Reading Genealogies of English and Indonesian Modernism,” in The Passage of Literature: Genealogies of Modernism in Conrad, Rhys, and Pramoedya (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2011), 153–176. 19 For a brief reconstruction of the history of the Buru Quartet, see my essay “Modernity, Sexuality, and Gender in Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s This Earth of

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22 23 24 25

26

27 28 29 30 31

32 33

34 35

Carl Niekerk Mankind (1980),” Symposium 65, no. 2 (2011): 77–98, here 78–79. In line with Indonesian custom, I will refer to the author by his first name, Pramoedya. The publication history of the Buru Quartet is documented in Max Lane, Indonesia out of Exile: How Pramoedya’s ‘Buru Quartet’ Killed a Dictatorship (Singapore: Penguin, 2022). Pramoedya Ananta Toer, This Earth of Mankind, Buru Quartet, vol. 1, trans. Max Lane (New York: Penguin Books, 1996), 39–40; see also 47 where Mr. Mellema calls Minke a monkey. Nyai is named after her place of employment: Ontosoroh is Javanese for Buitenzorg, the name of the farm she runs (see 24). Her given name is Sanikem (79), but nobody in her environment uses that name. Since she is Native, she, like Minke, does not have a last name. Through these processes of renaming, the novel shows how Native identities are erased. Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, 2nd ed. (London/New York: Routledge, 2008), 9. See my interpretation of the novel in “Modernity, Sexuality, and Gender,” here 86. See in this context Loomba, who argues that postcolonial writing in spite of its critical agenda can nevertheless be characterized by “gender asymmetry” (Colonialism/Postcolonialism, 137). See Maya Sutedja-Liem, De Njai. De moeder van alle volken (Leiden: KITLV, 2007), 21–23, and Kenji Tsuchiya, “Popular Literature and Colonial Society in Late-Nineteenth-Century Java—Cerita Nyai Dasima, the Macabre Story of an Englishman’s Concubine,” South Asian Studies 22, no. 4 (1991): 467–480, here 467. See Baay, De njai, 38–42, and Jean Gelman Taylor, “Nyai Dasima: Portrait of a Mistress in Literature and Film,” in Fantasizing the Feminine in Indonesia, ed. Laurie J. Sears (Durham/London: Duke UP, 1999), 225–248, here 230, 237–238. This (mutual) critique of national colonial traditions is a fairly common phenomenon among European nations, in particular in literary texts. Germans participated as well. G. Francis, Nyai Dasima, trans. Harry Aveling, Centre of Southeast Asian Studies, Working Paper No. 46 (1988), 19. See Sutedja-Liem, De Njai, 61–71. See Sutedja-Liem, De Njai, 45–57. Pramoedya Ananta Toer, Child of all Nations, Buru Quartet, vol. 2, trans. Max Lane (New York: Penguin Books, 1996), 131–157 and 178. P.A. Daum, “Nummer elf,” in Verzamelde romans, vol. 3 (Amsterdam: Nijgh & van Ditmar, 1998), 209–401, here 248. Daum’s at times fierce criticism was not based in socialist or social democratic convictions, but rather in nineteenth-century liberalism. He advocated for greater autonomy for the colony and space for responsible entrepreneurship. Baay, De njai, 125–126. See Petra Boudewijn, “Over donkere dochters, Indische dames en’n blanke lelie: De representatie van Indo-Europeanen in ‘Ups’ & ‘Downs’ in het Indische leven van P.A. Daum,” Indische Letteren 25 (2010): 220–235. Boudewijn analyzes the many ways in which gender and race are linked in Daum’s writings. See Gerard Termorshuizen, P.A. Daum. Journalist en romancier van tempo doeloe (Amsterdam: Nijgh & van Ditmar, 1997), 132–139, 340–346. Regarding the importance of naturalism and Zola for Daum, see Niek Oele, “De vierde weg,” in Rondom Daum, ed. Gerard Termorshuizen (Amsterdam: Nijgh & van Ditmar, 1997), 45–56, here 46–47, 51.

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36 See in this context also Andries Teeuws’s deliberations on the narrative structure of Nummer elf in “Het maleis in de romans van Daum,” in Rondom Daum, 73–85, here 74–78, and also Termorshuizen, P.A. Daum, 382–383. 37 Termorshuizen (P.A. Daum, 427–429) claims that this passage breaks with a negative view of Natives, while Rick Honings argues that Lena’s position does not represent that of the narrator or implicit author; see “‘Hij blijft tegenover de Inlander een rasechte koloniaal’ P.A. Daum,” in De postkoloniale Spiegel. De nederlands-indische letteren herlezen, 2nd ed., eds. Rick Honings, Coen van ‘t Veer, and Jacqueline Bel (Leiden UP, 2022), 99–121, here 111–112, 114. 38 Charlotte herself reflects on this nickname: de Klerk is fatherly: he is calm, reasonable, and strict, but also fair and not without compassion. See Carry van Bruggen, Goenong-Djatti (Amsterdam: H.J.W. Brecht, 1909), 2–3. One can read this as the internalization of a patriarchal model of colonialism that was actively promoted by the Dutch government conceiving of its responsibilities toward the native population as paternal. Javanese aristocrats collaborating with the colo­ nial government, for instance, were supposed to address Dutch civil servants as ‘father,’ with the governor-general serving as ‘grand-father.’ See Frances Gouda, “Good Mothers, Medeas, or Jezebels: Feminine Imagery in Colonial and Anticolonial Rhetoric in the Dutch East Indies, 1900–1942,” in Domesticating the Empire: Race, Gender, and Family Life in French and Dutch Colonialism, eds. Julia Clanchy-Smith and Frances Gouda (Charlottesville/London: University of Virginia Press, 1998), 236–254, here 241. 39 See Stoler, Carnal Knowledge, 56. See also the introduction to Western Women and Imperialism: Complicity and Resistance, eds. Nupur Chaudhuri and Margaret Strobel (Bloomington/Indianapolis: Indiana UP, 1992), 1–15, in which the editors note that the image of European women in the colony has veered between “sustaining colonialism and resisting or undermining it” (12), while their activities often combined elements of both. 40 See Stoler, Carnal Knowledge, 62. 41 See M.H. Székely-Lulofs, Rubber (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1931), 19–20, 247–249. 42 See Cees Nooteboom, Berliner Notizen, trans. Rosmarie Still (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 1991), 187; one of my academic mentors, Egon Schwarz (1922–2017), confirmed this. 43 See Jacqueline Bel, “Klewangwettende gezangen en knevelarij: Multatuli,” in De postkoloniale spiegel, 31–48, here 39, 45–48; regarding Dekker’s ambig­ uous stance on colonialism, see also my essay “Rethinking a Problematic Constellation: Postcolonialism and Its Germanic Contexts (Pramoedya Ananta Toer/Multatuli),” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East 23, nos. 1 & 2 (2003): 58–69, here 59–60. 44 Pramoedya Ananta Toer, “The Book that Killed Colonialism,” The New York Times, 18 April 1999, www.nytimes.com/1999/04/18/magazine/best-storythe-book-that-killed-colonialism.html. 45 See, in particular, Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain: Epistemic Anxieties and Colonial Common Sense (Princeton: Princeton UP, 2009), 17–20, who writes of a “quest for affective knowledge—that which moves people to feel and act” that is both central to the archive and “yet beyond its grasp” (18); see also GoGwilt, “The Vanishing Genre,” 171–174. 46 Pramoedya Ananta Toer, Child of all Nations, 179; Chris GoGwilt points out that the Buru Quartet alludes to, but does not tell, another nyai-story, Nyai Permana. Pramoedya owned a copy of the text, but it was destroyed in 1965

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Carl Niekerk when his house was ransacked and he was arrested by the Suharto regime (“The Vanishing Genre,” 65). Aamir R. Mufti writes of the “enticing and irresistible thought of literature as a single and world-extensive reality.” Later, however, he points to the novel’s “ori­ gins in a handful languages in the Western European countries”; see Forget English: Orientalism and World Literatures (Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2016), 1, 34. See Matthew Isaac Cohen, The Komedie Stamboel: Popular Theater in Colonial Indonesia, 1891–1903 (Athens, OH: Ohio UP, 2006), 278, 303, 322, 386; du Perron, Het land van herkomst, 77. See Peter Hitchcock, who argues that a text’s global dimension—what he calls “the long space”—by means of local histories can liberate texts from the influence of the West. Pramoedya accomplishes this by engaging dialogically with the tradition of the novel; see The Long Space: Transnationalism and Postcolonial Form (Redwood City: Stanford UP, 2010), 9–10, 143–144, 203. Stoler, Along the Archival Grain, 48.

4

Repairing Relations Gendered Encounters in the Dutch East Indies in Wilhelmina Kruijtbosch’s Novel Het witte doek Simon Richter

For someone with a Calvinist background, it’s quite a mouthful to say that their great-grandmother was married twice and wrote an autobiographical novel about her life as a single mother in the Dutch East Indies in the early part of the twentieth century. Except, it is not entirely true. As a handful of my cousins and I discovered during the first COVID summer, she was married not twice, but three times. The story she tells in her novel, including subtle clues about the brief second marriage few people knew about, is remarkable for the way it sets her personal vulnerability and resilience as a young Dutch woman in the colony in sympathetic relation to the Buginese gender system and against the prevailing patriarchal and masculinist culture of colonial administration. Just a Book in the Bookcase Copies of the novel that Wilhelmina (Mini) Kruijtbosch published in 1937 stood in bookcases in the home of my parents, my grandparents, and probably most of my aunts and uncles. Although we cherish and pass on our share of family lore, the older generations have been reticent about Het witte doek (literally, the white cloth; metaphorically, the silver screen), as Mini called her first novel, so much so that most of my cousins were unaware of it. I corresponded with one of my aunts about this. She recalled that her mother (Mini’s daughter, who was born in 1907 in Magelang on the island of Java and left the Dutch East Indies with her mother, Mini, and Mini’s third husband in 1923) never spoke about the book. “She also never told me to read it. It was just a book in the bookcase.” It wasn’t for lack of interest. My cousins and I clustered around our grandmother for stories about our parents, which she read aloud from what we called “the scriptures,” her diary of colonial life in the Dutch East Indies, to which she had returned after her marriage in 1928, setting up in Batavia (now Jakarta), where she bore four children, and suffered the separation of her family into various DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-6

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Japanese internment camps in 1942, until their release and return to the Netherlands in 1946. My grandfather was prone to display a stronger reaction to his motherin-law’s novel, though not one I ever witnessed. That same aunt recalls that “whenever Het witte doek came up, my father immediately made fun of it and quoted (well, not literally) the passage on page 119. ‘Those big grey eyes… . Was she pretty?’ All this in an exaggerated and affected tone. It was clear what he thought of it.” Although I was fond of my grandfather, I’m afraid I can readily imagine him doing this. After returning to the Netherlands, he was appointed rector of a lyceum, a secondary school that prepared students for higher education. Not only did he work constructively to help pupils deal with their war-time traumas, possibly together with the German-Jewish psychoanalyst and author Hans Keilson, who lived in the same town; family members recall that he struggled with his own traumatic memories of being interned in a Japanese POW camp. My grandfather was an effective public speaker with a sense of humor that easily slid into sarcasm. The passage from the novel that was the target of his mimicry comes at a point when Maleen (my great-grandmother’s fictional avatar) is confronting her vulnerability. After a year in the garrison town of Magelang, her first husband, an officer in the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL), sought and received an appointment as lieutenant governor in a still restive district among the Bugis people on the Island of Sulawesi, leaving his young wife and infant daughter to fend for themselves. The theme of this chapter is clear: the vulnerable social situation of the colonial officer’s wife when her husband is assigned elsewhere. Mini establishes the tone through a lively representation of town gossip. In the midst of this, Maleen receives an anonymous flattering love letter proposing a rendezvous. This leads to her reflecting ambivalently on her physical desirability in front of the mirror—“those big grey eyes … was she pretty?”—and the painful realization that her husband Jim, in contrast to the writer of the anonymous letter, does not desire her. For my grandfather, there was much to find objectionable in this passage. While Mini had grown up in a liberal household and only found her way to a personalized version of Calvinist belief in connection with her third husband, my grandparents belonged to a social group that abhorred the colonial licentiousness Mini described in this chapter. My grandfather probably read the mirror scene as a form of vanity related to sexuality, while for Mini, it was a moment of self-reflection and vulnerability for her protagonist. As we will see, Mini used the topos of the mirror strategically throughout the narrative as a way to mark increasing self-knowledge relative to the colonial context and the meaningful relationships in her protagonist’s life. For my own part, I read Mini’s novel in the late 1980s, when, as a graduate student, I was breaking away from deconstruction and finding

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my way to a mode of cultural studies infused with curiosity about the way gender and sexuality were involved in cultural production. I read the novel casually, hoping to find ready confirmation for tidbits of family lore. For example, did one of our forebears come from Russia? (Yes, Mini’s grandmother was Russian and one of Mini’s brothers moved to St Petersburg to work in the family business.) With the help of a cheat sheet my mother made for me, which paired the fictional characters with their real-life counterparts, I could make sense of Mini’s story, from her childhood in a well to do, liberal family in Kampen, the Netherlands, where she met her first and third husbands, both of whom were officers in training at the military academy of the KNIL in the same city, to her life in several cities on Java and brief periods on Sulawesi, where she attempted to rejoin her husband, and Sumatra where she lived with her second husband. In her account of the dysfunctionality of her protagonist’s first marriage set against the unfamiliar culture of a remote Bugis village, I had the sense of family narrative intersecting with something larger, something real. Given the direction of my own research, one scene in particular stood out. It involved a brief face-to-face encounter with a transgender Bugis priest, a bissu, as I would later learn. As a scholar of gay studies in the late 1980s, I was notionally familiar with alternative gender systems in Southeast Asia. Although I didn’t have the wherewithal to theorize what was going on at the time, it was clear that Mini’s novel was more than a story about finding faith; it was a piercing account of navigating conflicting discourses of gender within a colonial framework. The passage haunted me. It was indirectly one of the reasons I turned to my cousins in the first months of the pandemic lockdown in 2020 with the idea of jointly reading Het witte doek. I wanted to understand what transpired in that encounter. Little could we anticipate that what Mini had in fact offered in her account was an undisguised and compelling description of significant historical Bugis leaders and gender culture, the authenticity of which surprised the Indonesian, Dutch, and American anthropologists we reached out to. In deepening our understanding of that chapter of Mini’s life as she rendered it in her novel, we would also gain new insight into my grandfather’s hurtful mimicry, and, in some sense, “meet” our common great-grandfather for the first time. More Than a Conversion Narrative Wilhelmina Kruijtbosch published Het witte doek under the pseudonym of Mini van den Iessel, preserving her nickname and associating herself with where she came from, the city of Kampen on the River Ijssel, known in the local dialect as the Iessel. Her publisher was Jan Hendrikus Kok, who ran a Calvinist publishing house based in Kampen. We have a copy of

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the original contract for 1,000 guilders, signed by her on April 10, 1932. It would be a mistake to discredit the novel for appearing in this religious context. Dutch society of the time was subdivided into distinct socioreligious silos (zuilen) across levels of class and education. Dutch versions of Calvinism were known for their efforts to explore the implications of faith for all spheres of life with intellectual rigor. This was perhaps best symbolized by the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, which was founded in 1880 by Abraham Kuyper, the university’s first rector, an eminent theologian, and later prime minister of the Netherlands. As correspondence in the Kok archive preserved in the Stadsarchief Kampen abundantly shows, Mini did her part to promote the book. She plied Mr. Kok with suggestions about prospective reviewers, opportunities for public readings and book signings, inclusion in book discussions on the radio, and increasing availability of the book in bookstores outside of the Calvinist domain and in the Dutch East Indies. While the book was still in press, she had second thoughts about the pseudonym. Wasn’t “Mini” too childish? The publisher allayed her concerns. Through her persistence, the book received critical attention from reviewers who typically ignored “conversion” stories and women’s publications. It’s striking how many reviewers took the metaphorical sense of the book’s title—the silver screen—literally. Het witte doek, they said, is like a film. It consists of pictures that flicker across the screen of the reader’s imagination. This filmic quality, they wrote, is both a strength and a weakness of the writer. She has a decided gift for conveying story and character through image, but her exclusively male reviewers were skeptical about such a novel’s ability to lay claim to the rank of literature. There was insufficient psychological analysis and not enough reflection on the meaning of the events as they unfold. Some objected to the female character’s autonomy in ending her first marriage, even if it was a necessary step on her way to Christian faith. Wasn’t it her duty to remain with her husband? Indirectly, the reviews attest to the remarkable risks my great-grandmother took both narratively and socially. There is a modernist quality to her image-driven narrative, while her willingness to represent marriage dysfunctionality without editorializing opened space for male and female readers to dwell on the ambiguities. Between her efforts to steer the novel to success and a wide readership, on the one hand, and the ambivalent reviews by male guardians of moral and literary standards, on the other, we get the impression of an author who knew what she was doing. The novel was successful. It enjoyed at least two printings and continues to be available as a downloadable text in the Digitale bibliotheek voor de Nederlandse letteren [digital library of Dutch literature]. My cousins had no difficulty obtaining their copies because the book is abundantly available from secondhand book dealers.

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Sex and Gender in Kampen and the Dutch East Indies The sex and gender system in place around 1900 in Kampen, where Mini was the daughter of the rector of the lyceum (college preparatory high school), offered young women limited opportunities. Although Mini’s older sister was allowed to attend her father’s lyceum on the basis of excellent grades, she was not permitted to pursue a university degree because, as her father explained, she would wind up marrying anyway. For Mini, who first met husbands 1 and 3 in Kampen where they were being prepared for service in the Dutch East Indies as cadets at the military academy, marriage to her first husband was a way to escape the social confines of the Netherlands. The novel recounts an officers’ ball, where Maleen’s escort is “Jim” (the first husband), but the person she asks to dance when it is ladies’ choice is “Just” (the third husband). He brusquely declines. But, writes Mini, this would not be the last time she saw him. As for Jim, there is no account of a courtship, merely the announcement of an engagement and broad hints that little underlies their union apart from internalized social expectations and their desire to leave the Netherlands for the Indies. Maleen and Jim marry in the pall of her father’s death and under chastened circumstances. It was a quiet wedding, accorded only a few sentences in the narrative. “Maleen looked pale. It was all so unreal.” At the train station, as they leave to catch their boat to the Indies, it seemed to her “a dream within a dream.”1 Jim’s older brother Louis meets them in Batavia (Jakarta). One of the first things Maleen notices is a small medal of the Military Order of William on his chest and how her husband gazed longingly at it. He received this highest honor the Netherlands bestows “in glorious memory” of his service in Aceh. In a novel that offers few opportunities to get a sense of Maleen’s (or Mini’s) politics, this chapter provides a few clues, starting with Aceh. The Sultanate of Aceh was located in North Sumatra. Since the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 created new economic opportunities, the Netherlands had tried unsuccessfully to defeat the military forces of the independent sultanate. In 1898, J. B. van Heutz, governor of Aceh, ordered Frits van Daalen to pacify Aceh by any means necessary. In 1904, a year before Mini arrived, Van Dalen destroyed five villages, killing women and children indiscriminately, and massacred prisoners in an action that received international press attention. Ultimately, between 50,000 and 60,000 Acehnese died of violence or disease. It is in the context of the Pacification of Aceh that Louis, the fictional counterpart of Marinus van Lakerveld, performed his honorable service. Mini and Maleen accept that without critique. During a tour of the original colonial town of Batavia, Maleen is deeply impressed by a monument Louis shows them erected to mark the treachery of Pieter Erberveld, who along with 17 others was executed for leading a Javanese rebellion

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against the VOC in 1722. “This was also the Indies! This land so rich in powerful and cruel memories” (Het witte doek, 85). Instead of further reflection, Mini sums it all up in a hyphenated word: “Groot-Nederland!” (Het witte doek, 86; Great Netherlands). Recall that her novel is published in 1937. The concept of a Great Netherlands originated in the Flemish nationalist movement in the 1890s but was probably not yet current in the Dutch colonies at the time Mini lived there. It isn’t until the 1930s that Dutch Nazi sympathizers fantasized about a Great Netherlands, a realm that would fuse the Netherlands with the Dutch-speaking provinces of Belgium and include their colonial holdings in Africa, South America, and Asia. For Mini, it probably seemed like an effective way to encapsulate the Dutch colonial empire. But where did she get the term? The NIOD Institute for War, Genocide and Holocaust Studies in Amsterdam contains a type-written speech on “The Task of the Dutch Nationaal-Socialistische Beweging (NSB, National Socialist Movement) in the Indies,” delivered at a provincial meeting in Semarang on December 27, 1935, by a certain H. A. Kruijtbosch. That’s Mini’s youngest brother. Many of the documents concerning Hein Kruijtbosch, who died in 1946 in a prison camp for undesirables in Surinam, will be under seal for a few more years and await research. For me and my shocked cousins, it was already a challenge to fathom that this—from Aceh to the NSB—was the moral and political context in which Mini was operating. After a few days in Batavia, Jim and Maleen set up in the small garrison town of Magelang in central Java. It’s up to Maleen to find her way within its social structure. We can discern three distinct social spaces: a male, predominantly military space; the space of the colonial domestics (cooks, nannies, gardeners), which opens onto the (for colonial eyes) increasingly inscrutable and threatening space of the indigenous population; and a female space of apparently limited agency, where motherhood is the primary role, supplemented by sketchy opportunities for flirtation and adultery. Where these spaces cross, members intermingle asymmetrically. The male space is most clearly defined. During the day, Jim and the other officers are preoccupied with military training. In the evening, they socialize primarily among themselves. Jim and his friend Van Gilse cultivate a misogynist ethos. Maleen’s life seems empty by contrast. Jim had his duties. Jim had his illusions of going to war. Jim had his friend Van Gilse for deep discussions, which she couldn’t follow and didn’t care for. The two of them were in complete agreement about the “inferiority” of the female, raved about it with Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. “Du gehst zu Frauen? Vergiß die Peitsche nicht?” [You’re going to women? Don’t forget the whip]. That alone prevented her from any effort to understand them. Was woman really inferior to man? Then it was bad luck to be born

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a woman. It would make sense to hope that your child would be a boy. A boy, who, hopefully, didn’t take after her. Involuntarily she folded her hands and prayed, “Let my child resemble him in all ways, and not me. And give my life meaning.” (Het witte doek, 97) Although a challenge to this thinking lurks in her question about the putative inferiority of women, the preliminary conclusions she draws regarding her situation signal self- and gender-effacement. Meaning comes from mothering a male child. This is the colonial base line for a young woman. In the Netherlands, the prospect of having domestic servants and living large was part of the popular appeal of moving to the colonies. The celebrated Dutch novelist, Louis Couperus, troubled that perception with his novel De stille kracht (1900; The Hidden Force: A Story of Java, 1921), a sort of colonial Gothic in which the Dutch come to suspect that domestics use indigenous spiritual powers to undermine and threaten their colonial comforts. This is evidently how colonials projected their bad conscience about colonialism onto the colonized. In the beginning, Maleen falls into that trap. Her domestics regularly outwit her. When her newborn baby, a daughter, falls ill, she fears that “de stille kracht” is at work. The Dutch doctor is unable to help. A Dutch woman with longer experience in the colonies suggests that she summon a dukun, an indigenous healer. The baby responds well to treatment. From this point on, Mini depicts a more personal rapport between Maleen, her daughter, and the servants and other indigenous peoples with whom they interact. When it comes to describing interactions with indigenous people during her sojourn on the island of Sulawesi and later with the local pupils she teaches and who visit her home in the mountain town of Sukabumi back on Java, she individuates them and recognizes their autonomy. Whereas Mini’s tendency is to relate the narrative from Maleen’s perspective and focus largely on her interiority, it’s in the construction of colonial male space that Mini renders Jim’s thoughts. He envies his unmarried friend van Gilse and regrets his marriage. It was all well and good to have a son or perhaps a daughter, but it tied you down. Seeing the medal on his brother’s chest really brought that home. But—when the child was born … . With Maleen being strong and healthy … . So many officers’ wives had to manage for themselves … . Surely, he could apply for active duty in the field? And he’d most likely get it. On the island of Celebes [Sulawesi] they needed leaders. He could be appointed there as a lieutenant governor and—who knows—might even earn a “ribbon” in an area that had not yet been pacified. And if that wasn’t possible, he could pursue his study of land, people, and language. That would open many possibilities. (Het witte doek, 98)

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Using free indirect discourse, Mini gives voice to the career-driven calculations of her first husband. She depicts her deprecation as an obstacle to be sidelined with such precision that it feels like she’s reliving a trauma in order to master it. And it was a trauma. Within a year of arriving in Magelang, Jim requests and quickly receives an appointment to a remote area on the island of Sulawesi among the Bugis. The household is dissolved, and furniture is auctioned off. Maleen is left to fend for herself and her infant daughter. It will be three years before he sees them again and only because she defies his instructions not to join him in Sulawesi. It is during this intermediate period of virtual single motherhood that Maleen discovers more expansive possibilities for female agency and additional forms of female solidarity. We can trace her increasing autonomy along the three-year trajectory of her living arrangements up until she re-unites with Jim. She initially boards with an older married couple, but the husband makes a pass at her. Together with another young mother in similar straits, she rents a house. When her housemate receives notice that she and her son can join her husband on Sulawesi, Maleen decides to move to the harbor city of Surabaya, where she studies toward her teacher certification. Maleen, her daughter Emy (my grandmother), and the nanny reside in a guest house run by a widow who also manages a dairy farm. Maleen offers piano lessons in order to cover tuition for herself and Emy. Although this threefold existence as mother, student, and teacher is exhausting, Maleen and Emy thrive. Resuming an education foreclosed to her in the Netherlands opened space for intellectual growth, not only through the curriculum, but also because of the people she met. In a chapter with superstition as its theme, Maleen joins a circle of theosophists, an esoteric spiritualist movement that combined Western and Eastern thought, founded by the New York-based Russian immigrant Madame Blavatsky. (A restaurant near the University of Pennsylvania is called The White Dog because, according to local legend, when Madame Blavatsky briefly lived there, an ailment of her leg was healed by a white dog. A portrait of her hangs in the bar. I think of my greatgrandmother when I pass it.) In Surabaya, the theosophists form a nonhierarchal community in which women’s voices have an equal right to be heard. Theosophy provided her not only with a vocabulary for beginning to make sense of her life, it also offered new forms of agency. She zealously participated in speculative conversations and enjoyed the attention of wealthier members of the movement. After the completion of her teaching certification, a family in the theosophical community invites her and her daughter to join them on vacation in the mountains. They enjoy vegetarian fare, participate in syncretistic worship, and spend hours hiking in the

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mountains. It is in this idyllic space, removed from the social and existential pressures of life in Surabaya, that Maleen determines the time has come to make an attempt to rejoin her husband, whether he likes it or not. For the sake of her child and her own sake. “Wouldn’t it be best for both of them to speak honestly about everything? Including about what she had missed during these three long years?” (Het witte doek, 145). She is at the peak of her autonomy. As she surveys her situation, she recalls something Van Gilse said as he and Jim withdrew from her company. “Die Frauen sind der Freundschaft nicht fähig” (women are not capable of friendship). For her part, she could assert with equal right: “Die Männer sind der Liebe nicht fähig” (145; men are not capable of love). But there is a young man in Surabaya with whom she has developed a promising friendship. She’ll take that knowledge with her as she and Emy depart for Sulawesi. Among the Bugis Book 3 of Het witte doek is what I had been aiming for all along. This is where Maleen encounters a bissu, the androgynous fifth variant of the Bugis gender system. This time I came better equipped to understand what was going on. Still, I had no idea just how astonishing this set of chapters from my great-grandmother’s life really was. As we learned from the Dutch, American, and Indonesian experts we consulted, Mini’s story unexpectedly intersected with the search for an insurgent in the kingdom of Boné. During the six months she was there, she met key players and later recalled a considerable degree of detail. Roger Tol, a retired Dutch expert on Bugis cultural history and language and author of a monograph on Labuaja, one of the figures Mini met, was intrigued when I contacted him. He had never heard of Het witte doek and read it with interest. “Part 3 really stands out in terms of its non-sentimental and non-religious tone. Her writing is clever and realistic, despite being written some twenty years after the events. Perhaps she kept a diary because the descriptions and dialogs are lifelike. Occasionally even in Bugis (‘Adja mabisi-bisi’ [don’t whisper])—really remarkable.” Equally remarkable for us was the fact that Tol had already come across Mini’s first husband, Willem Frederick Jacobus van Lakerveld, whose unpublished anthropological and linguistic work he encountered in the archives. Thanks to Roger’s contribution and the intelligence of Mini’s narrative, my re-reading of the novel underwent a fundamental reorientation: I suddenly realized that this was not just the story of my great-grandmother. It was also the story of Jim, the troubled, misogynist husband who had kept Maleen and their daughter at a prohibitive geographical distance for three years. And Jim, as I realized with a jolt, was the fictional stand-in for the great-grandfather

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our family had resolutely disavowed. Through our research on Book 3, my cousins and I met him, so to speak, for the first time. Maleen and Emy’s journey from Surabaya on Java to the remote outpost of Mare in the Boné kingdom on Sulawesi was formidable. It involved a long boat trip from one island to another and then around the coast to the district where Jim was lieutenant governor. From the tiny harbor to their even more remote home, they rode on horseback and were transported by rowboat on a river in the dead of night. Language and culture were unfamiliar. They were among the Bugis now. Her husband scarcely altered his routines or restless activity to accommodate Maleen and Emy. Once again, she had to fend for herself and her daughter. Book 3 is formally and thematically organized around gender. It begins with an epigraph from the Book of Proverbs, “Only the heart knows its own bitterness,” stopping short of the verse’s continuation: “No one else can know its joy.” The first night’s stop is at the home of a Bugis matriarch, Aru Salomekko. Despite the abrupt, nocturnal beginning, she and Maleen develop a bond. At the end of Book 3, as Maleen leaves to make arrangements for the divorce proceedings in Makassar, she spends two days as her special guest, hunting and fishing with the Aru in the forest and waters of her realm. On her second day in Boné, only just arrived in Mare, she meets Aru Labuaja, a legendary figure who led the Bugis fight against the Dutch until their defeat in the fourth expedition of 1906 and subsequently became an indispensable if ambivalently regarded power broker in Boné. Surrounded by multiple wives, Labuaja exudes a larger-than-life masculinity. Remarkably, Maleen feels at ease in his presence. Finally, in the leadup to the clarifying conversation Maleen is determined to have with her husband, Jim arranges for a troupe of female dancers and a number of bissus (transgender priests) to entertain the sparse company. This is when Maleen has a brief face-to-face encounter with a bissu. Every detail, reference, and subtle allusion—and there are many—in the masterfully orchestrated narrative of Book 3 and its integration of key moments from earlier sections, especially in relation to a memory of Maleen’s father—all of this is keyed to the difficult conversation that Maleen knows she must have with her husband. Jim executes his administrative duties with alacrity. He spends hours adjudicating in matters brought to him by Bugis residents within his jurisdiction. An example is the unresolved case of the grave desecration of an infant. “Who dug up the grave?” Jim repeatedly asks. No one answers. Another pressing matter is the suspected insurrection of Daeng Pabarang, a messianic leader who for many years played a cat-and-mouse game with the colonial administration throughout the region. Through Maleen’s external awareness, Mini intimates that the hushed and intense meetings between Jim and Labuaja are focused on making plans to capture Pabarang. In the monthly journal, De Hollandsche Revue of May 25, 1909, an article reports

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that the inability of Dutch authorities to capture Pabarang is due to wide support among the people. Local leaders (such as Labuaja) could entrap him if they wanted to. In 1913, he is captured through the treachery of a local leader, presumably on van Lakerveld’s watch and possibly under his orchestration. Later in the novel, five years after their divorce, Maleen receives news of Jim’s death. Among his papers is a photograph of Daeng Pabarang, “cruelly stabbed and shot.” On the reverse, she reads in Dutch, “Killed by the people.” One of my cousins remembered that as a child he’d been allowed to choose some photographs that belonged to our greatgrandmother. His selection was guided by what interested him, photos of foreign people in unfamiliar scenes and landscapes, among them a photograph of Daeng Pabarang with handwriting on the reverse: “The long sought Daeng Pabarang, betrayed and captured in 1913.” Was that Mini’s handwriting? Or Wim’s? In either case, we were confronted with material evidence of colonial cruelty within our family. Beyond his administrative duties, Jim is captivated by the land and people of the region. This corresponds to what we learned from Roger Tol. Although van Lakerveld didn’t publish anything, manuscripts of his reports on the area, language, and people are in the Leiden University library. Tol pointed us to a reference in an article on “De oude beddingen van de Beneden-Saadang Rivier” (The ancient riverbed of the Lower Saadang) by E. C. Abendanon in Tijdschrift van het Aardrijkskundig Genootschap (1916; Journal of the Geographical Society): In the note from Mr. VAN LAKERVELD we read: “In the Pinrang subdivision several people are still alive, who have traveled both the course of the Saadang-Sawietto and that of the Saadang-Tiroeang.” And older people from the neighborhood still remember how the Saadang-Lemo, Saadang-Benteng-Benteng and Saadang-Kappa rivers changed their course, and the breach between Bamba and Boeloe Banga-Banga, as a result of which the Saadang henceforth drained into the sea at Salipolo. The latter happened about 11 years ago, which is also confirmed by the aru of Kasa (I Buwabara). She well remembers sailing along the Saadang-Kappa to Pinrang and Djampoea with her eldest son, who was already “walking.” This boy is now about 13 & 14 years old. For further information, I recommend consulting La Sinai or Maritoetoe and La Moehiding, both living in Beladjeng. What appeals to me in this account is a glimpse of the anthropologist at work. Rivers are wont to wander across terrain and van Lakerveld was evidently doing field work on the history of the meandering course of the Lower Saadang by interviewing local residents about their memories of where and how the river used to flow.

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Van Lakerveld’s interest in the Bugis language also makes its way into the novel. In her typical image-driven narrative style, Mini places Maleen at a table in the morning before the heat sets in. She’s copying columns of words in Dutch and Bugis for a dictionary Jim is compiling. Mini uses the occasion to ponder whether the word “altruism” has a counterpart in Bugis, which triggers a flashback of patching things up with her father in his study after she had kicked him in childish rage. While paging through a dictionary, she suddenly blurted out, “Father, you’re an altruist.” That Mini understood Maleen’s (and her own) story as a quest both for a fitting husband on the model of her father as well as a kind, paternal God and that both drive the overarching plot to its dissatisfying conclusion is clear enough. More to the point, in the present moment, is Mini’s picking up on van Lakerveld’s linguistic interests. According to Tol, who shared photographs with us of manuscripts from the library of the Royal Batavian Society, later absorbed into the National Museum of Indonesia in Jakarta, van Lakerveld had been creating a catalog of short Bugis poems with hidden meanings. In the left column in Bugis script known as Lontara are the poems, and on the right scarce attempts in Malay to render the meaning. Coincidentally or not, Tol found two in Van Lakerveld’s hand that pertain to the theme of the chapter: “There is no cure for heartache” and “This is what I seek: a soulmate.” The first relates to the solitary misery of the heart in Mini’s chosen epigraph. As for the second, as Tol points out, van Lakerveld misconstrued the pun to mean “commander” instead of “soulmate.” Tol modestly added that he is fond of these riddling poems and referred us to one of his articles. Labuaja’s name is also a sort of pun. Arung Labuaja means Prince of Labuaja, a place in Boné, but buaja also means crocodile, an animal revered by the Bugis. On one occasion, Labuaja invites Jim and Maleen to join him and his retinue on a crocodile hunt. Failing to find one, there is gentle teasing. When they finally do and Labuaja shoots, the crocodile disappears unscathed. Believe it or not, my cousin also found a picture of Labuaja. In our correspondence, Tol mentioned that there were two known photographs of Labuaja, both in advanced age: one in a large company and another with a number of his wives. Ours shows a younger Labuaja surrounded by a handful of unidentified Bugis. Mini evidently reveled in reworking her recollections of him: a vigorous and jovial man. She frequently dwells on his powerful thighs and his evident and perceptive interest in everything transpiring around him, including of course Maleen. Roger Tol confirms that Mini had an “eye for accuracy.” “She depicts Arung Labuaja precisely as I came to know him through stories and from people who knew him.” A Bugis scholar who was consulted says that Labuaja was a legendary warlord. Among his numerous descendants in the region, he is still revered as the Raja Taktik, king of tactics. We were puzzled that Mini described several cases of Bugis keeping pigs, despite Muslim dietary prohibitions.

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Our expert offered a theory: “Cows and pork were used as food for Dutch soldiers, with the food given to the Dutch as well as a strategy to kill them by sprinkling poison in the food.” There is no intimation of such strategy in Het witte doek, but it is clear that Labuaja is adept at code switching. He shifts easily between Bugis, Malay, and Dutch. At one point when tensions are particularly high, Jim summons him to continue the deliberations about Pabarang, while Labuaja would prefer to listen to an aria by Enrico Caruso on the gramophone. Music is Maleen’s element. While Jim and Labuaja confer behind closed doors, she sings “a sentimental chanson” about two lovers who die in each other’s arms on the wild sea. I Intang, Labuaja’s favorite wife, is moved to tears. Maleen asks her why. “Sakit hati, saja” (Het witte doek, 181; my heart aches, that’s all). They hold hands. Labuaja’s booming laugh signals the end of the meeting. The Bissu According to Sharyn Graham Davies, an expert in the field of Indonesian studies, “the Bugis language, Basa Ugi, has five terms to describe an individual’s gender identity: makkunrai (feminine woman), oroané (masculine man), calalai (masculine female), calabai (feminine male), and bissu (transgender shaman).”2 Obviously, Aru Labuaja was an oroané (masculine man). Aru Salamekko, on the other hand, may have been a calalai (masculine female). Gender identity is determined according to the principle formulated by Christian Pelras, in his classic monograph on The Bugis: “Whoever, although a man, has female qualities, is a woman; and although a woman, has male qualities, is a man.”3 Pelras continues: “A partial application of this principle is to be found in the appointment of women as political or war leaders” (Pelras, The Bugis, 163). For Het witte doek, our primary focus is on the bissu. As Pelras explains, “As priests, shamans and specialists in trance rituals they [bissus] mediated between humankind and the world of the gods, and they had heavenly beings as mystic spouses” (Pelras, The Bugis, 83). The increasing Islamization of Indonesia during the course of the twentieth century put this sex and gender system under some pressure, but it’s still largely intact and widely accepted. Trickier for the bissu is the encroachment on their religious authority. Although they continue to play an important part in ceremonies such as weddings, the cultural institution that undergirds the path of their religious development has become fragile and their numbers diminished. In the early part of the twentieth century when Maleen arrives in Sulawesi, Dutch colonial administrators were ambivalent about indigenous sex and gender systems at variance with European heteronormativity. In remote locations they were allowed to continue, possibly as a safeguard against Islamization, even though, as the Encyclopaedie van Nederlandsch-

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Indië (Encyclopedia of the Dutch East Indies) maintains, in the Indonesian archipelago “paederastie is widespread.”4 There was public concern that Dutch and other European men were also engaging in the practice. By the time Mini publishes her novel in the late 1930s, they are reviled. As Frances Gouda writes, “Concerns about these allegedly deviant sexual practices among men reached a fever pitch in late 1938, when they spilled over into an obsessive crackdown—a veritable ‘witch hunt,’ Margaret Mead called it—of homosexuals in the white-skinned colonial community” (Gouda, Dutch Culture Overseas, 181). Both of these circumstances may be relevant for understanding Book 3 of Het witte doek. Jim has organized an event for the few residents of Mare. The resident Christian minister has also been invited. A troupe of Bugis dancers has come to perform as have eight bissus, although the latter have yet to arrive. It’s evening. Lanterns flicker. Guests are seated. To describe the music and dance, Mini uses language and rhythms that verge on expressionist poetry. She conjures an atmosphere probably not dissimilar to that cultivated by Walter Spies, the German musician and artist, and his Balinese circle, who were, at the time Mini published her novel, under attack for homosexuality. This puts Jim—and van Lakerveld—in an interesting light. The latter’s documented interest in anthropology goes some way to explain why he’s invited bissus to his home. Mini foregrounds Jim’s intention to embarrass the Christian minister. The following day, after the minister offers an insipid sermon to a small congregation, Jim teases him with a line in German, usually attributed to Martin Luther: “Wer nicht liebt Wein, Weib, Gesang/Der bleibt ein Narr, sein Leben lang” (Het witte doek, 173; Who does not love wine, woman, song/Remains a fool, his whole life long). But this doesn’t seem a sufficient explanation. When the bissus arrive, Maleen transitions from being an observer to being involved. Her curiosity is piqued. One of them descends from the red cushion saddle of their5 horse, dressed in red themself, with a coquettish parasol. Timidly peering around, they enter Jim’s dwelling. Maleen follows. Without ado, they slip into the bedroom (is it Maleen’s? is it Jim’s?), observe themself in the mirror, open a drawer, and take some handkerchiefs. This is too much for Maleen. “What do you want?” They smile shyly and crouch obsequiously. Without speaking, but with abundant gestures, the bissu engages Maleen to the point that her anger dissolves into laughter, which the bissu returns. From there, the bissu proceeds down the hall to Jim’s office, Maleen in tow, and performs similar plaintive motions. “Jim gives him a kick, which sends him fleeing outside. ‘They imagine they are bi-gendered,’ Jim later explained, ‘and present themselves as priest and magician and doctor at one and the same time.’ Some have wife and child. That seems to be allowed” (174). What in the world just transpired? The bissu almost gives the impression of being at home, of having been there before. The mirror scene is

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intriguing, inviting readers to recall Maleen’s peering into the mirror in Malang, as well as a similar scene probably involving this selfsame mirror in Mare, which I’ll address in a moment. The contrast between the shared laughter between Maleen and the bissu, on the one hand, and Jim’s violent response, on the other, is unsettling. Jim’s explanation of the bissu shows him to be both informed and cynical. Just how suggestive does Mini want this entire pantomime to be? Is this an instance when Mini’s reviewers were right—so many images, so little explanation? Proceeding on the assumption that Book Three is thoughtfully constructed, perhaps the impending conversation will shed more light on the matter. Something Unspeakable When Maleen first entered Jim’s bamboo house in Mare, she looked at herself in the mirror. Despite the long and strenuous journey and in contrast to the mirror scene in Malang, she liked what she saw. She no longer doubted her desirability. Her eyes glistened, she opened her blouse, and she shook loose her hair. Footsteps behind her. Jim. He remains on the threshold. A curt instruction and he’s gone. She resolves what to do. Now, near the end of Book 3, after the empathetic encounters with I Intang and the bissu, the time to confront Jim has come. It’s Maleen’s purest act of agency. She finds him in his office. Their conversation turns on two things: Jim’s admission or statement that he’s done something unspeakable—“if you knew everything, you’d be gone in less than an hour” (Het witte doek, 183)—and whether he ever loved her (her perspective) or if they were ever compatible (his). He recalls an occasion from their courtship when a disagreement opened a chasm between them, prompting him to suggest that they break off the engagement. Though horrified by the experience, Maleen couldn’t bring herself to do so at the time. As for the unspeakable things that have occurred, Maleen begins to suspect that his saying so is a pretense for getting rid of her. Does Mini see it that way too? And what about us, the great-grandchildren? How bizarre it is to be privy, as it were, to the conversation that dissolved the marriage of our progenitors? What was the unspeakable thing Jim had committed? It’s not likely to have been an act of colonial cruelty. We have sufficient evidence that Mini would have accepted that as a cultural necessity and Jim as an honorable act. It is possible that Maleen and Mini too, for that matter, imagined it to be a passing adultery, perhaps with an indigenous woman. In the Dutch East Indies, such affairs and long-term relationships were common, especially in remote outposts among single or semi-single men. For a scholar like me, whose early career was devoted to the history of sexuality and gender in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Germany, reference to

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the “unspeakable” suggests something else. A similar thought occurred to Roger Tol, though he attributes the suspicion to Maleen (or perhaps Mini) herself: “In the novel, the bissus seem to have a close relationship to Jim, even though he kicks one of them out the door. Perhaps Maleen suspects that her husband has homosexual inclinations?” As a longtime scholar of the Bugis, Roger’s intuition has more weight than my own. Could that be the reason Mini included the scene with the bissu in Book 3? Maleen persists. Can’t they begin anew? No. What stands between them, Jim says, is a fundamental difference in their view of life. His philosophy is based on the law of balance. “If there is something that I desire with all my senses, I take it, if I can, even if I know that I’ll have to pay for it in another form. Then things are in balance” (Het witte doek, 184–185). This could be more of the masculinist stoicism that Jim shares with van Gilse. But the emphasis on the law of balance is striking because it is precisely that principle that is characteristic of Bugis philosophy. The gender system itself is premised on a complex balance which counterposes alternative forms of gender and sexuality around four nodes with the fifth in the middle. Jim has been studying and living among the Bugis for three years, often as the sole European. Does Mini’s narrative allow us to catch a real glimpse of her first husband, our great-grandfather, culturally immersed in the place where he’ll continue to live until his premature death in 1915? Like Maleen and Jim, Mini and van Lakerveld get divorced. It falls to Maleen (and Mini) to do the legwork in Makassar. For me, as the oldest of their great-grandchildren, it’s through the account of this time in Sulawesi leading up to their divorce that I am strangely closest to the great-grandfather who was systematically disavowed by my family. In the cheat sheet my mother prepared for me, I read: “Wim [van Lakerveld] dies young of pneumonia. Hein Buitenweg once published a very appreciative article about him after his death, about this promising young man.” Hein Buitenweg was a prolific writer of nostalgic books about the lost colonies with whom my grandmother maintained a long correspondence. (I have all the letters in a shoebox.) It’s unlikely that Buitenweg knew van Lakerveld or was in a position to write such an article. Searches have yielded nothing. More likely is that my mother merged my grandmother’s friendship with Buitenweg with the content of a brief obituary preserved as a clipping, which stated that “the encyclopedic bureau loses in him a worthy collaborator in connection with his monographic studies of the Bugis; likewise, the army and the administration are hard hit by the death of this promising young man.” This promising young man. That’s something to latch onto. For my grandmother, who experienced him in her first year of life in Malang and again for six months when she was three, there was precious little outside of Het witte doek. Perhaps her mother kept his memory alive for

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her in other ways. We don’t know, but it’s doubtful. The predominant message in the novel was: your father didn’t care about you. After her return to the Netherlands, as a teenager and also as a young woman, she did have opportunities to speak to van Lakerveld’s mother and his brother, the highly decorated officer they met in Jakarta, who went on to have a significant career in The Hague, but there is no record of what she learned from them. I have heard occasional suggestions from an aunt that my grandmother rejected the depiction of her father in the novel, but there was little she, and certainly we, could hold against it. Perhaps, through our reading, five generations later, we are able to perceive elements and angles previous generations could not. I admire them both, Mini and Wim. I admire her for her resilience and agency, the frankness and artistry of her scenic recall, her courage in revisiting sites of trauma, and the laughter she shared with a Bugis bissu. I admire him for his single-minded devotion to Bugis culture, for the glimpses of his intellectual and cultural life through the screen of Mini’s writing, confirmed by Roger Tol’s research. But then there’s his dedication to colonial-military administration (the murder of Daeng Pabarang), his misogyny and his kicking the bissu. His admiration for violence is abhorrent. I can contextualize his misogyny and associate it with the antecedents of the queer esthetics and anthropology that would draw artists like Walter Spies to the Dutch East Indies. Nietzsche comes up in Mini’s novel for a reason. Of course, all of this is no excuse for neglecting Mini and my grandmother. In the novel, Maleen forces Jim and herself to face facts and draw conclusions. Mini’s self-critical gaze is limited in its reach, but it is her strength and it stands out. The kick is another matter. It seems violent, racist, and colonial. Is it intolerant? The bissus were there on Jim’s invitation. Had Jim come to know them in the pursuit of his anthropological curiosity? In that case, heteronormative intolerance is unlikely to be a part of it. On the contrary. Could it be playful and familiar? Is it part of a queer backstory vaguely hinted at? We know that Jim kicked the bissu because it’s part of the narrative. Did he have sex with them? Did Wim? There are no answers to these questions. Although Jim and Maleen part ways, as did Mini and Wim, they do so along individual trajectories that validate their respective agency and their partial openness to a world of difference including gender in a fraught colonial setting, which they both maintain and question through their actions. The Missing Chapter There is no counterpart to Mini’s second marriage in Het witte doek. Certainly, there were those in her close circle and within the family who knew, but for the most part, people thought she had been married twice,

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once to van Lakerveld and then to Jacobus de Vries, father of her second daughter. At least that’s what most of my cousins thought. As part of our COVID reading project, I maintained a Google doc in which I summarized each chapter in English (for cousins who don’t read Dutch and, in due time, for their and my own children) and invited cousins to leave comments as our reading progressed. That’s how I noticed the missing chapter. Chapters are marked by numbers in roman numerals. On page 226, we have the beginning of chapter 25. The next chapter begins on page 243. It’s numbered chapter 27. Of course, this could be a simple oversight. But when I reported this circumstance, a very astute aunt wondered if this could be a sly way of representing the missing chapter of her second marriage, after all? We were dumbstruck. Mini was a resourceful and talented writer. Could she have engineered this? My mother’s cheat sheet provided some crucial and troubling information about the second marriage: Second husband is not mentioned in the book. Within half a year of the divorce, she remarried. Willem Herzklotz. He was a sadist, struck mother [our grandmother] with a horsewhip. She was five years old at the time. They lived in a remote location above Deli [on the island of Sumatra] and constantly argued. When the situation got out of hand at home, mother was sent to Medan to stay with another family. A sadist—what a horrifying thing to read! Having his name (approximately—my mother added some German touches, turning Herklots into Herzklotz) helped our research. We located distant relatives in Canada and the Netherlands who had done genealogical research. We found the record of the marriage of W. H. G. Herklots, Jr. and W. E. Kruijtbosch on July 1, 1912, in Deli. Through the relatives, we were even able to establish contact with two of Herklots’s grandsons, who lived in Connecticut. How utterly bizarre to reach out to the grandchildren of a man whom your mother describes as a sadist! (A vague auditory memory tells me that my mother was repeating a word I heard my grandmother used, which she in turn may have gotten from Mini.) Thanks to some sleuthing by one cousin in particular, we created a plausible timeline that placed both Mini and George in Surabaya before Mini left for Sulawesi. Another breakthrough: that same cousin remembered that Mini mentions Maleen meeting one George Hartog in a club in Surabaya and sensing his inclination for her. (Changing his name from Herklots to Hartog fits the pattern Mini used for many of the Dutch friends and relatives who wound up as slightly veiled characters in her roman a clef.) He accompanied Maleen and Emy to the boat that takes them to Sulawesi. He cared tenderly for Emy (no sadist, he!), wished

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Maleen happiness, but exacted a promise that she would write him if she encounters any difficulties. She thinks of him at crucial moments in Sulawesi. After the divorce, she gets her first teaching job in Semarang on Java. It’s a difficult position and she’s close to burnout. She recalls her promise to write. Hartog is no longer in Surabaya (Herklots had been transferred to Medan on Sumatra), so she pours out her heart to him in a letter, but he doesn’t respond. At least not in the novel. Since Mini and George marry just a few months after she abruptly quits her job in Semarang, we can assume that Herklots did. The Herklots’ grandchildren were as mystified by their grandfather’s marriage to Mini as we were. But their family lore was different: “As I recall the story, my grandfather had asserted to his wife (my grandmother) and his children that it was a different time and different culture/society, and that he had acquiesced to his employer’s repeated requests that he marry the lady as a personal favor to him.” I could not bring myself to divulge my family’s story about their grandfather’s putative sadism. By all accounts (obituaries and his grandsons’ recollections), the mature Herklots, who had settled down to become the publisher of a smalltown newspaper in Connecticut, was a decent man with a colorful past, about which he was reticent. I can imaginatively construct a situation where the Herklots story might make sense. Two things would come into play: 1) being a young divorced mother in the Dutch East Indies in the year 1911 might have caused a degree of panic, and 2) the one network that she was familiar with was the colonial-military administration. Perhaps within that network of officers and colonial administrators, one or another took her case to heart and tried to find a solution. It’s a stretch, though. Herklots worked for a bank and later for a rubber company. Their networks certainly intersected (at the club in Surabaya), but probably not to the extent that a bank official would prevail upon Herklots to marry Mini, who was by then in Semarang and had never set foot on Sumatra. That Mini contacted him by letter on the basis of their flirtation in Surabaya seems more likely. It’s understandable that Mini decided against including this chapter of her life in Het witte doek. You’d have to be a Nora Ephron or Edward Albee to do it justice. Relative to the storyline about Maleen’s increasing agency, this was a set-back, no matter whose interpretation you follow. In the novel, a furlough in the Netherlands stands in for the failed and possibly abusive marriage. She’s there long enough to spend time with her mother and other family members, to show Emy Kampen, and to feel that this world has become alien to her. (We have no evidence that this furlough took place.) They return to Java. Both Maleen and Mini find appointments in a mountain town called Sukabumi. Here, according to the novel as well as reminiscences and photographs, Mini sets up a single

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mother’s idyll somewhat external to the usual colonial structures with a happy thriving child and a position as a teacher to Javanese children to whom she becomes individually and personally attached. Letters to her from some of them with original names are in the possession of a cousin twice removed. They called their modest home—in the novel and in reality—Villa Dierenvreugd, home of animal joy, because of the many pet animals and birds they and their domestics cared for. The novel lavishes attention on her individual pupils and on her daughter. This, we felt, is where the novel should end. But it doesn’t. The compulsion that drove her into marriages with van Lakerveld and Herklots and the quest for a heavenly father—two compensatory versions of her own dear father—is enough for her knowingly to trade this secure and delightful space for marriage with Just (Jacobus de Vries), the severe Calvinist officer who refused to dance with her at the Kampen ball. It was heart-wrenching to my cousins and me to see Maleen place her daughter’s happiness at risk by entering a marriage where her free-spirited ways would be punitively met. To plunge into the psychology that underlies the strained and dispiriting relationships candidly laid out in a conversion narrative premised on submission to her strict husband and heavenly father is not the job of this article. Suffice it to say that Mini was no happier in this marriage than in the previous two. When World War II began, my grandmother had already been living in Batavia (Jakarta) again for eight years, while, back in the Netherlands, Jacobus de Vries, her stepfather, joined the underground, where he, as a former KNIL officer, organized a makeshift effort to sabotage German communication and supply lines. He was caught within six months and entered the Nazi prison system in the Netherlands until he was eventually transferred to Germany where he was confined in Buchenwald and Dachau. He died in Dachau in January 1945. What a discordance! Mini’s brother, a Nazi sympathizer who died in a Surinam prison, and her third husband, a member of the resistance who died in Dachau. As I learned from relatives who knew my great-grandmother in the postwar period, widowhood and an unchurched faith suited Mini until her death in 1970. Repairing Relations There is a lot of unresolved pain and trauma in Mini van den Iessel’s novel Het witte doek, some of it, as we have seen, related to conflicts within and between sex and gender systems. The familial necessarily intersects with the colonial and thus acquires a larger scope. For a group of cousins reading this novel together during the pandemic—a novel about only slightly fictionalized events that occurred more than one hundred years ago, that were put to paper in the decade before WWII, and that

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influenced family dynamics in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s—it was easy to be swept up by the astonishing resilience of Maleen as the stand-in for our great-grandmother, though her compromises with Calvinism, colonial administration, and the heteronormative order pained us. We sensed the trauma in the book and our research exposed far more. We were by turns intrigued, puzzled, dismayed, even outraged, and ultimately somehow sad. Our grandfather’s mimicry of Maleen’s vulnerable moment in front of the mirror was in itself a mirror to the vexed gender, familial and colonial relations that strained the generations of our extended family. How do you respond to a legacy of family pain and brokenness embedded in colonial and gender history? In The Nutmeg’s Curse, Amitav Ghosh reads colonial narratives such as the history of nutmeg (which primarily involves Indonesia and the Netherlands) or De stille kracht, Louis Couperus’s hauntingly critical novel about the Dutch East Indies, as parables for a planet in crisis.6 Climate change and its asymmetrical impacts on the Global South (including Indonesia) are an extension of the extractive practices at the heart of colonialism. I would not argue that Het witte doek lends itself directly to such planetary allegorizing, but I would like to highlight the concept of reparation as an appropriate form of response. We can think of reparation in two ways, in the psychoanalytical sense developed by Melanie Klein (the recognition of destructive impulses and the genuine and therapeutic effort to repair broken intergenerational relations) and in the philosophical and political sense of Olúfémi O. Táíwò’s reworking of the call for reparations for trans-Atlantic slavery and colonialism in terms of climate justice. Though many are surprised at the way he combines racial and climate justice, Táíwò argues that even though “not every aspect of today’s global racial empire is rooted in the impacts of climate change … every aspect of tomorrow’s global racial empire will be. Climate change is set not just to redistribute social advantages, but to do so in a way that compounds and locks in the distributional injustices we’ve inherited from history.”7 We should add that climate injustice also manifests as gender injustice. UN Women, the United Nations entity dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women, explains that: The climate crisis is not “gender neutral.” Women and girls experience the greatest impacts of climate change, which amplifies existing gender inequalities and poses unique threats to their livelihoods, health, and safety. Across the world, women depend more on, yet have less access to, natural resources. In many regions, women bear a disproportionate responsibility for securing food, water, and fuel. Agriculture is the most important employment sector for women in low- and lower-middle income countries, during periods of drought and erratic rainfall,

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women, as agricultural workers and primary procurers, work harder to secure income and resources for their families. This puts added pressure on girls, who often have to leave school to help their mothers manage the increased burden.8 Between the Netherlands, Indonesia, and the United States, there is more to repair now than ever before. In the years just before the pandemic, my research took me repeatedly to Indonesia, specifically to Jakarta and Semarang, where Mini briefly taught, her third husband was originally stationed, and Mini’s brother held his Nazi speech. (My professional interest in working on climate issues in Indonesia is, of course, not accidental.) I saw for myself the combined impacts of colonialism and climate change. Walking the often-flooded streets of the historical districts known as Kota Tua in Jakarta and Kota Lama in Semarang, entering buildings that were probably a part of my great-grandmother’s life, knowing the peril they and the people who use them now face because of accelerated sea level rise, I felt the urgency for repair. Working in collaborative, interdisciplinary climate adaptation teams with members from Indonesia, the Netherlands, and the United States, we occasionally bumped into the presence of lingering traces of conflict and misunderstanding, the variably experienced burdens of colonial history. My overwhelming sense, however, was of opportunities to repair. Notes 1 Mini van den Iessel (pseudonym for Wilhelmina Emilia Kruijtbosch), Het witte doek (Kampen: J. H. Kok, 1937), 78. All further references appear in the text as Het witte doek and page number. 2 Sharyn Graham Davies, Challenging Gender Norms: Five Genders among the Bugis in Indonesia (Belmont CA: Thomson Wadsworth, 2007), xii. 3 Christian Pelras, The Bugis (Oxford, UK, and Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1996), 163. Further references appear in the text as Pelras, The Bugis, and page number. 4 Frances Gouda, Dutch Culture Overseas: Colonial Practice in the Netherlands Indies 1900–1942 (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1995), 181. Further references appear in the text as Gouda, Dutch Culture Overseas, and page number. 5 In accordance with current nongendered pronoun conventions, I use they/them/ their in the singular to refer to the bissu in question. 6 Amitav Ghosh, The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2021). 7 Olúfémi O. Táíwò, Reconsidering Reparations (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022), 171. 8 https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/explainer/2022/02/explainer-howgender-inequality-and-climate-change-are-interconnected

Part 2

Accountabilities

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Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) as a Pioneering Literary Denouncement of Dutch Colonialism Jeroen Dewulf

In 2009, the Dutch government decided to use the 400th anniversary of the arrival of Henry Hudson, an English captain in Dutch service, in Manhattan for a celebration of New York’s Dutch roots. Following Hudson’s return to Europe, Dutch investors enabled the establishment of the colony of New Netherlands and its capital, New Amsterdam, which led to the foundation of what was to become New York City. The goal of the celebrations was to highlight how “the unique character of New York City, originally New Amsterdam, has been shaped by the legacy of the multiethnic and tolerant culture of seventeenth-century Amsterdam” and how both cities are “linked by their shared belief in the value of free, diverse, and entrepreneurial societies.”1 Academic scholars also benefitted from the €6,2 million of Dutch governmental support for this initiative, which allowed for the publication of Hans Krabbendam, Cornelis A. van Minnen, and Giles Scott-Smith’s edited volume Four Centuries of Dutch-American Relations and a bilingual edition of Nicoline van der Sijs’ linguistic study Cookies, Coleslaw, and Stoops: The Influence of Dutch on the North American Languages. In his foreword, Dutch Minister of Education Ronald Plasterk called the latter “a fitting present in the year in which we celebrate four centuries of Dutch-American relations.”2 The “most important Dutch loanword in American English” van der Sijs identified in her study was the term “boss,” as derived from the Dutch “baas.”3 While rarely used outside of Dutch-American circles in New York and New Jersey until the nineteenth century, this originally Dutch word replaced the English “master” following abolition, in accordance with Abraham Lincoln’s 1858 address on democracy that started with the words: “As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master.”4 The decision to henceforth use the Dutch-American “boss” instead of the English “master” was problematic considering that the former term was just as much tainted by a history of slavery. In fact, the enslaved population in Dutch colonies

DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-8

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had typically addressed the slaveholder as “baas.” As James Flint acknowledged in his Letters from America (1818–1820), “Master is not a word in the vocabulary of hired people. Bos, a Dutch one of similar import, is substituted. The former is used by Negroes, and is by free people considered as synonymous with slave-keeper.”5 That the most important Dutch loanword in American English is embedded in a history of slavery raises questions about the foundational values of freedom, tolerance, and diversity that were highlighted by the organizers of the 2009 celebrations. The fact that the legacy of slavery in Dutch-American relations has long remained a blind spot is revealed by a telling omission in the 1,190-page survey: Four Centuries of DutchAmerican Relations fails to include Sojourner Truth, a native speaker of Dutch, who was born enslaved to a Dutch-American family in the New York Hudson Valley. Although she was deprived of schooling, remained illiterate all her life, and had to learn English as a foreign language, Truth acquired nation-wide fame in nineteenth-century American society with her glowing speeches and activist engagement. Long before Rosa Parks, she used civil disobedience as a strategy to denounce segregation in public transportation and will forever remain associated with her powerful “Ain’t I a Woman” speech. The fact that Truth’s legacy has only been recorded in English undoubtedly contributed to the omission of this icon of America’s Black liberation movement in the 2009 Dutch festivities. Had Truth been able to record her narrative in her Dutch mother tongue, it is unlikely that the organizers would/could have ignored her. After all, Truth’s life story was published in 1850, ten years prior to Multatuli’s Max Havelaar, which used to be celebrated as the first major work in Dutch literature denouncing the exploitation of the indigenous Other in a colonial context. In spite of its fierce condemnation of Dutch policies in the East Indies (now Indonesia), however, this magnum opus of Dutch literature carried forward a European perspective that did not denounce colonialism as such. As a truly postcolonial alternative, scholarly attention has therefore shifted in recent years to Anton de Kom’s Wij slaven van Suriname (1934) as the first anti-colonial book in Dutch written from the perspective of the oppressed and opposing what De Kom’s referred to as the “falsification of history [in] bourgeois academia.”6 Both these groundbreaking works were anticipated, however, by a female Black voice, that of Sojourner Truth. Since this voice was recorded in her second language, English, it has remained silent in Dutch literary histories and ignored in debates over the legacy of Dutch colonialism. This shows us that the postcolonial discussion should not only focus exclusively on how we think and write about literature, but also include reflection on the criteria we use to determine the field(s) where literary texts “belong.”

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 111 The goal of this essay is to break this silence by reading and interpreting Truth’s work as a variant of Dutch literature, which I decided to call Dutch “contact literature”: textual evidence recorded in a different language than that of a traditionally defined field of study, yet profoundly influenced by the latter’s culture and history. I will start the essay with a theoretical reflection on why this methodology could be a productive response to the decline in support for less commonly taught languages in the Humanities. In the second part of the essay, I will use the case of Sojourner Truth to illustrate how the study of contact literature could work in practice. Contact Literature In the past decades, much attention has been paid to the connection between literary studies and nationalism. For good reasons. As E. Valentine Daniel and Jeffrey Peck point out, literature was “established as a credible academic field … at the cost of nationalizing the discipline.”7 In Culture and Imperialism (1993), Edward Said notes that this nationalistic compartmentalization of literary studies made the field complicit with European imperialism: “when most European thinkers celebrated humanity or culture they were principally celebrating ideas and values they ascribed to their own national culture, or to Europe as distinct from the Orient, Africa, and even the Americas.”8 In response to such complaints, recent developments toward an intercultural and transnational turn in the Humanities have opened up productive new methods of analysis. Unfortunately, these developments coincide with a decline in interest in less commonly taught languages. An evolution whereby fields once separated by language groups are merged into larger units defined by terms such as “global,” “world,” or “modern” is indicative of a tendency in the Humanities to question the need for programs such as Dutch Studies and even German Studies in an era of transnationalism. This worrisome evolution runs counter to what early advocates for an intercultural transformation of these fields had hoped for. Significantly, when Wolfgang Frühwald, Hans Jauss, Jürgen Mittelstrass, and Ruckhart Steinwachs pleaded in 1991 for “eine Hermeneutik interkultureller Kommunikation” (a hermeneutics of intercultural communication), their hope was that “regionalistische Schwerpunktforschungen … aus ihrer Isolation zurückgeholt werden … damit ihre Befunde für eine allgemeine Theoriebildung fruchtbar gemacht werden können” (regionally focused research … be brought back from its isolation … so that its findings can be used to develop general theoretical constructs).9 Instead of contributing to an increase in the diversity of languages and cultures to be offered to students, however, the intercultural/transnational turn in the

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Humanities has been accompanied by a decline in support for less commonly taught languages. Some scholars have placed the blame for this development on these fields themselves. One of them is Heinz Schlaffer, who in 2002 argued that in contemporary German Studies “das Wort ‘national’ lediglich dann auf [tritt], wenn es durch die Vorsilbe ‘inter-’ aufgehoben wird” (the word ‘national’ occurs only when superseded by the prefix ‘inter-’) which “lässt ein versteckt wirksames Neben- oder Hauptmotiv vermuten” (suggests a hidden secondary or main motif at work), namely, that “die Germanistik vor ihrem eigenen Begriff [flieht] und der an ihn gebundenen Zumutung, den Umriss des Faches aus der Einheit seines Gegenstandes ‘deutsche Literatur’ herleiten zu müssen” (German Studies [flees] from its own concept, and the challenge associated with it, of having to derive the unity of its subject matter “German literature” from the contours of the field).10 Schlaffer’s critique deserves to be taken seriously. There has, indeed, been little debate on what the term German still means once we redefine German Studies from a transnational and transcultural perspective. If we take Jonathan Friedman’s assumption that “all cultures have always been the product of import and mix of elements” as our point of departure, the acknowledgment that German or Dutch culture are intercultural/transnational in nature does not mean much unless we combine it with a reflection on Friedman’s additional point that “it is not the origin of its elements but the way they are synthesized that is the specificity of a culture.”11 In other words, if we believe that it still makes sense to train students in fields such as Dutch or German Studies, we have to accept that German and Dutch literature/culture have certain characteristics that distinguish them from others. Acknowledging that these characteristics are intercultural/transnational in nature and in permanent flux should not stop us from discussing the cultural and historical circumstances in which they were and are being synthesized. Indeed, while it may be tempting to avoid this discussion by reducing the importance of the term German to a matter of language, it should be clear that translating Cervantes’ Don Quixote into German does not turn it into a work of German literature nor that Goethe’s Werther in Spanish translation ceases to be German literature. Schlaffer himself provided a starting point to this discussion by highlighting the importance of religion to the development of German literature, in the sense that “keine andere geistige Haltung die Bildungsgeschichte der deutschen Intelligenz seit dem Mittelalter und in besonderem Maß seit der Reformation so nachhaltig bestimmt [hat] wie die Religiosität”12 (No other intellectual attitude has determined the cultural history of the German intelligentsia since the Middle Ages and especially since the Reformation as lastingly as religiosity).

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 113 While several other aspects could also be mentioned (a history of Kleinstaaterei, the late democratization, the different political development of Austria and Switzerland, etc.), Schlaffer’s decision to stress the role of religion in the formation of what came to be known as German literature is important as it cautions us not to identify the (ab)use of literary studies for a nationalistic agenda exclusively with nineteenth-century imperialism. There are, in fact, good reasons to trace the roots of this problem much further back in history and to point to a problematic understanding of cultural order, based on language groups and nations, that grew out of a biblical model. As Juan Ramón Lodares explained, the story of the Tower of Babel and God’s subsequent decision to confound human speech played a crucial role in Western thinking about languages and nations. In particular, it laid the groundwork for the assumption that people separated into different nations because they spoke different languages. In reality, of course, the opposite happened: people speak different languages because they separated themselves. According to Ramón, this misconception had far-reaching consequences, since it fostered a Western mindset inclined to perceive the division of humanity into different nations with different languages as a cultural world order ordained by God.13 The problematic perception that the mother tongue is crucial to the definition of what it means to be a nation—a unity of people, territory, culture, and government—lived on in the context of philological studies, including Germanistik and its Dutch equivalent, neerlandistiek. For this reason, a redefinition of these fields from a transnational/intercultural perspective requires us not only to think critically about the notions of culture and nation(alism), but also of language. It is precisely here that the concept of contact literature sets in. This new methodological approach to literary studies builds on the notion of the “contact zone,” defined by Mary Louise Pratt as a “social space where cultures meet, clash and grapple with each other, often in the context of asymmetrical relations of power such as immigration, colonialism and slavery.”14 In accordance with Pratt’s characterization of the contact zone as a heterogeneous space marked by transnational and multiethnic connections, the literature it generates is essentially polyglossic in nature, in the sense of Mikhail Bakhtin’s concept of “polyglossia” as the coexistence of multiple languages in the same area.15 Redefining fields such as German or Dutch Studies from a transnational/transcultural perspective implies that German or Dutch contact zones are to be understood as polyglossic in nature, which requires a methodology that no longer thinks of literatures as monolingual entities. Contact literature, therefore, assumes that even if a literary text is written in one language, the other languages of the contact zone in which it developed also impacted the writing process and therefore need to be

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included in the analysis. By reawakening the neglected voices of the contact zone, the analysis of a literary work as contact literature is not only transcultural and transnational in nature, but also multilingual. This approach requires scholars to possess a thorough knowledge of the language(s) and culture(s) of the contact zone, which takes us back to the hope expressed by Frühwald that the transnational turn would stimulate an increase in cultural and linguistic diversity of the Humanities. That such a methodology could be particularly productive to a field like Dutch Studies can be illustrated with reference to Suriname, where the analysis of Dutch literary texts as contact literature would imply the inclusion of other languages composing the Surinamese contact zone, such as Sranan, Sarnami, and a variety of languages spoken by Maroon and indigenous communities. This methodology would also push the field to move away from a tradition to interpret literature from the former Dutch East Indies, today’s Indonesia, from a monolingual Dutch perspective and to include voices in Malay/ Bahasa. In fact, authors writing in Bahasa have, particularly in the postcolonial era, debated several of the same questions that descendants of colonial repatriates—many of whom with Indonesian heritage—have been discussing in the Netherlands. The methodology would also be productive in the analysis of Dutch literature from Belgium where it could stimulate, for instance, the study of the late nineteenth-century contact zone of Flanders by connecting Francophone authors such as Émile Verhaeren and Nobel Prize winner Maurice Maeterlinck with contemporaries who opted to write in Dutch. Moreover, the growing diversification of Dutch and Belgian societies thanks to migration opens up almost endless opportunities to study Dutch literature as contact literature by including languages such as Turkish, Moroccan Arabic, or Papiamentu in the analysis. Like all “new” methodologies, the concept of contact literature builds on the work and expertise of earlier scholars who have used a similar approach, though not in the same systematic way and not as part of a deliberate strategy to redefine the field of Dutch Studies. Remarkably often, though probably not by accident, such pioneering studies have focused on female authors, who chose to write in Dutch even though it was not their native language. Several of these books acquired international fame, most notably Het Achterhuis, based on the diaries that Anne Frank did not write in her German mother tongue but in the Dutch language she spoke with her friends. Other examples are the Javanese feminist Kartini, who wrote her famous letters—published as Door Duisternis tot Licht (1912)—in the Dutch language she had learned at school and, more recently, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who expressed her criticism of the position of women in Islam in books such as De zoontjesfabriek (2002) and De maagdenkooi (2004), both of which she wrote in the language of the country that granted her asylum.

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 115 In the second part of this essay, I will add another author to this list: Sojourner Truth (c. 1797–1883). This decision may surprise, if not irritate. After all, the entire written legacy of this famous African-American activist was produced in the English language. However, in the eighteenth century, the New York Hudson Valley could be counted as a Dutch contact zone. Truth grew up in a Dutch-American cultural environment and was a native speaker of Dutch. The Dutch language was, as such, of crucial importance to the contact zone in which her work was produced. As will be shown in the next sections, by analyzing her work as Dutch contact literature, we acquire a deeper understanding of Truth’s message to the world. Dutch-Speaking African Americans Born circa 1797 as an enslaved female of the Dutch-American Hardenbergh family, Truth—then still called Isabel (or Isabella)—grew up in the rural New York Hudson Valley. The Hardenberghs were descendants of seventeenth-century settlers in New Netherland, who after the English takeover in 1664 had moved from Manhattan to rural parts of New York and New Jersey. For several generations, they remained attached to their Dutch heritage. Peter Kalm, a Swedish traveler who visited America in 1749, observed that in certain villages in the Hudson Valley, almost all people “speak Dutch, have Dutch preachers, and divine service is performed in that language; their manners are likewise quite Dutch.”16 The importance of the Dutch religion to these communities also accounts for the fact that Johannes Hardenbergh (1706–1786), the father of Truth’s owner, was among the founders of Queen’s College (today’s Rutgers), the Dutch Reformed response to the founding of the (Presbyterian) College of New Jersey (today’s Princeton) and the (Episcopalian) King’s College (today’s Columbia). The family’s Christian zeal did not imply opposition to slavery. The 1790 census of the town of Hurley lists the Hardenberghs as owners of seven enslaved people, which made them one of the largest slaveholders in the region. The limited number of enslaved people facilitated close contact with the slaveholding families, which resulted in acculturation to Dutch customs and the adoption of the Dutch language. Due to the limited size of the land, enslaved children were sold away as soon as they were considered old enough to work. This was also the case with Isabel(la), who was only nine when she was sold to the English-speaking Nealy family. To the surprise of the Nealys, she did not understand English. In her Narrative (1850), Truth later wrote that “if they sent me for a frying pan, not knowing what they meant, perhaps I carried them the pot-hooks and trammels.”17 Truth’s case was not exceptional. Graham Hodges and Alan Brown’s anthology of runaway advertisements from New York and New Jersey, dating from 1716 to 1783, includes 186 references to Black

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fugitives who spoke English and 58 who spoke Dutch. While those who spoke Dutch were mostly bilingual, some had great difficulties making themselves understood in English. A man called Cyrus, for instance, only spoke “Dutch and very bad English,” while a certain Adonia spoke “pretty good Low Dutch” but “little English.”18 Some African Americans kept an emotional attachment to the Dutch language after abolition. When interviewed in the early twentieth century, an elderly Black person with roots in the Hudson Valley recalled that his ancestors “were Dutch and proud of it” and that his “Aunt Sebania” told him “about her great-grandmother, a stern old lady who both spoke and understood English, but who refused to speak it except in the privacy of her home. In public she spoke Dutch, as any proper person should do, a dignified language.”19 Such statements should be treated with caution, however, since they could transmit the false impression that slavery among the Dutch was a benign system. It is not difficult to find examples of racism and cruel punishments in Dutch-American circles. In 1885, for instance, the Troy Daily Times quoted from an eighteenth-century report about the heavily Dutch Bergen County, where “two slaves were subjected to 500 lashes each … for an assault upon a man” until “one of the slaves died.” The report also referred to a bill “for wood carted for burning two Negroes” and mentioned that, by the late nineteenth century, older people in the region still remembered “the burning of two Negroes at the other side of the Hackensack.”20 Moreover, Dutch-American farmers had been among the fiercest opponents of John Jay’s Gradual Emancipation Law that would free all enslaved children born after July 4, 1799, and accused the New York governor of wanting “to rob every Dutchman of the property … most dear to his heart, his slaves.”21 Delaware County politician Erastus Root recalled, with reference to this debate, that “the slaveholders at that time were chiefly Dutch. They raved and swore dunder and blitzen that we were robbing them of their property.”22 The fact that some Black people in rural parts of New York and New Jersey became attached to the Dutch language should thus not be misinterpreted as a reflection of a racially harmonious society. What it does mean, however, is that the history of the Dutch language in America was biracial in nature and that Dutch stories, legends, songs, and customs contributed to shaping the cultural frameworks of a significant percentage of the nation’s African-American population, including Sojourner Truth. Dutch Culture Truth lived the first 30 years of her life in a predominantly Dutch-speaking environment. This implies that the narration of her life story or, as Carleton Mabee phrased it, the “images and parables” she used “to

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 117 convey symbolic truth … when interpreting her own life and the world at large,” must have been influenced by the Dutch culture and language she grew up with.23 Unfortunately, the life story of (the illiterate) Truth was penned by the Anglo-Saxon Olive Gilbert, who was unfamiliar with Dutch culture. As is confirmed by Erlene Stetson and Linda David, Gilbert often did “not understand what Truth t[old] her” and her Narrative, published in 1850 with the financial support of the famous abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, “retains the traces of Truth’s dialogic strivings with her interpreter.”24 The problem of authenticity extends beyond Truth’s Narrative. As Nell Irvin Painter pointed out, “everything we know of Sojourner Truth comes through other people, mostly educated white women,” all of whom shared an Anglo-Saxon background.25 Due to the latter’s lack of familiarity with Dutch culture, important elements of Truth’s message have been ignored or misunderstood. A case in point is Pinkster. Truth referred to this Dutch festive tradition at a crucial point in her Narrative: the moment when she considered returning to the slaveholder John Dumont from whom she had walked away only months before. She told friends that she expected Dumont to come to pick her up for Pinkster and even expressed a desire to return home with the same man who had whipped her, broken his promise to grant her freedom, and illegally sold her son Peter. Truth made this surprising confession when she was living in safety at the home of the abolitionist Van Wagenen family. Her justification for looking “back into Egypt” was the approaching Pinkster festival, where everything had been “so pleasant” (Truth, Narrative, 48). As the Dutch word Pinkster or, more commonly, Pinksteren― Pentecost―indicates, this Hudson Valley festival had its roots in the Netherlands, where it is celebrated on the seventh Sunday after Easter to commemorate the descent of the Holy Spirit upon Christ’s disciples. As elsewhere in Europe, these boisterous festivities were rooted in preChristian fertility rituals relating to the arrival of summer that, by the early Middle Ages, were incorporated into a Christian worldview.26 Thus, contrary to Painter’s claim, Pinkster was not a purely religious celebration that “after the American revolution … had become a carnival week.”27 Clearly, the boisterous character of these festivities was not introduced in America but had been part of Dutch Pinkster celebrations since ancient times. Rather, the American change to the Dutch tradition concerned the inclusion of African Americans. The latter’s inclusion over time triggered the development of a Black variant of these festivities, which included the election and celebration of a king. The anonymous 1803 description of a Pinkster festival in the Hudson Valley highlighted that “the blacks and a certain class of whites … begin to assemble on Pinkster Hill … forming in the whole a motley group of thousands,” who were eagerly awaiting “an

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old Guinea Negro, who is called King Charles,” whose “authority is absolute, and whose will is law during the Pinkster holiday,” and “after having passed through the principal streets in the city, is conducted in great style to The Hill already swarming with a multifarious crowd of gasping spectators.”28 Unfamiliar with both Dutch and African-American traditions, nineteenth-century Anglo-Americans tended to perceive Pinkster either as an exotic tradition or a despicable custom. For Gilbert, in particular, the passage on Pinkster represented a challenge since Truth’s desire to voluntarily return to her former slaveholder contradicted the core message of the abolitionist pamphlet she was hoping to produce. The very fact that this passage was included in the book is evidence for Margaret Washington’s argument that Truth consistently verified and exerted considerable control over the way her Narrative was written.29 In their interpretation of this remarkable passage, scholars have traditionally followed Gilbert’s moralistic line of reasoning according to which life with the pious Van Wagenens was dull and Truth did not resist the allure of the joyful festivities associated with Pinkster. According to Washington, “Isabella so longed for Pinkster’s pagan celebration and the world of the flesh that she chose to jeopardize her newly acquired, God-granted freedom,” and even went on to suggest a romantic relationship with Dumont in order to give credibility to her behavior.30 Of crucial importance to the understanding of this passage, however, is that Truth ultimately decided not to return with Dumont and declined to participate in the Pinkster celebrations. In her Narrative, she explained this change of mind as the result of a mystic encounter with Christ that made her decide to reject Pinkster and embrace a new life as an evangelical Christian instead. The fact that all of this coincided with Pentecost, the Christian Feast of the Holy Spirit, is likely not a coincidence. There is a long history, most notably in Dutch culture, of mulieres religiosae experiencing mystic encounters with Christ during Pentecost.31 In a Dutch tradition, such experiences were accepted as a unio mystica, a mystic union with the Holy Spirit, only when it could be convincingly shown that the spirit had taken possession of the heart. The paradoxical language that characterized descriptions of such mystic encounters is reflected in a desire to share this experience with others while preserving, almost jealousy, the individuality of the deeply intimate encounter with Christ.32 Truth’s narration of her vision followed this pattern and, like other mulieres religiosae, she interpreted it as a divine sign of election and a calling to imitate Christ’s itinerant and prophetic life. The fact that “the spirit call[ed] her,” as she herself narrated it, made her decide to start a pilgrimage in order to exhort “the people to embrace Jesus” and, subsequently, to change her name from Isabel (la) into Sojourner Truth (Truth, Narrative, 80).

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 119 As Isabelle Richman pointed out, Truth’s conversion had more than just a religious dimension, since she became “one of the first to convert her holiness preaching into social justice activism on the issues of her day.”33 This combination of religion with politics is intriguing since it corresponds to a century-old Dutch tradition to consider Pentecost a time when disputes were settled and harmony was reestablished. Tellingly, Van den vos Reynaerde, the Dutch medieval beast epic of Reynard the Fox, begins on Pentecost, when the king gathers his court to settle political disputes. Similarly, the thirteenth-century Dutch Carolingian novel Reinout van Montalbaen begins with Charlemagne’s decision to hold court on the Tuesday after Pentecost. We encounter a similar union of religion and politics on Pentecost in the tradition of members of the Hudson Valley Black community to elect and celebrate their kings during Pinkster. While it is tempting to perceive this custom in the tradition of the Roman Saturnalia, it is important to stress that none of the original descriptions include signs of mockery. All accounts by those who witnessed Pinkster king celebrations in the Hudson Valley show that the latter’s dignity was real and that African Americans treated their king with unfeigned respect. Moreover, as Bradford Verter has argued, documents show that “Pinkster in Albany is inappropriately labeled an African-American holiday. Rather, it was a multiracial, panethnic celebration.”34 Building on Claire Sponsler’s theory that the Pinkster king may have acted as a “master of cultural semiotics,” a bridge builder between communities, and Geneviève Fabre’s supposition that the king may have served as a “mediator between two racial worlds … a justice maker, who could intercede to right the wrongs done to an oppressed people,” the Hudson Valley Pinkster celebrations could be interpreted as a biracial ritual that built on an old tradition to perceive Pentecost as a time to reestablish harmony.35 In fact, Dutch-American families in New York and New Jersey typically negotiated some liberties with the enslaved population in anticipation of the Pinkster holiday, including conjugal or family visits and a number of labor-free days to enjoy the celebrations.36 An enslaved person called Yat, for instance, negotiated with his new owner that he would be permitted “three days off” for Pinkster to “go fiddling.”37 One source even mentioned how “the negro slaves had done practically no work for a week in anticipation of the holiday.”38 Pittstown Farmer Simeon Button’s account book also revealed that cash advances used to be paid to Black workers in anticipation of Pinkster.39 Since such arrangements involved complex exchanges of information, the enslaved must have provided guidance to one another. As David Gellman has argued, “African American New Yorkers sought to maintain and deepen the bonds of family and community attachment as a counterweight

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to the burdens imposed upon them through slavery.”40 Truth’s Narrative confirms this. Significantly, she stated that “the slaves often assist each other, by ascertaining who are kind to their slaves, comparatively; and then using their influence to get such a one to hire or buy their friends” (Truth, Narrative, 16). It made Suzanne Fitch and Roseanne Mandziuk conclude that there “must have been a network that allowed blacks and whites to communicate other than on the master-slave level.”41 In fact, the enslaved had no legal standing and could not force binding contracts upon slaveholders, who could unilaterally revoke all previously made concessions. It was, therefore, crucial for the enslaved to have the latter reconfirmed on a regular basis. Seen from this perspective, Pinkster could be understood as an annual ritual to celebrate a modus vivendi that had come to be established between the slaveholder and the enslaved in Dutch-speaking areas in America. This would also explain Truth’s prediction that Dumont would come to look for her (in order to take her to the festival). Gilbert misinterpreted this as a “mysterious prophecy” and Arthur Huff Fauset later even suggested that Truth’s “vision” was a likely example of African “black magic.”42 If understood in reference to a modus vivendi between the slaveholder and the enslaved, Truth’s decision to reject Pinkster becomes clearer. After all, the Pinkster scene she narrated took place in 1827, the same year in which the New York legislature ended two centuries of slavery. Rather than moral concerns about the false allure of alcohol and dance, it explains her decision to no longer participate in Pinkster celebrations in connection to this milestone decision that, once and for all, put an end to the need for such practices. In essence, her decision corresponded to Frederick Douglass’ argument that such festivities had been “among the most effective means in the hands of slaveholders of keeping down the spirit of insurrection.”43 Based on her own experiences in the Hudson Valley, however, Truth narrated the end of Pinkster in a way that was difficult to understand for those unfamiliar with the Dutch-American traditions she had grown up with. Dutch Language Even though she eventually became fluent in English, Truth is known to have kept a Dutch accent all her life. Significantly, the New York Tribune referred to her English as “tolerably correct,” yet “enhanced” with a “homely” expression.44 Transcribed versions of her speeches also contain examples of code-switching. When, in 1853, Truth spoke about her mother’s reaction to the news that her daughter would be taken away from her, she suddenly slipped back into her mother tongue, saying: “My poor mother would weep and say: ‘Oh! Mein Got, mein Got, my children will be sold into slavery!’”45 Truth’s code-switching and unusual

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 121 pronunciation were a source of amusement to native speakers of English. A journalist of The Boston Post, for instance, poked fun at the fact that she pronounced her own name as “‘Sojoum’ Trute.”46 Such disdainful comments coincided with a tendency to parody people who spoke English with an African American, Irish, German, or Dutch accent in the burgeoning minstrelsy scene of the time.47 These depictions of Truth as a rural simpleton stand in sharp contrast, however, to references about her impressive rhetorical power. Writing about her 1863 speech in Battle Creek, Michigan, an (anonymous) reporter noted (with reference to Truth) that if “Henry Ward Beecher, or any other such renowned man’s name been mentioned, it is doubtful whether it would have produced the electrical effect on the audience that her name did.”48 Other accounts indicate similar reactions. This is even more impressive since Truth, as an illiterate Black female, often faced a skeptical and even hostile crowd. In 1850, for example, the New York Herald warned against one of the conventions where she was to speak as a “motley mingling of abolitionists, socialists, and infidels, of all sexes and colors,” who wanted to “abolish” both “the Bible and the American constitution.”49 Such inflammatory language led to the formation of violent mobs, eager to disturb and harass the speakers at such rallies.50 Her success as a public speaker proves that Truth was able to use language (s) creatively to develop a unique rhetorical strategy that became her trademark. She accomplished this by transforming a weakness, her Dutch accent, into an asset. An analysis of accounts of her speeches reveals, in fact, that Truth deliberately played out her accent as part of a cleverly elaborated rhetorical strategy. Truth was known to exaggerate her (Dutch) accent on purpose to amuse her audiences at the beginning of her speeches. As Suzanne Fitch and Roseann Mandziuk point out, her “use of humor—quick wit, sarcasm, and the retort—was a key element in Truth’s ability to conquer her opponents.”51 Douglass, who often spoke at conventions where Truth was present, confirmed that “she seemed to please herself and others best when she put her ideas in the oddest forms.”52 However, it should be stressed that these “odd forms” were part of a rhetorical strategy that prepared the ground for a message that was not humorous at all. In the course of her speeches, the comic tone that had helped her capture the public’s attention would gradually transform into a tongue of fire when Truth, as a vindictive prophet, warned that if slavery did not end soon, the day would come when the enslaved would wash their robes “in the blood of the lamb.”53 When Truth, on a visit to Iowa in 1863, faced an angry crowd that compared her “race … to monkeys, baboons, and ourang-outangs,” as the National Anti-Slavery Standard reported, she reacted with self-mockery, introducing herself with a Dutch accent as “one of dem monkey tribes.”

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Soon after, however, the tone changed with reference to “de dirty work” she had to do as an enslaved person and ended by pointing an accusatory finger at the racist crowd and stating that “of all de dirty work I ever done, dis is de scullionist and the dirtiest.” The result of her powerful intervention was that “the whole audience shouted applause.”54 Reporting on a similar meeting in Michigan, also in 1863, the National Anti-Slavery Standard referred to Truth’s speech as “the most telling anti-slavery speech that was ever delivered in Battle Creek or in Michigan” and that “scores of eyes were filled with tears.”55 Such impact was created, not despite Truth’s accent, but because of it. Truth used her Dutch accent not to entertain the audience, but as part of a strategy that allowed her to transmit a message that a person of her color and gender in the oppressive society of her time would not have been able to utter. It also shows that the absence of written records in Dutch does not mean that this language had no importance to Truth’s work. Rather, Truth managed to transform the language of the nation that enslaved her ancestors into a tool to combat the injustices it had generated. Sadly, those who made Truth famous contributed to the effacement of her Dutch heritage. A case in point is her celebrated 1851 speech at the Woman’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio. Originally transcribed by Marius Robinson in Standard English, it was rewritten twelve years later by the feminist Frances Dana Barker Gage, who adapted Truth’s original pronunciation to the characteristics of Southern African American English. It was this version, cleansed of its Dutch elements, that became the standard reproduction.56 Significantly, Kerry Washington’s famous 2008 performance of Truth’s “Ar’n’t I a women?” speech followed Gage’s text and was pronounced with a Southern Black accent.57 A similar attempt to efface Truth’s Dutch heritage took place following her meeting with Harriet Beecher Stowe. In 1853, one year after the publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Truth visited the famous author, who wrote down her impressions and later dedicated an essay to the encounter, The Libyan Sybil (1863). While Beecher Stowe knew that Truth was born in New York and noted that Truth’s language sounded “very guttural,” a clear reference to the Dutch velar /x/, she interpreted what was foreign to her as a reflection of “the strong barbaric accent of the native African” and the “wild, savage impersonation of the fervor of Ethiopia.”58 Such misinterpretations were not exceptional. Even though Truth was born in America and spoke a European language as her native tongue, later generations displayed a similar tendency to relegate all aspects of Truth’s identity that did not fit within the familiar Anglo-Saxon framework to Africa. A revealing case is the name of her mother. When Truth spoke about her mother, called Elizabeth, she referred to her in Dutch as mama Bet, which Gilbert transcribed as “Mau-Mau Bett” (Truth,

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 123 Narrative, 5). Ever since, Gilbert’s transcription error has been reproduced in virtually all studies—including academic studies—on Truth, suggesting that Truth’s mother had the mysterious, African-sounding name Mau-Mau. These examples illustrate the problematic consequences of the nationalization of language and its (mis)use to support the notion of national literature. A reinterpretation of Truth’s written legacy as contact literature not only allows a correction of these errors but also demonstrates how effective and reality-based this methodology can be, in particular when applied to literature produced by illiterate people. Conclusion Analyzing Sojourner Truth’s work as contact literature and adding a Dutch perspective to the contact zone in which it was produced allows us to correct several misunderstandings about her life and legacy. Such an analysis reveals that Truth’s familiarity with Dutch culture and language is of great importance to acquire a better understanding of how she—as an illiterate person—framed her message to the world. It also shows that Truth successfully managed to employ her Dutch heritage as part of a skillfully designed strategy to pass on a message that a person of her color and her gender in the oppressive society of her time would not otherwise have been able to convey. Regrettably, this message failed to reach the nation that was responsible for enslaving her ancestors. Even though Truth is the most prominent Dutch-speaking American, she was overlooked in the 1190-page survey of Dutch-American relations that was published on the occasion of the 2009 “Hudson Year” festivities. It is legitimate to assume that the tone of these celebrations would have been less self-congratulatory if her message had reached the Netherlands. After all, her Narrative anticipates Multatuli’s Max Havelaar as the first literary work of importance to denounce Dutch colonialism and, long before the postcolonial phrase “talking back” was coined, did so from the perspective of the oppressed. Truth’s case reveals that the criteria we have come to use in determining what counts as Dutch literature have important consequences for the way we look at history. The decision to analyze her work as contact literature allows for a correction of the nationalization of written language and its support for the notion of national literature. It shows that a different approach to how we define literary studies provides an opportunity to reframe old debates and move away from established concepts that—not by accident—have tended to privilege a white, male perspective. The decision to redefine the field of Dutch Studies from the perspective of contact literature is more than just a response to these unfortunate omissions, however. It was also generated in reaction to a worrisome

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evolution in the Humanities that puts the future of less commonly taught languages at risk. The concept of contact literature generates a new impetus to think differently about the way we see literature, the way we read it, and the way we study it—not just in Dutch Studies, but also in German Studies and related fields. This is illustrated in this essay with the example of Sojourner Truth, an icon of America’s Black liberation movement, who precisely by giving voice to the horrors caused by Dutch colonialism calls for further study of the Dutch heritage and linguistic structures that shaped her identity. In this respect, Truth’s relationship with Dutch Studies mirrors that of Paul Celan’s importance to Germanistik: Celan describes his decision to use the German language when writing about the Holocaust as an attempt to break the “terrifying silence of the thousand darknesses of murderous speech.”59 Notes 1 http://www.henryhudson400.com/hh400_foundation.php (accessed 01/09/ 2022); “Technische informatie over de publicatie Stand van zaken: voorbereiding viering 400 jaar Nederland/New York,” Vergaderjaar 2008–2009, Bijlage bij Kamerstuk 31700-V nr. 16. 2 Ronald H.A. Plasterk, “Foreword by the Minister of Education, Culture, and Science,” in Nicoline van der Sijs, Cookies, Coleslaw, and Stoops: The Influence of Dutch on the North American Languages (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2009), 5. Subsequent references appear as Van der Sijs, Cookies, and page number in the text. 3 Van der Sijs, Cookies, 182. 4 Abraham Lincoln, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, vol. 2 (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Digital Library Production Services, 2001), https:// quod.lib.umich.edu/l/lincoln/lincoln2/1:547?rgn=div1;view=fulltext (accessed 01/09/2022). 5 James Flint, Letters from America: Containing Observations on the Climate and Agriculture of the Western States, the Manners of the People, the Prospects of Emigrants &c., ed. Reuben Gold Thwaites (Cleveland, OH: Arthur Clark Co., 1904), 33. 6 Michiel van Kempen, Bert Paasman, P.J. Verkruijsse, and Adrienne Zuiderweg, eds., Wandelaar onder de palmen: opstellen over koloniale en postkoloniale literatuur (Leiden: KITLV, 2004), 72. 7 E. Valentine Daniel and Jeffrey M. Peck, Culture/Contexture: Explorations in Anthropology and Literary Studies (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 16. 8 Edward W. Said, Culture and Imperialism (New York: Vintage Books, 1994), 44. 9 Wolfgang Frühwald, Hans R. Jauss, Jürgen Mittelstrass, and Ruckhart Steinwachs, eds., Geisteswissenschaften heute. Eine Denkschrift (Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 1991), 71. 10 Heinz Schlaffer, Die kurze Geschichte der deutschen Literatur (Munich: Carl Hanser Verlag, 2002), 14.

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 125 11 Jonathan Friedman, “Global Crises, the Struggle for Cultural Identity and Intellectual Pork-Barreling: Cosmopolitans versus Locals, Ethnics and Nationals in an Era of De-Hegemonisation,” in Debating Cultural Hybridity: Multi-Cultural Identities and the Politics of Anti-Racism, eds. Pnina Werbner and Tariq Modood (London: Zed Books, 1997), 81. 12 Schlaffer, Die kurze Geschichte, 20. 13 Juan Ramón Lodares, Lengua y Patria (Madrid: Taurus, 2002), 52–53. 14 Mary Louise Pratt, “Arts of the Contact Zone,” MLA Profession (1991), 34. 15 Mikhail M. Bakthin, The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays, ed. Michael Holquist (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981), 61. 16 Peter Kalm, Travels into North America, 1748–1749, ed. John Reinhold Forster (Barre, MA: The Imprint Society, 1972), 332. 17 Sojourner Truth, Narrative of Sojourner Truth, ed. Margaret Washington (New York: Vintage Books, 1993), 15. Subsequent references appear as Truth, Narrative, and page number in the text. 18 Graham Russell Hodges and Alan Edward Brown, eds., Pretends to Be Free: Runaway Slave Advertisements from Colonial and Revolutionary New York and New Jersey (New York: Garland Publishing, 1994), 87, 97, 111–112. 19 K. Leroy Irvis, “Negro Tales from Eastern New York,” New York Folklore Quarterly XI, no. 3 (1955): 165. 20 The Troy Daily Times (August 31, 1885). 21 John Jay, The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, ed. Henry P. Johnston, vol. 3 (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1890–1893), 413–415. 22 Jabez D. Hammond, History of Political Parties in the State of New York, vol. 1 (Albany, NY: Van Benthuysen, 1842), 581. 23 Carleton Mabee, Sojourner Truth: Slave, Prophet, Legend (New York: New York University Press, 1993), 128. 24 Erlene Stetson and Linda David, Glorying in Tribulation: The Lifework of Sojourner Truth (East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 1994), 14–15, 40. 25 Nell Irvin Painter, Sojourner Truth: A Life, A Symbol (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1996), 174. 26 G.D.J. Schotel, Het maatschappelijk leven onzer vaderen in de zeventiende eeuw (Amsterdam: J.G. Strengholt, 1905), 427–428; Johannes ter Gouw, De volksvermaken (Haarlem: Erven F. Bohn, 1871), 221–233; Hermina C.A. Grolman, Nederlandsche volksgebruiken naar oorsprong en betekenis (Zutphen: Thieme, 1931), 152–160; Catharina van de Graft and Tjaard W.R. de Haan, Nederlandse volksgebruiken bij hoogtijdagen (Utrecht: Het Spectrum, 1978), 89–105; Gerard Nijsten, Volkscultuur in de late Middeleeuwen. Feesten, processies en (bij)geloof (Utrecht: Kosmos, 1994), 94–102. 27 Painter, Sojourner Truth, 28. 28 The Albany Centinel (June 13, 1803). 29 Margaret Washington, Sojourner Truth’s America (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2009), 187. 30 Washington, Sojourner Truth’s America, 40–47, 73. 31 E. Colledge, ed., Mediaeval Netherlands Religious Literature (London: House & Maxwell, 1964), 69; F.P. van Oostrom, Stemmen op schrift: Geschiedenis van de Nederlandse literatuur vanaf het begin tot 1300 (Amsterdam: B. Bakker, 2006), 421–425. 32 Van Oostrom, Stemmen op schrift, 421; Willem Frijhoff, Wegen van Evert Willemsz. Een Hollands weeskind of zoek naar zichzelf 1607–1647 (Nijmegen: SUN, 1995), 59.

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33 Isabelle Kinnard Richman, Sojourner Truth: Prophet of Social Justice (London: Routledge, 2016), 26. 34 Bradford Verter, “Interracial Festivity and Power in Antebellum New York: The Case of Pinkster,” Journal of Urban History 28, no. 4 (2002): 400. 35 Claire Sponsler, Ritual Imports: Performing Medieval Drama in America (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2004), 56; Geneviève Fabre, “Pinkster Festival, 1776–1811: An African-American Celebration,” in Feasts and Celebrations in North American Ethnic Communities, eds. Ramón A. Gutiérrez and Geneviève Fabre (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995), 18. 36 Shane White, Somewhat More Independent: The End of Slavery in New York City, 1770–1810 (Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 1991), 108–112, 150–153; Leslie M. Harris, In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626–1863 (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2003), 40; Graham Russell Hodges, Slavery and Freedom in the Rural North: African Americans in Monmouth County, New Jersey, 1665–1865 (Madison, WI: Madison House, 1997), 128–129; Michael E. Groth, “Laboring for Freedom in Dutchess County,” in Mighty Change, Tall Within: Black Identity in the Hudson Valley, ed. Myra B. Young Armstead (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003), 64–65. 37 Percy van Epps, Contributions to the History of Glenville (Glenville, NY: Glenville Town Board, 1932), 101–102. 38 The New-York Tribune (February 23, 1902). 39 Walter Auclair, “Simeon Button (1757–1836), Pittstown Farmer and Rensselaer County Justice of the Peace,” Pittstown Historical Society Newsletter vol. XV (Spring 2009): 5. 40 David N. Gellman, Emancipating New York: The Politics of Slavery and Freedom 1777–1827 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006), 8. 41 Suzanne P. Fitch and Roseann M. Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth as Orator: Wit, Story and Song (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1997), 11. 42 Truth, Narrative, 48–49; Arthur Huff Fauset, Sojourner Truth: God’s Faithful Pilgrim (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1938), 44. 43 Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Written by Himself, ed. David W. Blight (Boston, MA: Bedford Books of St. Martin’s Press, 1993), 80. 44 New York Daily Tribune (September 7, 1853). 45 Fitch and Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth, 109. The Dutch original should be spelled as “mijn God.” 46 Boston Post (January 2, 1871). 47 Eric Lott, Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 16. 48 Fitch and Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth, 51. 49 New York Herald (October 25, 1850). 50 Stetson and David, Glorying, 74. 51 Fitch and Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth, 5. 52 Apud Charles A. Sheffeld, The History of Florence, Massachusetts (Florence, MA: Published by the Author, 1895), 132. 53 “Proceedings at the Anti-Slavery Celebration,” Liberator (July 7, 1854), reprinted in Fitch and Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth, 64, 54 National Anti-Slavery Standard (July 4, 1863), reprinted in Fitch and Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth, 163–164.

Reading Sojourner Truth’s Narrative (1850) 127 55 National Anti-Slavery Standard (July 11, 1863), reprinted in Fitch and Mandziuk, Sojourner Truth, 119–120. 56 Painter, Sojourner Truth, 170; Stetson and David, Glorying, 112; Maxine Leeds Craig, Ain’t I A Beauty Queen: Black Women, Beauty, and the Politics of Race (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2002), 7. 57 See https://www.history.com/videos/sojourner-truth. A more authentic version, with the cooperation of this essay’s author, was recently made in the context of the “Sojourner Truth Project,” see https://www.thesojournertruthproject.com/ (both accessed on 01/09/2022). 58 Harriet Beecher Stowe, “Sojourner Truth, the Libyan Sibyl,” Atlantic Monthly 11, no. 66 (April 1863): 477–478. 59 Paul Celan, Collected Prose, ed. Rosmarie Waldrop (Riverdale-on-Hudson, NY: The Sheep Meadow Press, 1986), 34.

6

German Women and the Dissemination of Colonial Ideology (1907–1920) Adèle Douanla and Ésaie Djomo

This chapter discusses how German women discursively constructed “Otherness” to disseminate colonial ideology in Germany in their attempt to encourage the migration of German girls to the German colonies. It ar­ gues that purveyors of this ideology participated in colonial discourse, or an ideological discourse that advocates for a colonizer’s domination and ex­ ploitation of a colonized population. According to the Cameroonian researcher David Simo, this discourse is based on three contradictory principles. First, Hegelian evolutionism stipulates that Africans are incapable of reaching the supposedly superior level of “European” civili­ zation. Second, it is assumed that the races are unequal. Simo notes that the racial theory contradicts the assumption of a civilizing mission. One cannot bring civilization to a people that are perceived to be incapable of reaching the European level of civilization, or did Europeans want the colonized to reach “their level”: “le principe de la colonisation comme œuvre de culture, devient progressivement au fil de la colonisation un danger pour le colon qui semble appréhender la concurrence du colonisé ainsi recrée à son image” (the principle of colonization as a work of culture gradually becomes a danger for the colonist who seems to apprehend the competition of the colonized thus recreated in his image).1 Finally, this ideology is based on the legitimacy of the right of the strongest.2 Colonial discourse, as mediated by German women, informed the Frauenbund der deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft (FDKG), a political organization founded by and for women. Anna Gräfin von Zech, the principal of the colonial women’s school in Witzenhausen, specifies the role of the German woman in the colony3: “Deine Tätigkeit soll nicht freizügig sein, schon gar nicht burschikos, sondern mit echter Weiblichkeit sollst du die deutsche Kultur über das Meer tragen” (Your activity should not be permissive, certainly not tomboyish, but you should carry German culture across the sea with genuine femininity). The members of the FDKG relied on the magazine Kolonie und Heimat in Wort und Bild to promote their goals. This article offers readings of DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-9

German Women and the Dissemination of Colonial Ideology

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Kolonie und Heimat in order to explain how German women used the discursive construction of otherness to disseminate colonial ideology. In particular, we ask how German colonialists used images and texts to promote migration to the colony; and how they crafted a specifically female discourse to co-opt other women to the colonialist ideology. In our analysis of visual communication, we rely on the catalog of criteria developed by the French art historian Martine Joly. Martine offers a sys­ tematic approach to the interpretation of images, which differentiates plastic, iconic, and linguistic messages.4 For our purpose, we focus on the following dimensions of the plastic message: the image carrier, the frame, the image section, the shooting angle, and the choice of lens. In terms of the iconic message, we are interested in motifs and the pose of the models as well as the organization of the figures. At the level of the linguistic message, it is a matter of working out the significance of the image title and the accompanying text (the relay function). We will first shed light on the lab­ oratory of female colonial thought before showing how this discourse relied on the defamation of African culture and the Germanization of Africa. The Means of Women’s Colonial Propaganda: The Frauenbund der Deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft as Laboratory Djomo has written extensively about the creation of FDKG.5 German women were recruited for the cause of colonization precisely because the project of Germanization had run into trouble in the wake of various colo­ nial wars. Georg Freiherr Gayl, a member and later vice president of the Deutsche Kolonialgesellschaft from 1913 to 1917, identified the fight against miscegenation and the preservation of Germanness as the primary function of the FDKG and emphasized woman’s crucial role in this endeavor: Wir alle wissen, was für die segenreiche Entwicklung unserer Kolonien, speziell für Südwestafrika, die Einwanderung deutscher Frauen, sei es als Gattinnen der Ansiedler oder Angestellten, sei es als Lehrerinnen, Wirtschafterinnen, Köchinnen, Dienstmädchen oder als Verkäuferinnen in Geschäften, bedeutet, schon, weil dies das sicherste Mittel gegen die mit Recht so stark verurteilten Mischehen ist und weil nur durch die Verbindung der Weißen Rasse untereinander Nachkommen entstehen, die wert sind, Deutsche zu heißen und die Erhaltung des Deutschtums für die Zukunft in Südwestafrika zu sichern.6 We all know what the immigration of German women means for the beneficial development of our colonies, especially for South West Africa, be it as wives of the settlers or employees, be it as teachers, housekeepers, cooks, maids, or shop assistants, because this is the surest remedy against mixed marriages, which are justifiably so strongly condemned, and because only through the union of the White Race with one another can

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descendants arise who are worthy of being called Germans and who will ensure the preservation of Germanness for the future in South West Africa. The FDKG was created in 1907 in Berlin as Deutschkolonialer Frauenbund (German Colonial Women’s Union). In 1908, the Women’s Union become a member of the German Colonial Society and changed its name to Frauenbund der Deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft. Adda von Liliencron, the founder of the FDKG, served as its first president. In 1913, the organization already had 128 departments throughout Germany. The FDKG had only one objective: to Germanize the colony. Its female members supported German men in their struggle to turn Germany into a world power. In his definition of colonialism, the banker Karl Heydt, one of the precursors of this ideology in Germany, links colonization and pan Germanism. Wehler claims that “Heydt sah den Kolonialismus nur als ein Mittel zur Erreichung der wirtschaftlichen und politischen Weltherrschaft Deutschlands, lediglich also ein Moment des Pangermanismus”7 (saw colonialism only as a means of achieving Germany’s economic and political world domination, merely, that is, an aspect of pan Germanism). To achieve the goal of world domination, the association saw fit to pre­ pare and encourage women to relocate to the colony through propaganda activities such as “Unterhaltungs-, Vortrags-, Kaffee- und Teerunden” as well as “Kolonialfeste” (Entertainment, lectures, coffee, and tea parties, colonial festivals). German men who had held various positions in German colonies were invited to these events.8 The association also cov­ ered the travel costs of female volunteers. Clearly, the leaders of the FDKG quickly understood that the preser­ vation of German culture was necessary for the effective Germanization of the colony, and this required the presence of German women who would make suitable wives for German men. Their presence would prevent marriages between German men and African women, which threatened to undermine the colonial project. The Frauenbund was committed to re­ cruiting women who could then bring German culture to the colony. It carefully selected and then prepared and trained the chosen women for their pan-Germanist mission: “Was die Auswanderung deutscher Frauen nach den Kolonien anbelangt, bestand die Arbeit des Frauenbundes nicht nur in der Propaganda, sondern auch vor allem in der Auswahl und Vorschulung der für die Ausreise angeworbenen Mädchen”9 (As far as the emigration of German women to the colonies was concerned, the work of the Women’s League consisted not only in propaganda but also, above all, in the selection and preliminary training of the girls recruited for emi­ gration). Such a “Trägerin einer wichtigen Kulturmission”10 (bearer of an important cultural mission) was trained at one of the colonial schools for women, which included the Kolonial-Frauenschule Weilbach (Colonial

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Women’s School Weilbach) in Bavaria, the Kolonial Haushaltungsschule in Trier, and the Koloniale Frauenschule and Deutsche Kolonialschule Wilhelmshof in Witzenhausen. By 1914, the FDKG had grown to a con­ siderable number of 18,680 members across the German empire.11 Kolonie und Heimat: The Voice of Women Kolonie und Heimat, a weekly colonial magazine, founded on July 15, 1907, in Berlin, describes the various activities of African and German women in the colonies: it offers news about the colonies, especially all matters relating to the European population, the daily lives of women, testimonies of travelers, and information about the various training courses offered in the colonial women’s schools. The magazine aimed to entertain women, to arouse their interest in the colonial question, but also to indoctrinate them. An average issue runs to about 20 pages. The first number appeared on October 1, 1907, and was sold by mail order at 10 Pfennig per magazine. Members of the FDKG received a copy for free. Every issue has the same basic structure. It includes a section called “Mitteilungen des Frauenbundes der Deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft” (Reports from the Women’s League of the German Colonial Society), which is typically written by the president, and minutes of the propaganda meetings. This section also contains articles about women’s trips to the colonies, income (and expenditure) of the Frauenbund to finance its numerous propaganda campaigns, an account of new offices of the Federation in Germany, and appreciative reports from these offices about their various activities.12 The section “Allgemeine koloniale Fragen” (General colonial question) focuses on general questions relating to col­ onization: the history of colonization, political, legislative, and adminis­ trative issues, and matters concerning transportation, agriculture, health care, and colonial education. We also find here news from individual colonies. Each colony has its separate entry with pertinent news and reports. The section “Deutschtum und deutsche Interessen im Ausland, fremde Kolonien” (Germanness and German Interests Abroad, Foreign Colonies) offers entertainment, including humor, sketches, fables, prov­ erbs, and poems. Each issue contains two or three articles on specific colonial topics with pictures and illustrations. Kolonie und Heimat presents women engaged in their daily duties, both domestic and maternal, in both the private and public spheres. Indeed, domestic and maternal activities are ascribed a crucial value for the con­ tinued existence of the German people. In order to encourage women to join the association, the magazine presented its case for the colonization of Africa and emphasized the need to civilize the African. It justified the latter through a defamatory discourse on African men and women illustrated in

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narratives but also reports and stories. In fact, the subtitle of the magazine, Wort und Bild, highlights the crucial importance of images designed to convey racist ideologies. Images offer a sort of shortcut: they transmit quickly what texts elaborate painstakingly. Paul Broca, founder of the Society of Anthropology of Paris, explains the patterns that characterize photography in the colony: “On reproduira par la photographie,1) les têtes nues qui devront toujours, sans exception, être prises exactement de face ou de profil […] 2) des portraits des pieds de face, le sujet debout, nu autant que possible, et les bras pendants de chaque côté du corps” (One will reproduce by photography, 1) the naked heads which will have to be always, without exception, taken exactly from the front or in profile […] 2) portraits of the feet from the front, the subject upright, naked, as much as possible, and the arms hanging on each side of the body).13 Such photo­ graphs then allow for a categorization of “types of humans” with the aim of separating primitive from evolved peoples. In the context of colonization images also provide general anthropological and ethnographic information. Many of these images seek to show Africans in their “natural state.” The images below from KUH, vols. III and IV (1907–1920) illustrate colonial discourse. The ideology that emerges from these images is articulated around several axes. In this work, we focus on three discourses: the defamatory, the migratory, and the discourse about the civilizing mission. Defamation as a Way to Legitimize Colonization In order to justify colonization, German women developed a defamatory discourse that denigrated Africans. Specifically, they portrayed Africans as barbaric, lazy, and cannibalistic. It followed that it was necessary to migrate to the colony to civilize and Germanize Africans. Texts and images that seek to convey such defamatory messages tend to focus on the “natural” state of the native population. In colonial discourse, the term “native” connotes backwardness and primitivity. The body of Africans functions as a symbolic site in colonial iconography, his darkness a source of curiosity. Typically, the male body is defined by a pronounced hyper­ sexuality. In Kolonie und Heimat, African men are portrayed as poorly dressed (compared to Europeans), and nudity is emphasized (naked head, naked upper body, genitalia covered, and bare feet and legs). Images 1 and 2 illustrate this “barbaric” and “lazy state” of nature. Figure 6.1 shows children with bare feet in the forest. The frog per­ spective as shooting angle highlights the children’s surprise and admi­ ration for the found object, a piece of soap. The image suggests that the children, who live in an “uncivilized” society, have never seen this cultural product before. Layout and letters identify the image as an

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Figure 6.1 Picture of children admiring soap. Source: KUH, Vol. III, N°. 12, 11.

advertisement for the soap “Lilienmilch” (lily milk) made by the German company Bergmann Radebul & Co. The implication is that this soap is produced exclusively in Germany for German people. The six children in the advertisement are embedded in nature: they are hunting in a forest (trees) and their clothing (naked upper body; barefoot, dressed in shorts or straw skirts, with an arrow in hand) suggests their barbaric state. The question that arises here is why these black children are brought in contact with a product that was made exclusively for Europeans. Surely, the reader concludes that the encounter is meant to remedy the civiliza­ tional delay of these people. The children appear excited and seem to desire this product of European industry, even though it was made for white skin. And in desiring soap, they also covet European civilization. The slogan is short and concise and summarizes the qualities and benefits of the product (for white and soft skin). Graphic signs, including the company logo and packaging, represent the brand of soap. Clearly, this image is aligned with the mission of the magazine. As a women’s maga­ zine, Kolonie und Heimat advertised cosmetics, including toilet soap. The slogan that accompanies the picture and the mention of the German

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Figure 6.2 Picture of two men making fire. Source: KUH, Vol. IV, N°.52, 14.

currency (50 pfg, i.e., Pfennig) highlight the soap’s German provenance. The children’s minimal clothing, their admiration for the soap, and the colonial context in which this drawing was created all suggest that African children desire to be a part of German civilization. Much like Figure 6.1, Figure 6.2 shows the backwardness of African civilization. Figure 6.2 is placed in a rectangular frame, and the photogra­ pher is close to the people photographed. The low-angle shot used here endows the depicted group with an imposing air. The long shot provides a survey; it shows all activities in which the depicted subjects are engaged and the surrounding environment. We see here two half-dressed men who work in the bush; their bodies are half-naked and their feet bare even though they walk amidst rough brushwork. The first holds a piece of wood vertically, the second horizontally. While both men are muscular, the activity in which they are engaged does not require much strength. Ideologically loaded texts accompany these images, cementing their message: the “backwardness” of African civilization and the “superiority” of Europeans. Their method of making fire (with the help of grass and wood) suggests that the black man

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has not yet reached the stage of industrialization. The matchbox is a treasure that remains inaccessible in Africa: Nach einer Büffeljagd in der Ulanga-Ebene sollte auf der mit Schilf, Gras und Rohr bestandenen Ebene ein Feuer entzündet werden. Wenn auch heute in jenen Gegenden schon die “von der Steuer hochgeschätzte” Streichholzbüchse triumphiert, so ist doch ein solches schätzenswertes Büchschen nicht gerade überall immer zur Hand. Für diesen Fall muss auf die frühere Art der Feuererzeugung zurückgegriffen werden. Ein Eingeborener erhält ein weiches Holz mit Einkerbungen, während ein anderer in diesen durch schnelles Quirlen eines harten Holzstabes mit den Händen Feuer reibt. [After a buffalo hunt in the Ulanga plain, a fire was to be lit on the plain covered with reeds, grass, and cane. Even if today the matchbox, “highly appreciated by the treasury department,” triumphs in these areas, such a valuable box is not always at hand everywhere. In this case, the earlier type of fire production must be used. A native is given a soft wood with notches, while another rubs fire in these with his hands by rapidly whirling a hard wooden stick.] These images underline the miserable backwardness of African society while holding out the possibility of evolution with the aid of an “advanced” country such as Germany. In reality, zones that had access to matches are zones that had already been colonized. And yet, the German women’s magazine still highlights the need to release Africans from the suffering caused by their nature. The lazy nature of Africans is present in Figure 6.3, which shows an African woman wearing a long dress with a headscarf, a typical garment for young women in a Sixa, a women’s school run by missionaries.14 The caption identifies her as a Herero who lives on a farm in South West Africa (Namibia). The angle of the shot makes her appear tall and strong. The sadness on her face suggests that she is not happy about the activity she is engaged in. This image is situated near an advertisement for a washing machine that bears the title “Why do you still wash by hand?” Thus, the caption suggests that she is sad because her work does not give her pleasure, whereas doing the laundry does not require any physical effort if one has the necessary appliances. Maria Karow, the author of the article, comments on the image: “Weniger froh sieht die farbige Dienerschaft dem kommenden Tag mit seiner Arbeit entgegen, denn anstatt sich einer nützlichen Beschäftigung hinzugeben, isst, raucht, schwatzt oder schläft sie lieber”15 (Less joyfully, the black servants await the coming day with its work, because, instead of engaging in a useful occupation, they prefer to eat, smoke, chat or sleep). Karow’s statement claims that the woman in the image is not motivated to perform any type of work well.

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Figure 6.3 Picture of African woman doing laundry. Source: KUH, Vol. III, N°. 15, 8.

Rather, she cares only for entertainment, eating, and smoking. In other words, she is lazy and fundamentally different from hardworking German women. Figure 6.2 also suggests that African women are available to serve Europeans. In another section of the magazine entitled “Mitteilungen des Frauenbundes der Deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft” (Reports from the Women’s Union of the German Colonial Society, KUH, N°15, 8), Maria Kuhn, president of the association, reassures German women who go to the colony that they will have the support of native servants for domestic labor: Es wird nach den jüngsten Beschlüssen des Bundes eine Heimstätte für Frauen und Mädchen aller Stände, auch für gebildete Frauen und Mädchen, nicht allein für Dienstboten werden […] von dort sollen weibliche Hilfskräfte an die Familien abgegeben werden. (KUH 3, no. 13, 8)

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[It will become, according to the recent decisions of the Federation, a home for women and girls of all classes, also for educated women and girls, not only for servants […] from there female assistants are to be provided for the families.] The caption “Why do you still wash by hand?” implies that appliances are widely available in Germany. And yet, many German women were still doing laundry by hand. The article establishes a contrast between an Africa that is supposedly underdeveloped and civilizationally backward and a Germany that is supposed to be superior, beautiful, and accom­ plished. This contrast is further enhanced by another supposed attribute of Africans: their cannibalism, as evidenced in Figure 6.3. The African as Animal: Cannibalism The three people in Figure 6.4, a drawing by the German artist and ex­ plorer Hans Martin Lemme (1871), are dressed identically (with a piece of fabric covering their loins). Only the man on the left has a cap on his head and shoes on his feet. Each of the three holds a bone. The most robust man

Figure 6.4 Picture of three African cannibals. Source: KUH, Vol. III, N°. 11, 2.

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holds a skull in his left hand, which affirms that these are human bones. The joy on the men’s faces suggests that they find their meal delicious. Here, the African man is depicted as a cannibal. Consequently, one must beware of him. Although Lemme visited Africa, nothing suggests that he witnessed cannibalism. Indeed, all available evidence demonstrates that anthropophagy is a racist fantasy projected onto Africans. Clearly, Lemme’s picture springs from his imagination. It is accompanied by the following caption: Diese beiden Matrosen sollen einer vorhandenen Fama gemäß, von einem deutschen Segelschiff in Zanzibar desertiert sein. Der Drang nach Abenteuern führte sie in das Innere des fremden Landes. Über ihr Schicksal verlautet, dass sie den menschen-fresserischen Neigungen der Wadoe zum Opfer fielen. (KUH 3, no. 11, 2) [According to an existing rumor, these two sailors are said to have deserted from a German sailboat in Zanzibar. The desire for adventure led them into the interior of the foreign country. It is said about their destiny that they fell victim to the human-eating inclinations of the Wadoe.] The text suggests further that the Wadoes’ cannibalism is directed even against their own family members: “Eltern frassen Kinder, Brüder ihre Schwestern” (KUH, vol. IV, no. 52, 9; Parents ate children, brothers their sisters). The Wadoe clan, referenced here, lives in Bagamoyo, a city in Tanzania. The accompanying text implies that the bones the men are eating are those of the two German sailors. It also cites another case of cannibalism that supposedly occurred in October 1907. Here, the Wadoe kills and eats a non-commissioned officer. Both allegations are impossible to prove. Germanization and Migration to the Colony Pan-Germanism advocated the Germanization of the colony, which required the presence of German women in Africa. Lord Mayor Dr. Wilhelm Külz of Bückeburg made a case for the urgent need for the migration of German women to the colony: Wir brauchen in Südwest jedoch die deutsche Frau nicht allein zur Schaffung und Aufrechterhaltung deutschen Heimatbegriffes und des deutschen Heimatgefühles, wir brauchen sie bitter notwendig auch zur Festigung des Rassebewußtseins. Die Hunderte von Kindern aus Gemeinschaften von Farbigen und Weißen, die man überall im Lande antrifft, sind eine namenlos traurige Erscheinung. Jedes einzelne dieser unglücklichen Geschöpfe ist ein Sinnbild des Niedergangs und der

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Entartung einer Rasse. Für solche Kainszeichen der Rasseentartung aber ist kein Platz im Bilde von Südwest, und unsere einzige Siedlungskolonie kann keinen Raum haben für eine Mischlingsbevölkerung. Hier helfen freilich nicht schöne Theorien, nicht doktrinäre Erörterungen, nicht moralisierende Ermahnungen und Traktate, hier hilft allein die Anwesenheit und das Wirken und Walten einer genügend großen Anzahl deutscher Frauen und Mädchen.16 [In Southwest, however, we need the German woman not only for the creation and maintenance of the German concept of homeland and the German feeling of homeland, we also need her urgently for the consolidation of racial consciousness. The hundreds of children from relationships of colored and white people, whom one encounters everywhere in the country, are an unspeakably sad phenomenon. Each one of these unfortunate creatures is a symbol of the decline and degeneration of a race. But there is no place in the picture of Southwest for such Cain signs of racial degeneration, and our only settler colony can have no room for a mongrel population. Here, of course, no beautiful theories, no doctrinaire discussions, no moralizing exhortations and tracts will help, here only the presence and the work and activity of a sufficiently large number of German women and girls will help.] The main goal of the FDKG was to encourage the immigration of German women to the colony in order to prevent mixed marriages. To achieve this goal, they offered training programs for future migrants. In 1913, the FDKG signed a partnership agreement with the KolonialFrauenschule Weilbach where the future “Trägerin einer wichtigen Kulturmission” (bearer of an important cultural mission) is equipped with the skills necessary to carry “deutsches Wesen und Volkstum in den Urwald” (German essence and folklore into the jungle).17 The jungle refers, of course, to Afrika. Women were seen as a powerful weapon for conveying German values and beliefs to Africans. The first female members of the FDKG arrived in South Africa in 1898 through the FDKG immigration program. Most of the women who arrived in Africa were physically strong women between the ages of 20 and 35. In addition to offering training, the FDKG also subsidized travel to the colony. Interested candidates were told that they would be freed from heavy and dirty work, which was presented as the purview of African women. After a few years of service, such female settlers could hope to be retrained as seamstresses or managers of a cafeteria. Figure 6.5 shows “mixed-raced children under the supervision of a white missionary sister.” This wife of a missionary is faithfully fulfilling one of the roles assigned to her in the colony. The photo accompanies an

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Figure 6.5 Children with white missionary. Source: KUH Vol. IV, N° 45, 2.

article about a colonial school for German women. The missionary sister represents the prototype of a female colonizer: she is the wife of a male colonizer. About 20 mixed-raced children are sitting on the floor and are being cared for by a white woman, who wears a long dress with a head­ scarf, resembling the habit of a Catholic nun. She holds the youngest child on her lap while the other children sit on the ground. The white nun is the only one who sits on a chair. Reinhard Mettin, the author of the article, describes the context in which the photo was taken: “Unsere Bilder zeigen die Schule von Okahandja mit den jungen Baumanlagen, die vor wenig Jahren gepflanzt wurden. Ein Teil der kleinen Schar selbst ist um Schwester Rosa Kimmerle versammelt und hört ihr aufmeksam zu” (Our pictures show the school of Okahandja with the plantations of young trees that were planted a few years ago. A part of the small group is gathered around Sister Rosa Kimmerle and listens to her attentively). The pho­ tographer captured the entire class, but only a few of the children are aware of and distracted by the presence of the photographer. He chose a motif that recurs with great frequency in colonial imagery: the children are sitting on the soil. Here too, the photographer intends to show that the children do not fulfill their duty but rather are lazy: Es ist eine mühevolle Arbeit, die da getrieben wird, und es gilt, viel Geduld zu haben mit den schwachen Köpfchen und dem angeborenen gleichgültigen Charakter, aber der Gedanke, diesen armen verlassenen

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Kinder eine Heimat zu bieten, spornt alle an, die am Werk beteiligt sind, und gibt ihnen Mut, den Kampf mit der Lüge und der Faulheit, die diesen Kindern nur zu sehr im Blute steckt. (KUH, no. 45, 2) [It is a laborious work that is being done, and it is necessary to have a lot of patience with the weak little heads and their innate indifferent character, but the thought of offering a home to these poor abandoned children spurs all those who are involved in the work and gives them courage to fight the lie and laziness that is only too much in the blood of these children.] Final Considerations As an analysis of these images and texts shows, the German woman was charged with the important cultural task of bringing German civilization to the colony. According to the postcolonial theorist Homi K. Bhabha, such discourses of a civilizing mission sought to reinforce the superiority of the “white race” over the “black race.” The supposed civilizational backwardness of black men and women is illustrated not only in depic­ tions of clothing and (the lack of) equipment, but also concerns their bodies: African men, women, and children are portrayed as lazy, justifying the use of the whip. One of the goals of FDKG is to encourage women who live in Germany to travel to the colony. It is likely that Kolonie und Heimat stressed the fact that German men had already conquered African territory in order to make their female readers feel that the ground has been prepared for their arrival. For women and men, the colonies offer opportunities for personal and professional self-improvement: “die Kolonien bieten Möglichkeiten zur Bereicherung oder zumindest zu einem menschenwürdigen Leben für alle, die sich nach einem besseren Leben sehnen” (the colonies offer opportunities for enrichment, or at least a decent life for all who long for a better life).18 The images of Black men, women, and children in the magazine Kolonie und Heimat convey stereotypes that feed a colonial discourse, which ultimately served to promote the German colonial agenda in Africa. The overarching message of this iconography is: we want “Africa, but not the Africans.”19 The images were designed to encourage German women to emigrate to the colony and engage in a mission of civilization and humanization of the “Other,” a noble struggle to eradicate the evil and animalistic nature embodied by the black man. The ambivalence that emerges in Kolonie und Heimat is characteristic of colonial discourse. A fundamental contradiction informs representa­ tions of the colony itself: it is perceived as both underdeveloped and a paradise. Its resources are conceived as freely available to the colonizers, and the leaders of the women’s colonial association praise the colonial

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infrastructure in the magazine. Similarly, Africans are represented as ex­ tremely dangerous, yet German women are encouraged to move to Africa even though they would be exposed to them. The male African “black­ body” is sexually attractive, desirable, and hyper-masculine—albeit completely off limits to German women—but also cannibalistic and lazy. To be sure, the slew of negative characterizations is designed to silence any stirring desires in the hearts of German women. At the same time, we know that the fight against interracial relationships was far from suc­ cessful. Many German men entered illicit relationships with black women; some married them. The mixed-raced children of Figure 6.5, for example, are the result of sexual relations between Germans and African women despite prevalent racism. The policies dealing with mixed-raced children in the colony were highly contradictory. In Germany, a child is given the nationality of his father; in the colony, this is typically not the case. Because “black blood” flows in their veins, mixed-race children are ex­ pected to live in the same conditions and be treated like black children. No law forced fathers of mixed-race children to take care of them. According to the president of the Rhenish Missionary Society in Namaland, Carl Wandres, “Mischehen waren geradezu unmoralisch, für das Deutschtum ein Schlag ins Gesicht und die Erzeugung der Mischlinge […] eine Gefahr für unser Land” (mixed marriages were downright immoral, a slap in the face for Germandom, and the production of metis a danger for our country).20 Here, the production of half-breeds is perceived as a danger for the colonizer. Combating mixed marriages is at the heart of the push for a greater presence of German women in the colony, even if neither the availability of German women nor the introduction of laws put a stop to mixed-race relations. One wonders what relations were possible between Germans and Africans against this background of domination and oppression rooted in an ideology of white supremacy. Rape was an ever-present reality. As were mixed marriages, which were particularly common in German South West Africa (today’s Namibia.) The bodies of black men are believed to be sexually attractive, capable of seducing German women. Mamozai claims that many “Kolonialistinnen fanden die einheimischen Männer durchaus attraktiv” (female colonialists found the local men quite attractive),21 but they were not allowed to form a loving, com­ mitted relationship with them since mixed marriages were forbidden.22 If they entertained an illicit relationship, they would lose their mem­ bership in the DKG and be publicly shamed. The treatment of métis children, who did not ask to be born, is at odds with the most basic values of so-called European civilization. The colonists purported to teach Africans how “to live better,” but one wonders what kind of civilization can make innocent children suffer?

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Notes 1 David Simo, “L’Intelligentsia allemande et la question coloniale. Les fonde­ ments idéologiques et culturels de la colonisation allemande,” in l’Allemagne de la colonisation à la coopération 1884–1986 (Le cas du Cameroun). Actes du Colloque international Cent ans de relations entre l’Afrique et l’Allemagne 1884–1986: Le cas du Cameroun, eds. Alexandre Kum ́ a Ndumbe III et al. (Yaoundé, Cameroun: AfricAvenir, 1986), 181–202. 2 Simo, “L’Intelligentsia allemande et la question coloniale,” 199. 3 Martha Mamozai, “Native and Colonial Women,” in Women in the German Colonies, eds. Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst and Mechthild Leutner (Berlin: Links, 2009), 18. 4 Martine Joly, Introduction à l’analyse de l’image (Paris: Nathan, 1993), 80. 5 Esaïe Djomo, “Des Deutschen Feld, es ist die Welt!” Pangermanismus in der Literatur des Kaiserreichs, dargestellt am Beispiel der deutschen Koloniallyrik. Ein Beitrag zur Literatur im historischen Kontext (St. Ingebert, W.J: Röhrig Verlag, 1992), 174. 6 Die Tätigkeit des Frauenbundes. Bericht des Ausschussmitglieds Exz. Frhr. v. Gayl über seine Afrikareise in der Ausschuss-Sitzung vom 14. Oktober 1912, in Kolonie und Heimat 6, no. 7–8 (1912/13), cited in Djomo, Des Deutschen Feld, 173. 7 Hans-Ulrich Wehler, Das deutsche Kaiserreich 1871–1918 (Vandenhoeck: Göttingen, 1988), 93, cited in Esaïe Djomo, Des deutschen Feld, 31. 8 Djomo, Des Deutschen Feld, 174 9 Djomo, Des Deutschen Feld, 172. 10 Djomo, Des Deutschen Feld, 173. 11 Katharina Walgenbach, Die weiße Frau als Trägerin deutscher Kultur: Koloniale Diskurse über Geschlecht, “Rasse” und Klasse im Kaiserreich (Frankfurt a.M: Campus Verlag, 2005), 88. 12 Esaïe Djomo, Des Deutschen Feld, 175. 13 Paul Broca, Instructions générales pour les recherches et observations an­ thropologiques (Paris: Victor Masson et Fils, 1965), 6. 14 See “Die Kulturarbeit,” cited in A. Nguemtchueng, “Die Kolonie als Ort der Entstehung neuer kultureller Paradigmen: Eine Untersuchung am Beispiel der Beziehungen zwischen den deutschen Pallottinern und den Ewondo. Von der kolonialen bis zur postkolonialen Zeit” (Master Thesis, University of Yaoundé, 2017), 90. 15 Kolonie und Heimat 3, no. 13 (1909–1910), 8. 16 “Die Aufgaben der deutschen Frau in Südwest, Auszug aus dem Vortrage des Herrn Oberbürgermeister Dr. Külz-Bückeburg,“ KUH 3, vol. 10, no. 8 (1909): 8. 17 Frieda Zieschank, Briefe an eine Kolonialbraut, Apia im Januar 1913, cited in Djomo, Des deutschen Feld, 173. 18 David Simo, “L’Intelligentsia allemande et la question coloniale,” 184. 19 David Simo, “L’Intelligentsia allemande et la question coloniale,” 184. 20 Dörte Lerp, “Zwischen Bevölkerungspolitik und Frauen Bildung,” in Frauen in den deutschen Kolonien, eds. Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst and Mechthild Leutner (Berlin: Links, 2009), 32–49, here 3. 21 Mamozai, “Einheimische und koloniale Frauen,” 24. 22 Mamozai, “Einheimische und koloniale Frauen,” 24.

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White Women Saving White Men Women Writers in Belgian and German Colonial Literature Robrecht De Boodt and Anke Gilleir

The title proper of this essay, “White Women Saving White Men,” does not need much explanation. It alludes to a sentence from Gayatri Spivak’s 1988 essay “Can the Subaltern Speak,” in which Spivak, roughly paraphrased and leaving aside the Freudian and other subtexts, captures the complacency of the colonial British when they abolished widow sacrifice in West Bengal in their purported quest to civilize the country.1 The abolition of the Hindu rite was presented as a gesture of enlightenment by the imperial force in response to the perceived cruelty toward indigenous women, a case of “white men saving brown women from brown men.”2 Spivak’s wry phrase points at the neglected role of women in this procedure. The abolition of the ritual by the British was not only accompanied by the implementation of a new set of colonial laws, but, even more problematically, also the British had neither bothered to explore the gendered archaic origins of this practice nor did they show any interest in the voices of the women affected by it. Caught in local and imperial systems of patriarchy, sati was an object of appropriation, transformed into a voiceless—or unheard—subaltern site of projection and collective phantasy that “placed [women] at the man’s mercy.”3 Spivak’s ongoing project of intellectual self-positioning by means of a large-scale theoretical mobilization makes it somewhat difficult to carve out a single thesis. Yet her analysis of multiple ways of colonial object-production, not merely in the form of political but also epistemic violence—reminiscent of Edward Said—functions as a compass for our reading of the less sophisticated case of German and Belgian colonial literature, as does a single nota bene from Spivak’s seminal text, which she does not elaborate on, but which we pursue in the following. After emphasizing repeatedly that the abolition of the widow sacrifice was a case of “white men saving brown women from brown men,” Spivak adds: “White women—from the nineteenth-century British Missionary Registers to Mary Daly—have not produced an alternative understanding.”4 In other words, the writings of white women as gendered subjects—or in spite of being gendered subjects—did not add DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-10

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anything to make the voice of the “other,” the subaltern women, heard in a colonial context. White women were complicit in the colonial enterprise and its appropriation of the colonized subject. This complicity brushes aside the—naive—idea that a sense of solidarity between white women and colonial subjects—male or female—should have existed on the grounds of the shared fate of being bereft of an unproblematic sense of identity in patriarchal discourse. Leaving aside the question of how familiar Spivak is with the diversity of historical women’s writings, this assertion makes sense to anyone who has addressed the ambit of colonial literature. Much else, however, does not make sense and for good reasons. First of all, terms such as subordination and subject formation can refer to very different situations. For example, Frieda von Bülow, an aristocratic German woman at the end of the nineteenth century, was worlds apart from the nameless “black beauties” whom she met during her stay in Zanzibar.5 In her East-African diaries from the late 1880s, Bülow describes an encounter with female slaves from the local sultan’s harem who have been enticed by curiosity to take a peek at the white women in their vicinity. The meeting is literally distant and mute and Bülow’s recollection suggests that there was little mutual curiosity. The “black beauties” are compared to “our own [German] country girls,” who look their best in their “Volkstracht” (traditional dress) but lose their picturesque charm when they abandon it for new fashion. What may sound disarmingly universal at first—women will be women—is little more than a social and gendered classification that has crossed the equator. At best, these women function as a mirror of the self. While Spivak’s analysis of Bengal women suggests that the names of foreign and unknown people are often misspelled, Bülow simply omits the names of the “Weiber.” One could argue that it is too easy to expose, retrospectively, the racism that informs colonial literature by both men and women. While representations of the “white man’s burden” in colonial literature are no longer a primary focus of interest, the challenge now consists in grasping undercurrents and spelling out various codifications in the imagination of the (African) colonized. This includes the modes of authority different colonial writers wielded during the heyday of the colonial system, tracing how they positioned themselves in the field of knowledge. The capitalist nature of colonial exploration and exploitation fostered the idea of an untrodden world as a place of opportunity for each person to distinguish himself (rarely herself) according to certain abilities. In addition to economic or social wealth, knowledge could bestow a certain distinction. It did so in a spectrum that ranged from institutional science to hands-on knowledge based on authentic experience and personal observation. As white women were excluded from nearly all professional colonial domains, in entrepreneurship,

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administration, or science, they had to resort to the ‘empirical’ if they wished to present themselves as colonial writers. Drawing on the spectacular scientific discourse on Africa developed in nineteenth-century Europe, non-scientists could make assertions of knowledge based on their personal experience as colonial inhabitants and witnesses. Whatever the categories of knowledge were, whether specialist treaties on plant species or personal experiences of non-learned colonial women, they all contributed to the naturalization of difference in a hierarchical manner. In attempting to strengthen their claims to epistemic authority, women writers often shored up the ways in which male colonial authors established their own. Knowledge markers were paramount in this process. Part of this strategy consisted of referring to scientific theories or the use of jargon, interspersed with real-life anecdotes. Eye-witness accounts were one of the hallmarks of colonial epistemic authority.6 Often women writers expressly explained the presence of women in the colony as an implication of the greater (national) enterprise that was primarily being executed by husbands or brothers. Indeed, they made a home for themselves within this system. Both women in the colonies and women writing about the colonies relied on men as a source of authority both on a diegetic level and in paratextual introductions. They were careful not to destabilize the existing gender ideology while they carved out a place for themselves in the colonial system. In her historical analysis of (white) women in German colonialism, Lora Wildenthal has shown how women had “to situate themselves in relation to German men and to work through the mediating figure of the German man as they sought to promote imperial and racial policies.”7 In this article, we look at three women writers from Belgium and Germany whose work appeared in different periods and who pictured their colonial ‘adventure’ from different angles. All three ventured to Africa and drew on first-hand experience for their stories. Although these women wrote in different historical moments, impacted by profound political, social, and economic changes, their writings reveal striking similarities and evoke the locked temporality of colonialism. Frieda von Bülow was a German aristocrat, who worked as a nurse and later as a plantation manager in German East Africa between 1887–1889 and 1893–1895. Bülow was a professional writer and acutely aware of the position of women in the male-dominated field of culture of her time.8 She died in 1909 and did not live to see the end of German colonial expansion in Africa. But her work leaves little doubt as to the importance of the German nation for the imperial enterprise. The final paragraphs of her African diaries are a manifesto of German colonialism. Though she herself was called back to Germany by the Evangelische Missionsgesellschaft for which she had worked, she states: “[man möchte] auch nur die Besten der Nation, hier, wo noch jeder Deutsche mehr oder minder als Repräsentant des Deutschthums empfunden wird, beschäftigt

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sehen. Ich scheide mit dem Wunsch, daß mein Platz im Interesse der Weiterentwickelung unserer Sache nur durch eine wirklich gute Kraft ausgefüllt werden möge” (Bülow, Reisescizzen, 197; we only want the best of the nation present here, where each German is more or less considered a representative of Germanness. I leave with the wish that my place will be filled by a truly good force in light of the further development of our cause). Madeleine Migeon (1888–1945), nicknamed “Mme Lucifer,” was a Belgian journalist, who traveled to the Congo in the 1930s with her husband, an inspector of colonial industries. She became renowned for her book C’est la faute du soleil ou Eve en Afrique (The Sun is to Blame or Eve in Africa) published in 1931 by the aptly named “Les Editions de l’Expansion Belge” (Publishers of the Belgian Expansion).9 In the introduction to her narrative about the Congo Migeon expressly mentions the “absolue sincérité” (absolute sincerity) of her observations, which, she claims, were not influenced by any “entraide feminine” (mutual female support). Nonetheless, her book is a contribution to “le magnifique héritage que nous a légué le grand roi Léopold II” (Migeon, La Faute, xx; magnificent heritage that was left to us by the great king Léopold II) from a woman’s point of view. In particular, it deals with “l’existence des ses soeurs en Afrique” (Migeon, La Faute, xx; the existence of her sisters in Africa). The third woman writer, Mariette Haugen, had lived in Africa with her husband, Sylva de Jonghe, between 1929 and 1931. Apart from his career as a colonial administrator and a proficient writer of colonial literature, de Jonghe was convicted for collaboration after the war and died in prison (due to illness) in 1950. Haugen’s book Oerwoud, Bantoe en … een vrouw. Omzwervingen in Kongo’s Wildernissen (Jungle, Bantoe and … a Woman: Wandering in Congo’s Wildernesses) appeared in 1951, i.e., in an utterly different political and cultural context. The war and the four-year-long German occupation had left deep scars in the Belgian political landscape and had affected Mariette Haugen profoundly. Haugen’s book was published one year later with Davidsfonds, a cultural fund established in the late nineteenth century in support of the Flemish emancipation cause. After the war, it was tainted by its history of collaboration and struggled to reestablish itself as a publicly accepted cultural partner in Belgium.10 It is no accident that Haugen’s book was published under her maiden name. Though her husband features as a protagonist in her narrative, any sign of concrete identification is omitted. No foreword refers to Sylva de Jonghe as a figure of authority in colonial affairs, although he saw himself as such, explicitly and even during his trial. The title of her book, Jungle, Bantu and … a Woman flaunts exotism. It diverts attention from the conflicted Belgian political landscape by evoking, in rather crude terms, the eternal other that anchors Western civilization: women and “the jungle,” “waar goddank nog de oude, schilderachtige en soms zo geheimzinnige gebruiken van Dark Afrika voortleven” (where thank God, the old picturesque and

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sometimes mysterious habits of Dark Africa continue to live).11 A pre-war German aristocrat, a francophone liberal Belgian bourgeois from the 30s, and the widow of a convicted collaborator in the early 50s: the political positions and social environments of these writers were worlds apart vis-à-vis their national and linguistic backgrounds, the colonial mission, and the function of women in it. And yet, their colonial attitudes, as expressed in their works, are—dishearteningly—alike. Resilience in a Radical Environment A crucial aspect of the strategy of authority in women’s colonial writing was their bodily fitness and resistance to the tropical environment. Women and men wore the same protective clothing—white attire and pith helmet—that became iconic of Western colonials since the late nineteenth century. On the first page of Madeleine Migeon’s C’est la faute du soleil. Eve en Afrique, a book without illustrations, the editor evokes the image of a white woman, who is attired “en casque et en culotte de cuir, en bottes, une carabine en bandoulière, et un browing à la ceinture” (ix; white helmet and leather trousers, boots and a rifle slung over the shoulder as well as a browning at her belt). Her costume is so well adapted that one could easily mistake her for one of the famous colonial traveling men, such as “Chalux or Pierre Daye” (Migeon, La Faute, IX).12 In Bülow’s Tropenkoller, the story begins with an evocation of a rugged coastline surrounded by lavish tropical flora at midday. After a dramatic description of the scenery, the narrator zooms in on “ein menschliches Wesen” (a human creature) that is sitting on a felled tree, as motionless as the surrounding stones and plants: “Dies Wesen war eine Frau. Sie trug den weißen losen Anzug und den weißen Korkhelm, die die Tracht der Europäer bilden. Ihr Wuchs war jugendlich schlank. Das Gesicht beschattete außer dem Korkhut noch ein grüngefütterter, großer Sonnenschirm. Schirm und Hinterkopf lehnten gegen den Stamm des Baobab” (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 6; This creature was a woman. She wore the loose white attire and the white pith helmet that form the costume of Europeans. Her figure was youthfully slender. In addition to the pith helmet, a large sunshade with green lining also shaded her face. The sunshade and the back of her head rested against the trunk of a baobab tree).13 While the brief narrative suspense reinforces the idea of a European identity that precedes any gendered identity, the woman’s bodily posture suggests a unity between herself and the exotic environment. Equipped with a sunshade in the color of the plants around her, the young woman eases herself into nature without apprehension. She does so, moreover, at a time of day when all European life has come to a standstill because of the heat. A comparable association of a white woman with

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tropical flora is made at the outset of Mariette Haugen’s narrative Oerwoud. Though one of the first scenes presents an anecdote about the dangers of setting out in nature without a companion at the wrong time (she stepped on a snake in the dark), half a page later the narrator relies on nature metaphors in her description of herself: “Maar, Goddank, ik ben sterker dan een zwakke, tengere bloem, steviger dan de eendagsvlieg, die verdwijnt van zodra ze geboren is. Ik ben tot nog toe een dimbelenge, de eenzaat-boom die in de eindeloze woestenij der savannes met zijn hoge kruin de bliksems en tornado’s tart” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 31; But I am stronger than a weak, slender flower, more substantial than a mayfly that languishes from the moment it comes into being. I am until now a dimbelenge, the solitary tree that defies lightening and tornadoes in the endless desert of the savanna). Like the two Belgian writers, Bülow’s writing also describes resilient women. If they fall ill occasionally, their speedy recovery to full strength appears as an obligation. Bülow’s novel Tropenkoller specifically deals with the ‘typical’ fevers that befall nearly all Europeans in Africa and undermine both their physical and mental stability. Throughout the story, however, the female protagonist Eva is never ill, in stark contrast to her half-brother, a German colonial official, who suffers from fever attacks from beginning to end (and eventually succumbs to them). Eva’s physical strength is remarked upon by her fellow countrymen: she is the “kleine[s] Fräulein Biron […] der fehlt nie etwas” (little Fräulein Biron […] with whom there is never anything wrong” and some even believe that “sie muß schon mehr Negerkonstitution haben” (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 33; she must have more of a negro constitution). Indeed, Eva’s descent is presented as a source of resistance: she is not African but there is nonetheless a spot of difference as she has a Hungarian mother and has inherited some “Zigeunerwesen” (gypsy nature). Yet Eva’s female antagonist Leontine, the Governor’s wife and a “pre-Raphaelite” beauty, who is constantly ill and is described as having “das schmale Gesichtchen wie eine sonnenmüde Lilie” (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 27; the narrow face like a sun-weary lily) also does not succumb. With remarkable obstinacy, the “fragile and pale” duchess maintains a genuine aristocratic German household in a totally alien environment. She proves to be a tireless dancer at balls and never fails to defend her husband energetically against any criticism of his rule. The reader expects Leontine to die at any moment in the story, but she does not. While Bülow presents heroines of remarkably sturdy constitution, Haugen’s travel account, which deals mostly with her husband’s trips as an official in the interior of the country, discusses illness in an almost lighthearted manner. When she gets malaria, her husband notices that she is ill before she does. Her account of the illness includes an account of his worries. Her narrative is factual compared to the often dramatic

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evocations of fever in the male characters’ narratives: “Ik drink al maar door koude koffie, want mijn dorst is onlesbaar […] alles tolt en wentelt. Het is alsof ik dronken ben. Dan is het alsof ik in een rivier terecht kom, want ik heb de indruk dat ik doornat ben” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 156–157; I keep drinking cold coffee, because my thirst is unquenchable […] Everything turns upside down, as if I were drunk. It feels like I have fallen into a river, because I have the impression that I am totally soaked). After sleeping for 20 hours, she is hungry and gets up: “‘Ik kom eruit’ zeg ik. ‘Niets van’ oppert hij. Maar er is geen kwestie van me nog langer in bed te houden. Malariakoorts is immers geen ziekte gelijk een andere. Eens de aanval voorbij is, is men weer gezond en op de been” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 157; I’m coming out, I say. ‘No’, my husband objects, but nothing can keep me in bed any longer. Malaria fever is not a disease like any other. After the attack has passed, one is healthy and on one’s feet again). A tip of the veil of physical distress is lifted in Mariette Haugen’s foreword. In the final paragraph of her introduction, the writer vividly remembers the sound of the drums from 25 years ago: “waar mijn eerste dochtertje begraven ligt” (Huyghen, Oerwoud, 13; Probably the tam-tam is now rolling in the moonlit night over the Mpata Kalonga, in South Sakuru, where my first little daughter lies buried). The loss of her child and any sorrow she might feel are banned into the margins as her personal story merges into the larger history of Western colonization: “Wellicht bromt zij [de tamtam] nog steeds even droefgeestig, even enerverend en even mysterievol als vijf-en-twintig jaar, … als 72 jaar, … als vijf eeuwen geleden!” (Probably it [the tam-tam] stills rolls as sadly, enervatingly, and mysteriously as it did twenty-five years ago, … seventy-two years ago … five centuries ago!) The Ethos of Colonial Women Writers Women writers emphasized the hallmarks of ‘proper’ colonial writing: personal experience and extensive study of all things colonial. However, their focus differed from that of mainstream male works. The selling point of women’s writing was the specifically feminine take on the unknown colonial world. Domestic life was quite a different matter on different continents. In colonial women’s writings the comparison to daily life in the homeland is a topos and functions to reinforce both the resourcefulness and perseverance of the Western lifestyle. Mariette Haugen describes her experience as a housewife in great detail; since she is responsible for food and shelter, the prosperity of all larger undertakings hinges on her domestic skills. She cites a French proverb to confirm the ancient gender pattern she embodies: “Het Franse spreekwoord: un coeur et une chaumière, komt hier ten volle tot zijn recht” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 112; the

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French proverb: a heart and a hut (un coeur et une chaumière), this is what indeed matters here.) This mode of conduct is reinforced for women of all social classes. The “grande bourgeoise” Madeleine Migeon, who travels through the colony without setting up a household of her own, confirms as much in an anecdote about her visit to the house of a fellow colonial. Observing colonial housekeeping and its standard reliance on local servants, she expands on problems that arise when traditional housewifely duties are not carried out by European women. She notes that all colonials seem to share the conviction that if white women—even more so than white men—execute work in the house themselves, the order of the system is jeopardized. Cooking and laundry are tasks that have to be performed by one or more indigenous servants—although the latter’s work is rarely seen to live up to European standards. When Migeon visits the kitchen of the house where she is staying, she is shocked to see “black hands” at work without proficiency or hygiene. The omnipresent servants are also a constant threat of deceit. Against this backdrop, Mariette Haugen casts herself as a conscientious housewife. While she admits that both at the residential home and on the road in the interior, she relies on the aid of local domestics, she figures as the person who guides and oversees all cooking. And she presents herself as a model housewife, who transforms monstrous exotic ingredients into familiar Belgian dishes: “Lekkerder dan de elektriekvis is de kapiteinvis, die een nog aanzienlijker gestalte kan bereiken. Zijn vlees smaakt niet naar vis doch naar kalfsvlees en het is dan gelijk kalfsgebraad dat zijn vlees wordt toebereid” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 115; Better still than the electric eel is the Nile perch that grows even bigger. Its meat tastes of veal rather than fish and it is to be prepared like a veal stew). Readers are introduced to new types of produce that serve as replacements for traditional ones, for example, papaya instead of the “traditional use of whisky” to marinate meat or mango as a replacement for apple sauce. While Migeon adjusts her habits to suit local conditions, the aristocratic protagonist Leontine in Bülow’s Tropenkoller, who is “konservativ von Haus zu Haus” (conservative in domestic matters), refuses to adapt her lifestyle to the tropical climate, which is seen critically by the narrator: “sie beachtete nicht genug, daß an der Tropenküste Sesam prächtig gedeiht, aber kein Roggen” (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 26–27; She was not sufficiently aware that sesame thrives beautifully on the tropical coast whereas rye does not). When guests are served with “Kaviarschnitten” for dinner, however, the narrator does not even hint at the alienating presence of this northern staple in East Africa (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 31). The fact that a quintessentially German snack follows right upon the heels of a comment on adapting to the tropics exemplifies the many paradoxes that mark colonial narratives.

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Though trivial at first sight, exposés on domestic topics, left unexplored or glossed over by male writers, enhance the epistemic authority of these narratives by women writers. It reveals a unique knowledge which made their readers, who were predominantly female, feel at home even as it acquainted them with an unknown world. It confirmed the validity of old habits and further justified the colonial presence (of women) in Africa. In that vein, domestic matters could function as a point of entry that made it possible for women writers to criticize certain colonial rules and habits. Women could do so with a certain moral authority, especially when it concerned their fields of expertise. Colonial women’s narratives comment on situations of abuse and exploitation that were perceived as incompatible with ‘proper’ European civilization. Yet this express criticism of the behavior of male colonials threatened neither the purported legitimacy of colonialism nor the foundations of a gendered power structure. The most critical voice is that of Madeleine Migeon. The title of her book, La Faute du Soleil (The Sun is to Blame), mimics, albeit ironically, an often-heard excuse for misdemeanor: the extreme climate changes Europeans. In Tropenkoller, the protagonist Eva is presented as an eager observer of colonial habits, both in the domestic and political spheres. As the sister of a colonial administrator, she socializes with all Germans in the area and witnesses their struggles amongst themselves, with the climate, the natural environment, and the native inhabitants. At the outset of the story, she positions herself explicitly as excluded from official colonial rule, which affords her some critical distance: “‘Ihr armen Männer’, rief sie lebhaft. ‘Darin hab’ ich’s viel besser: ich halte es mit dem ‘femme n’a pas de rang’ Napoleons” (10; You poor men, she cried vividly. I am in a much more comfortable situation and I would agree with Napoleon’s ‘femme n’a pas de rang’). While she insists that she possesses “male idealism,” it is the combination with a clear “feminine” insight that enables her to understand profoundly and realistically how to live life within the confines of an imperial system (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 144). All three women address the excessive use of alcohol by European men, which, particularly in a tropical climate, does not enhance anyone’s wellbeing. Tropenkoller reports that most of the German colonial staff start their day with an early “Punsch” and end it utterly drunk and incapable of the most basic self-control: “Bei diesen nächtlichen Wanderungen durch die Stadt kam es vor, daß sie, alkoholumnebelt, wie sie waren, in Negerhütten eindrangen, um sich schwarze Weiber zu holen. Dann kam es auch zuweilen zu blutigen Schlägereien. Das Nachspiel pflegten Gerichtsverhandlungen auf dem Bezirksamt zu sein” (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 147; During these nightly wanderings in town it happened that they, overcome by alcohol, as they were, broke into the Negro houses

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to fetch Black women. At times this led to bloody fights, the aftermath used to be court hearings in the district office). The Monster of Seduction Interestingly, neither climate nor alcohol are represented as the prime cause of abuse. The greater problem is the recruitment of the wrong people for the great colonial enterprise, an argument rooted in a eugenic discourse embraced by all three writers. Long-term stability in the colonies is possible only with suitable (male) personnel. Since the climate has such a strong negative impact on the health of Europeans, as Bülow’s protagonists Eva and Rosen expound extensively in their many conversations, the nation must send only the most strong-willed and physically fit men to execute the task of colonization. Fitness is not simply a property of an individual; rather, in eugenic lingo, it is a condition related to social descent. Eugenicists argued that ample experience reveals that the abrupt ‘social promotion’ of lower middle-class men to positions of power in the colony has dire consequences for their mental health and behavior and consequently also for the native inhabitants, although the latter point receives little attention. Tropenkoller features an example of the ill effects of the African climate in Drahn, a plantation overseer, who is said to suffer from “delirium acutissimum aequatoriale,” a variant of tropical fever contracted predominantly by people of a certain class and character (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 125). Such genetically inferior individuals cannot absorb the shock of social promotion. Rosen, a self-declared “Afrikaner” with a long record of colonial service, explains this to Eva, a keen listener: “Sehen Sie, so ein guter Junge, der in Deutschland Herdenmensch und Nummer war, sieht sich mit einem Mal in einen hoch, hoch über der farbigen Menge stehenden Vertreter der kleinen Herren-Elite umgewandelt. Es wäre ein Wunder von einem Menschen, wenn das keinen Einfluß auf die Selbständigkeit ausübte.’ ‘Ein Wunder’, bestätigte Eva andächtig” (Bülow, Tropenkoller, 107–108; You see, such a good boy who was nothing but a member of the flock and a sheer number in Germany finds himself all of a sudden transformed into a representative of the small elite men, standing high, high above the colored crowd. It would be a miracle man if this were without consequences on his self-image. A miracle indeed, Eva confirmed solemnly). Half a century later, Bülow’s Belgian colonial sisters reaffirmed this idea. Colonial men need to be selected more carefully. Migeon’s book addresses the lack of screening for intellectual ability and social capacities. The Belgian authorities should learn from the British, who select only men with a decent education and of good social background. Such men make

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true servants and representatives of the nation. Because they possess an innate disposition to adapt their lifestyle to the climate, they do not tend to exhibit improper behavior toward subalterns. Migeon evokes an atmosphere of toxic masculinity among Belgian colonials and its impact on local society, which, in her book, means white women: “il est de coutume, en Angleterre, d’envoyer à la Colonie des cadets the familles d’excellente éducation, et que l’esprit de la race et la correction des hommes ne sont en rien comparables au muflisme que trop de Belges mâles pratiquent à al Colonie vis-à-vis les femmes” (Migeon, La Faute, 219–220; It is a custom in England to send only young men from families of excellent education and their sense of race and improvement of man cannot possibly be compared with the rudeness of so many Belgian men in the colonies toward women). Mariette Haugen’s narrative shows more restraint in its evocation of abusive men, though, in the end, her observations are similar. She summarizes the problem as “petit-bourgeois provincialism” in many colonial settlements (she also notes the lack of state resources for the proper execution of the colonial ‘mission’). All three women writers discussed here were convinced that colonialism is nothing less than a mission fueled by Western idealism. Even the exploitation policy of Leopold II and his legacy of “blood rubber” at the turn of the century, acknowledged as a bleak aspect of Belgian history even in the heydays of colonialism, is minimized and recast as a conflict between a visionary sovereign and certain malicious executioners. Both Migeon and Haugen exonerate all major colonial players: Leopold II; the Belgian state representatives; and even the management of state-run companies, such as the Compagnie du Kasaï, that were in fact responsible for the rubber trade. The true problem of colonization is a lack of strength and proper attitude. The colonial mission itself is beyond dispute and is, in fact, the impetus of all three writers’ criticism from their position as women. The semantics of the word ‘mission’ beg the question of sacrifice, which is embodied by various male protagonists in the different colonial stories. In Bülow’s Tropenkoller, it is the fictional protagonist Rosen; in Migeon’s and Haugen’s travel narratives, it is their respective husbands, whose knowledge and dedication are exemplary of the work necessary to realize the great mission. Against the backdrop of the idea that colonials live a “dolce far niente” Mariette Haugen underlines the true commitment of her husband, who is a so-called “broesseloper” (jungle runner in Flemish slang), whose official duty is to inspect the implementation of government plans in the interior of the Congo: “De broesseman houdt zich niet aan een uurrooster, hij kent geen tijd; alle dagen, zowel Zon- en feestdagen als werkdagen zijn eender. Nooit heeft hij rust of ontspanning” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 195; The jungle man does not limit himself to a set schedule, he does not know time; all days, including Sundays, holidays, workdays are the same. He has rest

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nor relaxation). The presence of the husbands undergirds the authority of these women writers. It does so in the epistemic sense of the word, as these men function as professional sparring partners in the narrators’ extensive reflections on the state of the colony, the climate, and people. But it does so equally in the moral sense of the word, as these anonymous Belgian colonials are shown to have the good sense to take their wives to Africa, thus implying that the presence of (white) women will save the colonial project. The beneficial impact of white women in Africa is topical in the work of all women writers. The gendered discourse by white women about white women in the colony, however, is not feminist in the sense that it suggests drastic role changes in a patriarchal society. It does not need much close reading to notice here the eugenic ideology that subtends these texts: again and again, they present images of women whose biology predestines them to build a stable and ‘civilized’ European society outside of Europe. It is a discourse fueled by ideas of a racial and eugenic purity of European civilization that is jeopardized if the colonial system relies only on men. The three women writers’ texts are in unison that a world inhabited solely by (white) men, particularly a system that allows for uncontrolled power, is sinister. It has been proven to be a moral failure. Bülow’s colonial world shows drunken and rampaging (German) men, Migeon speaks of “a lack of equilibrium that has caused many disasters” and even Haugen in her more measured tone describes “de slopende eenzaamheid, die het oorkussen van de duivel is […] het monster der bekoringen” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 195; the wasting disease [of] solitude in which the monster of seduction raises its ugly head). The story of Genesis is rewritten: the lost Adam finds himself rescued by Eve. Eva is the name of Bülows clear-eyed protagonist, “Eve en Afrique” is the subtitle of Migeon’s work. The goal of the white woman is not to subvert colonial power, but to support it: “La femme qui comprend son rôle est précieuse sous se beau ciel, elle rétablit la vie normale de la famille dont le colonial a trop souvent l’occasion de s’échapper” (Migeon, La faute, 260; the woman who understands that her role is precious under this beautiful sky; she will reestablish normal family life from which the colonial (man) has escaped too often). Socially acceptable occupations are manifold: in addition to being fellow European travelers, women act as housewives (and/or sisters) and nurses. All these activities are carefully negotiated within the existing male (colonial) order and even presented as economically beneficial. In addition to performing paid work, women are also available as free sources of labor (Migeon’s argument), but most importantly: white women fill the gaps and heal the wounds of an exclusively male rule. Though none of these writers evokes motherhood as such, the mother function manifests itself metonymically with respect to the nation as a colonial power. Eva embodies Frieda von Bülow’s own colonial

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biography and aspiration that more women should be involved in the German colonies, particularly as nurses. Though not professionally trained, Eva takes care of the many colonials who are adversely affected by the climate and she is shown to have a keen eye for household hygiene. While she grows impatient when she is not allowed to have a voice in a local conflict, the story highlights her key role in the colony from a long-term perspective. All women protagonists, whether fictional or not, eagerly acquaint themselves with everything there is to know about their new environment, rehearsing the importance of proper education. As Haugen explains, “ik bijt door de geschiedenis, de aardrijkskunde, de politiek van het gewest. […] omdat ik de les van Beaconsfield niet heb vergeten: ‘De mens die het best slaagt in het leven, is degene die het best ingelicht is.’ En ik wil mijn man met raad en daad ter zijde kunnen staan” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 1940; I grind my teeth on the history, geography, and politics of the district […] because I have not forgotten the lesson of Beaconsfield: the man who succeeds best in life is the one who is best informed. And I want to be able to advise my husband in the best way possible). In Tropenkoller, Rosen and Eva discuss medical theories that Rosen acquired through institutional education and Eva through her unique position in colonial society. One aspect of the ‘colonial reality’ that white women tackled or intervened in concerned the presence of indigenous women in white men’s society. The “entanglement” of male colonials with local women, conspicuously unmentioned in the letters of Henry Morton Stanley and even Arthur Rimbaud was a well-known “situation” and problem.14 In the eyes of white women, the problem did not concern any suffering on the part of the subaltern women involved, but rather the transgressions of European men, whose behavior raised profound eugenic and racial anxieties. Eugenic reasoning at the end of the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century put European white women in the singular position of securing ‘racial purity,’ both at home and in the colonies. Eugenic pseudo-sciences, such as physiognomy and phrenology, aimed to detect and eliminate racial ‘weaknesses’ in the European population, for example, by raising awareness about the importance of choosing the right partner. However, since the colonies were perceived as a place where social and eugenic self-control proved elusive, white women needed to step up. The presence of an indigenous woman in a colonial man’s house was considered a major threat, no matter how she came to be there. As mentioned, Bülow’s Tropenkoller discloses—albeit in the form of a second-hand report—how drunk German officials break into the houses of the local population to “fetch” women. In Bülow’s earlier novel, Im Lande der Verheißung, the “problem” the African woman “poses” is evoked in

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almost romantic terms. At the outset of the story, shortly after the young German Maleen’s arrival in Africa, a fellow colonial woman sends her a local girl as a servant. Upon seeing the girl Maleen reacts in surprise: “Sie ist ja allerliebst! […] Aber ganz allerliebst! So also kann eine Negerin aussehen?” (“How very beautiful … she is […] But really beautiful. This is what a black woman can look like?”).15 Then follows a discussion with her brother, a colonial administrator: “‘Wirklich, sie hat Liebreiz!’ sagte Maleen zu Rainer. ‘Ich fange an zu begreifen, daß ihr euch in schwarze Mädchen verlieben könnt. […] ‘Nur, sie können uns niemals Gefährtinnen sein’, meinte Rainer. ‘Ist es das, was du vermissest?’ forschte voll Anteil die Schwester” (Bülow, Im Lande, 12; Really, she is so attractive, Maleen said to Rainer. ‘I’m beginning to understand that you men can fall in love with black girls.’ ‘Only, they can never be partners to us,’ Rainer observed. ‘Is that what you miss?’ his sister asked with sympathy). Aside from the (in) appropriateness of the expression “to fall in love” here, the ‘situation’ of the black woman and the white man appears in all these narratives. Mariette Haugen’s Oerwoud evokes the topic of the indigenous female “companion” without naming the relationship. When the narrator pays a visit to the local Belgian health inspector, she notices a beautiful indigenous woman leaving his house and draws conclusions: Dan komt eensklaps de verdenking in me op. Ik loop kordaat naar de barza, waar Abel achter zijn mikroskoop zit en ik roep hem tamelijk ruw to: ‘Abel, is dat je … ? Dat had ik van jou niet gedacht.’ Abel proest het eensklaps uit. ‘Geen kwestie van. Ze is een patiente. (Haugen, Oerwoud, 72–73) Suddenly a suspicion arose in my mind. Firmly, I walk to his porch where Abel sits over his microscope and I call out to him in a fairly crude manner: ‘Abel, is that you … I never would have thought that of you.’ Abel suddenly bursts out laughing: ‘No way. She is a patient!’ Abel is quickly reinstated as an honorable white colonial. Yet, the message is clear: “firmly” (kordaat) and “in a fairly crude manner” (tamelijk ruw) the white woman saves the white man from black women. Madeleine Migeon expressly “investigates” behind the colonial scenes. In a subchapter entitled “Est-il indiscret,” (116; Is it indiscrete) affairs between indigenous women and white men are presented as improper: “Pourquoi certain commissaire de district a-t-il, au cours d’un voyage d’inspection, réquisitioné (hum!) certaine jeune fillette noire destinnée à l’usage de ‘medical confort’ pour la caravane?” (Migeon, La Faute, 117: Why did a certain district commissioner during his journey of inspection requisition (ahem!) a certain black young girl for ‘medical comfort’ for his caravan?). While Migeon’s rhetorical question appears to indicate

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indignation about the abuse of women, her focus is in fact the corruption of the colonial agent, not his female victim. What indigenous women might suffer does not even feature as an afterthought. Identification with black women on the grounds of their common sex is not evoked in any text. Race is a higher barrier than gender. Female friendship across races is a “romantic” projection that is belied by reality, as Mariette Haugen has to “learn” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 76). Worse, women are competitors in seducing white men. Migeon imagines that if African women are taught the same feminine skills that white women learn, such as embroidery and sewing ladies’ underwear, they will discover the sexual potential of this feminine handicraft: “elles auront trop tôt l’idée d’en faire pour elle et leur intelligence rudimentaire saura trouver le seul moyen de s’en procurer à bon compte” (225; they will have the idea of producing some for themselves and their rudimentary intelligence will tell them how to make use of it for their own benefits). As colonial women writers reveal themselves as agents of the nation who work to restore the dysfunctional colony to a state acceptable to the homeland, their ‘imperial feminism’ leaves no room for indigenous women. To them, a racially segregated colonial society is a given. Despite their fascination with indigenous cultures Haugen and Migeon in particular portray African women in cringingly pejorative ways. Migeon adds the figure of the black “housekeeper” (ménagère) to the list of threats white men are exposed to in a world without white women.16 vivre à la colonie sans épouse, équivaut à aller sur la mer sans étoile. C’est par la femme qu’on suprimera les ennemis de l’homme qui vit seul sous le ciel africain: syphilis, dive bouteille, ménagères noires, cafard! Le solitaire qui résiste à seul de ces ennemis peut être qualifié de surhomme. (Migeon, La Faute, 233–234) for a man to live in the colony without a wife is like taking to sea without stars. It is only through women that the enemies of a man who lives alone under the African sky will be suppressed: syphilis, the bottle, black housekeepers, depression. The lone man who can resist just one of these enemies can be qualified as an übermensch. Similar to Eva in Tropenkoller, Migeon evokes an image of colonial men as weak and thus in constant jeopardy. Only in the presence of white women will colonials perform the task that is required of them. Anything else would be “ein Wunder” (a miracle), as Eva confirms, or, as Migeon has it, require a “surhomme.” In the same racial vein, Migeon underscores that all white youth, particularly girls, should avoid prolonged contact with indigenous black youths in order to prevent interracial relationships

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(Migeon, La Faute, 252). As future white women, white girls are the guarantors for the continuation of the “great project” of colonization “as it had been the wish of our king Leopold II” (Migeon, La Faute, 119). Indigenous women meanwhile remain a “feminine shadow” (“ombre féminine”), “little can be said on their account” (Migeon, La Faute, 224). Emancipation as it is practiced in contemporary European society would go against the nature of indigenous women. When Mariette Haugen catches a glimpse of a possible matriarchal society on meeting “Mama Lonkala,” the woman chieftain of the Niashaku, the veil of imperial patriarchy falls away immediately: “Ze moet weleer de gunst van een blanke man hebben verworven, dat men haar tot opperhoofd van deze klan der Batela heeft aangesteld” (Haugen, Oerwoud, 81; She must have gained the favor of a white man back in the day, that they appointed her chief of this clan of the Batetela). The notion of “white women saving white men” appears as an ideological oddity or even impossibility within the firmly established patriarchal system of European colonialism. How could white women, who figured only in feverish dreams of homesick travelers, possibly “rescue” white men? Stanley’s famous report about his search for Livingstone only mentions the latter’s deceased wife.17 His two-volumed Through the Dark Continent (1878) introduces one white woman: a nameless lady friend “for whom [he has] a reverent respect” and who gives him a present on the eve of his departure.18 The world of conquest, hardship, or horror even, was a man’s world. The narrator in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness speaks of white women who inhabit “drawing-rooms,” are “out of touch with truth,” and “live in a world of their own […] [which] would go to pieces before the first sunset.”19 In spite of male projections of women going to pieces, women found their way to colonial spaces and wrote about them, each in her own way justifying their presence and indeed the need for it. Their narratives stage (white) male colonials who find themselves trapped in myriad forms of corruption because they lack their better halves. From a gendered perspective women colonial writers carved out a position for women in the imperial system, advocating that the “mission” could only be fulfilled if they were properly included in it. The narratives of women writers from different periods and backgrounds like Frieda von Bülow, Madeleine Migeon, or Mariete Haugen are strikingly similar, each of them wielding what could be called “imperial feminism.” Much like the inherent racism of (white) American feminism bell hooks revealed in her seminal Ain’t I a Woman, colonial women’s writing dissolves the idea of female solidarity across racial borders. White men are cast as victims of colonial hardship, whose enterprise depends on white female intervention to succeed.

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Notes 1 In her introduction to the new edition of Spivak’s essay, Rosalind Morris states that this is “perhaps the most quoted and misquoted passage from the text,” which is plausible, though the word “misquotation” implies that there is an original “true” meaning, which is at odds with the notion of a Derridean reading. Rosalind C. Morris, “Introduction,” in Can the Subaltern Speak? Reflections on the History of an Idea, ed. Rosalind C. Morris (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010), 1–18, 3. 2 Gayatri Spivak, “Appendix,” in Can the Subaltern Speak? Reflections on the History of an Idea, ed. Rosalind C. Morris (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010), 237–291, 269. 3 Edward Thompson, Suttee: a Historical and Philosophical Enquiry into the Hindu Rite of Widow-Burning [1925], quoted in Spivak, Can the Subaltern Speak, 268, 274. 4 Spivak, Can the Subaltern Speak, 269. 5 Frieda von Bülow, Reisescizzen und Tagebuchblätter aus Deutsch-Ostafrika (Berlin: Walther & Apolant, 1887), 88. Subsequent references appear as Bülow, Reisescizzen and page number in the text. 6 There was no graver insult for a colonial author than being called an “armchair” colonial: someone without personal colonial experience prone to writing overly sentimental and erotic novels, riddled with ethnological and other falsehoods. See, for example, Sylva de Jonghe, Het Koloniale in de Literatuur (Turnhout: J. Van Mierlo-Proost: 1938), 11–18; Hippolyte de Mathelin de Papigny, Le Coup de Chicotte (Bruxelles: Ed. de Belgique, 1930), 127–133; Ernest Tilemans, Bendsjé of de Liefde der Negerin (Brussel: A. Lambrechts, 1931), 8; Madeleine Migeon, La Faute du Soleil Eve en Afrique (Bruxelles: Ed. de l’Expansion Belge, 1931), X–XI, 199–201. Subsequent references appear as Migeon, La Faute and page number in the text. 7 Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1884–1915 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2001), 54. 8 Brinker-Gabler, “Perspektiven des Übergangs. Weibliches Bewusstsein und frühe Moderne,” in Deutsche Literatur von Frauen. Vol. II: 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, ed. Gisela Brinker-Gabler (Munich: C.H. Beck, 1988), 190. 9 Elaine Gubin et al., ed. Dictionnaire des femmes belges: XIXe et Xxe siecles (Bruxelles: Racine, 2006), 402–403. 10 Lode Wils, Honderd Jaar Vlaamse Beweging 1: Geschiedenis van het Davidsfonds tot 1914 (Leuven: Davidsfonds, 1977), 15; Lode Wils, Honderd Jaar Vlaamse Beweging 3: Geschiedenis van het Davidsfonds in en rond WO II (Leuven: Davidsfonds 1989), 160–161. 11 Mariette Haugen, Oerwoud, Bantoe en … een Vrouw! (Leuven: Davidsfonds, 1951), 13. Subsequent references appear as Haugen, oerwoud and page number in the text. 12 Madeleine Migeon wrote a remarkably early book on the danger of fascism and National Socialism which she had witnessed during her travels through Europe in the early thirties. On the first page of her work on Germany and the National Socialist regime there is a portrait of the author wearing a masculine travel outfit with shorts, leather boots and casually holding a pair of goggles. Madeleine Migeon, Sous la Terreur Brune (Choses vues) (Paris: Moorthamers, 1933), 2.

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13 Frieda von Bülow, Tropenkoller: Episode aus dem Deutschen Kolonialleben (Berlin: Hilger, 1911), 6. Subsequent references appear as Bülow, Tropenkoller and page number in the text. 14 Morton Stanley recounts a moment of solitude and longing during his exploration: “There was fever; there were no books, no newspapers, no wife of my own race and blood, no theaters, no hotels, no restaurants, no East River oysters, no mince-pies, neither buckwheat cakes, nor anything much that was good for a cultivated palate to love.” Significantly, this mention of the absence of a “wife of my own race and blood” discloses the presence of an indigenous one (which convention does not allow him to speak about). Henry Morton Stanley, How I Found Livingstone, Travels, Adventures and Discoveries in Central Africa Including Four Months Residence with Dr. Livingstone (1872), https://gutenberg.org/files/5157/5157-h/5157-h.htm (accessed 5.10.22)) 15 Frieda von Bülow, Im Lande der Verheißung (Dresden: Verlag von Karl Reißner, 1899), 11. Subsequent references appear as Bülow, Im Lande, and page number in the text. 16 Walther notes that various factors were at play in the historic absence of women in colonial spaces. These ranged from purported female bodily and mental frailty to restrictive social roles in a patriarchal society. Ultimately, however, it was an economic argument that drove the state and private companies to employ single men. Daniel Joseph Walther, Sex and Control, Venereal Disease, Colonial Physicians, and Indigenous Agency in German Colonialism (New York: Berghahn, 2015), 25–26. 17 “ever since he had buried his wife in the woods of Shupanga he had sighed for just such a spot, where his weary bones would receive the eternal rest they coveted.” Henry Morton Stanley, How I found Livingstone. 18 Henry Morton Stanley, Through the Dark Continent, Vol. 1 (London and New York: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, 1878), 7. 19 Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness [1899], The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Major Authors (New York: Norton and Co., 1987), 2224–2290, 2232.

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Colonial Revisionism and German Imperialism in Senta Dinglreiter’s National Socialist Writings 1 Joseph Kebe-Nguema

As the global protests against racism and police brutality reached Germany in 2020, public discourse emphasized Germany’s colonial past and the genocide of the Ovaherero and Nama at the hands of the Schutztruppe in then German South West Africa (1904–1908).2 At the same time, the fact that German colonial thought and literature increased after the loss of its colonies in 1919 and reached its highest point under Nazism was glossed over.3 Similarly, studies of youth literature largely ignore the role of colonial literature for young readers during the Third Reich, according to Norbert Hopster.4 In general, attempts to highlight the ideological similarities and continuities between German colonialism and National Socialism are controversial in Germany.5 If we choose to ignore the ideological and political affinities between German colonial imperialism and the Third Reich, however, we fail to comprehend the popularity of colonialist ideology in Nazi Germany. This chapter focuses on texts for young readers by the German National Socialist journalist and author Senta Dinglreiter. To this day, scholarship on German women authors of colonial literature published in Nazi Germany has remained an academic niche. Moreover, youth literature is a particularly salient research object since it is designed to reflect social norms.6 Drawing on postcolonial theories and Critical Race Theory, this chapter argues that Senta Dinglreiter’s writings attempt to rehabilitate Germany’s colonial reputation and support its colonial claims. Her texts are aligned with Nazi Germany’s state ideology while underlining the importance of white German women for Germany’s colonial project and the leading role of Germany in white hegemony. My analysis focuses on the following texts by Senta Dinglreiter: Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder? Eine Reise durch unsere Kolonien in Afrika (1935; When Will the Germans Finally Come Back? A Journey through our Colonies in Africa), Ein Mädel reist durch Afrika: Selbsterlebtes im schwarzen Erdteil (1935; A Girl Travels through Africa: Lived Experiences on the Black Continent), So sah ich unsere Südsee (1939; How I DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-11

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Saw our South Seas Colonies) and Deutsche Frau in Afrika (1940; German Woman in Africa). The first three can be described as travelogues taking place in former German colonies. The author presents encounters with former colonial subjects and rival colonial masters. The last text is a novel for girls and young adults set in then German South West Africa and German East Africa between 1913 and 1938. It depicts the challenges that a young white German female settler from rural Bavaria faces before, during, and after the First World War. The novel ends at the dawn of the Second World War. Since Dinglreiter joined the ranks of the German Nazi party several years before Adolf Hitler’s rise to power, she must be considered a committed follower rather than an opportunist. Unsurprisingly, the characters in her books tend to reflect state ideology. Before analyzing the texts, I offer some information about the historical and cultural background that informs them, which will allow us to comprehend these texts more fully. German Colonial Heritage From 1884 to the end of the First World War, the German Empire held several overseas colonies in Africa. In every German-African territory, German colonial rule was met with resistance.7 It is therefore hardly surprising that Gustav Frenssen’s Peter Moors Fahrt nach Südwest (1906; Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa: A Narrative of the German Campaign, 1908), a colonial youth novel about the violent conflict between the Schutztruppe (German colonial troops) and local native rebellions, became a bestseller. Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa tells of the tribulations of a young German locksmith from Itzehoe who joined the navy and then volunteered to fight the Ovaherero’s rebellion in then German South West Africa “um an einem wilden Heidenvolk vergossenes deutsches Blut zu rächen” (“to be revenged on a heathen people for the German blood that had been spilled”).8 The novel became mandatory school reading in the German Empire and Nazi Germany.9 The success of Frenssen’s novel10 associated with demographical challenges—there were 3,391 white male settlers and only 1,249 white female settlers in 190311—among the colonizing population in German South West Africa contributed to the popularization of colonial novels for young female readers. Indeed, the most popular girls’ colonial novels of the time depict the struggles of young adult or teenage German women in German South West Africa. These novels were designed to highlight the importance of German women for the German colonial project and to encourage female emigration to the colonies.12 In spite of such efforts to promote colonization, German defeat in the First World War resulted in the loss of its colonies even if German colonial troops, among them Askari soldiers, led by general Paul Lettow-Vorbeck continued to fight the

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numerically superior British colonial troops in German East Africa until the end of November 1918.13 Paradoxically, the end of the Second German empire coincided with a surge of interest in the lost colonies among the German metropolitan population, including several mass protests in 1919.14 The will to recolonize, as a symbol of reclaiming Germany’s prewar glory, was present across the political spectrum, including the Nazi Party, which demanded “colonies” in its program.15 The efforts to revise the Versailles Treaty and to reclaim Germany’s colonial mission manifested itself in a heated public discussion about the so-called “Black Shame on the Rhine.”16 This propaganda campaign demanded the withdrawal of Black troops that formed part of the French occupying army.17 Black French soldiers were constructed as threats to white women and children, a quasibiological danger to Germanness.18 Even though most French non-white troops had left Germany by 1923, the rhetoric that defined the “Black Shame” campaign continued to pervade public discourse in Nazi Germany, even in the field of girls’ literature.19 Minni Grosch’s Grenzlandjugend (1934; Borderland Youth), for example, highlights the atrocities committed by French-Black soldiers against white German women and children. Many Germans viewed the mere presence of occupying forces that included Black soldiers as a disgrace and a threat to the supposed purity of German womanhood. For example, Heinrich Schnee, the former governor of German East Africa, lamented that Black people were “given such positions of authority on European soil, on the Rhine and in the Ruhr district.”20 Heinrich Schnee is the author of the colonial revisionist book Die koloniale Schuldlüge (1924; German Colonization Past and Future: The Truth About the German Colonies, 1926). Die koloniale Schuldlüge protests the “theft” of the German colonies and defends Germany’s colonial record against “hateful propaganda” by its foes.21 Schnee seeks to justify German colonial violence by comparing it to the behavior of other colonizing powers.22 The former colonial governor denies that German colonial troops had led a “war of extermination” against the Ovaherero—despite general Lothar von Trotha’s extermination order in 1904.23 Furthermore, Schnee underlines German colonial contributions, such as the medical treatments of native workers, and the loyalty and affection of Germany’s former colonial subjects toward their masters.24 Schnee perceives a relation of mutual need between settlers and colonial subjects: the former need the natural resources and the available labor in these oversea territories, while the latter need supervision.25 After the Nazi party’s rise to power, efforts were undertaken to promote colonialist ideology and literature.26 Indeed, some Nazi ideologues, such as the literary critic and author Paul Ritter, argued that there was a shared ambition between National Socialist and colonialist ideology. Ritter cited

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Carl Peters’s complaint that “Ich hatte es satt, unter die Parias gerechnet zu werden, und wollte einem Herrenvolk angehören” (I was tired of being counted among the pariahs and wanted to belong to a master race).27 The novels of the author and journalist Senta Dinglreiter (1893–1969) are also informed by both National Socialist and colonialist ideology. Dinglreiter was socialized in imperial Germany and during the First World War. Born into a modest rural family in Bavaria, she longed to travel the world but had to work on the family farm for the first 19 years of her life before moving to Munich to become an office worker.28 She then became a photographer to finance her travels, which inspired many of her works.29 In 1926, she joined the National Socialist Party and gave speeches inspired by her travels in Africa.30 She also wrote for the SA-Mann (The SA-Man) and Der völkische Beobachter (The völkisch Observer).31 Tellingly, Dinglreiter’s writings are informed by her life experiences and her National Socialist worldview. White German Womanhood: The Good Comrade In Die Frau im Dritten Reich (1933; The Woman in the Third Reich), Else Frobenius essentializes gender roles: “Das Gesetz der Männlichkeit fordert Kampf und Unruhe [ … ] Das Gesetz der Weiblichkeit fordert […] leibliche und seelische Befruchtung durch den Mann” (The law of masculinity demands struggle and restlessness […] The law of femininity demands […] bodily and spiritual impregnation by the man).32 Frobenius’s words characterize Käthe Althaus, née Braun, the main character in Dinglreiter’s Deutsche Frau in Afrika, who evokes the traditional protagonists of colonial literature for girls, because she transgresses against traditional gender roles.33 She possesses abilities and personality traits that are associated with the then dominant German view of masculinity, including courage and bravery. Käthe takes part in hunting outings, an activity that features frequently in colonial literature for girls, and she is ready to aim a firearm at a lion to protect the life of her Swiss companion, Fräulein Geier (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 88).34 Moreover, much like Tina in Schwere Zeiten (1913; Hard Times), she is prepared to face the enemy and lose her life if necessary (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 245).35 While many novels for girls routinely use the adjectives “tapfer” (brave) and “mutig” (courageous) to describe their heroines, and their implied bravery is usually associated with colonial-German womanhood,36 Käthe owes her bravery not only to her Germanness but also to her husband, who, before leaving for war, exhorted her: “‘Sei tapfer’” (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 179; Be brave).37 In order to showcase the bravery of their female protagonists, colonial novels for young female readers often introduce the topic of gender

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discrimination, and they depict scenes in which their heroines’ abilities are questioned by their male counterparts. This is the case with Käthe Braun (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 9) and Hannah Vollrad.38 In both texts, the heroines prove their abilities during times of war and peace and gain the approval of German men; and in all these texts, the main character either gets proposed to or marries at the end of the story.39 Thus, marriage is presented as the life goal of every white German woman. Moreover, such colonial marriages are aligned with a political agenda that informed the push for German female emigration to the colonies: Die Anwesenheit der Frau ist geboten in Rücksicht auf die Reinerhaltung der Rasse und dadurch auf Entwicklung und Erfahrung unseres Deutschtums; die Frau ist ferner der erste Mitarbeiter des Mannes […]; sie sorgt endlich in erster Linie für ein Heimischwerden deutscher Art und Sitte, deutschen Familienlebens.40 [The presence of women is necessary for the preservation of the pure race and thus for the development and experience of our Germanness; furthermore, women are the first collaborators of men […]; finally, they ensure first and foremost that German ways and customs and German family life become native.] Seen in this light, it is hardly surprising that the female protagonists are not involved in relationships with non-German men. After all, such relationships would jeopardize the völkisch goals of the German colonial project41; they are a clear threat to “biological” Germanness. Nevertheless, as Clara Brockmann’s words imply, left to their own devices, male German settlers are vulnerable to the “lure” of non-white women.42 The possible consequences associated with the absence of white German women are mentioned by Herr Behr, a farmer Käthe meets in South West Africa: Was sollen die jungen Männer, ohne Familien und irgendwelchen Anhang, denn in ihrer Freizeit machen? Wenn einer dann gar noch einsam auf einer Farm ist […] dann schließt sich der arme Kerl in seiner grenzlosen Verlassenheit manchmal an die Eingeborenen an und kommt dadurch herunter oder ergibt sich dem Trunk und versumpft. (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 35)43 [What are young men, without families and any attachments, supposed to do in their spare time? If one of them is lonely on a farm, […] then the poor chap, in his boundless abandonment, sometimes joins the natives and thus comes down or surrenders to drink and sinks into the mire.]

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He argues that, for this reason, only married men should migrate to the colonies (Deutsche Frau, 35).44 The deplored phenomenon described here is commonly referred to as “Verkafferung.”45 Since “Verkafferung” blurs the lines between Germanness and Blackness and subverts racial hierarchies, it is viewed negatively. A white German spouse, who offers support, is needed to prevent such developments. In other words, it falls on the shoulders of white German female settlers to save male German settlers from themselves and, in doing so, preserve Germanness as such.46 Interestingly, Herr Behr’s words serve as a forewarning. Through Erna Geier’s brother, Käthe meets a “blond und blauäugig” (blonde-haired and blue-eyed) Swiss man called José Leser, who seems to be attracted to her (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 127). As it turns out, however, he is already married to a Portuguese woman, and they have a blonde non-Germanspeaking boy. Leser is now a Portuguese citizen. Unsurprisingly, Käthe feels that the Portuguese woman is a poor housekeeper, and that José Leser was wrong to betray his “Volkstum” (Deutsche Frau, 127–129). The text speculates that Leser feels attracted to Käthe but is ashamed because she reminds him of what he has given away: his Germanness.47 The identification of Käthe with Heimat echoes Marieluise Christadler’s observation that “Die deutschen Frauen […] stehen in den Kolonialromanen mehr oder weniger als Metaphern für Heimat. Sie verkörpern die Tugenden, nach denen sich der deutsche Mann […] in der Fremde sehnt: Geborgenheit, Ordnung, Reinlichkeit, Reinheit” (In the colonial novels, German women […] stand more or less as metaphors for Heimat. They embody the virtues that the German man […] longs for in a foreign land: security, order, cleanliness, purity).48 This might explain why Käthe’s mere presence and unmarried status garner (white) male interest in the first part of the novel and why, following the loss of the German-African colonies, she remarks: “Einer Göttin gleich wurde die weiße Frau in den Kolonien verehrt” (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 199; The white woman was adored like a goddess in the colonies).49 However, Käthe is shown to be unique not only because of her character, but also because of her commitment to Germanness. When the heroines of older colonial literature for girls took up arms and fought Ovaherero assailants, they did so to defend their families and themselves.50 In contrast, Käthe Althaus joins the German colonial troops, ready to sacrifice all “wenn es für Deutschland ist” (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 185; if it is for Germany). Her nationalism is her driving force. Käthe is presented as a National Socialist heroine because she prioritizes the Volksgemeinschaft over her personal desires.51 Unsurprisingly, when Käthe learns that the British colonial power is setting up concentration camps for German settlers in the wake of the negotiations of Godesberg in 1938, she is again guided by her Germanness: “Nein, sie wollte ihre Farm

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nicht freiwillig verlassen, denn ihr Platz war hier. Und selbst, wenn man sie wegholen würde—sie lächelte verachtungsvoll—, es war der letzte Ausdruck britischer Machtgier, der sich noch einmal an wehrlosen Deutschen austoben konnte” (Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 245; No, she did not want to leave her farm voluntarily because her place was here. And even if they took her away—she smiled contemptuously—it was the last expression of British lust for power that could once again be unleashed on defenseless Germans). This echoes her husband’s attitude, who died fighting British colonial troops (Deutsche Frau, 179). Even though she feels the constraints imposed on her gender, she aspires to own a farm, and wishes that her stewardship could benefit the entire German nation—even in peaceful times (Deutsche Frau, 116). Throughout, her fate is inextricably linked with Germany’s fate. Käthe functions not only as a metaphor for Heimat, but also as an allegory for Germany. She is constructed as a role model, whose behavior follows the guidelines laid out in Die deutsche Frau in Südwestafrika (1910; The German Woman in South West Africa): Jede deutsch empfindende Frau sollte hier ihre Mitarbeit zusagen: denn es handelt sich um eine nationale Pflicht. Die deutsche Frau liebt ihr Vaterland; der Trieb, ihm zu dienen, ist ihr tief ins Herz gepflanzt, und die Kategorie jener Frauen und Jungfrauen, die den Erlös ihres Haarschmuckes auf den Altar des Vaterlandes legten und Eisen statt Gold an den Händen trugen, ist heute nicht erstorben; sie schläft nur.52 [Every German-feeling woman should pledge her cooperation here: for it is a national duty. The German woman loves her fatherland; the impulse to serve it is planted deep in her heart, and the category of those women and virgins who laid the proceeds of their hair ornaments on the altar of the fatherland and wore iron instead of gold on their hands has not died out today; it is only asleep.] In light of Dinglreiter’s ideological preferences, it is hardly surprising that her protagonist Käthe was disenchanted with post-WWI Germany (Deutsche Frau, 221–222). Although she hails from a modest background, Käthe is not interested in class differences. When, upon her return to rural Bavaria following the First World War, she learns that an “Arbeiterrat” (workers’ council) has been founded in her childhood village, she is furious (Deutsche Frau, 225). Throughout, her anti-communism and her enthusiastic support for National Socialism are clearly visible, especially after 1933, when the text celebrates “die Erstarkung des Reiches, die Rückgliederung der Saar, die Wiederherstellung der Wehrfreiheit und Einbeziehung des Rheinlandes in die deutsche Wehrhoheit” (Deutsche Frau, 243; the strengthening of the Reich, the reintegration of the Saarland, the

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restoration of military freedom and the inclusion of the Rhineland in German military sovereignty).53 She notes that German settlers are hopeful that their time will come (Deutsche Frau, 243), that is, that Germany will recover the colonies that were “stolen” by Great Britain and France. England as Germany’s Arch-Enemy and Unfit Colonizers In Peter Moor, a German seaman compares the Germans and the English: “‘Wir aber? Eine einzige ihrer Eigenschaften haben wir von alters her: die Tapferkeit. Eine andre gewinnen wir langsam: den Reichtum. Ob wir den Rest jemals bekommen: das ist unsre Lebensfrage’” (“‘As for us—well, one of their qualities, bravery, we have had for ages; one other, riches, we are slowly acquiring. Whether we ever acquire the others—that is our life problem’”).54 The seaman also characterizes the English as “distinguished” and “wise.”55 Upon hearing such praise of the “Perfidious Albion,” the main character is surprised at first but later realizes that the reputation of the English is well deserved.56 When Dinglreiter put pen to paper, however, such praise had become unimaginable. Rather, her depictions of the English are antagonistic and Manichean, as is evident in Deutsche Frau in Afrika. Upon arriving in German South West Africa in 1913, Käthe Braun holds the British in high esteem. A conversation with a German settler named Herr Reder, however, suffices to change her views. Reder claims that, initially, Britain was not interested in then German South West Africa because it seemed to lack natural resources, but it began to covet the country when German settlers developed the soil and found out that it was rich in mineral resources (Deutsche Frau, 28).57 Out of envy, the British spread resentment against the German settlers, which, according to Reder, incited the rebellion of the Ovaherero causing the loss of countless German lives (Deutsche Frau, 28).58 Dinglreiter’s novel casts the British as Germany’s natural enemy and obfuscates the factors that actually motivated the Ovaherero rebellion.59 The more she learns about the British, the more Käthe starts to fear them (Deutsche Frau, 28). A conversation with Herr Minnaar, a Boer settler of German origin, who took part in the war against the British (Deutsche Frau, 79), reveals that soldiers of fortune working on behalf of the British committed war and sex crimes on “jungen Mädchen, selbst Kinder” (Deutsche Frau, 82–83; young girls, even children), with the support of the authorities. Dinglreiter was critical of the Boers in her travelogue Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder?, but defends them in Deutsche Frau in Afrika, and this sympathy for the Boers motivates Käthe’s desire to take revenge on the British (Deutsche Frau, 84).60 Cruelties attributed to the British have become more relevant in the context of the First World War. Käthe left German South West Africa and moved to German East Africa in 1914, before the start of the conflict.

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While discussing the war with Herr Neubert, a fellow German settler, she informs him that British colonial troops assaulted medical facilities and looted German houses (Deutsche Frau, 192). When Neubert appears surprised, she answers: “‘Merkwürdigerweise denken viele Deutsche wie Sie. Mich haben diese Dinge kaum überrascht. Im Gegenteil, ich bin erstaunt, wie rasch die Menschen doch vergessen. War nicht die ganze Welt außer sich über Grausamkeiten der Briten im Burenkrieg?’” (Deutsche Frau, 194; Strangely enough, many Germans think like you. I am hardly surprised by these things. On the contrary, I am amazed at how quickly people forget. Was not the whole world beside itself with British atrocities in the Boer War?). Clearly, the text constructs the British as “uncivilized,” thus implying that British atrocities are to be expected. While cowardly when faced with German soldiers, British troops, utterly devoid of Ritterlichkeit (chivalry), show no mercy toward German women (Deutsche Frau, 80; 219) and ransack the homes of German settlers: “Papiere, Briefe, Bücher und sonstige weniger begehrenswerte Dinge lagen zwischen den Trümmern herum. Nicht einmal die Uhr an der Wand und die Bilder hatte man geschont. […] Was der Feind nicht mitnahm, das hatte er mit teuflischer Wut vernichtet” (Deutsche Frau, 202; Papers, letters, books and other less desirable things lay around among the rubble. Not even the clock on the wall and the pictures had been spared. […] What the enemy did not take, he had destroyed with diabolical fury). Unlike the Germans, the British supposedly did not live up to the standards of white European culture, which is interpreted as a betrayal of the white race: “Mit dem Einbruch der Briten in unsere Kolonien, entgegen den Kongoverträgen, begann Englands Verrat an der weißen Rasse” (Deutsche Frau, 210; With the British invasion of our colonies, contrary to the Congo Treaties, England’s betrayal of the white race began). The British violated what Heinrich Schnee called “the White Man’s Pact—the Congo Act of 1885.”61 While Dinglreiter’s earlier writings, including Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder?, associated “savagery” with the colonized masses, her later works construct British and Africans alike as “wild.” According to Dinglreiter, the British are naturally bad colonizers. In Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder?, she criticizes the post-WWI situation in East Africa, claiming that British leadership encouraged the supposed criminal leanings of the colonized population while disenfranchising white settlers.62 Dinglreiter suggests that the British are not harsh enough toward the colonized population and therefore indirectly undermine white supremacy.63 Here she misrepresents the colonial realities under British rule, which did not disenfranchise the settler population in favor of native nations.64 Indeed, the “colonial contract” did not allow it.65 Yet, to underline her point, Dinglreiter purports to quote an East African

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native who favors the Germans: “‘Die Engländer haben gute Worte aber ein hartes Herz. Die Deutschen aber haben harte Worte und ein gutes Herz’” (Wann kommen, 184; The English have good words but a hard heart. But the Germans have hard words and a good heart). Curiously, Dinglreiter introduces Cecil Rhodes as a proponent of German colonialism. Rhodes defends Germany’s colonial record, claiming that Germany accomplished in a short period of time what England would need a century to implement (Wann kommen, 8). This quote endows Dinglreiter’s argument with legitimacy and a semblance of objectivity. To be sure, Britain is not the only colonizing state that Dinglreiter criticizes. She spends some time in French overseas territories and notes that, much like the British in East Africa and Tanganyika, France fails to uphold white supremacy. While traveling through francophone West Africa, Dinglreiter witnessed an argument between a white chief mate and a Black sailor who wants to drink Schnapps.66 The chief mate refuses to allow it, yet the sailor disobeys and talks back (Wann kommen, 48). In a conversation with the author, the chief mate blames the laxity of French colonial rule for a lack of discipline and respect for the “Herren” (master) among the colonized population (Wann kommen, 48). Again, it is implied here that such laissez-faire would not be possible under German colonial rule. Moreover, the term “master” confirms that the native is once more constructed as a child regardless of the effectivity of any given colonial system. In spite of its supposed laxity, French colonial rule does not seem to benefit the native nations. We learn that there is high unemployment in Togo, a former German colony, and that French authorities had to recruit workers in Dahomey because, according to Dinglreiter, the former German colonial subjects loved Germany so much that they did not want to work for the French (Wann kommen, 53–54). She adds that native people in Togo demonstrated against French colonial rule and looted all shops except a German one (Wann kommen, 54). While elsewhere the author condemns looting, this anecdote is designed to underline the efficiency and benevolence of German colonialism. Germany is constructed as a superior colonizing power much adored by its former colonial subjects. Furthermore, Dinglreiter laments that, in Togo, France did nothing to improve the facilities it inherited from the Germans (Wann kommen, 58). Again, this underlines the supposed achievements of German colonialism, which—contrary to historical evidence—is said to have looked after its colonial subjects. Since Great Britain and France divided most of the German-African colonies amongst themselves, it is hardly surprising that Dinglreiter’s criticism of these two nations is particularly harsh. At the same time, she also finds fault with Belgium (Wann kommen, 174) and the South-African Union (Wann kommen, 107), and, in So sah ich unsere Südsee, she laments that Australia has not built any new infrastructure in the former

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German colonies located in the South Seas.67 According to Dinglreiter, the Australians are negligent because they do not actually need colonies since their metropolitan territory is already underpopulated (Südsee, 201). In that regard, Australia is the antithesis of Germany, which the Nazis conceived as “Volk ohne Raum” (people without space).68 Just as she derided British rule in Africa, Dinglreiter also argues that Australians are not well equipped to be effective colonizers. Their justice system is characterized as too lenient and said to benefit the native population instead of white settlers (Südsee, 272). Dinglreiter cites two cases in which a native man took the life of his “weißen Herren” (white master) and was released after serving only three years, while a white man was incarcerated for ten years for the manslaughter of a native person (Südsee, 272). We can deduce that these sentences would have been different under German rule. In order to further elevate German colonial achievements, Dinglreiter quotes Mister Mullaly, an Australian gold digger, who confirms that German rule was better and that the Australian government is ineffective. The treatment of the native population is deplorable (Südsee, 269), which is to say not harsh enough. Since the native population is infantilized, the Australian government is made responsible for the actions of natives. Even so, the colonial discourse surrounding natives appears to have evolved: before 1919, natives were cast as natural enemies in youth colonial novels;69 now they overwhelmingly support Germany. This celebration of German colonial rule is not limited to the former “protectorates” located in the South Seas but is also confirmed in the former German-African colonies. Germanophilia and “Black Danger” Colonial narratives of the post-WWI period—a time when Germany attempted to redeem its reputation as a colonial power70—are marked by a discursive shift: now, most natives are shown to be devoted to Germany and its settlers. This is summed up by the title of Dinglreiter’s travelogue: Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder? Dinglreiter claims that, during her travels, the natives constantly asked this question (Dinglreiter, Wann kommen, 185). She also mentions native kings who sided with the German colonial power and desired its return (Wann kommen, 183). In Ein Mädel reist durch Afrika, she reports that a German settler in Cameroon is moved by the affectionate devotion of the black population: “‘Rührend zeigte sich die Treue und Anhänglichkeit der Schwarzen, als wir 1925 hier ankamen. Voller Begeisterung liefen sie zusammen, von weither […] und sie heulten und jubelten vor Freude über unsere Rückkehr’”71 (The loyalty and devotion of the Blacks were touching when we arrived here in 1925. Full of enthusiasm, they ran together, from far

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away […] and they howled and cheered with joy at our return). This is supposed to lend credibility to her argument. Similar scenes occur in her novel Deutsche Frau in Afrika, in which the natives, among them “the Askaris,” are delighted when the German settlers return several years after their banishment by the British (Deutsche Frau, 235). The supposed rejoicing of the Askaris, who fought with German colonial troops against the British, is meant to demonstrate that a pro-German attitude is genuine and historically proven. Some natives even offer to work for free for Käthe Althaus and are disappointed when she declines (Deutsche Frau, 205–206). Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder? expounds on the reason that motivates such devotion to the German settlers: “humane, straffe und gerechte Behandlung” (humane, strict and just treatment), thus making the German “der geborene Kolonist” (the natural colonist) (Wann kommen, 185). Yet, while older colonial novels for youth portray different attitudes toward Germany among the natives, the racial hierarchy remains unaltered. In addition to attributing a “kindliche Auffassung” (child-like mentality) to the indigenous population (Dinglreiter, Wann kommen, 182), there is a strong emphasis on anthropophagy, a well-known trope in colonialist discourse, employed to distinguish “an imperial Europe … from the subjects of its colonial expansion, while providing a moral justification for that expansion.”72 Dinglreiter’s texts routinely associate anthropophagy with Blackness; thus, it is present in Africa as well as in the South Seas, which are both constructed as Black in her writings. For example, in So sah ich unsere Südsee, Dinglreiter speaks of the poor character of the Azera nation in New Guinea and its inclination toward “cannibalism” (Südsee, 219–220).73 Indeed, she claims that the Azera would go so far as to eat people of their own group, which, she adds, happens rarely even among “Raubtiere” (Südsee, 220; predators). This is noteworthy. While colonialist discourse frequently likens native peoples to animals,74 here Dinglreiter suggests that they are even worse than animals. This is why their “instincts” must be tamed—from a colonialist perspective. As a result, Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder? argues that the “Invasion der Weißen” (invasion of white people) has the beneficent effect of “die Ausrottung des Kannibalismus, die vielleicht heute noch nicht vollkommen ist” (Wann kommen, 173; the eradication of cannibalism, which is perhaps not yet complete today). This claim is designed to underline the so-called civilizational benefits of and consequently the need for German colonialism.75 According to Dinglreiter, any disruption to that order can have negative consequences for the so-called civilized world. Dinglreiter claims that the First World War had a negative impact on the relation between colonizer and colonized. In Deutsche Frau in Afrika, the author laments that the British betrayed white supremacy when they

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attacked German colonies in the First World War (Deutsche Frau, 210), since this violation made native people in East Africa lose respect for their white masters. As a result, natives wanted to use the situation to raid white farms and murder white people (Deutsche Frau, 210). According to Dinglreiter, until the First World War, “[d]er Weiße war bis dahin für die Schwarzen unantastbar gewesen und nur mit einer gewissen Scheu und hündischen Unterwürfigkeit sah er zu ihm wie zu einem höheren Wesen auf” (Wann kommen, 85; the white man had been untouchable for Black people and only with a certain shyness and dog-like submissiveness did he look up to him as to a higher being). In the war, however, the colonized were allowed to shoot at white soldiers, which diminished their veneration for white settlers,76 and emboldened the natives to treat Black and white people the same (Wann kommen, 85). The text suggests that colonized populations now refuse to be “domesticated,” even though the “Racial Contract” requires it, just as it “prescribes non-white self-loathing and racial deference to white citizens.”77 Natives who defy the “Colonial Contract” are pathologized; those who adhere to it are still considered inferior.78 Colonized people are denied agency—even their rebellions are attributed to foreign interference, as was the case with the Ovaherero and Nama and the British in Deutsche Frau in Afrika—but they still pose a threat. Consequently, Dinglreiter casts Germany as the last rampart against the “schwarze Gefahr” (Wann kommen, 185; Black danger). In order to prevent “Empörung” (outrage) and “Aufstand” (revolt), the natives need Germany and a “Führer” (Wann kommen, 185). In the hands of the wrong nation, colonized subjects who are docile and easy to control can easily be led astray (Wann kommen, 185). Dinglreiter seeks to illustrate what happens when the Germans are not in charge anymore: violence, including theft, robbery, and assault on white peoples, is allegedly on the rise in German East Africa (Wann kommen, 186). Dinglreiter claims that the situation is particularly dire in New Guinea, where white women and children are being abused daily by the natives. Evoking the common trope of the Black sexual brute, familiar from the “Black Shame”-campaign, Dinglreiter claims that, in Rabaul, a “Vereinigung der Bürger zum Schutze der weißen Frauen” (citizen association for the defense of white women) had to be created (Südsee, 206). Dinglreiter suggests not only that German colonial rule prevented sexual violence, but also that Germany is better equipped to defend both whiteness and white womanhood. The natives are again constructed as “subpersons,”79 that is, as “humanoid entities who, because of racial phenotype/genealogy/culture, are not fully human and therefore have a different and inferior schedule of rights and liberties applying to them.”80 In this respect, Africans, Jews, and Chinese are alike in their racial “inferiorities” but differ in their ways of being a threat to the National Socialists and their global politics.

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Jews as Enemies of Germanness and Chinese Threats Earlier colonial youth novels constructed the Ovaherero as Germany’s biological enemies whose extermination was justified by a socialDarwinist logic and portrayed as a service to humanity.81 In light of Germany’s efforts to rehabilitate a colonial image tarnished by brutality toward the natives, however, it is hardly surprising that Dinglreiter does not advocate for the eradication of the colonized population.82 Rather, in her grossly antisemitic texts from the Third Reich era, Jews appear as the biological and racial enemies of Germanness. In Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder?, Dinglreiter—drawing on a common trope in colonial literature for girls published during the Third Reich—holds the Jewish population responsible for the dire economic situation of the German settlers in South West Africa in general and Lüderitzbucht in particular (Wann kommen, 106). Similarly, in Deutsche Frau in Südwest (1937), the main character, Brigitte Remmert, claims that in postwar Berlin a non-German Jewish mass benefited from the financial distress of Germans.83 The situation Dinglreiter deplores is not confined to Germany. In Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder?, she meets a Dutch steward and member of the Dutch Nazi party, while riding on a sheep along the West African coast. The Dutch man informs her that the Dutch Nazi party grew in popularity in his home country, because the Netherlands are “verseucht … von Juden” (Wann kommen, 75 infested with Jews). Here too, Jews are constructed as “foreign bodies.” The term “infested,” commonly applied to vermin, underlines that they do not belong and pose a biological threat. Moreover, Dinglreiter refers to an Ovambo man who does not want to be compared to Jews because his people have been exploited by a Jew (Wann kommen, 139). Also, while reflecting on her defense of National Socialist policies, she notes: “[d]aran anknüpfend fiel es mir nicht schwer, an vielen Beispielen zu beweisen, daß gerade der Jude Haupt-, wenn nicht alleiniger Träger der heutigen materialistischen Idee und daher verantwortlich für das derzeitige Chaos ist” (Wann kommen, 66; Adding to this, it was not difficult for me to prove with many examples that it is precisely the Jew who is the main, if not the sole, bearer of today’s materialistic idea and therefore responsible for the present chaos). Throughout, Jewishness is essentialized, and Jewish people are deindividualized. Thus, Dinglreiter tries to convince her readers that the “Jewish problem,” much like the “Black danger,” is a global threat. While German colonialist literature casts Black people as villains, it also assumes that they can be redeemed if they accept their supposed inferior status. This, however, does not apply to Jewish people who are constructed as the natural and eternal enemy of the German population. Since

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this enmity is biologically determined, German aversion to Jews is genuine and inescapable. Thus, Deutsche Frau in Afrika rationalizes Käthe Braun’s antisemitism. The first part of the story takes place in German South West Africa, where Käthe gets to know Fräulein Geier’s brother, Robert, a gold digger in Southern Africa, who works for a Jewish waiter with curled hair named Goldstein (Deutsche Frau, 114).84 When Käthe meets Herr Goldstein on a train, she feels uneasy about him but converses with him because she is curious about the nature of his professional relationship with Robert (Deutsche Frau, 117). When she realizes that Robert is being exploited, Käthe rejects Goldstein’s unwanted advances and furiously orders him to leave, which he does eventually. Since Käthe is presented as a character who does not hurt fellow human beings without a good reason (Deutsche Frau, 165), Dinglreiter’s readers can deduce that she was justified in her treatment of Herr Goldstein. In Dinglreiter’s writings, both Black and Jewish people are constructed as “subpersons.” In this, as in other matters, Dinglreiter embraces National Socialist ideology, as laid out in Julius Streicher’s Der Stürmer (The Storm Trooper): “Unter anderem hat der Jude einen gehörigen Schuss [N-Wort]blut in seinen Adern. Seine gekräuselten Haare […] zeugen davon ebenso, wie die unersättliche Geschlechtsgier, die vor Sittlichkeitsverbrechen nicht zurückschreckt und in der brutalen Schändung andersrassiger Frauen ihren höchsten Triumph sieht” (Among other things, the Jew has a good shot of [Black] blood in his veins. His curled hair […] bear witness to this, as does his insatiable sexual greed, which does not shrink from moral crimes and sees its highest triumph in the brutal desecration of women of other races).85 Thus, Wann kommmen die Deutschen endlich wieder? prophesizes that Germany, the only country capable of tackling these problems, will have its revenge, one way or another, for the oppression of its settlers in South West Africa at the hands of the Boers, who are supposedly led by Jews (Wann kommen, 107). Nevertheless, Black and Jewish people are not Germany’s only foes; Chinese people also present a threat. Dinglmeier’s Sinophobia, evident in So sah ich unsere Südsee, is partly politically motivated. She holds the Chinese responsible for spreading communist ideology among the Papua and corrupting their morals (Südsee, 102). Moreover, she accuses the Chinese of spreading resentment against white settlers in the South Seas and Africa on behalf of the Soviet Union and with the intent to cause disorder in the world (Südsee, 103). According to Dinglreiter, Chinese communists use Black people globally for Soviet interests and pose a threat to the colonial and white supremacist order since their end goal is “das Chaos auf Erden und die absolute Knechtung der Menschheit” (Südsee, 104; chaos on earth and the absolute bondage of humanity). While the exploitation of colonized peoples is normalized, National Socialism is assumed to bring order.

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Nevertheless, Dinglreiter’s Sinophobia is also economically motivated: “Die Chinesen haben sich auch hier wie an anderen Stellen der Südsee breitgemacht, den Handel großenteils an sich gerissen und die wenigen europäischen Firmen bereits in Abwehrstellung gedrängt” (Südsee, 46; As elsewhere in the South Seas, the Chinese have also spread out here, seized much of the trade and have already pushed the few European companies into a defensive position). In other words, the Chinese threaten Western interests in the region. Moreover, while feigning concern for the wellbeing of the natives, Dinglreiter claims that the success of Chinese traders is rooted in unethical business practices: “Besonders in den Kolonien sichert er sich durch billige Ramschware, welche europäische Firmen gewöhnlich nicht führen, die Kundschaft der ‘Primitiven’” (Südsee, 47; Especially in the colonies, [the Chinese] secures the business of “primitives” through cheap junk goods, which European companies usually do not carry). Again, Dinglreiter emphasizes the supposed inferiority of non-Europeans while Europe, a compact of supposedly “civilized” nations, is constructed as culturally and morally superior to the non-white world. Finally, the Chinese also pose a demographical threat. Dinglreiter states: “Durch ihre natürliche Vermehrung—jede chinesische Familie hat acht Kinder und oft auch mehr—wächst die ‘gelbe’ Handelsrasse weiter in beängstigender Weise an, und kein Mensch kann heute sagen, wie die Sache enden wird” (Südsee, 47; Through their natural reproduction—every Chinese family has eight children and often more—the “yellow” merchant race grows at an alarming rate, and no one can say today how the matter will end). Here, Dinglreiter likens Chinese people to animals and robs them of their individuality while simultaneously casting them as a biological threat. The text betrays a desperate desire to control the sexual, economic, and political agency of people who are deemed to be inferior and branded as untrustworthy thieves. Indeed, the German envy toward the Chinese economic success in the Pacific resembles that toward the British in securing the resources in the former German colonies in Africa after the First World War. Even though the hostility to the British cannot be justified in racial terms, the racist denigration toward the Chinese is carried out with a tenor of economic interest. In this case, Dinglreiter’s view could well be that of a man. Her role as a woman does not give her a special perspective here. Conclusion In all her texts, Senta Dinglreiter highlights German colonial achievements and the shortcomings of other colonial powers in order to rehabilitate Germany’s reputation as a colonizer. Yet, those accomplishments rarely benefitted the colonized populations.86 Throughout, Dinglreiter relied on established colonial tropes and binary imperialist logic. Like many other

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women writers of the time, she emphasized the importance of white German womanhood for the German colonial project. Her texts are marked by her National Socialist worldview, which appears as the logical continuation of German colonialist ideology. As a result, class differences among the settlers are overlooked, while racial differences are underlined. Moreover, highlighting the supposed fondness of natives for their former colonial masters allows Dinglreiter to defend Germany’s treatment of the former, while criticizing other colonial powers. It does not, however, alter the status of natives, who have historically been constructed as “the ‘racially inferior’ Human Other.”87 If they are represented in a more positive light during the Third Reich than during the time of German colonial imperialism, this change merely serves to whitewash Germany’s reputation. In addition, Dinglreiter discusses the “Jewish problem” as a global challenge, while presenting the Chinese as a political/ideological threat and economic competitor. Tellingly, several anti-Black, Antisemitic, and Sinophobic tropes used in Dinglreiter’s texts persist to this day. All in all, Dinglreiter’s writings support the colonial project of the German state, just as girls’ colonial literature published before the end of German colonialism in Africa had done. Further research is needed on National Socialist colonial literature for girls. In particular, we need to ask if and how emancipatory discourses were and are being coopted to justify an imperialist or fascist agenda. Moreover, since German colonialism is still being romanticized in some former German-African colonies, such as Togo,88 it is globally necessary to continue investigating its representations in the past and present. Lastly, Europe still being compared to a “garden” and the rest of the world to a “jungle” reveals how deeply pervasive colonialist and Eurocentric discourse is.89 Notes 1 Dedicated to Diana Bonnelamé and Dagmar Seck; the author wishes to thank Elisabeth Krimmer, Ph.D. and Chunjie Zhang, Ph.D. for their suggestions. Thanks are also due to Nzâme e yô. 2 Jelena Malkowski, “Rassismus durchzieht die Stadt,” taz am wochenende, June 20/21, 2020, 56. 3 Joachim Warmbold, ‘Ein Stückchen neudeutsche Erd’ …’: Deutsche KolonialLiteratur. Aspekte ihrer Geschichte, Eigenart und Wirkung, dargestellt am Beispiel Afrikas (Frankfurt am Main: Haag + Herchen, 1982), 14. 4 Norbert Hopster, “Kolonien,” in Kinder- und Jugendliteratur 1933–1945: Ein Handbuch. Vol. 2: Darstellender Teil, ed. Norbert Hopster et al. (Stuttgart: Metzler 2005), 314. 5 See Dirk Moses’ comments on “the German catechism,” Hary Nutt, “A. Dirk Moses: Angriff auf die Einzigartigkeit des Holocaust,” Frankfurter Rundschau, 27th July 2021, https://www.fr.de/kultur/gesellschaft/dirk-moses-angriff-aufdie-einzigartigkeit-des-holocaust-90886412.html. Accessed 29th of July 2022.

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6 Elodie Malanda, “La Transmission des valeurs dans les romans pour la jeunesse sur l’Afrique subsaharienne (France, Allemagne, 1991–2010). Les pièges de la bonne intention” (Ph.D. diss., Université Sorbonne Paris Cité, 2017), 46. 7 Martha Mamozai, Herrenmenschen: Frauen im deutschen Kolonialismus (Reinbek: Rowohlt, 1982), 29; Christine de Gemeaux, “La République fédérale d’Allemagne et le Togo. ‘Prendre pied’ sur le continent Africain?,” Allemagne d’aujourd’hui 217, no. 3 (2016): 154–165, here 157, https:// doi.org/10.3917/all.217.0154. 8 Gustav Frenssen, Peter Moors Fahrt nach Südwest: Ein Feldzugsbericht (Berlin: Grote, 1906), 6; Gustav Frenssen, Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa: A Narrative of the German Campaign, transl. Andrew Henshaw Ward (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1908), 7. 9 See Jörg Wassink, Auf den Spuren des deutschen Völkermordes in Südwestafrika: der Herero-Nama-Aufstand in der deutschen Kolonialliteratur; eine literarhistorische Analyse (Munich: M-Press, 2004), 140; and Elizabeth R. Baer, The Genocidal Gaze: From German Southwest Africa to the Third Reich (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2017), 60. 10 “Der wirklich entscheidende Durchbruch aber war Gustav Frenssens Buch ‘Peter Moors Fahrt nach Südwest’ vorbehalten, das 1906 herausgeben wurde. […] Deutsches Heldentum und deutsches Schicksal in Übersee wurde zum zentralen Thema der deutschen Kolonial-Literatur” (However, Gustav Frenssen’s book ‘Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa’, published in 1906, made the decisive breakthrough. […] German heroism and German fate overseas became the central theme of German colonial literature), Warmbold, ‘Ein Stückchen neudeutsche Erd’…’, 13. Therefore, it is hardly surprising that Dinglreiter’s texts deal with these subjects too. 11 Theodor Leutwein, Elf Jahre Gouverneur in Deutsch-Südwestafrika: Mit 176 Abbildungen und 20 Skizzen (Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler und Sohn, 1906), 232. To stop miscegenation and a potentially growing Afro-German population, marriages between settlers and the colonized population were banned by the colonial governor Lindequist in 1905. See Fatima El-Tayeb, Schwarze Deutsche: der Diskurs um »Rasse« und nationale Identität 1890–1933 (Frankfurt am Main: Campus) 2001, 92. To prevent interracial relationships, the GermanColonial Women’s League promoted the emigration of young white German women to South West Africa. See Anton Meyer-Gerhard, “Frauenbund der deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft,” in vol. 1: A-G of Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon, ed. Heinrich Schnee (Leipzig: Quelle und Meyer, 1920), 662. 12 Silke Kirch, “Reiseromane und Kolonialromane um 1900 für junge Leserinnen,” in Mädchenliteratur der Kaiserzeit: Zwischen weiblicher Identifizierung und Grenzüberschreitung, ed. Gisela Wilkending (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2003), 103–164, here 148. 13 See Warmbold, “Ein Stückchen neudeutsche Erd’… … ”, 137; and Horst Gründer, Geschichte der deutschen Kolonien (Paderborn: Schöningh, 1985), 169. This explains Lettow-Vorbeck’s cult status in German colonial youth literature. More than a dozen works published between 1918 and 1945 depict his heroics, see Norbert Hopster et al. ed., Kinder- und Jugendliteratur 1933–1945. Vol. 1: Bibliographischer Teil mit Registern (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2001). 14 Kien Nghi Ha, “Macht(t)Raum(a) Berlin—Deutschland als Kolonialgesellschaft,” in Mythen, Masken und Subjekte: Kritische Weißseinsforschung in Deutschland, ed. Maureen Maisha Eggers et. al. (Münster: Unrast, 2017), 105–117, here 109.

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15 Gottfried Feder, Das Programm der N.S.D.A.P. und seine weltanschaulichen Grundgedanken (Munich: Eher, 1931), 19. 16 See Iris Wigger, Die “Schwarze Schmach am Rhein”: rassistische Diskriminierung zwischen Geschlecht, Klasse, Nation und Rasse (Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot, 2007). 17 Peter Martin, “Schwarze Pest. Traditionen einer Diffamierung,” Mittelweg 36 4, no. 3 (June/July 1995): 69–81, here 70. Blackness and whiteness are social constructs whose flexibility depends on a given context. As Priscilla Layne explains, this changeability of racial definitions was evident in the discourse about the “Black Shame”: “Whether a soldier was from Indonesia, Madagascar, Tunisia, or Algeria, he was labelled Black, because at that moment Blackness did not refer to a particular skin tone, but rather was meant to signify difference, inferiority, and dangerous sexuality,” Priscilla Layne, “Decolonizing German Studies While Dissecting Race in the American Classroom,” in Diversity and Decolonization in German Studies, ed. Regine Criser et al. (Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2020), 83–100, here 91, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030–34342-2_5. 18 “The propaganda routinely portrayed 40,000 black savages roaming the Rhineland at will, raping the women, infecting the population, and polluting the blood,” Sally Marks, “Black Watch on the Rhine: A Study in Propaganda, Prejudice and Prurience,” European Studies Review 13, no. 3 (July 1983): 297–334, here 297, https://doi.org/10.1177/026569148301300302. 19 El-Tayeb, Schwarze Deutsche, 166. This denigration had material consequences for the Afro-German population since the children of White German women and Black French soldiers were forcibly sterilized by the Nazi authorities, see El-Tayeb, Schwarze Deutsche, 188. 20 Heinrich Schnee et al., German Colonization Past and Future: The Truth about the German Colonies. With introduction by William Harbutt Dawson. [Based upon the author’s Die koloniale Schuldlüge] (London: Allen & Unwin, 1926), 100. 21 Schnee, Schuldlüge, 126. Schnee claims that, before the arrival of German settlers in Africa, “[t]he native tribes were continually robbing and murdering one another” (Schnee, Schuldlüge, 112). 22 Schnee, Schuldlüge, 117. 23 Schnee, Schuldlüge, 105; 117. See also Lothar von Trotha who stated in 1904: “Innerhalb der deutschen Grenze wird jeder Herero, mit oder ohne Gewehr, mit oder ohne Vieh erschossen. Ich nehme keine >Weiber< und keine Kinder mehr auf, treibe sie zu ihrem Volke zurück oder lasse auf sie schießen. Das sind meine Worte an das Volk der Herero” (Every Herero, with or without a gun, with or without cattle, will be shot within the German borders. I will no longer accept women or children, I will drive them back to their people or let them be shot at. These are my words to the Herero people), cited in Horst Drechsler, Aufstände in Südwestafrika: Der Kampf der Herero und Nama 1904 bis 1907 gegen die deutsche Kolonialherrschaft (Berlin: Dietz, 1984), 80. 24 Schnee, Schuldlüge, 94; 126; 171. 25 Schnee, Schuldlüge, 50; 94. The former colonial civil servant Paul Rohrbach relied on the same argument under National Socialism: “Deutschland hat sich die Treue und Anhänglichkeit der Schwarzen in höherem Grade erworben als Engländer, Franzosen oder sonstige Kolonisatoren in Afrika. Von allen großen Industrieländern der Welt ist heute allein Deutschland ausgeschlossen vom Besitz eigener überseeischer Rohstoffquellen, eigener kolonialer Siedlungsgebiete” (Germany has

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earned the loyalty and attachment of Black people to a greater degree than the English, French or other colonizers in Africa. Of all the world’s major industrialized countries, only Germany is today excluded from owning its own overseas sources of raw materials, its own colonial settlements). Paul Rohrbach, Deutschlands koloniale Forderung (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1940), 90. For example, a Nazi-funded publishing house, Steiniger Verlage, published the dime novel series Die Kolonial-Bücherei: Erlebnisse und Abenteuer tapferer wagemutiger Deutscher in unseren Kolonien, in fernen Ländern und auf fernen Meeren (The Colonial Library: Experiences and Adventures of Brave, Bold Germans in our Colonies, in Distant Lands and on Distant Seas, 1940–1942). Peters, cited in Ritter et al., ed., Kolonien im deutschen Schrifttum: Eine Übersicht über dt. koloniales Schrifttum unter Berücksichtigung nur volksdeutscher Autoren (Berlin: Verlag Die Brücke zur Heimat, 1936), n. page. Senta Dinglreiter, Ich besah mir die Welt: Ein Mädel reist um den Erdball (Biberach an der Riß: Koehler, 1954), 5–6. Dinglreiter, Ich besah mir die Welt, 6. See Timm Ebner, Nationalsozialistische Kolonialliteratur: Koloniale und antisemitische Verräterfiguren »hinter den Kulissen des Welttheaters« (Paderborn: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 2016), 164; and Richard Sperber, “Slave and Sovereign: Alma M. Karlin and Senta Dinglreiter in the Western Pacific,” Colloquia Germanica 40, no. 2 (2007): 175–96, here 178. Senta Dinglreiter, Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder? Eine Reise durch unsere Kolonien in Afrika (Leipzig: Koehler & Amelang,1935), 114. All further references appear in the text as Wann kommen and page number; Ebner, Nationalsozialistische Kolonialliteratur, 164. Else Frobenius, Die Frau im Dritten Reich: Eine Schrift für das deutsche Volk (Berlin-Wilmersdorf: Nationaler Verl. J. G. Huch, 1933), 54. Käthe is 19 years old at the beginning of the novel, which starts in January 1913. See Senta Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau in Afrika (Berlin: Junge Generation, 1940), 7–8. All further references appear in the text as Deutsche Frau and page number. In light of Senta Dinglreiter’s ideology, Käthe’s family name Braun (Brown) might have been chosen intentionally. On traditional gender roles in youth literature, see Joseph Kebe-Nguema, “Genderhybridität in der Mädchenkolonialliteratur des Deutschen Reiches,” in Gender in der deutschsprachigen Kinder- und Jugendliteratur, ed. Weertje Willms (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2022), 150, https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110726404-009. E.g. Hedda’s Lehrzeit in Südwest (1909; Hedda’s Apprenticeship in South West) by Käthe van Beeker, and Auf rauhen Pfaden (1910; On Rough Paths) by Valerie Hodann. Contrary to Tina, who faces Ovaherero assailants, Käthe must confront British colonial rule. See Elise Bake, Schwere Zeiten: Schicksale eines deutschen Mädchens in Südwestafrika (Munich: Gmelin, 1913; Difficult Times), 98; Dinglreiter, Deutsche Frau, 186. Kebe-Nguema, “Genderhybridität in der Mädchenkolonialliteratur des Deutschen Reiches,” 144. See also Else Frobenius’s sexist claim that “Erst der Mann vermag alle in der Frau schlummernden Entfaltungsmöglichkeiten zu wecken” (Only the man is able to awaken all the dormant possibilities of development in the woman), Frobenius, Die Frau im Dritten Reich, 53. Henny Koch, Die Vollrads in Südwest: Eine Erzählung für junge Mädchen (Stuttgart: Union, 1922; The Vollrad Family in South West), 1.

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39 E.g. Die Vollrads in Südwest (1916) by Henny Koch and Schwere Zeiten by Elise Bake (1913). 40 Clara Brockmann, Briefe eines deutschen Mädchens aus Südwest (Berlin: Mittler, 1912), 87. 41 The same mentality characterized National Socialism: “Auch die Ehe kann nicht Selbstzweck sein, sondern muß dem einen größeren Ziele, der Vermehrung und Erhaltung der Art und Rasse, dienen. Nur das ist ihr Sinn und ihre Aufgabe” (Marriage, too, cannot be an end in itself, but must serve the one greater goal, the propagation and preservation of the character and race. Only this is its meaning and its task), Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf: Zwei Bände in einem Band (Munich: Eher, 1943), 275–276. Regarding organized female emigration to the colonies, Else Frobenius states: “Man wählte das beste Menschenmaterial aus. Jede wurde ärztlich untersucht, ihre Herkunft genau geprüft” (The best human material was selected. Each one was examined by a doctor, their origin was carefully checked), Frobenius, Die Frau im Dritten Reich, 50. 42 Such interracial relationships were in fact quite common, which is why the aforementioned female German emigration to German South West Africa was organized in the first place. 43 The focus on the threat of interracial relationships differentiates Dinglreiter’s novel from older colonial fiction for girls. 44 This echoes National Socialist plans regarding former German colonies: In order to suppress interracial marriages, the Nazis sought to prohibit the emigration of unmarried Germans to the colonies. See Richard Lakowski, “Apartheid auf Deutsch. Kolonialpolitische Vorstellungen der Nationalsozialisten,” in Deutscher Kolonialismus: Ein Lesebuch zur Kolonialgeschichte, ed. Entwicklungspolitische Korrespondenz, compiled by Ekkehard Launer and Werner Ustorf (Hamburg: Gesellschaft für entwicklungspolitische Bildungsarbeit, 1991), 198. 45 “Verkafferung” is defined as follows: “Unter V. versteht man in DeutschSüdwestafrika das Herabsinken eines Europäers auf die Kulturstufe des ‘Eingeborenen’ […]. Einsames Leben im Felde, in stetem Verkehr mit ‘Farbigen’, ganz besonders aber die Mischehe mit jenen begünstigt diese bedauerliche Entartung weißer Ansiedler. […] Das sicherste Mittel gegen diese keineswegs zu unterschätzende Gefahr besteht in der Erleichterung der Eheschließung mit weißen Frauen” (In German South West Africa, V. is understood to mean the lowering of a European to the cultural level of the ‘native’ […]. Lonely life in the field, in constant intercourse with ‘colored people’, but especially intermarriage with them, favors this regrettable degeneration of white settlers. […] The surest remedy against this danger, which should by no means be underestimated, is to make it easier for them to marry white women), Karl Dove, “Verkafferung,” in vol. 3 P-Z of Deutsches Kolonial-Lexikon, ed. Heinrich Schnee (Leipzig: Quelle und Meyer, 1920), 606. 46 Both arguments echo Herr Lehmann’s words in the völkisch girls’ colonial novel Wiete erlebt Afrika (Wiete Experiences Africa). See Else Steup, Wiete erlebt Afrika (Berlin: Deutscher Verlag, 1938), 76–77. 47 Note that, although Leser is originally from Switzerland, he, like all Germanspeaking Swiss, is associated with Germanness. This underlines the pan-Germanic tone of Dinglreiter’s novel. Moreover, here, Portugal, although a European country, is constructed as Mediterranean and inferior to Germany. Paradoxically, though, the author praises Italy, which, although Mediterranean as well, had

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formed a fascist alliance with Germany, as referenced in Dinglreiter’s travelogue Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder? (see Dinglreiter, Wann kommen, 75). Since there was no such alliance with Portugal, Dinglreiter freely criticized the Portuguese colonial record, see Dinglreiter, Wann kommen, 17. Marieluise Christadler, “Jungdeutschland und Afrika: Imperialistische Erziehung durch das Jugendbuch 1880–1904,” in Die Dritte Welt im Kinderbuch, ed. Jörg Becker (Wiesbaden: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft, 1978), 36–57, here 49. See Die Vollrads in Südwest in which a young white German woman in German South West Africa, here the main character Hannah Vollrad, is “‘Gold wert hierzulande’” (worth gold in these parts), Koch, Die Vollrads in Südwest, 41. See Die Vollrads in Südwest by Henny Koch and Schwere Zeiten by Elise Bake. National Socialist literary critics objected to youth literature whose heroes had individualistic motivations, see Petra Josting, “Schmutz, Schund und Konjunktur–die unerwünschte Kinder- und Jugendliteratur,” in Darstellender Teil, vol 2 of Kinder- und Jugendliteratur 1933–1945: Ein Handbuch, ed. Norbert Hopster et al. (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2005), 110. Self-sacrifice for German interests is also evident in Else Frobenius’s Das Mädchen mit dem Pferde (The Girl with the Horse, 1941). Here, Ilse Kempfer wants to support Germany’s war effort in the Second World War. See Else Frobenius Das Mädchen mit dem Pferde (Berlin: Junge Generation, 1941), 25. Clara Brockmann, Die deutsche Frau in Südwestafrika: Ein Beitrag zur Frauenfrage in unseren Kolonien (Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler & Sohn, 1910), 64. Underlining the so-called achievements of National Socialism is a common trope in National Socialist colonial literature for girls. In Else Frobenius’s Das Mädchen mit dem Pferde (1941), National Socialism brings German settlers together: “Man hört gemeinsam am Radio die Nachrichten aus Deutschland—besonders läßt man sich keine Rede des Führers entgehen” (Frobenius, Mädchen, 12; One listens together to the news from Germany on the radio—in particular, one doesn’t miss any of the Führer’s speeches). Christine Holstein’s Deutsche Frau in Südwest (German Woman in South West; Leipzig: Koehler & Amelang, 1937) criticizes “Jewish exploitation,” which she blames for poverty in pre-Nazi Berlin, while praising NS achievements after 1936: “Welcher Unterschied! Es war wie Tag und Nacht. Da war ordentlich aufgeräumt und mit eisernem Besen ausgefegt worden in der Reichshauptstadt” (Holstein, Deutsche Frau, 150; What a difference! It was like day and night. The capital of the Reich had been properly tidied up and swept out with an iron broom). Frenssen, Peter Moors Fahrt nach Südwest, 14; Frenssen, Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa, 16. Frenssen, Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa, 16. Frenssen, Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa, 16. The historical reality was vastly different. Reder’s claim omits the labor exploitation of the Ovaherero at the hands of German settlers and the fact that German colonial rule in Hereroland disrupted indigenous agriculture, while expropriating their livestock (see Drechsler, Aufstände in Südwestafrika, 41). Reder does not mention that the British provided logistic support for the German colonial troops during their crushing of the Bondelzwarts’s rebellion in German South West Africa in 1903 (see Drechsler, Aufstände in Südwestafrika, 44). Nor does he mention that 80% percent of the Ovaherero

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population died as a result of German extermination (Drechsler, Aufstände in Südwestafrika, 139), whereas the German colonial troops—including their native soldiers—lost circa 700 combatants (General Staff 1907: quoted by Isabel V. Hull, Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in Imperial Germany (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005), 88. According to Fatima El-Tayeb, the exploitation of the Ovaherero, a systemically dysfunctional justice system that favored German settlers, and sexual violence all led to the Ovaherero uprising (El-Tayeb, Schwarze Deutsche, 79–80). Blaming the uprising on the British colonial power misrepresents the realities of German colonialism and erases the agency of the Ovaherero and Nama nations. In Wann kommen die Deutschen endlich wieder?, she blames them for humiliating the German settler population by siding with Jewish people against the former (107). Schnee, Schuldlüge, 81. Once more white settlers are cast as caretakers who must look after an infantilized colonized population, see Dinglreiter, Wann kommen 194. Heinrich Schnee also defended the German colonial justice system: “All [a colonising country] can do is to prosecute delinquents with the utmost diligence and to see, as far as is possible, that all evil elements are eliminated. That this was done by the German government, especially in the years preceding the War, can be disputed by no one who is conversant with the actual facts” (Schnee, Schuldlüge, 111). Walter Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (Washington D.C.: Howard University Press, 1981), 151. The colonized population is assigned “the status of ’minor.” See Charles W. Mills, The Racial Contract (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997), 83. Vice-loving colonized people are a common trope in colonial discourse designed to cement the culture against nature discourse. Indeed, there is no alcohol abuse among settlers in Dinglreiter’s writings, even though this was a reality among White German settlers (see Drechsler, Aufstände in Südwestafrika, 19). Senta Dinglreiter, So sah ich unsere Südsee: Mit 42 Bildern nach Aufnahmen der Verfasserin (Leipzig: Hase & Koehler, 1939), 201. All further references appear as Südsee and page number. Volk ohne Raum was the initial title of Heinrich Grimm’s novel (1926), which argues that Germany needs colonies because there is not enough space in the metropole. See Peter Moors Fahrt nach Südwest (1906) by Gustav Frenssen, Die Helden der Naukluft (1912; The Heroes of the Naukluft Mountains, 1912) by Maximilian Bayer, Die Goldene Schlange (1907; The Golden Snake) by Otto Felsing or even the aforementioned colonial novels for girls published in imperial Germany. Despite this antagonism, Black soldiers were part of the German colonial troops. “Wie schon in der Weimarer Republik konnte Frenssens unverhohlene Schilderung des Genozids an den Herero nicht einfach imitiert werden, wenn der Widerstand gegen die ‘Kolonialschuldlüge’—und sei es aus einer unbequemen Nische heraus—fortgeführt werden sollte” (As in the Weimar Republic, Frenssen’s unvarnished account of the genocide of the Herero could not simply be imitated if resistance to the ‘colonial guilt lie’ was to continue— even if it was from an uncomfortable niche), Stefan Hermes, “Fahrten nach Südwest: die

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Kolonialkriege gegen die Herero und Nama in der deutschen Literatur (1904–2004) (Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2009), 124. Senta Dinglreiter, Ein Mädel reist durch Afrika: Selbsterlebtes im schwarzen Erdteil (Reutlingen: Enßlin & Laiblin, 1935), 25. All further references appear as Ein Mädel and page number. Bill Ashcroft et al., eds., Post-Colonial Studies: The Key Concepts (New York: Routledge, 2013), 37. The child-like nature of the native is a common trope in colonialist literature, see Brockmann, Briefe eines deutschen Mädchens aus Südwest, 100; Frobenius, Das Mädchen mit dem Pferde, 24; Schnee, Schuldlüge, 119; as well as in anti-Black discourse generally, see Aimé Césaire, Discourse on Colonialism, transl. Joan Pinkham (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2001), 60. The verb fressen in the German “Menschenfresserei” applies to animals, whereas “essen” applies to human beings. Consumption of human flesh is therefore an animal-like, uncivilized activity. According to Dinglreiter, anthropophagy is one of the reasons why New Guinea is underpopulated (Use ABB, 273). This takes the blame away from the colonial powers. See Brockmann, Die deutsche Frau in Südwestafrika, 27; Frenssen, Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa 1914, 99. See Rohrbach, Deutschlands koloniale Forderung, 126. Heinrich Schnee’s German Colonization Past and Future relies on the same argument (83). Mills, The Racial Contract, 84, 89. Adolf Hitler confirms Blackness’s (constructed) inferiority in Mein Kampf. He too relies on animal tropes, referring to Black persons as “half-apes” (Hitler, Mein Kampf, 479). In Dinglreiter’s texts, gendered constructs and the associated expectations do not seem to apply to the natives, which is not the case among European settlers. When discussing Black people in Dinglreiter’s texts, I use the term genre instead of gender. Tellingly, the actions of the colonized population are informed mainly by their Blackness and their constructed inferior status. Therefore, their gender and the associated humanity are negated, which is why “genre,” as Sylvia Wynter coined it, is used here. See Greg Thomas, “PROUD FLESH Inter/Views: Sylvia Wynter,” ProudFlesh: New Afrikan Journal of Culture, Politics and Consciousness, no. 4 (2006): 1–35, here 23–24. Mills, The Racial Contract, 56. e.g. Frenssen, Peter Moors Fahrt nach Südwest, 200; Frenssen, Peter Moor’s Journey to Southwest Africa, 233–234. German settlers were also dependent on the natives’ physical labor, which is why the extinction of the indigenous population was deemed counterproductive (Rohrbach, Deutschlands koloniale Forderung, 75). Holstein, Deutsche Frau in Südwest, 149; According to point four of the Nazi party program, Jewish people could not be “Volksgenossen,” see Feder, Das Programm der N.S.D.A.P. und seine weltanschaulichen Grundgedanken, 19. Rather, they are naturalized as foreign. Unlike Käthe, Herr Goldstein is invested in class differences. This too highlights his immoral nature, since racial difference erases class difference in National Socialist Ideology. Streicher 1934, cited in Warmbold, ‘Ein Stückchen neudeutsche Erd’ … ’, 184. “The true situation can accurately be presented in the following terms: African workers and peasants produced for European capitalism goods and services of

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a certain value. A small proportion of the fruits of their efforts was retained by them in the form of wages, cash payments, and extremely limited social services, such as were essential to the maintenance of colonialism” (Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, 212–213). 87 Sylvia Wynter, “Unsettling the Coloniality of Being/Power/Truth/Freedom: Towards the Human, After Man, Its Overrepresentation—An Argument,” CR: The New Centennial Review 3, no. 3 (2003): 266, Project MUSE, https:// doi.org/10.1353/ncr.2004.0015. 88 de Gemeaux, “La République fédérale d’Allemagne et le Togo,” 159. 89 See Ben Zion Gad, “EU’s Borrell calls Europe ‘garden,’ rest of world a ‘jungle’,” The Jerusalem Post, October 18, 2022, https://www.jpost.com/ international/article-719895.

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Fire, Savannah, and Passion The New Africa Novel and the Construction of White Femininity Verena Hutter

German colonial novels, that is, novels published during European Imperialism and set in colonial spaces, traditionally are conceived as adventure novels. With some exceptions, such as Frieda von Bülow or Adda von Liliencron, these novels center around male protagonists who, through trials and tribulations, including wild animals, conflicts with Indigenous populations, idealistic but unhelpful missionaries, and impediments imposed by the German bureaucracy, succeed in proving their masculinity and return triumphantly to the imperial motherland. Contemporary literary engagements with the colonial past are also predominantly written by male writers, such as Uwe Timm, Ilija Trojanow, Giselher W. Hoffmann, Urs Widmer, and Christian Kracht, to name just a few. Their works won awards and have been debated in feuilletons and academic circles, and their literary merit is undeniable. A secondary mass market, however, targets white female readers: Africa romance novels (Afrikaromane). Written by German women writers, such as Patricia Mennen, Leah Bach,1 Karen Winter, Micaela Jary, or Ilona Maria Hilliges, the contemporary Africa romance novel is set primarily in German colonial spaces, the plot centering a white female protagonist, who makes her way in unknown lands, endures hardship and eventually finds love. Novels such as Sterne über Afrika (Stars over Africa, 2009, Ilona Hilliges), Der Himmel über dem Kilimandscharo (The Sky over Mount Kilimanjaro, 2015, Leah Bach), Der Ruf der Kalahari (The Call of the Kalahari, 2010, Patricia Mennen), or Zauber der Savanne (Enchanting Savannah, 2013, Patricia Mennen) are written for entertainment. They do not aspire to the status of belles-lettres, but they do attempt to modernize colonial adventure novels written around 1900, trying to add a postcolonial gaze. In the following, I focus on two sets of representative novels: Patricia Mennen’s Owitambe trilogy, consisting of Der Ruf der Kalahari (Call of the Kalahari, 2010), Sehnsucht nach Owitambe (Yearning for Owitambe, 2011), and Zauber der Savanne (Enchanting Savannah, 2013) set in German South West Africa (today’s Namibia) and spanning the period DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-12

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from 1903 to 1929. The second set consists of works by Hilke Sellnick writing as Leah Bach and Anne Jacobs, including Der Himmel über dem Kilimandscharo (The Sky over Mount Kilimanjaro, 2015), Sanfter Mond über Usambara (Golden Moon over the Usambara Mountains, 2019), and Insel der tausend Sterne (Island of a Thousand Stars 2020). They span the period from 1880 to 1914 in German East Africa, which corresponds roughly to today’s Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi and parts of Mozambique. In my reading, I pay particular attention to the structure of these texts and to the representation of gender and of the Indigenous populations. I also seek to highlight conflicting subtexts about colonialism. In particular, I argue that attempts to imbue the texts with a postcolonial gaze that depicts white women as protectors of Indigenous populations and harbingers of racial harmony remain unsuccessful; instead, these novels whitewash violent colonial history, re-affirm a deeply problematic narrative of the role of colonialism within the history of Western civilization, and reinforce racist tropes of white women as victims. My project situates these novels within the current German academic, sociocultural, and political discourse on the colonial past and warns that in the absence of an institutionalized colonial memory culture, these novels take the place of history, and add to a growing trend of colonial revisionist narratives. The Novels: Affirmative Literature Bach and Mennen’s novels can be categorized as formula fiction. Formula fiction is characterized by one-dimensional characters, predictable and repetitive structures, clichéd plot devices, and melodramatic actions and motivations of the protagonists. This preference for established patterns is reflected in the visual design of the book covers: romance novels set in African colonial spaces feature commonplace Western tropes and stereotypes about the African continent; two of Mennen’s books show outlines of grazing wild animals against a sunset. Mennen’s first book Ruf der Kalahari and Bach’s books hint at the story: The foreground features a woman in non-descript nineteenth-century garb staring longingly into the distance with a similarly non-descript landscape in the background. The cover extends the promise of a story about our protagonist who is trying to find her place in an unknown land. The title of this essay, “Fire, Savannah and Passion,” references this promise: the titles of romance novels set in Africa almost always contain buzzwords and suggestive phrases that raise and satisfy readers’ expectations of passion and adventure novel in an “exotic,” here colonial African, setting. Both Mennen’s and Bach’s novels begin in imperial Germany (1871–1914), showcasing protagonists who fail to conform to the demands of a restrictive and repressive Wilhelmine society. Disillusioned, the misfits flee to the colonies, where they hope to start anew. Upon their

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arrival on the African continent, both Mennen’s and Bach’s protagonists experience adventure and calamity; in the end, union with a love interest completes the story arc. In Der Ruf der Kalahari, Mennen’s protagonist, Jella von Sonthofen, an impoverished noblewoman, is presented as strong-willed and spirited. She dreams of becoming a physician, a career largely inaccessible to women at the time. Her unconventional character also manifests itself physically: she is “too tall” for a woman, with a head of red, untamable, curly hair. Microbiologist Robert Koch, here portrayed as a friendly proto feminist, takes her on as a laboratory aide and trains her as a nurse. After the death of her mother, Jella, with the help of another friend, artist Heinrich von Zille, decides to move to German South West Africa to look for her long-lost father, Johannes von Sonthofen. She succeeds in locating her father and courageously saves him from the clutches of a criminal couple intent on stealing his farm, Owitambe. Over time, she befriends a Joansi-San girl named Nakeshi, with whom she feels a mystical bond and who teaches her traditional plant knowledge. Jella’s happiness is complete upon marrying former veterinarian and wildlife conservationist Fritz van Houten. They settle on Owitambe, which they run on egalitarian principles, Blacks and Whites are working alongside each other. The second sequence of Mennen’s trilogy, Sehnsucht nach Owitambe, traces the events of the Herero-Nama genocide, after which the family is forced to leave German South West Africa. Jella, Fritz, and their daughter spend 15 years in exile in India before returning. The second part of the second novel and the third novel, Zauber der Savanne, follow the trials and tribulations of various family members. These involve repeated attempts of the antagonistic neighbor Rüdiger von Nachtmahr and his partner Jon Baltkorn to gain control of Owitambe. Another, less predictable, plotline focuses on Jella’s bi-racial half-brother Raffael who struggles to be accepted in both his mother’s Himba society and his father’s white settler society. His difficulty in finding a place in society intensifies when he marries Sonja von Nachtmahr, the unloved daughter of the owner of the neighboring farm and family’s arch-nemesis Rüdiger von Nachtmahr. The three-novel series ends after the return of Fritz and Jella’s daughter Ricarda to Owitambe in 1928, as three generations celebrate the christening of Ricarda’s newborn daughter. Charlotte Hansen, the orphaned protagonist of Bach’s series, grows up in Northern Germany with her grandparents and dreams of faraway countries. She, too, is described as willful, and, like Jella, she stands out visually: she has “fülliges, pechschwarzes Haar” (full, jet-black hair), her eyes are reminiscent of amber and in the summer months her skin takes on a “leichte Brauntönung” (a light tan).2 The text attributes her appearance to her maternal grandmother who hails from India, which others her and makes her the subject of local gossip.

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Charlotte marries Christian, the owner of a Kolonialwarenladen (a store selling goods from the colonies), which soon goes bankrupt. To avoid public scandal and legal consequences, Christian, Charlotte, and her cousin Clara escape to Dar-es-Salaam, where he succumbs to malaria. During the Maji–Maji Rebellion (1905–1907), Charlotte is abducted but rescued by bon vivant and coffee plantation owner Max von Roden. They marry and Charlotte gives birth to daughter Elisabeth. Their marital bliss is abruptly cut short by Max’s sudden death from a snake bite, leaving Charlotte to run the plantation. Charlotte excels at this, turning the originally small enterprise into a thriving business. Female empowerment, as we will see, is intimately connected to capitalism, which in turn, is seen as an essential part of the European “civilizing mission.” Ultimately, she reunites with her childhood sweetheart George, an English aristocrat and doctor, and settles in Dar-es-Salaam. Bach’s third Africa novel, Insel der tausend Sterne (2020), is similar in plot and storyline. Upon discovering that she was adopted, protagonist Paula von Dahlen travels to Dar-es-Salaam to find her biological father. Like Charlotte, she is a modern, independent woman, and, again like Charlotte, she ends up running a coffee plantation. On the island of Zanzibar, where she locates her father, she is welcomed with open arms and re-connects with journalist and love interest Tom, who had repeatedly rescued her in the past. The repetitiveness of the plotlines, especially visible here, is not accidental, but an inherent quality. It points to the fact that formulaic novels are also always affirmative: These books are not pedagogic or disruptive. Rather, much like crime novels, they satisfy the reader’s expectations, provide catharsis, and affirm their worldview, in this case, a romanticized vision of colonialism. Imperial Feminism Both Mennen’s and Bach’s novels champion a modern self-understanding of women by way of their protagonists. Implicitly or explicitly, female empowerment is connected to the purported German “civilizing mission.” Life in Africa, the pre-industrialized continent, is hard, but it also presents new opportunities, for example, a “do-over” for industrialization, where women are equal participants in capitalistic enterprises and can control their destiny. The novels assert that Africa, the seemingly backward continent, can serve as a laboratory or trial ground for emancipation and professional fulfillment. Thus, Mennen writes: Auch in Deutsch-Südwest achtete man die Regeln der Sitte und des Anstands, doch sie wurden angesichts der oft schwierigen Lebensumstände etwas großzügiger ausgelegt. So war es hier nichts Ungewöhnliches, wenn

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eine Frau ihr Leben selber in die Hände nahm. Frauen wie ihre Freundin, die Krankenschwester Lisbeth, führten ein angesehenes Leben, das sie selbst bestimmten, ohne sich in die Obhut eines Mannes begeben zu müssen. [In German South-West Africa too one respected the rules of custom and decency but they were interpreted, more generously in light of the often difficult living conditions. Thus, it was not uncommon here for a woman to take her life into her own hands. Women, like her friend, the nurse Lisbeth, led a respected, self-determined life, without having to put themselves in the care of a man.]3 In contrast, Bach’s texts suggest that gender politics, that is, the oppression of women, is universal and advocate for solidarity among women in the fight against male dominance: “Es war in Afrika auch nicht viel anders als daheim in Deutschland: Schulen waren für Männer da, die Mädchen brauchten keine Bildung. Für eine Frau war die Arbeit auf dem Feld gut, die Sorge um die Kinder und den Ehemann, und nicht selten mussten sie durch kleine Handelsgeschäfte auch noch das Geld für die Familie verdienen” (It was not much different in Africa than at home in Germany: schools were for men, the girls did not need any education. Working in the fields was fine for a woman, taking care of the children and husband, and not infrequently they also had to earn money for the family by conducting small trades).4 Throughout Mennen’s and Bach’s novels, complicated inter-cultural and inter-racial gender politics are reductively rendered through simplistic phrases. In Germany, Charlotte’s appearance is read as “exotic,” and serves to other her; in Africa, she indulges in what sociologist Herbert Gans has called “symbolic ethnicity:” she makes a point of mentioning her Indian grandmother when negotiating with Indian traders; otherwise, she is “read” as white and enjoys the privileges associated with whiteness.5 As a result of such simplifications, female emancipation is equated with advancing in capitalist systems of exploitation, especially in Bach’s novels. In Insel der tausend Sterne, protagonist Paula reflects on how Black plantation workers are “nicht gewohnt einer weißen Frau zu gehorchen” (not used to obey a white woman).6 This suggests again that male chauvinism, regardless of skin color, is universal. Paula ultimately earns the respect of the workers by withholding wages from “ungehorsame Arbeiter” (disobedient workers). Wage theft as punishment is presented as acceptable because it is better than physical violence, which Paula, the modern white woman, rejects. Here too, Africa allows the white woman to realize her career ambitions; her “work” as overseer of a plantation becomes a source of pride: “Die Anerkennung, die sie für ihre Arbeit erhielt, war ihr unendlich wichtig. Zum ersten Mal in ihrem Leben lag Verantwortung in ihren Händen, niemand redete ihr ein, sie sei nur eine Frau und daher für diese

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Arbeit ungeeignet”7 (The recognition she received for her work was infinitely important to her. For the first time in her life, responsibility lay in her hands, no one told her that she was only a woman, and therefore unfit for this job). Valerie Amos and Pratibha Parmar call this phenomenon “imperial feminism”: in Western eyes, imperialism presents as progress for pre-capitalist societies, regardless of the continued oppression of Indigenous populations.8 Paula and Charlotte, as white women, are the face of progress and modernity, conveniently eliding the fact that they owe their status to a white supremacist social hierarchy. While Mennen’s and Bach’s novels seemingly champion female emancipation and independence, they are careful to hedge their bets: each protagonist eventually marries her love interest, implicitly affirming the patriarchal structures that confine them. At the same time, as modern women, they also realize their dreams: Jella and her husband run Owitambe. Although she has no formal training beyond her nursing education, Jella assumes the role of the “white doctor”; she treats patients and works together with local healers. While Charlotte finds professional success on her plantation, she ultimately complies with the wishes of her third husband George and settles in Dar-es-Salaam. After being reunited with her father, Paula gives in to her admirer’s wooing and accepts his marriage proposal. The African colonies are presented as spaces in which gender roles are less rigid than in Imperial Germany; they offer room for experimentation, albeit, within a white supremacist, patriarchal framework as female emancipation and traditional marriage go hand in hand. Africa as Space for Everyone: Interactions with Indigenous Populations In all the novels discussed above, the inextricable link between race and gender is also evident in the white women’s interactions with Indigenous peoples. To be sure, both Mennen and Bach attempt to transcend the binary of black vs. white; they make a point of describing the various peoples inhabiting German South West and East Africa. Yet, they remain caught in clichés and beholden to a white Western perspective: Jella feels a mystical connection to the San people, especially to her friend and “Sternenschwester” (star sister) Nakeshi, who lives in tune with nature. This bond between a “noble savage” figure and a white German woman not only “perpetuates exoticist fantasies in historical and pseudo-feminist guise,”9 but functions similarly to what has been termed “Indianthusiasm”10: Just as German nationalists sought to distinguish themselves from other European nations by presenting themselves as soul mates of Native Americans,11 Jella’s mystical bond with Nakeshi positions her as a “good colonizer,” as opposed to violent brutes, such as their neighbor Rüdiger von Nachtmahr.

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Bach’s novels contrast the Chaga people and the Massai and briefly mention the Shambaa but ignore the over 100 ethnic groups living in Tanzania: the Chaga are praised for being hard-working, albeit sometimes “ungehorsam” (disobedient). In contrast, Bach’s depiction of the Massai, like Mennen’s depiction of the San people, presents as a random amalgamation of colonial fantasies paired with notions of the “noble savage.” Before her arrival in Dar-es-Salaam, Charlotte voices her desire to encounter the “fremdartigen, wundervollen Wesen” (the strange, wonderful creatures), especially “die Massai, diese stolzen Krieger, die niemals versklavt werden können, da sie in Gefangenschaft sterben”12 (the Massai, these proud warriors, who can never be enslaved, since they die in captivity). Beyond such contradictory characterizations—the Massai are first dehumanized as “creatures,” then deemed “proud”—the text’s admiration for their love of freedom, albeit a common trope also applied to Native Americans, is part and parcel of a white supremacist mindset. In singling out the Massai, Bach suggests that other Indigenous peoples may not value freedom as much (and may therefore be enslaved). Seen in this light, Bach’s ostensible admiration of the Massai implies contempt for those who do not die from but endure slavery. In both Bach’s and Mennen’s novels the Indigenous populations speak rudimentary German; they make grammatical errors, produce short sentences, and occasionally use local expressions, especially when addressing the white characters, such as the Swahili terms bibi and bwana or the Boer term baas. Using the Swahili or Boer form of address familiarizes, perhaps even naturalizes, the white settlers. Instead of demarcating them as the violent intruders they are, the honorific integrates white people into the local language and thus into the lives of the colonized. Conversely, grammatical errors in the use of the colonizers’ language mark black Africans as Other and infantilize them, suggesting that they are in need of (white, German) guidance. This is further supported by the texts’ recitations of African workers’ assertions of love and by descriptions of their docile and admiring behavior. In Mennen’s novel, Jella’s father Johannes is addressed as “der gute Baas” (the good master) who “wurde für seine menschenfreundliche Art und Hilfsbereitschaft von allen schwarzen Farmarbeitern geachtet”13 (was respected by all black farm workers for his philanthropic nature and readiness to help). Bach’s novels are replete with representations of black devotion to white masters. During a stay in Germany, Charlotte receives several desperate letters from her housekeeper Hamuna, who implores her to return to the plantation, since they are without guidance and “weinen jeden Tag”14 (cry everyday). Although contemporary women writers reproduce racist world views that define the nineteenth-century colonial adventure novel, they depart from the established formula to some extent. While writers like Frieda von

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Bülow (1857–1909) or Adda von Liliencron (1844–1913) depict brutality and racism either as a simple matter of life, or even delight in it, Mennen’s and Bach’s protagonists, and their families, condemn racism and violence in strong terms. In all novels, the main characters insist on the humanity of the Indigenous populations and protest racial injustice. When racism and excessive violence are depicted, they are presented not as structural problems, but as the character flaws of individual antagonists. The contrast between protagonists and antagonists then serves to foreground the goodness of the white female characters, such as Jella von Sonthofen, the white healer in South West Africa, and Charlotte, the planter in East Africa who takes care of her workers like a mother. Here, the image of the caring mother is of particular interest. In a letter to her third husband George, Charlotte writes: Ich schlage meine Wurzeln tief in die Erde, ich spüre dieses Land, ich liebe es, ich leide daran, bin für sein Wohlergehen verantwortlich wie eine Mutter für ihr Kind. Neu-Kronau—das sind vor allem die Menschen, für die ich verantwortlich bin. Alle meine schwarzen Angestellten, die im Haus und die draußen in den Arbeiterwohnungen. Und sogar die Schwarzen in den umliegenden Dörfern. Neu-Kronau— das sind meine Tiere, die Wiesen, Berge, Waelder, meine Äcker, die Sisalpflanzen,die blühenden Kaffeebäumchen. Das alles ist lebendig, und ich muss mich darum kümmern. Warum also sollte ich kein Recht auf dieses Land haben, da doch so viele Wesen meine Fürsorge benötigen?15 [I plant my roots deep into the earth, I feel this land, I love it, I suffer from it, am responsible for its well-being like a mother for a child. NeuKronau—above all, it is the people I am responsible for. All my black employees, those in the house and those outside in the workers’ quarters. And even the blacks in the surrounding villages. NeuKronau—that is my animals, the meadows, mountains, forests, my fields, the sisal plants, the flowering coffee trees. All this is alive, and I have to take care of it. Why then shouldn’t I have a right to this land, since so many beings need my care?] In the metropole, nineteenth-century Germany weaponized the image of the strict but generous paternal factory owner against the growing labor movement—the Social Democratic Party (SPD) was founded in 1863. In the colonial context, the stereotype of the motherly plantation owner, which echoes a long tradition of embodying the nation as a female figure, serves to justify colonial exploitation and the expropriation of Indigenous peoples.16 Charlotte’s “ich liebe es, ich leide daran” (I love it, I suffer from it) allows her to stylize herself as a mater dolorosa, the long-suffering pièta of the Usambara mountains. At the same time, the statement conveys the

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importance of her presence to Germany’s purported civilizing mission, as does her brief excursion into blood-and-soil rhetoric. Exploitive and extractive colonial power is re-packaged as motherly care, and the local population is reduced to the status of children. This description is rooted in the historicist notion that European civilization is more “advanced” than the rest of the world, rendering non-European cultures as less developed and childlike. The (Failed) Attempt at a Postcolonial Gaze Both Patricia Mennen and Leah Bach attempt the balancing act of providing a postcolonial perspective or gaze in their novels whilst staying true to their goal of writing a historical novel. They are by no means alone in this quest. Commenting on the popularity of historic Africa novels since the 1990s, Dirk Göttsche states that there exists “kein[en] Roman, der nicht koloniale Gewalt- und Ausbeutungsverhältnisse, deutsche Kolonialpolitik, Rassismus und die wilhelminische Geschlechterordnung kritisiert … ohne dadurch allerdings vor neuerlichen Exotismen und Paternalismen geschützt zu sein”17 (no novel that does not criticize colonial violence and exploitation, German colonial politics, racism and Wilhelmine gender roles … without being thereby protected from renewed exoticism and paternalism). Indeed, both writers remain beholden to problematic ideologies and reproduce stereotypical images, despite attempts to resist them. In both Mennen’s and Bach’s texts, the attempt at a postcolonial gaze is evident in strong and explicit condemnations of racism or the repeated insistence on the humanity of the Indigenous populations. Similarly, when discussing the fate of the Herero-Nama people, Mennen’s characters use the word “Völkermord” (genocide). In this, Mennen exceeds the position of the German government, which acknowledged the fact only hesitantly and in painfully vague wording in 2021, after years of activism and legal battles with representatives of the Herero and Nama population. In Bach’s second novel, Sanfter Mond über Usambara, Charlotte—especially when challenged by her anti-colonialist husband—admits to and laments the German administration’s cruel policies against the local population, including its full responsibility for the Maji–Maji rebellion. In spite of these rhetorical gestures, however, the novels continue to present white supremacy and racism as character flaws rather than integral elements of a brutal system of subjugation; similarly, they perceive the extractive cultivation of land and exploitation of its people as a playground for the protagonists’ emancipatory self-realization, rather than naked capitalism. As a result, the novels’ purported postcolonial gaze remains nothing but a chimera, the authors’ good intentions drowned out by discursive acts of relativization, such as favorable comparisons with

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other colonial powers and historical inaccuracies. Instead of adopting the intended postcolonial gaze, the authors (re)produce a neocolonial gaze. While several novels feature characters who embrace anti-colonial points of view or who object to certain aspects of colonialism, the protagonists dismiss their critique offhand. For example, the humanitarian opposition of an English aristocrat who argues against exploiting the local population on plantations is set aside as the talk of a detached nobleman who has always been wealthy and never had to work; similarly, a school teacher’s opposition to child labor and wage theft is shrugged off as socialist babble. In each case, the protagonists declare that “in Afrika ist genug Platz für alle”18 (Africa has enough space for everyone), thus, articulating a vision that includes white colonizers, and Indigenous peoples along with Indian and Arabic traders. Indeed, the protagonists’ platitudes reveal their (and perhaps the author’s) attitudes: a naïve belief in benevolent colonialism, or in what Göttsche, paraphrasing Sartre, calls a “better colonialism.”19 While both authors rely on historical events as a backdrop for the action and on diligent research with respect to factual events, they also recycle colonial myths. In Bach’s novels, for example, the Askari soldiers are portrayed as brave, loyal, and proud to wear the German uniforms: “Die Parade machte ihnen Spaß, das sah man den schwarzen Soldaten deutlich an. Mit Stolz präsentierten sie Gewehre und Munitionsgürtel, und das »Heia Safari« der Militärkapelle geriet so lautstark, dass die schwarzen Offiziere ihre Befehle aus Leibeskräften brüllen mussten, um gegen die Bläser und Trommler anzukommen”20 (Looking at the black soldiers, one could see that the parade was fun for them. They proudly presented rifles and ammunition belts, and the military band’s “Heia Safari” got so loud that the black officers had to shout their orders at the top of their lungs to keep up with the horns and drums). While Bach portrays the Askari soldiers as happy campers, historians, such as Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst or Michelle Moyd, have examined the complexities of the Askari soldiers’ experiences, both their complicity in the colonial enterprise, as well as their limited agency and exploitation. Moyd thoroughly dismantled one-dimensional representations of “loyal Askaris” as self-serving myths of German colonizers: “in using the askari to construct a myth about Germany’s past as a model colonizer, colonial apologists elided the devastating toll that nearly three decades of German colonialism had exacted on East African peoples.”21 Despite Mennen’s “original contribution to the postcolonial memory discourse,”22 in particular, her decision to refer to the Herero-Nama genocide as “Völkermord,” her books perpetuate myths. Governor of German South West Africa Theodor Gotthilf Leutwein (1849–1921) may appear “friedfertig”23 (peace-loving) when compared to his murderous and cruel successor, General Lothar von Trotha (1848–1920). And yet, Leutwein’s

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opposition to genocide rested primarily on his conviction that Indigenous labor was needed to keep the colonists’ farms economically viable.24 Similarly, Mennen’s portrayal of Robert Koch as friendly and emancipated is supported by scant evidence: it is rooted in the fact that he had a wife “die ihn bei seinen Forschungen unterstützte” (who supported him in his research).25 Hedwig Koch did indeed support her husband: she let him test tuberculin on her. Choosing to focus only on Koch as a medical visionary, Mennen also does not mention Koch’s human experiments in Africa.26 To be sure, the protagonists occasionally engage in introspection. Leah Bach’s first novel, for example, ends with a sober commentary on colonialist practices and the protagonist’s temporary return to Germany. But the texts do not offer systemic criticism; whenever they hint at larger problems, they immediately undermine and relativize their critique, for example, by offering comparisons of German colonialism with that of other states. Thus, Charlotte’s husband Max von Roden proudly declares that on his plantation “wird nicht geprügelt wie bei den Buren, und es gibt auch keine kiboko, höchstens mal ein hartes Wort”27 (we do not beat people like the Boers, and there is also no kiboko, at most a harsh word at times). After traveling through Belgian-Congo, Charlotte muses, “Auch die Deutschen hatten die Eingeborenen Afrikas nicht immer sanft behandelt, doch seit dem Maji–Maji-Aufstand versuchte man hierzulande, einen besseren Weg einzuschlagen”28 (The Germans, too, had not always treated the natives of Africa gently, but since the Maji–Maji uprising, attempts were made here to find a better way). If we remember the Maji–Maji uprising’s overall death toll of 75,000–300,00029 and the subsequent famine induced by a scorched-earth policy,30 the expression “nicht immer sanft” must be considered wildly inappropriate. Even though the authors did not create the imperial myths they propagate in their texts, portraying their white, female protagonists as modern, emancipated, and even as harbingers of racial harmony is especially problematic. The historic reality of German women in colonial Africa was a far cry from that of the novels’ protagonists. As Lora Wildenthal has shown, life in the colonies did afford white women some measure of social mobility along with freedoms denied to them in the homeland. In order to gain permission to participate in colonial endeavors, however, these women “had to convince men that they were necessary to empire.”31 Thus, colonial women presented themselves as preservers of Germanness; a stance that implied support for the segregation and subjugation of Indigenous populations: “Colonial racism in all its intentions, manifestations and effects was a project implemented by German women and German men in interaction with one another.”32 Martha Mamozai argues that women’s gratitude for the upward social mobility afforded to them manifested itself as nationalism: “Sie revanchierten sich mit glühendem Nationalismus. Ohne

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Nationalismus aber hätte keine Kolonie als solche Bestand haben können. Der Nationalismus wurde also wiederum zum Garanten ihrer privilegierten Situation”33 (They returned the favor with ardent nationalism. Without nationalism, however, no colony could have existed as such. Thus, nationalism, in turn, became the guarantor of their privileged situation). Moreover, we would do well to consider Marcia Klotz’s call to consider the “tangled complexities of race and gender.” In her article “Memoirs from a German Colony: What Do White Women Want?,” Klotz reminds us that there is “no monolithic description of European women’s role in the colonial campaign.”34 To be sure, Frieda von Bülow’s racist sadomasochistic domination fantasies are unique in their repulsiveness, and Grete Zieman’s militant insistence on racial purity seemed extreme even to many of her contemporaries. At the same time, examinations of diaries, articles in colonial journals, memoirs, and novels published by German women who had spent time in African colonies reveal a persistent filiation of white supremacy and women’s social advancement. The actions of white German women in the colonies imprinted an indelible stain on the feminist movement in Germany (and other western countries). In 1969 Karin Schrader-Klebert issued a call for unconditional solidarity among women of all races, a call the feminist magazine Emma reprinted and amplified in 1981.35 While she attempted to remedy the sins of the past, she herself used a racist slur in the title and equated racism and gender discrimination, suggesting that patriarchal oppression was the only real marker of difference. Following this reasoning, she did not acknowledge the unique experiences of BIPOC women, nor did Emma provide a space for them to voice their experiences, opinions, and demands. Instead, Emma spoke for them. It would appear that in the 1980s the legacy of imperial feminism was alive and well. The authors’ inability to see their own embeddedness in a system of white supremacy, aided by the ubiquity of white feminism in Germany, likely contributes to their failure to engage critically with their protagonists. While Mennen’s stated intention was to highlight Indigenous peoples’ plight and their fight for survival36—she repeatedly traveled to Africa to conduct research—her novels are ultimately what Göttsche describes as a “Rückprojektion heutiger Wunschvorstellungen von freier Interkulturalität” 37 (retro-projection of today’s wishful thinking of free interculturality). Yet even such wishful thinking is shaped by white savior narratives and designed to perpetuate a colonialist mindset. Leah Bach, in contrast, freely admits to writing three books set in colonial Africa without having ever set foot on the continent. Indeed, she prides herself on the fact that “Leute, die dort gewesen sind, haben mir bestätigt, ‘es ist genauso wie du es beschrieben hast’”38 (people who have been there have confirmed to me, “it is exactly like you described it”).

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Bach’s comment points to the crux of writing historical novels in general, and those set in colonial spaces in particular. It is unlikely that Bach spoke to anybody who experienced life in colonial Africa around 1900—more than 100 years after the colonial project. Thus, the assertion “genauso” is already one shaped by second-hand narratives, privileged (white) perspectives, and colonial myth. As Hermann Schulz has observed, “our image of Africa may be the most obvious legacy of German colonialism.”39 The goal of portraying a period in history accurately is always already doomed to fail, especially if its authors lay claim to a postcolonial, anti-racist perspective. By recycling colonial motifs, centering white women in their narratives, and perpetuating colonial myths, these novels—intentionally or not—extend a colonialist mindset into the present. As mentioned earlier, Mennen’s and Bach’s formulaic novels can be categorized as “Trivialliteratur” (trivial literature) or even “Schundliteratur” (pulp fiction); it would be difficult to prove that they have literary value. Still, they are not written for a rarified audience, and one should not underestimate their mass appeal and sociocultural impact in an era of global populism. The texts are widely available in digital form and in print; on Amazon Germany alone, hundreds of reviews praise them for being “spannend” (suspenseful), mention the “fesselnden Schreibstil” (gripping style), and even voice hopes that “Wenn, wie in diesem Roman beschrieben, alle zusammen halten würden, also Schwarz und Weiß, könnte das Leben sehr viel angenehmer sein”40 (if, as described in this novel, everyone would stick together, that is, Black and White, life could be much more pleasant). While it is easy for us to deride and ridicule these contemporary colonial novels (and perhaps by extension their readers), the full extent of their cultural impact becomes evident when they are contextualized with Germany’s (lack of a) colonial memorial culture. Colonial Memorial Culture in Germany While German colonialism has been discussed in academic circles since the 1970s, it has been largely absent from wider public debates and institutionalized memory culture, including history curricula in schools, public remembrance days, or monuments. Instead, Germany has chosen myth over history. Roland Barthes reminds us that “myth deprives the object of which it speaks of all History. In it, history evaporates.”41 According to Barthes, the main function of a myth is to naturalize a concept, or a belief, whether it is rooted in actual history or not. Barthes’ example of a magazine cover featuring a black French soldier saluting the Tricolore is eerily similar to the Askari myth: The image, he writes, suggests that “there is no better answer to the detractors of an alleged colonialism than the zeal shown by this ‘Negro’ in serving his so-called oppressors.”42 In the 1920s,

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colonial myths empowered colonial apologists; in the post-WWII era, such myths allowed Germany to sidestep debates on decolonization. The mythologization of colonial history has found expression in street names commemorating the likes of Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck (1870–1964) and Carl Peters (1856–1918), or in the so-called “Afrikanisches Viertel” in Berlin, which is rooted in Carl Hagenbeck’s plan to build a human zoo to showcase inhabitants of Germany’s overseas colonies. The Schutztruppen Denkmal (protective forces monument) in Hamburg’s so-called “Tanzania Park” was erected by the Nazis to celebrate the achievements of German colonialists. Furthermore, the discipline of German studies has privileged German-language texts about colonial Germany, but largely ignored the many writers from formerly colonized spaces who engaged with the German colonial heritage in other languages. And yet, the empire has been writing back, picking up what Kenyan author Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor calls the “derelict shards,”43 dealing with the aftermath of colonialism. There is a growing awareness of Germany’s colonial history fostered by public and academic debate about including colonialism in German remembrance culture. This is owed to the many activist groups, many of them BIPOC, artists, and public intellectuals who have long sounded clarion calls for education on colonialism, reparations, and the return of looted art, among other things. For a long time, these voices were ignored; only recently, in 2017, the great coalition (cabinet Merkel IV) referenced engagement with the colonial past in its coalition contract. Since then, the German government has acknowledged the Herero-Nama genocide, albeit in terms that were subject to strong criticism by descendants of the victim groups. As late as 2022, the (new) German government announced the return of the Benin Bronzes and other looted artifacts to the people of Nigeria. In a speech, foreign minister Annalena Baerbock expressed her hope that other museums would follow.44 While Ms. Baerbock’s idealism is commendable, it may not be feasible in reality. Writing about memory culture in Germany, Sabine Volk has identified two strategies employed by conservative actors in commemorative culture, the first being the avoidance or trivialization of problematic chapters in the past. The second strategy is more alarming: the promotion of “allegedly glorious episodes in the past,”45 especially the notion of Imperial Germany as a proto democracy. An example of such an uncritical engagement is the Humboldt-Forum, Berlin’s newest museum. The re-creation of a Prussian City Palace, housing one of the largest ethnographic collections (some of the unknown provenance), claims to be “a place for the arts and sciences, for exchange, diversity and a multiplicity of voices. A place where differences come together.”46 Conversely, critics compared the Palace to “Chernobyl”47 or decried it as a “preußisches Disneyland”48 (a Prussian Disneyland), highlighting the fact that the museum has only vague plans to return looted objects, or even engage in provenance research.

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Even more problematic than a depoliticized, uncritical view of Imperial Germany is the growing tendency of right-wing forces to minimize the crimes of colonialism and engage in colonial revisionism. Examining the toolkit of right-wing groups, Robert Heinze has shown how among other tactics, colonial revisionists re-cycle and reuse old colonial myths. They invoke “the idea that colonialism is a legitimate project, often with recourse to colonial propaganda.” Such rhetoric also includes the justification that the colonial project is anti-slavery, referencing the “civilizing mission and … the colonial revisionist propaganda of the Weimar Republic.”49 While Heinze focuses on right-wing forces, the relativization, and minimization of colonial crimes have also been employed in centrist, conservative discourses. As recently as 2018, Günter Nooke, Angela Merkel’s special delegate (Sonderbeauftragter) for Africa, declared that “die Kolonialzeit [hat] dazu beigetragen, den Kontinent aus archaischen Strukturen zu lösen” (the colonial period helped to extract the continent from archaic structures) and argued that the Cold War had done more damage to African countries than colonialism.50 In spite of public protests, Nooke remained in his position until 2021. The glaring lacuna of an official, institutionalized memorial culture on colonialism in Germany and the growth of revisionist narratives make the commercial success of pulp fiction, including Mennen’s and Bach’s books, possible. They take the place of historical education, and in doing so, reproduce the imperialist structures around us. Even more so, whether intended or not, these books serve as ideological stirrup-holders for more sinister forces. Conclusion: Accountability The editors of this volume state: “The problematic colonial past continues to permeate everyday encounters: immigrants and refugees are perceived as outsiders and/or branded as sexual predators; statues and street signs honor colonial perpetrators; everyday speech, ranging from TV news to advertisements, relies on derogatory racist and sexist terminology.”51 In my contribution I sought to shed light on discursive practices by which writers of popular romance novels set out to criticize colonialism and its practices, but instead—knowingly or not—re-affirm myths and further romanticize white supremacist belief systems. This opens several arenas of debates, including one on whether and how to write fiction about the colonial past. While such debates tend to focus on form, genre, and questions of power (whose voices are privileged by the publishing industry, for example), I added a focus on gender. All three protagonists discussed above, Charlotte, Paula, and Jella, are presented as identification figures, and their willing participation in systems of oppression is seen as progress. This “imperial feminism” is still strong: it is

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no coincidence that the feminist magazine that demanded unconditional solidarity from Black women in the 1980s now engages in blatant Islamophobia. The practice of portraying white women as innocent bystanders or agents of racial harmony engages in (global) historic revisionism and hinders us from embracing anti-racist practices, including accountability for historical wrongs and crimes. Again, it is easy to minimize the impact of popular novels on larger public or literary debates, but, as we have learned from media studies, representation matters. B. Venkat Mani has shown how books do not exist in a vacuum but are embedded in a global market.52 While Mennen’s books have not been translated yet, Bach’s books are available in several European languages. The Africa romance novel is part of a larger, international genre of romance novels in colonial spaces. These texts have the power to shape our thoughts and ideas and to normalize white supremacy, especially through the figure of the white, innocent heroine. Colonial revisionism is on the rise, despite or perhaps because of growing demands to acknowledge the colonial past, offer restitution and engage in a worldwide reckoning with racial injustices. To combat this alarming trend, a new politics of memory dedicated to decolonization and postcolonial justice, education, and vocal anti-racist practices needs to be fostered and promoted, both by civic initiatives and in the form of institutionalized Vergangenheitsaufarbeitung. Education and official commitments to decolonization and anti-racism are not a panacea to combat fascism, but they are our best hope.53 Notes 1 Leah Bach is one of authors Hilke Sellnick’s pen names. For simplicity’s sake, throughout the chapter, I refer to the author as Leah Bach. 2 Leah Bach, Der Himmel über dem Kilimandscharo (Munich: blanvalet, 2015), 223. 3 Patricia Mennen, Der Ruf der Kalahari (Munich: blanvalet, 2010), 1004. 4 Leah Bach, Der Himmel, 390. 5 Herbert Gans, “Symbolic Ethnicity: The Future of Ethnic Groups and Cultures in America,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 2, no. 1 (January 1979): 6. 6 Leah Bach, Insel der tausend Sterne (Munich: blanvalet, 2020), 550. 7 Bach, Insel, 550. 8 Valerie Amos and Prathiba Parmar, “Challenging Imperial Feminism,” Feminist Review 80 (2005): 48. 9 Dirk Göttsche, Remembering Africa: The Rediscovery of Colonialism in Contemporary German Literature (Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2013), 301. 10 Hartmut Lutz, Florentine Strzelczyk, and Renae Watchman, eds., Indianthusiasm: Indigenous Responses (Waterloo: Wilfried Laurier Press, 2020). 11 Frank Usbeck, Fellow Tribesmen: The Image of Native Americans, National Identity and Nazi Ideology in Germany (New York, Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2015), 4.

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Bach, Der Himmel, 445. Patricia Mennen, Ruf der Kalahari, 797. Leah Bach, Sanfter Mond über Usambara (Munich: blanvalet, 2019), 105. Leah Bach, Sanfter Mond, 707–8. Nira Yuval-Davis, Gender and Nation (London: Sage, 1997); Claire Bielby, Violent Women in Print: Representations in the West German Media of the 1960s and 1970s (Rochester: Camden House, 2012); Lauren Nossett, The Virginal Mother in German Culture: From Sophie von La Roche and Goethe to Metropolis (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2019). Dirk Göttsche, “Deutsche Kolonialgeschichte als Faszinosum und Problem in neuen historischen Afrika-Romanen und historischen Biographien zur afrikanischen Diaspora,” in Postkoloniale Germanistik. Bestandaufnahme, theoretische Perspektiven, Lektüren, eds. Gabriele Dürbeck, Axel Dunker (Bielefeld: Aithesis Verlag, 2014), 375. Leah Bach, Der Himmel, 938; Leah Bach, Sanfter Mond, 45. Dirk Göttsche, Remembering Africa, 303. Leah Bach, Sanfter Mond, 552. Michelle Moyd, Violent Intermediaries: African Soldiers, Conquest and Everyday Colonialism in German East Africa (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2014), 209–10. Dirk Göttsche, Remembering Africa, 253. Patricia Mennen, Sehnsucht nach Owitambe (Munich: blanvalet, 2011), 362. Theodor Leutwein, Elf Jahre Gouverneur in Deutsch-Südwestafrika (Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler und Sohn, 1906), 545–7. Mennen, Der Ruf, 909. Wolfgang Eckart, Medizin und Kolonialimperialismus (Leiden: Brill, 1997). Kiboko is the Swahili word for hippopotamus; this is a reference to the Sjambok, a whip made from hippo or rhinoceros hide, and used predominantly by Boer settlers. Leah Bach, Sanfter Mond, 510. John Illiffe, “The Organization of the Maji-Maji Rebellion,” The Journal of African History 8, no. 3 (1967): 495. Diana Miryong Naterman, Pursuing Whiteness in the Colonies: Private Memories from the Congo Free State and German East Africa (1884–1914) (Münster: Waxmann Verlag), 59. Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire 1884–1945 (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2001), 2. Wildenthal, German Women, 202. Martha Mamozai, Schwarze Frau, weiße Herrin. Frauenleben in den deutschen Kolonien (Hamburg: Rowohlt 1989), 152. Marcia Klotz, “Memoirs from a German Colony: What Do White Women Want?,” Genders 19 (1994): 154–187, 154. Karin Schrader-Klebert, “Die Frauen sind die Neger aller Völker,” Emma 2 (1981): 24–30. Patricia Mennen, Der Ruf, 907–9. Dirk Göttsche, “Deutsche Kolonialgeschichte,” 384. Anne Jacobs, “Livestream-Lesung auf LovelyBooks.de,” Nov 11, 2017, last accessed Aug. 1st, 2022; https://youtu.be/Rxtt-Hg6YqI Hermann Schulz, “Fremde Nähe: Persönliche Anmerkungen zu Begegnungen mit Afrika und zu den Spuren des deutschen Kolonialismus,” in Hamann, Hintergründe und Aktualität des Kolonialkriegs in Deutsch-Südwestafrika.

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Seine Rezeption in Literatur, Wissenschaft und Populärkultur (1904–2004), quoted in Göttsche, Remembering Africa, 251. “Traum von Afrika,” review by user Sanibel on amazon.de; May 18, 2014, https://www.amazon.de/-/en/Patricia-Mennen-ebook/dp/B009FQGUK4/ref= cm_cr_arp_d_pl_foot_top?ie=UTF8 (Last accessed Aug 8, 2022) Roland Barthes, Mythologies, translated by Richard Howers and Annette Lavers (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1957, 2012), 265. Barthes, Mythologies, 225. Yvonne Adhiambo-Owuor, “Derelict Shards: The Roamings of Colonial Phantoms,” Keynote at the Colonialism as Shared History. Past, Present, Future Conference, October 9, 2020, recording available on the website of the Gerda Henkel foundation: https://lisa.gerda-henkel-stiftung.de/sharedhistory_ keynote_owuor (Last accessed, Aug. 1st, 2022). “Speech by Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock at the Signing of the Joint Declaration between Germany and Nigeria,” Auswärtiges Amt, July 1st, 2022, https://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/en/newsroom/news/baerbock-benin-bronzesnigeria/2540458, last accessed, Aug 8, 2022) Sabine Volk, “Patriotic History in Postcolonial Germany, Thirty Years after “Reunification,” Journal of Genocide Research 24, no. 2 (2022): 276–287, 277. Humboldt Forum, “What we are,” https://www.humboldtforum.org/en/ about/, last accessed Aug 1st, 2022. Jörg Häntzel, “Kunsthistorikerin Bénédicte Savoy: Das Humboldt-Forum ist wie Tschernobyl,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, 20. July 2017, https://www.sueddeutsche.de/ kultur/benedicte-savoy-ueber-das-humboldt-forum-das-humboldt-forum-ist-wietschernobyl-1.3596423?reduced=true, last accessed, Aug 1st, 2022. Julian Zur Lage, “Ein preussisches Disneyland: Prof. Dr. Jürgen Zimmerer in verschiedenen deutschen und internationalen Medien über das Humboldt Forum,” Hamburgs Postkoloniales Erbe, Blog, 18.12. 2020, https:// kolonialismus.blogs.uni-hamburg.de/2020/12/18/ein-preussisches-disneylandprof-dr-juergen-zimmerer-in-verschiedenen-deutschen-und-internationalenmedien-ueber-das-humboldt-forum/, last accessed, Aug 1, 2022. Robert Heinze, “The AfD’s New Colonial Revisionism,” Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, Sept 28, 2021, https://www.rosalux.de/en/news/id/45065?fbclid= IwAR23gQJQqChB1R4-BDFhbslGblPeofakCfUtQula25HBoNan1GedGukzk2A, last accessed Aug 1st, 2022. Günter Nooke, “Wir haben viel zu lange im Hilfsmodus gedacht,” interview with Ulrike Ruppel, Berliner Zeitung, Oct 7, 2018, https://www.bz-berlin.de/ archiv-artikel/afrikabeauftragter-guenter-nooke-der-kalte-krieg-hat-afrika-mehrgeschadet-als-die-kolonialzeit Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang, “Introduction” in Gender and German Colonialism, eds. Elisabeth Krimmer and Chunjie Zhang (New York: Routledge, 2023), 2. Mani, Venkat B., Recoding World Literatures: Libraries, Print Culture and Germany’s Pact with Books (New York: Fordham University Press, 2017). I would like to thank the editors of this volume for their helpful and valuable feedback on previous drafts of this article. I am also indebted to my sister, Elisabeth Hutter, whose research on colonial masculinities has been an inspiration for this chapter.

Part 3

Intersections

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Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries Kā lidā sa’s Ś akuntalā in Germany Tanvi Solanki

This chapter examines the gendered reception of the Sanskrit play Abhijñānaśākuntalam (ca. fourth century CE), or Ś akuntalā , by the canonized Indian poet and playwright Kālidāsa (ca. fourth to fifth century CE) in male German scholars’ systematic study of the Sanskrit language and German poets and literary critics’ eroticized literary and poetic investments in Indian literature in the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries.1 I argue that this reception process erases the agentive voice of the drama’s eponymous heroine, and instead focuses on those parts of the play where she is depicted as a passive and silent plant-like female figure ultimately to further what I call a colonial philology. Poets and critics did not create the misogynist representations of her which were already present in Kālidāsa’s plot central to which is an episode in which a king impregnates and promises to marry Ś akuntalā , who is described as a young and innocent maiden, after he finds her while hunting in a forest. He later forgets about her due to a curse, thus offsetting any of his own responsibility. However, German and British scholars used the play for their own agenda, imbued with an unmarked heteronormative and colonizing gaze. The then newly established disciplines of comparative philology and Indology, with the accompanying linguistic and racial myth of the originary Indo-European, emerged in large part from the canonizing and now canonized readings of this drama by prominent German intellectuals, including Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749–1832), Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805), Johann Gottfried Herder (1744–1803), Georg Forster (1754–1794), Novalis (1772–1801), Friedrich Schlegel (1772–1829), and August Wilhelm Schlegel (1767–1845), to the point where scholars refer to this period as the “Shakuntala Era.”2 Kālidāsa’s Ś akuntalā and its German and British Reception as Colonial Philology The seven-act play or natak in Sanskrit presents a reworking of an episode from the Indian epic Mahabharata, both meant to be transmitted orally DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-14

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not only in the learned Sanskrit but also the vernacular Prakrit, associated with women’s language and male characters marked by low social status, such as the king’s companion.3 The play relates the love affair between Ś akuntalā , a foster daughter of a high-caste Brahmin hermit who has royal parentage, and the powerful king Dusyanta. He is described in Georg Forster’s German translation as sovereign over “die seeumgürtete Erde” (the sea-girded earth),4 “der Herr der Welt” (the lord of the world).5 The king discovers Ś akuntalā watering plants in an idyllic grove at the foot of the Himalayas during his hunt for antelope, after some religious hermits stopped him because he had entered sacred ground. Dusyanta impregnates her behind the scenes and gives her a ring as a promise that he will not forget her when he leaves for his kingdom, and boldly declares his intention to marry her, despite their caste differences as he is a ksatriya (warrior caste). This could happen through a gandharva marriage, which is based not on social acceptability and the matching of castes, but only on sexual intercourse. Demonic forces, however, angered by the lack of hospitality of Ś akuntalā’s household, curse him so that he forgets his impregnation of and marriage with Ś akuntalā. The curse can be lifted only if Ś akuntalā shows him the ring that he gave her. In the second half of the play, she travels to his kingdom to stay with him as his wife, only to find that he has no memory of her and denies having impregnated her and even meeting her. Moreover, the ring he had given her was lost in her journey. At this point in the original version of the epic Mahabharata rather than in Kālidāsa’s version, Ś akuntalā , who does not know about the curse, orates most elaborately and eloquently. She is angry at the king; indeed, this is the only moment in which she is represented as a defiant and assertive figure. When the ring is found, the king is remorseful. His morally repugnant behavior is attributed to his victimization by sacred, even demonic, forces, and he, Ś akuntalā , and their son, Bharata, are united in a paradisical setting. The son symbolizes the origin of the state of India, his name signifying the name of the country. The play caused a sensation in Germany’s predominantly male intellectual circles when Georg Forster, German travel writer and naturalist, translated the 1789 English translation of the play Sacontalâ; or The Fatal Ring by William Jones (1746–1794), the High Court Justice of the East India Company in Calcutta and founder of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Jones’s rendition had introduced Europe to the playwright and the play.6 Jones was a foundational and powerful figure in British India. He first translated the play with the help of Indian scholars, pandits, from Sanskrit into Latin, the language of the Catholic church and the elite republic of letters in Europe, which he thought bore “a great resemblance to Sanskrit” (Jones, Sacontala, vii). He had learned Sanskrit to be able to read and translate the ancient Laws of Manu and other legal tracts, motivated by a

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 209 drive to govern, control, and manage the colonized Indians. In learning Sanskrit and aspects of Indian culture, he relied on the help of high-caste scholars, brahmins, and pundits, and encountered literary texts in the language. When asked which plays were “universally esteemed,” he recounts, his Brahmin informant Radhacant told him about Ś akuntalā (Jones, Sacontala, vi). Jones believed that translating literary texts as well as legal tracts would allow the British to learn Indian customs, fables, religion, and prejudices.7 He canonized Kālidāsa in Europe by declaring him the Indian Shakespeare who represented the heights of Hindu civilization. In 1786, decades prior to German comparative linguistics, Jones hypothesized the idea of an Indo-European civilization, later taken up by the Germans, through his education in Sanskrit. As Siraj Ahmed has pointed out, it was his hypothesis that catalyzed, especially in Germany, “a feverish quest throughout the following century to reconstruct humanity’s prehistorical language and thus return to a period otherwise ‘lost in the darkness of time.’”8 This search for linguistic origins was accompanied by an abstracting and idealizing reading of the eponymous female protagonist of the play, which placed her as a metonym for the play itself and further diminished the character’s voice and agency, which were already compromised in the chain of translations starting from Kālidāsa. It is important to note that Forster’s translations—a partial translation in 1790 and a complete German translation in 1791—bore colonial origins via Jones. The connection between a text meant to aid the British in governing Indians and Forster’s seemingly innocuous translation, along with the literary, esthetic, anthropological, and linguistic projects of the German Romantics and philologists who relied on it, are instances of what I call colonial philology. They are imbricated in the formations of empire even if the German version is doubly or even triply mediated from texts authorized by the East India Company. My discussion of the appropriation and interpretation of Ś akuntalā in Germany contributes to the clarification of this neglected aspect of German philology and literary history, which tends to exonerate the Germans from colonial intentions and attitudes, because they did not directly collaborate and aide the British imperial project in India. However, the German use of the literary texts received from Jones is part of a colonial paradigm that relies on Oriental women as a metonym of India to authorize hegemonic, specifically Germanic philological and classificatory agendas. Ś akuntalā is, at least for the first half of the play, portrayed as hyperfeminized; she is passive, sincere, authentic, withdrawn, plant-like, and responsible for watering the plants in the sacred grove. Much information about and interpretation of her behavior, moods, and future actions are mediated to the audience and other characters in the play by her two

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female companions and protectors, Anusúyá and Priyamvadá, and Dusyanta. As a hunter of antelopes, Dusyanta stages himself as a predatory hunter of Ś akuntalā as well. Knowing he has transgressed onto sacred ground, he addresses her: “O damsel with an antelope’s eyes, be not apprehensive of my indiscretion.” He then describes her eyes as having the “proximity of the lotus” which “equals it in brightness” (Jones, Sacontala, 59). The text is rife with analogies between her character, a “timid girl” (Jones, Sacontala, 48) and body parts, flowers, objects, and creatures culturally marked as having feminine traits: Dusyanta calls her akin to the “brightest ornament of these [sacred] woods”; her limbs are repeatedly described by Dusyanta as “delicate” and “sweet,” her feet “red as water lilies,” her scent the same as deer in the forest, and her immediate surroundings as a “flowery couch” (Jones, Sacontala, 52). Her hand, on which he has placed her “bracelet of thin stalks,” is described as “a young shoot of Cámalatà: or it resembles rather the god of love himself, when, having been consumed by the fire of Hara’s wrath, he was restored to life by a shower of nectar sprinkled by the immortals” (Jones, Sacontala, 42).9 The “shower of nectar” represents Ś akuntalā . The Erotics of Ś akuntalā Romila Thapar has argued that Kālidāsa’s presentation of Ś akuntalā as “extremely shy and retiring” casts her as “the romanticised persona of a woman of upper caste [Indian] culture.”10 At the same time, as Douglas McGetchin suggests, “[Kālidāsa] describes Ś akuntalā gratuitously not only in terms of her physical features, but specifically her reproductive body parts,” thus sexualizing her.11 The king, accosting Ś akuntalā who is angry at him for forgetting her and his vows, describes not what she says, but how “her lip, ruddy as the Bimba fruit, quivers as if it were nipped with frost; and her eyebrows, naturally smooth and equal, are at once irregularly contracted” (Jones, Sacontala, 96). Here, Jones’ translation is consistent with the sexist tenor of Kālidāsa’s text. In Kālidāsa’s version her hips are “heavy” for the purpose of childbearing, her foot springs “shallow at the toe and depressed at the heel because of the heaviness of her hips.”12 Jones, concerned that a reference to heavy hips would be too erotic for his British audience, changed the translation to “elegant limbs” (Jones, Sacontala, 43–44). Unsurprisingly, Dusyanta prizes her physical attributes, not her voice, as made overwhelmingly obvious when, toward the end of the play, he prefers staring at a painting of her, rather than relishing her embodied presence and individualized voice. Thapar highlights the “erotic undertones” of Kalidasa’s play, evident when the king is envious of a bee that hovers over Ś akuntalā face or of Ś akuntalā ’s friends when they help her loosen her bark clothing.13 In

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 211 describing himself and his emotions, Dusyanta frequently relies on eroticized metaphors from plant life, animals, and the natural elements. These relatively subtle sexualized undertones build up to a “more open expression of the erotic”14 in Act III, as the encounters progress from the perception of a scent and the exchange of glances to touch. The first exposure of German readers to the play was via its most erotically charged excerpts, made available by Forster’s partial translation in Schiller’s journal Thalia. Whereas Jones sought to lessen the text’s eroticism for the sake of propriety, it would appear that the German publication was informed by the implicit assumption that such scenes would be most likely to interest future readers. Ś akuntalā is presented here at her most hyperfeminized, and infantilized, with a clear power asymmetry between her and the king.15 The king appears as a voyeur who hides and witnesses a feverish Ś akuntalā , sickly because she is in the throes of love for the sovereign. He, meanwhile, tries to ascertain if her feelings for him match the intensity of his. Ś akuntalā ’s state of mind is mediated through the king’s descriptions of her and her two companions. Dusyanta in Forster’s translation calls her a “reizendes” (tempting or charming), “schüchternes” and “schlankes Mädchen” (shy and thin girl), full of “reiner Zärtlichkeit” (pure tenderness) and infantilizes her as a “schönes Kind” (beautiful child). He compares her to a silent but glistening jewel that he would like to possess. In Jones’ translation, he loves her “distractedly” whereas in Forster’s version, he loves her “bis zum Wahnsinn” (Forster, “Scenen,” 72; to love to madness). Clearly, Forster intensifies the eroticism of Jones’ translation. In doing so, he gives German readers a foretaste, possibly as a form of advertisement, as well as a framework through which his complete translation should be approached. None of the three versions I have discussed portrays direct physical contact; rather, the love of the two is displayed by producing couplets in the same meter. While Ś akuntalā measures out the meter for hers, the king refuses to close his eyes, as if he were viewing an intimate act or her naked body. The king competes with Ś akuntalā regarding the strength of his love for her, describing hers as merely warm, while he has the intensity of fire, burning him. In Jones’ prose translation: “Thee, O slender maid, love only warms; but me he burns; as the day-star only stifles the fragrance of the night-flower, but quenches the very orb of the moon.” Forster translates quenches as “gänzlich auslöscht” (completely extinguished). The king associates Ś akuntalā with a plant, a night flower or in Forster’s translation a “Nacht-wiole” (night violet) while he is the moon. Shortly thereafter, when she recovers from her fever, she is likened to a peahen by Priyamvada: “Sieh nur, wie allmählig unsere holde Freundin ihre Kräfte wieder bekommt; so die Pfauhenne, wenn die Sommerhitze sie drückt; ein sanftes Säuseln, ein milder Regen erquicken sie wieder” (Forster, “Scenen,” 77; see how our

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friend recovers her spirits little by little, just as the peahen, oppressed by the summer heat, is refreshed by a soft gale and gentle shower). When she does speak, her voice and expression are described as follows: she “lächelt, mit einem gemischten Ausdruck von Zärtlichkeit und Unmuth” (Forster, “Scenen,” 76; smiles, with a mixed expression of tenderness and displeasure). Overall, she is characterized as shy, quiet, and tender, with vegetative qualities that can be summarized as self-effacing. Her surroundings too are eroticized by Dusyanta, who wishes to sit next to her “Blüthenteppich, den du mit zarten Gliedern drückst” (Forster, “Scenen,” 78; a carpet of flowers, which you press with delicate limbs). Her body is described as weak, her bosom is covered with fresh flowers. The king wonders how she can “mit einem so schwachen Körper diese übermäßige Hitze … ertragen, wenn du dich vom Lager erhebst?” (Forster, “Scenen,” 79–80; can ill sustain this intense heat with so languid a frame if you rise from your bed). The scene then shifts to one of very few scenes where Ś akuntalā and Dusyanta are alone after their companions leave to chase their favorite deer. For the first time, he follows her and attempts to touch her, grabbing the hem of her clothing. Consistent with her modesty and shy ways, Ś akuntalā warns him that the hermits in the grove may witness his assertive moves. Here, more so than anywhere else in the play, Dusyanta wishes to be intimate with her. Despite her multiple attempts to leave, he seeks to persuade her to marry him, claiming that her foster father who knows the laws well will not object to their union, suggesting a gandharva wedding. Nonetheless, she is still intent on leaving but asks him not to forget her, which, of course, as readers learn later, he does, though he is not presented as being at fault since his memory loss is attributed to a curse. The translated excerpt by Forster, the most erotic part of the play, set the stage for what was then read and canonized by the likes of Goethe and Herder. In the second part of the play, omitted in Forster’s preview, the representation of Ś akuntalā changes radically in all versions of the play. In all translations, she is initially, if briefly, presented as timid and submissive, as she was when she first met Dusyanta. In the second part, however, she speaks out for herself when she faces humiliation as he denies his liaison with her, his promise for marriage, and his impregnation of her. At this point, the king invokes several classically misogynistic tropes. In Jones’ translation, he states that she speaks “angrily and inconsistently with female decorum,” and, hearing of her story about the fatal, lost ring that he had given her, he exclaims: “so skilful [sic] are women in finding ready excuses!” (Jones, Sacontala, 96, 95). However, in Kālidāsa’s, Forster’s, and Jones’s versions of the play, that is, the versions first circulating in Germany, the representation of Ś akuntalā is different and more diffident than in the original narrative in the Mahā bhā rata. In the oral Indian epic, she talks

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 213 back to Dusyanta for, from her perspective, his feigned forgetting of his promise for marriage and their child. In the epic, faced with the king’s denial of their union, Ś akuntalā likens herself to the formidable Mount Meru and him to a tiny mustard seed, and even asks him to behold her power to roam other great palaces, and, in a long monologue, discusses the moral behaviors of good and bad men using a wealth of analogies. She accuses his character of magnifying the faults of others, even if they are “mustard seeds” while refusing to see his own, “the size of pumpkins!” She tells him that her “birth is higher than [his],” since she was the daughter of the most powerful of thirty gods and aims to teach him the truth, which she calls “the sovereign covenant,” about behaving morally.16 However, this representation of Ś akuntalā was not the one chosen by Kālidāsa in his work, which became canonized in India and Europe, even after the Mahabharata episodes came to be known in Germany. The Erasure of Ś akuntalā ’s Complexities In Jones’s translation of Kālidāsa, which Forster follows closely, Ś akuntalā first describes herself as a “lawful wife” who politely and humbly asks “whether she be loved or not, she may pass her days in the mansion of her husband” (Jones, Sacontala, 92). Several times she laments to herself “Ah! Woe is me,” “Ah, me!” appearing helpless rather than assertive. She addresses the king as “O my husband!” referring to him in deference as “O son of Puru,” and “her king” rather than asserting her own superior caste as she does in the Mahabharata. In what is described in stage directions as her “angry” speech, rendered by Forster as “aufgebracht,” she accuses him of being “void of honour” (“Ehrloser” in Forster) and of measuring all else in the world with his own “bad heart” (“verderbten Herzen”). She calls him a “base deceiver, like a deep well whose mouth is covered with smiling plants!” (Jones, Sacontala, 96) or, in Forster, “ein niedriger Betrüger? Dem tiefen Brunnen gleich, dessen Oeffnung einladende Pflanzen verdecken” (Forster, Sakontala 153–5; a lowly scammer? Like the deep well whose opening is hidden by inviting plants). However, in this comparatively brief speech, the focus is on his perfidy rather than her owning and acknowledging her power over him; even in describing him as a deceptively friendly “deep well,” she still highlights his positive qualities, his being a “prince descended from Puru” (Jones, Sacontala, 96) suggesting that she is of a lower caste than he. Her speech also lacks the relentless critical analysis of his character evident in the Mahabharata. Furthermore, a very brief monologue, an accusation of Dusyanta described as “ironic” in Jones’ stage directions, reveals another new aspect of her character: she establishes a binary between the respect which kings owe “to virtue and to mankind” and which Dusyanta clearly lacks, and

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females who “however modest, however virtuous, know nothing, and speak nothing truly.” What is “ironic” here is that women may still be marked as devious and ignorant even if, as her example shows, they are more virtuous and know more than even a king. Here, her “ironic” speech ends, after which she “she hides her face, and weeps” (Jones, Sacontala, 97) weakening the effect of her criticism of Dusyanta. The Ś akuntalā of the Mahabharata is neither the character Forster first introduced to Germany in Schiller’s Thalia nor the one that Jones’ Brahmin informants suggested he first translate, and she is certainly not the vegetative and plant-like figure idealized by German poets and scholars. Although most likely the scene from the Mahabharata was not accessible to Forster when he translated Ś akuntalā , the German reception of the figure did not change even when parts of the work became available in English translated by the founder of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Charles Wilkins in 1794, and Friedrich Schlegel into German in 1808. In Kālidāsa’s as well as Forster and Jones’ versions of the play, she is mostly controlled by men around her: Kanva, her foster father, Dusyanta the king, who, according to tradition, has complete power over her as her husband and is in his full right to desire a son to be born rather than a daughter. To this, we can add the male philologists and translators of the play who canonized it suggesting that its plant-like “natural poetry,” highlighted in their reading of the first part of the play, required the tools of philology. The character of Ś akuntalā along with the play itself was eroticized and portrayed as having traditionally feminine characteristics despite the multidimensionality of the figure, evidenced in her response to Dusyanta when he denies that she is the mother of his child and that he even married her. A.W. Schlegel’s attitude is representative of this trend. In his 1819 essay “Über den gegenwärtigen Stand der indischen Philologie” (“On the Current State of Indian Philology”), Schlegel wrote: “Soll das Studium der Indischen Litteratur gedeihen, so müssen durchaus die Grundsätze der classischen Philologie, und zwar mit der wissenschaftlichsten Schärfe, darauf angewandt werden” (In order to see the study of Indian literature blossoming, it is imperative that the principles of classical philology [such as that of Ancient Greek literature] be fully applied to it, and with the strictest scientific rigor).17 The text’s organic growth or blossoming (gedeihen), a verb suggesting reproduction and thereby the femininity of Ś akuntalā herself, needed to be controlled by philology akin to the controlling of many foreign and “Oriental” literatures, such as Ancient Greek literature and the Hebrew Bible. And indeed the “blossoming” of Sanskrit as a subject of study was realized through government-sponsored chaired positions at the first German research universities, with A. W. Schlegel taking the professorial Chair for Sanskrit Studies at the University of Bonn in 1818.

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 215 The Gendered Genealogy of Colonial Philology Constitutive of colonial philology are erotic imaginaries of women: women inhabit primordial orality as in Goethe’s lyric poems or in Herder’s poetic translations,18 or are, as in Ś akuntalā , idealized, and, at the same time, erased in the canonized readings of the play. The gendered genealogy of colonial philology accompanied by German Romantic concepts and practices of reading and natural poetry and derived from the canonization of colonial and mythical representations of the “exotic” Oriental woman has not been sufficiently acknowledged.19 These erotic imaginaries existed in the realm of representation and theories, leading to Goethe’s dilettantish interest, resulting in a sonnet about the play as a whole. They also conditioned German practices of understanding and reading texts, including views of the Sanskrit language, central in the establishment of the field of philology as a scientific discipline, along with comparative grammar, marked by a philological yearning to “re-construct the language that precedes the historical record.”20 In a 1803 letter to his friend and fellow German Romantic Ludwig Tieck, Friedrich Schlegel reiterated his fascination with everything Indian, and how he believed it was the source of all language, ideas, and the human spirit: everything originated in India without exception.21 In particular, the study of Sanskrit aimed to show its affinity with German. In his 1808 study of Sanskrit grammar and linguistics, which was meant to be comparative, systematic, and scientific, Friedrich Schlegel calls it the oldest language, and the source from which other languages of later origin such as the Greeks, Roman, German, and Persian are derived.22 In this work, Schlegel lists examples of Indian words which when spoken sound identical with the German, citing roots and grammatical structures, creating hierarchies of languages, inferior or superior based on the standard of Indian languages, notably Sanskrit. Even the approach to the Sanskrit language, though framed as scientific, was highly gendered in Germany, bearing its roots in the reception of Ś akuntalā . And such gendering was mediated through the agenda that informed the interpretive translations of Jones and other British governor generals, judges, and administrators, commissioned by the institutional forces of the British empire. For British colonialists such as Jones, there was a political agenda behind reconstructing the linguistic origins of IndoEuropean civilization, in which the Germans too were imbricated by their uncritical reception of these works. Such a narrative of continuity, as Ahmed has carefully and forcefully exposed, allowed the “colonial state in British India to claim possession of “transregional” and “metahistorical” knowledge about—and hence continuity with—the religious and national identities of the colonized,”23 thus “proving” that the British belong in India, and that their rule should continue.

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German male scholars and writers’ idealization of a play conditioned on a dehumanizing naturalization of the female protagonist closely aligns with their declaration of Sanskrit as the original language of humans. In his 1803 preface to the second volume of Forster’s translation, which includes several pages dedicated to praising Jones’ translation, Herder describes the play as a flower and calls Jones the president of Indian literature.24 The play is characterized as supernatural, a “wechselndes Spiel für die Sinne” (Herder, “Vorrede,” xxxiv; a changing game for the senses), and, continuing its equation with nature, all its scenes are said to be connected with “Blumenketten” (chains of flowers), with each emerging out of the thing itself, naturally, like a beautiful “Gewächs” (Herder, “Vorrede,” xxxi; growth). Herder considers it and Indian nature as a whole sites in which “sprechen und fühlen Pflanzen, Bäume, die ganze Schöpfung” (Herder, “Vorrede,” xxxiv; plants, trees, and the entire creation speak and feel). He writes that the younger generation would learn from the Indians, “immer vertrauter mit dem Geist der Natur werden und geniesse ferner an dieser Sakontala Freude” (Herder, “Vorrede,” xxx–xxxi; to become more and more familiar with the spirit of nature and furthermore to enjoy Sakontala). His comments affirm the representation of Ś akuntalā in Jones’ and Forster’s translation, and Kālidāsa’s adaptation. He writes that she is “aufgeblüht im reinsten Aether, einem Schutzund Erziehungsort der Frauen” (blossomed in purest ether, a place for the protection and upbringing of women), amidst a forest and flowers, the holiest stillness in a paradise, “worinnen diese unbekannte Hochgebohrne, als eine Blume, verborgen und ungestört sich entfaltete, ihre unschuldige Seele gebildet und gepflegt von der Hand der Weisheit ihres Pflegevaters;—und für wen? Für den edelsten Mann; Er, der hochverehrte, angebetete König—Sie, die von der ganzen Natur gefeierte weibliche Unschuld und Liebe” (in which this unknown aristocrat, like a flower, developed hidden and undisturbed, her pure soul formed and nurtured by the wise hand of her foster father; and for whom? For the noblest man; He, the high-born, worshiped king—She, celebrated by all of nature, womanly innocence and love). Clearly, in Herder’s foreword as in the play itself, the representation of Ś akuntalā as a “Kind der Natur” (child of nature) is rife with patriarchal, vitalist judgments and metaphors, though his romanticization is not an attempt to control Ś akuntalā through classical philology, as it was for A.W. Schlegel, for example.25 Reminiscent of the portrayal of Ś akuntalā as tender, he describes the play as the “zarteste” (the most tender), the language of the play as “geschmückt, Blumenreich und nie doch übertrieben” (ornamental and flowery and yet not exaggerated), and the music, paintings, taste, concepts of religion as “paradiesisch” (paradisiacal) and “zierlich” (dainty). The relation between gods or humans are “so anständig und artig, dass in allem diesem

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 217 das Stück seines Gleichen suchen dürfte in allen Sprachen, unter allen Nationen” (Herder, “Vorrede,” xxxvii; so decent and well-behaved that in all of this the play is unequaled in all languages and in all nations). Tellingly, the terms decent and well-behaved are also used to describe colonized peoples, as the colonizer would wish them to be, and indicates how knowledge about these peoples was mediated by the British. In a 1793 essay entirely devoted to Ś akuntalā , Herder calls Ś akuntalā the “süße Geschöpf” (sweet creature). The play is said to represent “alle Symptome der Liebe” (all symptoms of love) in general rather than to address the culturally specific eroticization of Ś akuntalā which is characteristic of the patriarchal environment she grew up in. He appeals to German readers to read the play as he imagined Indians would read it, “Indisch, mit feinaufmerkender Ueberlegung, Ruhe und Sorgfalt” (Indian, with careful consideration, calm, and care), rather than the “flüchtiger Neugierde” (fleeting curiosity) of Europeans, ignoring the fact that the affectively charged, identificatory reading he is recommending is mediated by Jones and not derived from Sanskrit, or even the oral tradition from which the story emerged in the Mahabharata.26 Ś akuntalā becomes a signifier for an effeminate, silent, and colonized India, objectified and desired by the hunter-colonizer Dusyanta, whose behavior toward Ś akuntalā parallels the simultaneous exoticizing and eroticizing of India by the British as well as the seemingly innocuous reception of the play by emerging philologists in Germany with scientific aspirations in their study of ancient languages and literatures, such as the Schlegel brothers. Jones and following him, German writers and scholars chose to canonize this particular play, which already in Kālidāsa’s version had problematic gendered features, rather than other texts that did not suit the British need to rule. Particularly telling is the parallel between Jones, who was a Judge working for the East India Company, and Dusyanta. In the play, when the latter insults and humiliates Ś akuntalā by denying their engagement and her impregnation, he ultimately comes across as innocent in his actions because he was under a curse, thus denying any consequences for his actions, also a common strategy in British and European colonization. German poets, philosophers, and philologists’ writings about the play systematically efface cultural difference, positing instead a higher unified transcendental absolute. This “translation” is accompanied by an appropriation of the character of Ś akuntalā as German, because Germans are said to be uniquely equipped to read it in an intense, uncritical, affectively charged manner, although the text is simultaneously and paradoxically also seen as universal and absolute. An extreme example of this dynamic is Novalis, who employs the erotic imaginary of the signifier Ś akuntalā for his underaged lover, Sophie von Kühn. Following the lead of Dusyanta, he

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gave Sophie a ring to symbolize fertility. About the historical von Kühn, Novalis wrote: “Sie will nichts sein—Sie ist etwas” (She doesn’t want to be anything—she is something).27 His lover, like Novalis’ Ś akuntalā , is unable to develop, as Heinrich von Ofterdingen does, the eponymous protagonist of Novalis’ novel, but rather remains in the realm of an idealized, eternal essence, similar to the Ś akuntalā of Goethe’s 1791 sonnet. My aim is to show how the German reception of Ś akuntalā exposes the imbrication of the practices of German philology and Romanticism during the period of European colonialism and empire. German and British colonial philology conceived of Sanskrit as an originary language, and of the entirety of Ś akuntalā as exemplary of such natural trans- and prehistorical origins. Such a position relied on the idealization and mythologization of the erotic imaginary of the Indian woman—marked broadly as Oriental in Germany. The particularities and complexities of the figure Ś akuntalā are erased in the readings of the German scholars’ and writers’ reading of the play, who would rather universalize her as nature itself. Goethe’s sonnet, which accompanied Herder’s thoughts on the play, published in 1792 in Herder’s journal Zerstreute Blätter (“Scattered Leaves”),28 is the most blatant example. Goethe removes Ś akuntalā ’s particularity by identifying her name with blossoms, fruits, and all that charms and feasts the soul, along with heaven and earth. He performatively names this combination “Sakontala,” and adds: “so ist Alles gesagt” (thus, all is said). Goethe’s lyrical ‘I’ creates “Sakontala” by naming her, and, in naming her, he names everything, while she, a disembodied signifier, remains the poet’s creation. The sonnet reveals more generally Goethe’s take on femininity, which may have been both shaped by and shaping his reception of Ś akuntalā . As Chunjie Zhang has pointed out, Ottilie in Goethe’s 1809 Die Wahlverwandtschaften (Elective Affinities) is also frequently compared to plants and life, to what Zhang calls a “vegetative femininity,” 29 resonating with how he described Ś akuntalā several decades earlier. For Goethe and his contemporaries, Ś akuntalā was a “model of (Romantic) literature” because it combined “primordial sensuality” and “refined understanding,” the “origins and ends of civilization.”30 Goethe was far from alone. August Wilhelm Schlegel in his first lecture on dramatic art and literature also compared the play to the German romantic drama, stating that the cultivation of humans was derived from Indian culture at a time when it was free from foreign influence.31 For Herder, Indian writings were marked by a beautiful simplicity. His closest engagement with Indian writings was with Ś akuntalā , and he generalized his response to this text to Indian writings at large. Forster provided not only prefaces for his translation, but an extensive glossary explaining details he gathered from sources published by the

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 219 Asiatic Society and East India Company about persons, flora and fauna, gods, religious rites, an ethnographic document akin to the kind of cultural science or Völkerkunde his father-in-law, Christian Gottlob Heyne (1729–1812) was conducting in Göttingen. This glossary comes closest to a philological analysis of the text in Germany, even Jones’s version included no such notes. Much like Schlegel, Forster compares the play to the Western classics—Horace, Virgil, Theocritus, and many more—in order to lend authority to a text in a language with which his German readers were unfamiliar, but, while doing so, he too distorts the play’s particularity for the sake of conformity to canonized and authoritative Western Classics, another strategy of philological subjugation and control. For example, under the entry for “Armband” (bracelet), he compares Dusyanta’s golden bracelet with one in Theocritus’ Idyllus (Book 11), which he quotes in the original Greek (Forster, Sakontala, 220). Forster wrote to Heyne that the play was not only a literary work, but characteristic of a universalized “humanity” thus far unknown. Prior to his trip to England, he wrote to the writer Sophie La Roche on March 15, 1790, displaying his anthropological interest in the Indians, wishing that his study of humans and nature would allow him to engage with India and its peoples in order to see how similar they were to the Tahitians whom he was able to encounter personally in his travels.32 Goethe, Herder, Forster, and the Schlegels only had positive words for Jones, focusing entirely on his repertoire as a philologist and translator, rather than on his work as a Judge or other political activities in the name of the British Empire in India, the main organ of which was the East India Company. In 1819, Goethe wrote a one-sided report stating that Jones’ merits were known universally.33 In his 1793 essay on the play, Herder wrote a long laudatory passage about Jones’ translations and his commentaries on “morgenländische Dichtkunst” (Oriental Poetry), including Arabic and Persian, as well as his translation of Nadir-Schachs. Herder appreciated Jones’ fascination for India. He noted that “Die leichten Poesien der Indier lobt Herr Jones sehr, gewiß ein gültiger Richter; so auch ihr feines System der Musik und vieles andre” (Jones praises the light poetry of the Indians very much, certainly a competent judge; as well as their fine system of music and much else). Herder does not mention Jones’ position as a Supreme Court Judge in India but rather presents him as a judge of esthetics. He continues to praise his talents in language and passion to extend knowledge.34 In his preface to his translation, Forster was similarly effusive in his praise of Jones’ translation of Sacontala. He was likewise enthusiastic about Warren Hastings, the first governor general of India, who returned to England in 1785, and from whom Forster sought a letter of recommendation so that he could go to India, presumably with the British East

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India Company.35 In the aforementioned letter to La Roche, he writes that he wants to get to know such an interesting man and his wife. In 1785, Hastings was spectacularly and infamously impeached in the House of Commons for alleged crimes and misdemeanors in India, including embezzlement, judicial killing, and extortion. Forster could not possibly have been ignorant of this given the high profile of the case by 1790 when Forster was in England, with Edmund Burke managing the prosecution, who needed all of two days to read out loud Hastings’ many charges. The unwillingness to acknowledge the dubious characters and actions of Hastings and even Jones could be motivated by his own desire to go to India and contradicts anti-colonial claims he made elsewhere. After reading Ś akuntalā , Friedrich Schlegel too was compelled to study Sanskrit in 1803 after his move to Paris in 1802 to initially learn Persian. In the preface of Weisheit, itself inspired by the British Asiatic Researches, he recounts learning Sanskrit through private lessons from Alexander Hamilton, a linguist and lieutenant in the navy of the East India Company from 1783 to 1797, as well as through documents from the keeper of the Oriental manuscripts of the Imperial Library in Paris. He thanks Charles Wilkins and William Jones for shedding light on the “dark history of the origin of the world” (“bis jetzt so dunkle Geschichte der Urwelt”).36 Thus, Schlegel’s philological practices too were institutionally imbricated in British colonialism, mediated by Hamilton in this case, as were those of his brother A. W. Schlegel, who also has encomia for Jones and Wilkins in “Philologie.” Conclusion Any study of Sanskrit and Indian literature in Europe at this time was dependent on the resources of the Asiatic Society and employees of the East India Company, and ultimately modeled after it. In his preface to his 1791 translation of Ś akuntalā , Forster writes that he wishes an authoritative Sanskrit dictionary existed and hopes that the Asiatic Society in Bengal would compile one. In Weisheit, Schlegel discusses his desire to create, in Paris where he had access to manuscripts in Indian characters, such as Devanagari, and in Bengali, an Indian “Chrestomathie,” both in the original Sanskrit and in Latin, which would contain excerpts from what he deemed the most important Indian works. Like Jones, he also wanted to include Latin translations with notes and a glossary. The excerpts which formed the appendix of Weisheit included selections from the Bhágavatgita, Rámáyana, an excerpt on Indian cosmogony in the Laws of Manu, and the excerpt of Ś akuntalā from the Mahabharata. Schlegel writes that he “besitz [] auch eine Abschrift von dem ersten Akte der Sokuntola des Kalidas nach einer sehr zierlichen bengalischen Handschrift, mit Scholien, in denen das

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 221 Prakrit des Textes in Sanscrit übertragen ist” (possess[es] a copy of the first Act of the Sacontala of Calidás, transcribed in a very delicate Bengalese character, with notes [TS: scholia], in which the Pracrit of the text is translated into Sanscrit).37 He reported painstakingly copying manuscripts in each character, in hopes to create models for type-cutters, though he found that he did not have the power or inclination to execute the task, which had already been accomplished by scholars in British India. Herder and Forster appear in many ways as writers who are more anticolonial than many of their contemporaries in that they are more conscious of colonial exploitation and critical of such practices. Herder, for example, made many explicit statements criticizing European colonialism and slavery, particularly in the aftermath of the French Revolution.38 Their interest in and comments on Ś akuntalā have been read as advocating for a politically neutral “intercultural communication,” an attempt to provide a “well-rounded Bildung” for Europeans rather than as manifestations of cultural imperialism.39 Each highlighted the piece’s foreignness, calling on their contemporaries to keep its alterity and cultural difference intact, rather than attempting to imitate or assimilate it, so that it may by virtue of its foreignness, retain its so-called authenticity. Yet their work and that of others, such as the Schlegel brothers, approach literature via philological work done in service of the British Empire, and as such lacks a critical stance toward the British or the high-caste brahmins from whom they gained so much of their knowledge about India as a whole. Friedrich Schlegel, in particular, was keen on using affinities with Indian culture as key to his agenda of marking Germany as special. Schlegel sought to define “Germany as the Oriental other of Europe,”40 especially distinct from France, thus creating what Chunjie Zhang calls a “transcultural symbiosis,” which “tells us more about the European describers than about the described non-Europeans.”41 Schlegel even embraced the oppressive Indian caste system as a form of social organization, identifying it with Germany.42 I call these readings of Ś akuntalā paradigmatic instances of colonial philology, one with not a British or French pedigree as may be expected in studies of orientalism, but with a German one. Colonial philology as a concept and practice exposes as false the still prevalent notion that German philology remained detached from colonialism because its interest in India or the Orient was not a result of imperialism and could therefore be considered an innocent fantasy tied to a real desire for erudition and limited to the realm of scholars. Siraj Ahmed used the term “colonial philology” to refer to attempts by British philologists, such as Jones, to “restore something that had, in fact, never existed,” that is, to lend canonical textual authority to Sanskrit texts by linking them to a prehistorical origin. Such an endeavor rested on the assumption that it is possible

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for Jones, and other British philologists, along with the Germans, to “comprehend every language, literature, and legal tradition—and hence to provide Europeans transhistorical and suprageographic knowledge about the colonized (among much else).”43 Comparative scholarship thus bears a direct link to the logic of colonialism. Indeed, this nexus of scholarship and empire directly impacts British governance in India, although in Germany the consequences were largely limited to the scholarly front. What Ahmed does not point out and what I wish to emphasize is the heavily gendered, heteropatriarchal aspects of colonial philology. Colonial German philology is different from “German Orientalism,” a concept developed by Marchand and Todd Kontje in critiquing Edward Said’s Orientalism, which focused primarily on England and France. It also differs from Susanne Zantop’s “colonial fantasies” and Nicholas Germana’s “self-othering.”44 Said defined “orientalism” as the “western style for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient” in literary and scholarly work.45 He highlighted the imaginary dimension of orientalism and failed to outline its practices; he also underemphasized its gendered, erotic component. Sheldon Pollock differentiates German and British Orientalism: “In the German instance Orientalism as a complex of knowledge-power has to be seen as vectored not outward to the Orient [as for the British] but inward to Europe itself, to constructing the conception of a historical German essence and in defining Germany’s place in Europe’s destiny.”46 While I agree with Pollock that German Orientalism unfolded not only as an imaginative representation of and fascination with the East, but also in the service of creating a German national identity or a German essence, I argue that it was not a monolithic collective project as he represents it. Rather, it was founded on distinct practices of textual hermeneutics mediated by English translations done in service of the British colonial empire. Scholarly practices, such as translations, the creation of glossaries, prefaces, essayistic commentaries, including those by Forster and Herder, and Herder and Goethe’s odes and sonnets were founded upon colonialism and its drive to control the reception of texts through the erasure of, in the exemplary case of Ś akuntalā , an “Oriental“ woman who was at the heart of the texts upon which the philologists worked. The Romantic poets’ fascination with the mythical image of India captured in the erotics of Ś akuntalā eventually gave birth to the academic disciplines of comparative grammar and Indology at the nineteenth-century German University.47 By the end of the nineteenth century, Germany had more professors specializing in Sanskrit than all other European countries, and the Prussian government was funding them.48 In their readings of Ś akuntalā , Germans attempted to control the other, just like the British did in lived experience, using Sanskrit to rule the cultural production of Indians by utilizing the tools of European classical philology mediated by British sources.

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 223 Notes 1 Different transliterations of the title and characters of this play into the Roman alphabet abound: Sakuntalā, Shakuntala, Sacontalá, Sakontala, Ś akuntalā , and more. And of the king: Dusyanta, Dushyanta, and Dushmanta. The transliterations in Georg Forster’s German translation and William Jones’ English also differ. With the exception of “Ś akuntalā” and “Dusyanta” I will be using the names as they appear in Jones’ translation. 2 Raymond Schwab, The Oriental Renaissance: Europe’s Rediscovery of India and the East, 1680–1880, trans. Gene Patterson-Black and Victor Reinking (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984), 57–64. 3 See Romila Thapar, Ś akuntalā : Texts, Readings, Histories (New York: Columba University Press, 2011), originally published in 1999, for complete English translation of the excerpt in the epic and the philological history of emendations and analysis of its narrative, a palimpsest due to its many versions when orally transmitted, 11–43. 4 Georg Forster, Sakontala oder der Entscheidende Ring: ein Indisches Schauspiel von Kalidas: Aus den Ursprachen Sanskrit und Prakrit ins Englische und aus diesem ins Deutsche übersetzt mit Erläuterungen von Georg Forster (Mainz und Leipzig: Johann Peter Fischer, 1791), 80. 5 Forster, Sakontala, 83. The English translations of Forster’s German here and in later citations are mine. 6 Sir William Jones, Sacontala; or, The Fatal Ring: an Indian Drama by Calidas (Calcutta: Joseph Cooper, 1789). I will be using the 1792 edition printed in London since it includes page numbers. Further references appear in the text as Jones, Sacontala, and page number. 7 Siraj Ahmed, The Archaeology of Babel: On the Colonial Foundations of the Humanities (Stanford University Press, 2015), 45. 8 Ahmed, Babel, 168. 9 See also Dorothy Figueira who situates the reception of Ś akuntalā and the exotic objectification of the ‘Other’ in 19th-century Europe, and provides background of how “the Orient was emplotted by Europeans throughout centuries in various forms,” as in medieval religious traditions. Figueira, Translating the Orient: The Reception of Ś ā kuntala in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Albany: SUNY Press, 1991), 2–3. 10 Thapar, Ś akuntalā , 52. 11 Douglas T. McGetchin, Indology, Indomania, and Orientalism: Ancient India’s Rebirth in Modern Germany (Madison and Teaneck: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2009), 64. 12 McGetchin, Indomania, 64. 13 Thapar, Ś akuntalā , 52. 14 Thapar, Ś akuntalā , 53. 15 Georg Forster, “Scenen aus dem Sacontala, oder dem unglücklichen Ring, einem indischen, 2000 Jahr alten Drama,” Thalia 10, ed. Friedrich Schiller (1790): 72–88. Further references appear in the text as Forster, “Scenen,” and page number. 16 From the narrative in Thapar, Ś akuntalā , 32–33. See Thapar for an English translation of the narrative from the Mahā bhā rata itself. 17 A.W. Schlegel, “Philologie,” Indische Bibliothek I (Bonn: Eduard Weber, 1823), 1–27, here 22. Cf. Pascale Rabault-Feuerhahn, Archives of Origins: Sanskrit, Philology, Anthropology in 19th Century Germany, trans. Dominique Bach and Richard Willet (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2013), 67.

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18 See David Wellbery, The Specular Moment: Goethe’s Early Lyric and the Beginnings of Romanticism (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996) who uses ‘primordial’ in his discussion of “The Myth of Lyric Voice,” and his analysis of poems such as Prometheus, see esp. 187–221. 19 An important exception is Chunjie Zhang, “German Indophilia, Femininity, and Transcultural Symbiosis around 1800,” in Imagining Germany Imagining Asia: Essays in Asian-German Studies, eds. Veronika Fuechtner and Mary Rhiel (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 2013), 204–19. Zhang analyzes the Indian girl Gurli in August von Kotzebue’s Die Indianer in England, which premiered in Germany in 1789. 20 Ahmed, Babel, 43 21 Edgar Lohner, ed. Ludwig Tieck und die Brüder Schlegel: Briefe (Munich: Winckler, 1972), 135–36. Cf. Nicholas Germana, “Self-Othering in German Orientalism: The Case of Friedrich Schlegel,” The Comparatist 34 (2010): 80–94, here 87. 22 Friedrich Schlegel, Ueber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier: Ein Beitrag zur Begründung der Alterthumskunde (Heidelberg: Mohr und Zimmer, 1808), 66. 23 Ahmed, Babel, 150. 24 Johann Gottfried Herder, “Vorrede zur zweiten Ausgabe von G. Forsters Sakontala,” in Sakontala oder der Entscheidende Ring: ein Indisches Schauspiel von Kalidas, übersetzt mit Erläuterungen von Georg Forster. Zweite rechtmäßige, von J.G. v. Herder, besorgte Ausgabe” (Frankfurt am Main: August Hermann dem Jüngern, 1803), xxix-xxxviii, here xxxvii. Further references appear in the text as Herder, “Vorrede,” and page number. 25 Herder, “Vorrede,” xxxiii. xxiv. A. Leslie Willson, “Herder and India: The Genesis of a Mythical Image,” PMLA 70, no. 5 (955): 1049–1058. 26 Herder, “Ueber ein morgenländisches Drama: Einige Briefe,” in Zerstreute Blätter, in Herders Sämmtliche Werke, ed. Bernhard Suphan, vol. 16 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1887), 84–106. See esp. 88 and also Herder, “Vorrede,” xxxi. 27 Gerhard Schulz, Novalis in Selbstzeugnissen und Bilddokumenten (Reinbeck: Rowohlt, 1969), 53. Cf. Todd Kontje German Orientalisms (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004), 95. For more on Novalis’ engagement with Ś akuntalā , see Françoise Dastur, “Novalis: On the Orient, Love, and the Symbolism of the Ring,” Comparative and Continental Philosophy 1, no. 2 (2009): 161–9. 28 For examples see McGetschin, Indomania, 58. 29 Zhang, “Reading Goethe’s Elective Affinities (Die Wahlverwandtschaften) through Cao Xueqin’s The Story of the Stone (Hong Lou Meng): Immanent Divinity, Vegetative Femininity, and the Mood of Transience,” in German Literature as World Literature, ed. Thomas Oliver Beebee (New York and London: Bloomsbury, 2014), 25–42. 30 See Ahmed’s reading, Babel, 163. 31 A.W. Schlegel, Ueber dramatische Kunst und Literatur: Vorlesungen, vol. 1 (Heidelberg: Mohr and Zimmer, 1809), 37–38. 32 In Forster, Werke: Briefe 1790–91, vol. 16 (De Gruyter, 1980), 30. See Chunjie Zhang, Transculturality and German Discourse in the Age of European Colonialism (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2017) for more on Forster’s travel writings and his stay in Tahiti. 33 Schwab, Oriental, 53. 34 Herder, “Drama.” 35 As was A.W. Schlegel, “Philologie,” 2.

Colonial Philology and Its Erotic Imaginaries 225 36 F. Schlegel, Weisheit, iii. 37 F. Schlegel, Weisheit, vii-viii. Eng. Translation, “On the Indian Language, Literature, and Philosophy,” in The Aesthetic and Miscellaneous Works of Frederick von Schlegel, trans. E.J. Millington (London: Bohn, 1849), 425–526, here 426–7. 38 Particularly in his 1783 Ideas on the Philosophy of History. 39 Jörg Esleben, “Indisch lesen”: Conceptions of Intercultural Communication in Georg Forster’s and Johann Gottfried Herder’s Reception of Kā lidā sa’s ‘Ś akuntalā ,’” Monatshefte 95, no. 2 (2003): 217–229, here 227. 40 Germana, “Self-Othering,” 90. 41 Zhang, “Indophilia,” 206. 42 Germana, “Self-Othering,” 89–90. 43 Ahmed, Babel, 2. 44 Kontje, Orientalisms, Suzanne Marchand, German Orientalism in the Age of Empire: Religion, Race, and Scholarship (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009), Nicholas Germana, “Self-Othering,” and Susanne Zantop, Colonial Fantasies: Conquest, Family, and Nation in Precolonial Germany, 1770–1870 (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997). 45 Said, Orientalism (New York: Pantheon, 1978), 3. 46 Pollock, “Deep Orientalism? Notes on Sanskrit and Power Beyond the Raj,” in Carol A. Breckenridge and Peter van der Veer, eds. Orientalism and the Postcolonial Predicament (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993), 76–133, here 100. 47 Kontje, Orientalisms, 64. 48 McGetschin, Indology.

11

Völkisch Nationalism and Its Unfolding in the Colonial Context Adda von Liliencron’s Historical Novels Giovanna (1881) and Nach Südwestafrika (1906) Aylin Bademsoy

Adda von Liliencron’s first colonial novel Nach Südwestafrika. Erlebnisse aus dem Hererokrieg nach Briefen von Mitkämpfern (1906, Toward South West Africa. Episodes from the Herero War According to Letters of Combatants) opens with an illustration of a white woman fighting side by side with a black man. The false dualism of European civilization and African barbarism, inherent to colonial narratives from the outset of the European quest for exploitable resources, manifests itself here visually: White figures with hats and mustaches battle shirtless black torsos. In the foreground, protagonist Anneliese points her gun at the heart of a “rebel” outside the window, while her slave Timotheus, notwithstanding his masculine sex, occupies the feminine-coded domestic realm alongside her. His very posture illustrates the supposed “effeminate nature” of black people, juxtaposed in the novel with courageous, masculine Germandom.1 Timotheus is situated in a limbo between civilization and barbarism: while his shirt and trousers evidence a degree of assimilation and separate him from the dark, stripped silhouettes outside, his bare feet, one of which is lifted as though ready to run, expose his unbelonging amongst the deco­ rous whites (Figure 11.1). Adda von Liliencron, known as the “Baroness of Africa” in Germancolonial circles, was a founding and honorary member of the GermanColonial Women’s League (Frauenbund der Deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft, 1907).2 In addition to supporting the German colonies ideologically and financially, the league dispatched predominantly underclass German women to the colonies. These “surplus women,” to borrow Malthusian jargon, were given the task of “preserving” German cultural identity and securing the reproduction of the white German race in the Second Reich. It is highly ironic that Liliencron, the “Baroness of Africa,” had never actually been to the

DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-15

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Figure 11.1 Annelies and Timotheus in Nach Südwestafrika (Public Domain, J.F. Steinkopf Verlag, 1906).

German colonies. Instead of first-hand experience, she offered “spiritual” support (letters, songs, and poems) to the military and arranged in her house a seating corner named “Afrikaecke,” where she indulged in colonial phan­ tasies with soldiers on leave.3 In her memoir, Liliencron asserts that the presence of German women in the colonies aimed to prevent Verkafferung (becoming kaffirs, a pejo­ rative term for indigenous and black peoples that refers to assimilation but

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also race mixing) and the emergence of a “Geschlecht von Mischlingen” (Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 285; race of half-breeds). As Martha Mamozai demonstrates in Herrenmenschen, interracial marriages were far and few between in South West Africa. The rape of indigenous women by white men, however, was common and typically went unpunished.4 “Mischlinge,” whose legal status as German citizens was disputed, were not only threats to the purity of the German race, but they also posed a political threat to white German hegemony in the colonies.5 Yet, for the most part, the prospect of a loss of white hegemony was elided in colonial propaganda, which instead highlighted concern over the degeneration of “Germandom,” a concern that affected all Germans regardless of class. The notion of Germandom referred to culture, ethnicity, and race at once. Thus, in German (and other) colonial discourses, the preservation of “culture,” a notion deeply entwined with the völkisch conception of the nation as an organic, racial unity, is tantamount to the biological pres­ ervation of a homogeneous Volksgemeinschaft.6 Throughout, Liliencron’s works uphold the patriarchal order and confine women to the role of reproducers of the race. They exhibit sym­ pathy with the hegemon, exemplified by the French nobility in Giovanna. Historischer Roman aus den Jahren 1788–1792 (Giovanna, Historical Novel of the Years 1788–1792) and by the German colonists in Nach Südwestafrika. Giovanna adheres to the historical timeline of the French Revolution, and Nach Südwestafrika’s claim of historical factuality is enshrined in its subtitle, Episodes from the Herero War According to Letters of Combatants. Allegedly based on letters of German soldiers who crushed the resistance of the Herero and Nama peoples, and thus partook in the genocide that took place from 1904 to 1907 in today’s Namibia, Nach Südwestafrika reverses perpetrator-victim constellations, transfig­ uring the attempted annihilation of the “barbaric rebels” into an act of German self-defense. The disposition to sacrifice, the praise of hy­ permasculinity, and the recurrent emphasis on the superiority of the German Herrenmenschen over the “barbarians” represent integral parts of an ideology congruent with the classism manifest in Liliencron’s 1881 novel Giovanna, set during the French Revolution. In both novels, puta­ tive history constitutes the framework for a love that is difficult to attain, while the motif of love is used to recode constellations of domination. In Giovanna as well as Nach Südwestafrika, love equals absolute submission, but in the latter subordination to the concrete authority of a king gives way to the subordination to an abstract collective—the Volk. Ostensibly a novel on the French revolution, Giovanna reflects the his­ torical conditions of middle and late-nineteenth-century Germany: the bourgeois-liberal 1848 uprising and the rise of the German proletariat that increasingly unsettled the hegemonic position of the German nobility. The

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fear of class conflict manifests in Giovanna and the redemption of this fear through völkisch reconciliation in Nach Südwestafrika represents a trajectory described by Étienne Balibar in his essay “Class Racism.” Balibar stresses the necessity of deepening the understanding of the mechanisms inherent to the displacement of class conflict by means of racism: We shall find it necessary to ask how the development of racism displaces class conflict or, rather, in what way class conflict is always already transformed by a social relation in which there is an inbuilt tendency to racism; and also, conversely, how the fact that the nationalist alternative to the class struggle specifically takes the form of racism may be considered as the index of the irreconcilable character of that struggle.7 The social relation that Balibar refers to is bourgeois class society, characterized by the complex entanglement of alienation—the objectifi­ cation of the subject, the self—and racism—the objectification of the object, the fungible other. Liliencron’s oeuvre can be read as a literary and historical testimony to the displacement of an imminent class conflict, which in Germany surfaced most clearly in the failed revolution of 1919, through völkisch race ideology. Thus, this chapter examines the rela­ tionship between class, race, and gender in Giovanna and Nach Südwestafrika, respectively, and concludes with a discussion of völkisch race ideology in the context of German colonialism.8 In her literary works, Liliencron resolves pronounced class hatred through the mythification of a unified Germandom. In the process, the ideal of bourgeois womanhood is smoothly transposed onto the vocabulary of völkisch-colonial frenzy. Canine Devotion and the Cult of Death in Giovanna Giovanna was published shortly before Imperial Germany acquired its first colonial settlements in Africa9 and long before Liliencron took notice of them, which was only in 1906.10 Introduced with the epigraph “Fidèle à Dieu, au roi, à mon amour” (loyalty to God, to the King, and to my love), Giovanna begins on the eve of the French Revolution in November 1788 and ends with the execution of Louis XVI in January 1793, spanning a period of over four years. Against the backdrop of the unfolding revo­ lution, the novel revolves around the seemingly unattainable love between the aristocratic hero Horace St. Herbert and petit-bourgeois Giovanna. The critique of aristocratic rule, particularly its lavishness, is cut short at the beginning of the novel; instead, the text reverses into incessant por­ trayals of the “barbarism” of the lower classes.11 While the conflict of interest between the aristocracy and bourgeoisie is resolved in the end with

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the marriage between Horace and Giovanna, it is their willingness to sacrifice that ultimately ensures their survival. Giovanna cultivates the notion of Todesfreude, joie de mort, and ap­ plauds the return to the inanimate condition for the sake of the patriarchal triple hegemon, the allegorical father represented by God, King, and the (biological) Father. The romantic transfiguration of the master–servant relationship manifests itself in the glorification of sacrifice, where absolute submission appears as proof of love (and/or devotion). Inherent to the very notion of “joyous death” is the linkage of pleasure and sacrifice, as discussed by Freud in the context of his theory of the death drive. According to Freud, “instinctual life as a whole serves to bring about death,” as reestablishing preexisting conditions (and thus “inorganic existence”) appears as the ultimate objective of drives.12 In a social context, sacrifice invariably entails violence that aims to restore an (illusory) preexisting peaceful order, a delusion that is particularly tangible in Liliencron’s colonial narrative. Furthermore, the notion of sacrifice is gendered in Liliencron’s works; here, women’s utmost sacrifice is linked to reproductivity, whereas Horace’s willingness to die for the king exemplifies masculine bravery. His father’s, Marquis St. Herbert’s, words—“so wünsche ich, daß ein jeder willig ge­ horche, ohne zu fragen, wie dieser Wille entstand. Dieser Königsname genügt, um freudig in den Tod zu gehen” (Thus I want that everyone obeys willingly without questioning how this order came to be. The name of this king suffices to go to death joyously)13—capture precisely the intricate nexus of authoritarianism and death cult. Whereas, for example, in Kafka’s short story In the Penal Colony, the grotesque “hündische Ergebenheit” (canine devotion) of the Condemned Man en route to the scaffold arises from Todesangst, in Liliencron’s works the will to sacrifice is entwined with the notion of devotion and Todesfreude.14 The German servant of Horace, Francois, who remains loyal to his masters until the end is “hündisch ergeben,” while Jean, the French servant, betrays them by joining the revolution. The figure of the hostile servant bears witness to the transition from a feudal to a bourgeois capitalist order—or from a so-called “closed, hierarchical” to an “open, mobile” society.15 The threat that emanates from the French servant is historically linked to an epochal (and in reality drastically limited) capacity to over­ throw the authority, the father. In Giovanna, Jean’s betrayal of the ruling class and collaboration with the revolutionaries, his development of class consciousness, are portrayed as products of his immoral (and French) dis­ position. Conversely, Francois accepts his role as a status symbol of his masters.16 The “canine” nature of his devotion—tantamount to total subordination—unfolds fully when the Jacobins arrest his overlords: along with their dog Pluto, Francois lurks in front of the prison at “seinem Warteposten in der tiefen Mauernische, den er geduldig wieder einnahm”

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(Liliencron, Giovanna, 3884; his waiting post in the deep wall niche which he resumed patiently). The allegorical father–child relation invariably laminates subordination to the most “natural” form of love. In the feudal context, the need to submit to the authority figure is a condition of survival, a safeguard against social downfall. Conversely, what appears as fatherly “love” is merely a romantic transfiguration of domination and of the patriarchal, socio-economic power emanating from the father. After all, the “child’s” dependency on the father is not biological or natural; rather, the bequest of power and capital reflects the social conditions of reproduction. Love’s transfigurative function as a means to conceal social dominion also features in Liliencron’s later work: the legitimacy of rule through ancestral ties (by means of belonging to a superior class by birth) gives way to the legitimacy of rule through belonging to a superior Volk: a national, racial collective. In both narratives, the hegemonic order is justified via the juxtaposition of rational, morally intact rulers and irrational, destructive masses. In Giovanna, the king’s love for the people evokes the father’s love for his children who get out of hand in his absence. Louis XIV claims to be “wirklich euer König und Vater” (Liliencron, Giovanna, 2352; truly your king and father) and looks in deep sadness at his poor, misguided Volk (people; see Liliencron, Giovanna, 1705). Thus, the authority figure is transfigured into a loving father whose children do not love him in return. The people’s ingratitude remains a mystery, for their abysmal living conditions are attributed to natural conditions, such as poor weather. At the same time, the king’s failure to sustain his authority is linked to a lack of masculine toughness—a quality the German colonizers certainly do not lack in Liliencron’s account of imperial rule. Paris, a megalopolis with a population that is difficult to tame, is replete with explosive revolutionary fervor (see Liliencron, Giovanna, 1278). Anarchy breaks out when the “rabble” begins to loot the gun stores. “Gangs” burgle private houses and behead the newly appointed minister Foulon, then showcase his head on a pike. By juxtaposing theft with physical violence, Liliencron ties the notion of violence equally to the threat against property and the threat to life. The death cult, manifesting itself as a call to return to the pre-animate state, aligns with this reified vision: the utter objectification of life. Overshadowed by the omnipresence of the allegorical father, the mother’s absence is a precondition for overcoming feudal gender roles and establishing a bourgeois, domestic womanhood. Horace’s mother repre­ sents the feudal/aristocratic woman, an inadequate wife, and mother in pursuit of her pleasure, whose death conveniently provides the occasion for Horace’s reunion with Giovanna. Unlike Horace’s mother, who clearly lacks the submissive disposition demanded of women and servants alike,

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Giovanna exemplarily subordinates her desires to the solidification of the patriarchal order. Giving birth to a descendant at the end of the novel, Giovanna fulfills her raison d’etre as a woman. Tellingly, in an early childhood memory, Liliencron identifies women’s submissiveness to paternal authority as a precondition for peace and order. In March 1848, four-year-old Adda asks her mother to quiet the loud and threatening masses outdoors, whereupon her mother responds that nobody will listen to “Mutterchen.” However, she then reassures her daughter that “einer” (a man) will come soon enough to restore peace and order (Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 6): In the child’s imagination, it is the father who returns and defeats the “wild people” whom the frightened girl observes from the window (Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 7). The author’s projection of the 1848 revolution and the German working class onto the French revolutionaries emerges fully when the latter are referred to as “roher Pöbel” (brutish rabble), “Rotte” (horde), “Pöbelhaufen” (heap of riffraff), “Barbaren” (barbarians), and “böses Gesindel” (evil rabble) hiding in “Höhlen und Schlupfwinkel” (Liliencron, Giovanna, 3591; caves and nooks). The terminology reveals not only the narrator’s class situatedness but also suggests that the animalistic, barbarian insurgents pose a threat to civilization, epitomized by the rational and moral hegemon, the father. In Nach Südwestafrika, the pronounced classism gives way to a völkisch unification in service of the search for Lebensraum for ethnic Germans, anticipating ideological cornerstones of Nazism: here, a nos­ talgic adherence to feudal notions of loyalty is intermingled with bour­ geois gender roles and a völkisch re-conception of Germandom. A German Farm in South West Africa Liliencron’s first literary engagement with colonialism was the two-act piece Afrika, which she wrote shortly after witnessing the departure of German troops to Swakopmund.17 Her novel Nach Südwestafrika: Erlebnisse aus dem Hererokrieg nach Briefen von Mitkämpfern (1906; Toward South West Africa: Episodes from the Herero-War According to Letters of Combatants) is the first volume of a colonial trilogy based on letters Liliencron received from German-colonial troops, some of which are embedded in her memoir Krieg und Frieden.18 Set in today’s Namibia, Nach Südwestafrika narrates the plight of the Wendelows, a Germancolonial settler family, in the face of the Herero uprising. Nach Südwestafrika begins and ends at the Farm Karlshorst, estab­ lished by the German colonist Wendelow, his daughter Annelies and his sons Kurt and Fritz. When Wendelow’s ox dies and their financial situa­ tion worsens, Kurt tries to coax his sister Annelies into marrying their creditor, a merchant named Berko. The plot moves from Wendelow’s farm

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located between Otavi and Grootfontein to the Mutterland, where German soldiers receive letters about the events in the colonies, reporting lootings and atrocities committed by the Hereros. Motivated by patri­ otism, the most righteous among the German soldiers, Hans Lund19 and Karl Friedrich von Wilbert, decide to join the German-colonial troops and defend the “Second Reich.”20 After a dramatic farewell, they set out for Swakopmund, a city whose colonial past has become a tourist attraction today. As the troops come across the farm, Annelies and Hans Lund, who know each other from Germany, get engaged. After Hans and his troops depart, Hereros attack the German farm, facing resistance from the settler family and their slave Timotheus. Their second slave Samuel informs the Schutztruppen, who arrive just in time.21 The novel concludes with Kurt’s announcement of his engagement with his cousin Ericka—a closure that restores the symbolic bond between the German Mutterland and the Second Reich and reassures the concerned reader that, despite the colonial endeavor, the German race will be preserved. In the brief introduction to the plot, the narrator emphasizes the pre­ existing “tiefsten Frieden” (profound peace) between the local populations and German colonists, a peace that was guaranteed by the German presence and that was surprisingly interrupted by the “cunning” and violent Hereros. Whereas in Giovanna a brief description of the French people’s misery and failures of the aristocracy precedes the narrative, the narrator of Nach Südwestafrika is not interested in exploring the Hereros’ motives for the revolt. The narrative casts anticolonial resistance as utterly irrational and unmotivated, an interruption of the harmonious coexistence of blacks and whites in the German colony. The reversal of the perpetrator-victim con­ stellation is foundational in colonial narratives, where Hereros appear as gruesome perpetrators, and German colonizers as their victims. Tellingly, Hans Lund’s departure to the colony is motivated by his compassion for the “misshandelten deutschen Brüder” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 54; abused German brothers). When Hans informs his family about his decision to join the colonial troops, he reasons as follows: Hast mir ja selbst gelehrt, wie ich noch ein kleiner Bursche war, dass ich immer dem beispringen müsste, dem’s schlecht ginge, und hast dich weidlich gefreut, wenn ich mit meinen starken Fäusten einem unterdrückten Schulkameraden Luft schaffte, wenn so ein paar nichts­ nutzige Bengels ihm hart zusetzten. (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 51) [When I was still a little boy you [mother] taught me yourself that I should always help the one who is in trouble. You were extremely pleased when I gave an oppressed schoolmate who was being mistreated by useless rascals some breathing room with my strong fists.]

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The text creates a parallel between Hans’ oppressed schoolmate and the German colonists in South West Africa, both mistreated by “rascals.” As Manuel Junge points out, this reversal, along with the recurring emphasis on the brutality of the Hereros, serves as a justification for the genocide perpetrated against the indigenous peoples.22 In “Elements of AntiSemitism,” Adorno and Horkheimer discuss this entanglement of projec­ tion and reversal that is manifest in colonial narratives, and claim that; “Those impelled by blind murderous lust have always seen in the victim the pursuer who has driven them to desperate self-defense, and the mightiest empires conceived of their weakest neighbor as an intolerable threat before falling upon him.”23 In Nach Südwestafrika, the “ideal” relationship between colonizer and colonized is exemplified by the Wendelows’ relation to their slaves, Timotheus and Samuel. Both embody the antithesis of the “treacherous” Hereros by exhibiting unconditional loyalty to their masters. As in other colonial narratives, here too, German rule in South West Africa is justified by the supposed cultural gap between “civilized” Germans and “uncivilized” local peoples.24 The description of the colonized land as “kultur- und wasserarm” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 36; poor in culture and water) obfuscates any distinction between the “social” and the “natural” and suggests that social constructs such as culture and civili­ zation are determined by facts of nature. A further implication is that the brutal, genocidal strategy of driving the Herero and Nama peoples into the desert and cutting them off from water sources (a strategy also deployed by the Turks during the Armenian genocide) is predestined by African nature. Finally, the ability to name the supposedly “nameless” reiterates the colonizers’ purported cultural and intellectual superiority.25 The nar­ rator’s casual comment on the renaming of “Timotheus,” for example, constitutes an attempt to erase the practices of forced assimilation and conversion to Christianity in the colonies. Not much distinguishes the “nameless” and “speechless” subjects from the “wild” land to be culti­ vated, a euphemism for domination. The supposed lack of culture of the colonized peoples is equated with their inability to speak proper German and is exemplified by Timotheus’ inarticulateness.26 His simplified and comical speech recalls contemporary “Kiezdeutsch” (“Ik is die schöne Bambus—erste Klass Bambus,” Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 11) and aims to add a “comical” element to a char­ acter who functions as both a jester and a means to legitimize German rule in South West Africa. After work, Timotheus “goes about his business of fun,” searching for food or extravagant items that he uses to decorate “his black person” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 8–9). His master Fritz (laughingly) pulls Timotheus’ ear when he catches him nibbling rice pud­ ding.27 Timotheus is not only infantilized but reduced to his physical nature

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and to bodily pleasures, all of which become sources of entertainment for the Wendelows (and implicitly for the reader). The text propagates the trope of black people’s proximity to nature and even to animals, for example, when Kurt tackles Timotheus’ foot “mit einem Griff, der ihm vom Beschlagen der Ochsen her geläufig war” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 10; with a grip familiar to him from shoeing oxen). The German colonizers’ mission of taming the “wild”—a process that according to Kurt requires a reasonable amount of beating—applies, again, to both, nature and the indigenous populations. Timotheus’s performance of a “primitive” song and dance—“Die Oss is schön … Die Oss is groß” (the ox is beautiful, the ox is big)—only substantiates Kurt’s claims about the unmusical and “primitive” nature of the colonized. Tellingly, it is not only the characters, such as the Wendelows, who engage in a racist discourse that is emblematic of colonial ideology, but also the narrator, who likens Timotheus to “ein braver Pudel, der schwanzwedelnd jede Freundlichkeit seines Herrn quit­ tiert” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 13; a docile poodle, who ac­ knowledges his master’s every act of kindness by wagging his tail). Timotheus, “der wie eine treue Dogge seine Herrin bewacht” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 132; who guards his mistress like a loyal mastiff) and Giovanna’s Francois, who stands sentinel over his aristocratic masters, both justify their own subjugation through the display of joyful submission, canine devotion. The false assertion of an interdependence between masters and servants, which Hegel resolves in favor of the servant’s relative, objective independence, appears here conversely as the servant’s heavy reliance on a disciplinary force. Timotheus is not only required to entertain his masters, but also, and perhaps more importantly, to demonstrate a willingness to conform to Protestant work ethics. In Herrenmenschen, Martha Mamozai discusses the racist trope of the “laziness” of the colonized, which fulfilled two functions: it justified “educational” violence and delegitimized resistance against colonial rule by dismissing deliberate acts of sabotage as expres­ sions of idleness. Here too, “lazy” locals are contrasted with hardworking German farmers, to whom work equals pleasure.28 In both novels, the propagated work fetish aims to legitimize the hegemonic order and to mute existing and potential resistance. Thus, the aforementioned nexus of “pleasure and sacrifice” also char­ acterizes the relationship between “pleasure and work”: work is conceived as a “sacrifice” of time for the illusion of progress, both of which leave a masochistic aftertaste through the object-becoming of subjects. Fritz Wendelow’s words shed light on what motivates German settlers to un­ dertake such a strenuous endeavor far from their homeland: “Hier ist ein Fleckchen Erde, wo der kraftvolle Mann sich, unabhängig von hundert unbequemen Scherereien, sein Heim aufbauen kann und darin haust wie

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ein kleiner König in seinem Reich” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 13; Here is a patch of land where the strong man, despite a hundred uncomfortable inconveniences, can build his home and dwell in it like a little king in his empire). In Fritz’s imagination, he becomes a king by means of his labor, while his vision conveniently elides the subjugation of the indigenous, the main factor that enables the upward mobility of the German lower classes in the colonial context. Moreover, Fritz’s sentiment uncovers the narcissism that defines the psyche of white colonialists: even those who previously belonged to the working class, the so-called “sur­ plus” population, are “kings” in the colonies.29 Here, surplus refers not only to unemployed men, but also to women whose reproductive capac­ ities are “unutilized.” In the colonies, men like Fritz become “masters,” and women, often former servants and housemaids, become “mistresses” (Herrinnen), a development that, as Mamozai explains, was often frowned upon by women with an upper-class background.30 The labor of the social climbers that enables upward mobility includes not only manual, pro­ ductive farm labor, fertilization of the land, but also the “taming” of “wild people” exemplarily demonstrated by Anneliese and her brothers. According to Wildenthal, even though Liliencron had not set foot in the German colony, gossip about her magical ability to “effortlessly disci­ pline” the African peoples was in currency in colonial circles.31 In Nach Südwestafrika, Hans and Annelies are not separated by class or denomination, but by the urgent need to conquer Lebensraum for the German Volk. Race constitutes the demarcation line between the two collectives, the civilized German Volk and the “barbaric” Hereros, re­ placing the category of class that is dominant in Giovanna. The illusion of the German people’s unity in solidarity—extending across the ocean back to the homeland, as Liliencron repeatedly assures her readers—and of the abrogation of class as a relevant category constitutes a step toward a classless völkisch society, as it was propagated stridently by the National Socialists a few decades years later. In a sense, Liliencron’s literary fantasy accomplished what some hoped to resolve through the acquisition of colonial settlements32: the class struggle that was feared to wreak havoc in Germany (and that Liliencron projected onto her rendering of the French Revolution) is mitigated by means of a völkisch unification in the face of a conflict between racial communities.33 To this day, such imagined con­ flicts between racial-ethnic communities and the fear of the eradication of the white race detract from the misery that capitalism brings about for the “white” poor.34 The fear of being eradicated by the “other,” defined variously as blacks, Jews, or others, is the result of projection and dis­ placement: in Western eyes, the suspected anger of colonized subjects about their enforced subordination is transformed into the unmotivated, genocidal wrath of the “Other.” The fantasized reversal of such

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subjugation necessitates the annihilation of the threat that emanates from the “Other” to protect the self.35 Antisemitism in Disguise Racial demarcation lines are reinforced through repeated emphasis on the “blackness” of the other and the “blondness” (synonymous with whiteness) of the colonizers, but also through the suggestive characterization of the creditor and merchant Berko. After the Wendelows lose an ox and their economic situation worsens, Kurt proposes that his sister Annelies marry their creditor in exchange for remission of their debt. In addition to reducing Annelies to an object of exchange, such a transaction also highlights the financial nature of the relationship between the Wendelows and Berko. The bond between the Wendelows and Berko is not defined by friendship and loyalty, the qualities that are supposed to characterize the Volksgemeinschaft, but rather is purely economic. Berko’s occupation as a merchant and creditor is certainly no coincidence; it alludes to the practice of usury associated with Jewry at least since Sheakespeare’s infamous merchant Shylock. In the 19th century, the anti-Judaic trope of the Geldjude (money Jew) was popularized once more in German cultural discourse, most famously by the Deutsche Tischgesellschaft (German Table Society). Unlike Timotheus, Berko speaks perfect German, yet Annelies doubts his Germandom: Annelies stand am Herd. Da schlüpfte eine Gestalt zu ihr herein und huschte dicht an sie heran. [… …] “Wie lange ist der Herr in Afrika?” “Sechs Jahr!” “Und er ist ein Deutscher?” examinierte sie weiter. “Natürlich, das wissen Sie ja!” “Es wollte mir nur nicht so recht in den Kopf.” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 143) [Annelies was standing at the stove when a figure slipped in and scurried close to her. [… …] “How long has the gentleman been in Africa?” “Six years!” “And he is German?” she continued examining. “Of course, you know that!” “I could not quite get it in my head.”] It stands to reason that Liliencron’s völkisch sentiment is all the more convincing because the narrative contrasts a “concrete” image of the

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enemy, embodied by the black natives, with a more abstract opponent36: Berko, a slithery creature (he “slips in” and “scurries”), flees immediately after hearing of an attack by the Hereros. His clandestine nature hints at an ability to infiltrate the German Volksgemeinschaft unobserved; unlike the threat that emanates from the colonized subject, the danger that Berko poses may go undetected. According to Annelies, Berko’s cowardice is reason enough for his ex­ clusion from the Volksgemeinschaft: “Nein, ich sage dem Berko, er ist gar nicht wert, ein Deutscher zu sein, wenn er nichts von Kameradschaft, nichts von Treue weiß. Wir halten hier aus, wir stützen uns, wir wachen und kämpfen für einander, und wenn wir dabei sterben müßten, dann versiegeln wir die deutsche Treue mit unserem Blut” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 144; No, I tell Berko, if he does not know anything of comradery, of loyalty, he is not worthy of being a German. We hold out here, we support each other, we watch and fight for each other, and if, in doing so, we have to die, then we seal German loyalty with our blood). Similarly, Kurt assures a German soldier whom he does not know that “Wir Deutschen stehen einander bei, so gut wir können” (Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 23; We Germans stand by each other as best we can). Concluding her statement with an emphasis on loyalty and German blood, Annelies reveals the true reason for her antipathy: Berko’s non-German “blood” indicated by his foreign, and possibly Jewish, name. Tellingly, she defends Germandom while standing at the hearth, the heart of the German home. The combination of the antisemitic notion of a völkisch belonging rooted in blood, which defies any prospect of “assimilation” or “inte­ gration” of the other, particularly the Jew, and the woman’s placement at the stove are paradigmatic of völkisch ideology. The Volk defeats the “other” not only on the battleground by military means, but also “at home”: like Faber in the notoriously antisemitic propaganda film Jew Süß (Veit Harlan, 1940), Annelies sees through Berko’s disguise, and instinc­ tively knows how to protect the German “race” from impurity. The survival of the German Volksgemeinschaft is contingent on both the military defeat of the Herero and the preservation of the German race, which requires guarding against pollution by Jews and blacks alike. Seen in this light, the previously mentioned infantilization of Timotheus not only justifies his subordination, but also, and perhaps more importantly, guarantees the nonsexual nature of his relationship with Annelies. The figure of Timotheus is indispensable: his behavior validates the German colonization of South West Africa; he loves his masters, especially Annelies, and internalizes German work ethic in an exemplary manner. Throughout, he exemplifies the triumph of the German mission in Africa. Yet at the same time, he is a young, black man. His blackness and Annelies’ whiteness are emphasized repeatedly throughout the narrative,

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presumably because, as mentioned above, Verkafferung was an important concern of (not only but especially) völkisch ideologues at the turn of the century. Furthermore, in Liliencron’s colonial narrative, Timotheus’s “asexual” nature, a characteristic commonly attributed to servant figures, which serves as a testament to their disinterested devotion, also guarantees the unsullied reproduction of the German race. What is more, women of color, who were feared as potential sexual competitors and hence as contaminators of the white race,37 are not featured in Liliencron’s novel; both Karl Friedrich and Hans announce their engagement to German women in the end, reassuring the undisturbed reproduction of white Germans in the Second Reich. In Nach Südwestafrika the death of the mother is mentioned only briefly at the beginning; shortly after arriving in the colony, mother Wendelow passed away, but there was no time to grieve. As in Giovanna, the removal of the “mother” from the narrative initiates the implemen­ tation of the new female ideal: the bourgeois woman in Giovanna and the völkisch ideal embodied by Annelies. In both narratives, the mother’s absence, immediately repressed and absorbed by the father’s omnipres­ ence, fulfills a similar function, should be; whereas in works such as William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying (1930) the dead mother’s presence lingers on, Liliencron’s texts undermine the mother in favor of the father. The swift repression of the mother’s death and absence paves the way for the völkisch transformation of the Wendelows. Not surprisingly, the two divergent concepts employed in Liliencron’s texts—the bourgeois and the völkisch woman—are not mutually exclusive but rather complement each other. In fact, völkisch race ideology can be integrated seamlessly into the already existing ideal of bourgeois womanhood: like her bourgeois counterpart, the völkisch woman is obedient, subordinate, reproductive, and a homemaker, but now she is also, and especially, German. Additionally, it would appear that the mother’s disposability is in both cases linked to the reduction of women to their fertility—or more eu­ phemistically, their motherhood—which renders women superfluous once they have fulfilled their role as reproducers (of the German race). The ideology of sacrifice thus pertains to both sexes equally: while men are sacrificed to war, women are sacrificed to reproduction. Conclusion In her memoir, Liliencron expresses a strong desire to become “ein Stück Mutti” to the soldiers in the German colonies (Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 263). Historian Lora Wildenthal, who wrote an extensive study on German women’s participation in colonial oppression, groups Adda von Liliencron with the most reactionary fraction of German-colonial

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women, at least with respect to her views on women’s role in society. Liliencron’s conservatism aligns, in a Freudian sense, with the cult of death she promotes throughout her oeuvre: According to Freud, the drives, per se conservative, are compelled to restore an original state, the most primal of which is the inanimate state preceding life: The hypothesis of self-preservative instincts, such as we attribute to all living beings, stands in marked opposition to the idea that instinctual life as a whole serves to bring about death. Seen in this light, the theoretical importance of the instincts of self-preservation, of selfassertion and of mastery greatly diminishes. They are component instincts whose function it is to assure that the organism shall follow its own path to death, and to ward off any possible ways of returning to inorganic existence other than those which are immanent in the organism itself.38 The cult of death, most famously cultivated by the National Socialists, can therefore be interpreted as an ideological manifestation of the death drive, which forms a stark antithesis to the survival instinct. On the sur­ face, völkisch ideology sacrifices the individual for the survival of a greater collective, the “race”; its underlying objective, however, remains the res­ toration of an illusory collective homogeneous unity. Since this goal proves unattainable, so long as we are “alive,” the restoration of an inanimate condition transpires as the ultimate goal. Liliencron’s supposed motherly love for the colonial endeavor constitutes a romantic transfiguration of völkisch-military fanaticism, now attached to the colonization of Africa. In her memoir, Liliencron admits not knowing much about the colonies and developing the “fürsorgende Liebe” (caring love) of a mother for the German conquest only in the context of the bloody suppression of the uprising of Herero and Nama peoples.39 Although Liliencron resolves her fear of turmoil and class conflict through the unifi­ cation of the Volk, the hierarchical order is not abolished, but displaced. The omnipotence of the Volk compensates for the impotence of the individual—and especially of female subjects—in capitalist patriarchy. Romantic transfiguration finds particularly fertile ground in “historical fiction,” a genre favored by Liliencron, who poses fiction and history not as complementary but antithetical. Consistently, subordination—across gender, class, and race hierarchies—is transfigured through the romantic vocabulary of “devotion” and “loyalty.” The romantic transubstantiation of the master–servant relationship pertains to the masterhood that the Germans—not as a class but as a Volk—exercise in their colonies, with brutal consequences for the native populations. Perhaps more than any other ideology, völkisch nationalism (and its contemporary reverberations)

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entwines the pleasure principle and the death drive in the most intimate terms. The fascination with death, work, and sacrifice, ubiquitous in Liliencron’s oeuvre,40 is insolubly tied up with her idea of romance. All three categories, along with the notion of “subordination,” presuppose a transi­ tioning from “subject” to “object,” a sacrifice that is rewarded with the allpowerful belonging to a völkisch collective. Mamozai argues that the “racism” of German women is motivated by the internalization of their subordination under the leading power of men which renders it natural that other peoples are also subordinated to the same Führungskraft (leading power).41 In völkisch ideology as evident in Liliencron’s works, however, subordination gives way to a total liquida­ tion of the self as it merges with the collective. German women, then, not only subordinate themselves to men, but also they self-obliterate and become part of men, part of the aspired father. They are not merely ac­ complices, but perpetrators. Notes 1 The text does not specify if Timotheus, who is mostly referred to as “Bambuse” (a pejorative term for indigenous people), is a “servant” or a “slave,” thus there is no information about his social status or whether his labor is paid or unpaid. It is implied that he resides at the settler farm by virtue of the Wendelows’ benevolence. In this essay, I will refer to him as their “slave,” so as not to reproduce euphemistic transfigurations of the relationship between German colonizers and the colonized peoples. 2 Adda von Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden (Berlin: R. Eisenschmidt, 2014), 269. Subsequent references appear as Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden and page number in the text. For more information on the League and the discourse on colonial women’s racial obligations, see Lora Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 1844–1945 (Durham, London: Duke University Press, 2011), 131–172. Subsequent references appear as Wildenthal, German Women for Empire and page number in the text. 3 The erasure of the difference between primary and secondary memory is evi­ dent when Liliencron speaks of her “Afrikaerinnerungen” (memories of Africa), Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 296. 4 Martha Mamozai, Herrenmenschen: Frauen im deutschen Kolonialismus (Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag, 1982), 128–130. Subsequent ref­ erences appear as Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, and page number in the text. 5 Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 95. According to Wildenthal, the absence of the category of “race,” which did not (yet) exist as a legal term, complicated endeavors to prevent “interracial” marriages or to keep their offspring from claiming their rights. 6 As Sebastian Conrad puts it, “The experience of a caesura and of a deep chasm between the homeland and abroad was connected discursively with the belief that a national identity understood in terms of the cultural and, increasingly, the völkisch—that is, stressing the notion of an organic German ethnic community—could not be cast aside; it, at least, would endure,” German Colonialism: A Short History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012),

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9

10 11

12 13 14 15 16

17 18

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19. Subsequent references appear as Conrad, German Colonialism, and page number in the text. Strangely, a similar desire for the preservation of “culture” features in both right and left wing discourses today. Etienne Balibar, “Class Racism,” in The Ethnicity Reader: Nationalism, Multiculturalism and Migration (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2010), 319. Subsequent references appear as Balibar, “Class Racism,” and page number in the text. Jörg Wassink discusses colonial literature and Liliencron’s work as examples of popular light fiction. Jörg Wassink, Auf den Spuren des deutschen Völkermordes in Südwestafrika: der Herero-/Nama-Aufstand in der deutschen Kolonialliteratur; eine literarhistorische Analyse (Munich: Martin Meidenbauer, 2004). Individual endeavors preceded the relatively late participation of Imperial Germany in the European colonial frenzy, the so-called “Scramble for Africa” at the 1884 Berlin Conference, see Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 12–15. According to Susanne Zantop, subconscious colonial fantasies predated imperialist action. Susanne Zantop, Colonial Fantasies. Conquest, Families and Nation in Pre-Colonial Germany, 1770–1870 (Durham, London: Duke University Press, 1997), 2–3. In this light, Horace’s conquest of Giovanna can be interpreted as a latent expression of imperialist phantasy. Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 141. Liliencron’s pronounced aversion to the revolutionaries and the revolution is likely linked to her family’s century-old military background and her great uncle’s role in the crushing of the 1848 revolution. Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 139–140. Sigmund Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principle (New York: W. W. Norton, 1961) 33. Subsequent references appear as Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principle, and page number in the text. Adda von Liliencron, Giovanna (Berlin: Christlicher Zeitschriftenverein, 1897, Kindle Edition), 130. Subsequent references appear as Liliencron, Giovanna, and page number in the text. Hündische Ergebenheit has been translated as “dog-like resignation” by Ian Johnston, or nominalized as “submissive dog” in the translation of “The Penal Colony” by Willa and Edwin Muir (New York: Random House, 1952), 90. Balibar, “Class Racism,” 370. Karl Marx distinguishes domestic servants from other workers; since they consume the revenue of their masters, their interests align with those of their masters. Servants as “luxury articles” of the wealthy belong to them entirely; they do not sell their labor for a given period of time. Karl Marx, MEW 24 (Berlin: Dietz Verlag, 1963), 409. Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 260–262. The other two volumes of the trilogy are titled Der Entscheidungskampf am Waterberg. Nach Briefen von Mitkämpfern und mit Benützung der Veröffentlichungen des Generalstabs (1907; The Showdown at Waterberg. According to Letters of Combatants and Using Publications by the General Staff) and Bis in das Sandfeld hinein. Afrikanisches Zeitbild bis zum Schluß des Jahres 1904 nach Briefen von Mitkämpfern und mit Benützung der Veröffentlichungen des Generalstabs (1908, Deep into the Sand Field. A Portrayal of Africa until the End of the Year 1904 according to Letters of Combatants and Using Publications by the General Staff). All three novels were published during and shortly after the events associated with the uprising and genocide. Hans Lund is inspired by Liliencron’s acquaintance, Sergeant Lüth, who par­ ticipated in the “China-expedition” and volunteered for military service in

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21 22

23

24 25

26

27 28

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South West Africa because he considered it his “heilige Pflicht” (sacred duty) to help his German brothers “die dort meuchlings von den Hererobanden überfallen wären” (Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 256; who were treacher­ ously attacked there by Herero gangs). Birthe Kundrus asserts that South West Africa played an important role in public discourse not only because it was the first settlement of the German Kaiserreich but also because its conquest was considered the “zweite Reichsgründung” (establishment of a Second Reich). See Birthe Kundrus, Moderne Imperialisten: das Kaiserreich im Spiegel seiner Kolonien (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2003), 8. Samuel is not mentioned until the plot twist at the end of the novel, which casts doubt on his loyalty but is resolved in his favor. Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 142. Manuel Junge, “Das Afrika- und Afrikanerbild in den Texten der Adda Freifrau von Liliencron,” in Attitudes to War. Literatur und Film von Shakespeare bis Afghanistan, ed. Claudia Gunz and Thomas F. Schneider (Göttingen: V&R unipress, 2012), 44–46. Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, translated by Edmund Jephcott (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002), 154. I’ve altered the translation of Jephcott “and the mightiest of the rich have experienced their weakest neighbor” to “and the mightiest empires conceived of their weakest neighbor”, as the German term “Reiche” refers here to empires not the wealthy. Junge, “Das Afrika und Afrikanerbild,” 46–48. Gewald notes that “German administrators attempted to establish a single amorphous African working class bereft of, and indeed prohibited from having, an ethnic and cultural identity beyond that deemed acceptable to the colonial state.” Jan-Bart Gewald, “Namibia (German South West Africa and South West Africa),” Encyclopedia of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity (Detroit: MacMillan Reference, 2005), 723. Similarly, Martha Mamozai emphasizes the significance of naming and renaming in erasing the colonized people’s identity through “Christianization” (Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 94) while Frantz Fanon discusses language’s function as a means to consolidate power in the colonial context. Black Skin, White Masks (London: Pluto Press, 1986), 17–41. Liliencron writes that she rehearsed Timotheus’s “accent” with an acquain­ tance of Ludwig von Estorff, who played a significant role in the Herero genocide, particularly in forcing the Hereros into the desert (Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 261). See Dominik J. Schaller, “‘Ich glaube, dass die Nation als solche vernichtet werden muss’: Kolonialkrieg und Völkermord in ‘Deutsch‐Südwestafrika’ 1904–1907,” in Journal of Genocide Research 6, no 3, (September 2004), 397. Liliencron, Nach Südwestafrika, 16. Justifying domination with references to the infantile nature of indigenous peoples was a widespread colonial strategy across the European metropoles. Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 258. Liliencron’s autobiography Krieg und Frieden concludes with a poem that juxtaposes the “nutzlos versickern in schlammigen Sand” (useless seeping into muddy sand) of African natives with German “Schaffen” (creating) and “Aufwertsstreben” (striving upwards). Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 297. Joseph Conrad’s short story “An Outpost of Progress” is a satire on European colonies’ function as localities for the disposal of so-called surplus population. Joseph Conrad, Tales of Unrest (London: Alma Books, 2018), 105–141. See Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 141–143.

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31 Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 143. 32 See Conrad, German Colonialism, 28. 33 Sebastian Conrad writes that “The Social Democrat Wilhelm Liebknecht, father of the famous socialist Karl Liebknecht, denigrated colonialism as ‘the export of the social question.’” Conrad, German Colonialism, 35. 34 Lora Wildenthal asserts that “Many colonists interpreted the 1904–1907 war as a ‘race war’ (Rassenkrieg). That is, they saw it as one manifestation of an underlying, inevitable conflict between two well-defined groups of people rather than a political struggle over rule and resources with diverse constitu­ encies on various sides.” Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 95. Today, similar arguments and fears are manifest in, for example, Renaud Camus’ theory of the Great Replacement, which also resonates in US right-wing circles, for example, in the chant “You will not replace us” at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville 2017. 35 The similarities between the fear of being abused by the colonized, which Adda von Liliencron puts in the mouths of German settlers in today’s Namibia, and the fear expressed by, for example, the Neo-Nazi and mass murderer Dylann Roof, are striking. 36 Moishe Postone interrogates, based on the commodity form, the distinction between the “concrete” and “abstract” racial other in his essay “Anti-Semitism and National Socialism: Notes on the German Reaction to ‘Holocaust,’” New German Critique 19, no. 19 (1980): 97–115. 37 As Lora Wildenthal points out, German women’s obsession with race purity and Germandon is linked to their main role in the colonial context as re­ producers of the race. Wildenthal, German Women for Empire, 201. 38 Sigmund Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principle (New York: W. W. Norton, 1961), 33. According to Freud, the death drive originates in evolution: “The attributes of life were at some time evoked in inanimate matter by the action of a force of whose nature we can form no conception. It may perhaps have been a process similar in type to that which later caused the development of con­ sciousness in a particular stratum of living matter. The tension which then arose in what had hitherto been an inanimate substance endeavored to cancel itself out. In this way the first instinct came into being: the instinct to return to the inanimate state,” Beyond the Pleasure Principle, 32. 39 Liliencron, Krieg und Frieden, 255. 40 As Liliencron proudly brags in her memoir, the ideological substructure characterized by the cult of death is consistent throughout her work from Giovanna to Nach Südwestafrika to her Soldatenlieder. 41 Mamozai, Herrenmenschen, 20.

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Maria Theresia Ledóchowska as an Activist in the Religious Colonization of Africa Esaie Djomo and Dorine Mbeudom University of Dschang, Cameroon

Religious colonization,1 or colonization through the (Christian) religion, is a form of colonization that has never been disrupted by the decolonization movements in Africa since the 1950s.2 Maria Theresia Ledóchowska, an Austrian nun and a major figure of the religious colonization of Africa, was a great activist in Europe. She never visited Africa, but she was known as “Mother of Africa” with reference to her colonial Catholic activism in Europe. The most comprehensive account of this figurehead of Catholic religious activism was presented by Pope Paul VI in his homily of “19 October 1975: Beatification of four Servants of God”: Unter den wegen ihres missionarischen Wirkens von uns am heutigen Weltmissionstag seliggesprochenen Glaubenszeugen fehlt auch nicht ein leuchtendes Beispiel für die Mitwirkung der Frau im Missionsauftrag der Kirche. Es ist die ehrwürdige Dienerin Gottes Maria Theresia Ledóchowska. Sie stammte aus einem Adelsgeschlecht polnischen Ursprungs, wie es ihr Name anzeigt, jedoch österreichischer Nationalität in Salzburg; sie ist die Nichte des Kardinals Ledóchowski, die Schwester des späteren Generaloberen der Gesellschaft Jesu, des so geschätzten P. Wladimir Ledóchowski, wie auch die Schwester einer anderen auserlesenen Seele, Ursula, der Gründerin der Schwestern vom Heiligsten Herzen Jesu in der Todesangst (die hier in Rom in Primavalle gut bekannt sind). Die neue Selige, Maria Theresia Ledóchowska, vernahm den dringlichen Aufruf von Kardinal Lavigerie für Afrika und stellte ihre hervorragenden Fähigkeiten hochherzig in den Dienst der Kirche und des Missionsapostolates. Sie gründete die Petrus-Claver-Sodalität für die afrikanischen Missionen, die heutigen «Missionsschwestern vom hl. Petrus Claver», deren Ziel es ist, die apostolische Tätigkeit der Missionare in Afrika durch Gebet, Almosen, religiöse Schriften und sonstige erforderliche Hilfen tatkräftig zu unterstützen. Die selige Maria Theresia Ledochowska förderte den Missionsgedanken insbesondere auch durch Vorträge, Abhandlungen und die Verbreitung von Zeitschriften, die DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-16

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noch heute erscheinen. Sie war aus dem Geist des Evangeliums und der christlichen Nächstenliebe auf vorzügliche Weise eine Pionierin der modernen Forderung nach Alphabetisation.3 [Among the witnesses of faith whom we beatify on the occasion of World Mission Day because of their missionary action, we did not omit a shining example of female collaboration in the missionary work of the Church. It is the Blessed Servant of God Maria Theresa Ledóchowska. She is descended from a noble family of Polish origin, as her name suggests; was, however, of Austrian nationality in Salzburg; she is the niece of Cardinal Ledóchowski, the sister of the very eminent Father Wladimir Ledóchowski who became General of the Society of Jesus, sister also of another chosen soul, Ursula, foundress of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Agonisant (well known here in Rome, in Primavalle). The new Blessed, Marie-Thérèse Ledóchowska, accepted Cardinal Lavigerie’s urgent appeal in favor of Africa and wholeheartedly put her remarkable faculties at the service of the Church and the missionary apostolate. She founded the Peter Claver Sodality for the African missions, today’s «Missionary Sisters of St Peter Claver», whose aim is to actively support the apostolic activity of missionaries in Africa through prayer, almsgiving, religious writings and other necessary aids. Blessed Maria Theresia Ledochowska promoted the missionary idea in particular through lectures, treatises and the distribution of magazines that are still published today. In the spirit of the Gospel and Christian charity, she was an excellent pioneer of the modern demand for literacy.] For her religious activism, especially her monumental missionary work in favor of the Catholicization of Africa, Ledóchowska was rewarded by the highest authority of world Catholicism. In our investigation of this effervescent Catholic activism, we first review its tools and then parse its antiIslamic tendency aimed at eradicating Islam from Africa for the benefit of Catholicism. Our goal is to lift the veil on the work of this author who is best known through the prism of humanitarianism thanks to her commitment to anti-slavery and feminism.4 Infrastructure for the Catholicization of Colonial Africa: The Periodical Echo from Africa, the Publishing House St. Petrus Claver, and the NGO St. Petrus Claver Sodality The colonial ambition of Maria Teresa Ledóchowska was to win the souls of the citizens of the African territories colonized by Austria’s competitors for Catholicism. She, therefore, did everything possible to assemble and ready the intellectual weapons of her battle. The infrastructure of her

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missionary endeavor comprises a newspaper, the magazine Echo aus Afrika, an NGO, the St. Petrus Claver Sodalität (St. Peter Claver Sodality), and a publishing house, St Petrus Claver.5 She also gave many public lectures and wrote missionary poetry, dramatic and theater works. In the following, we focus on some of these tools of her religious activism to catholicize Africa. The magazine Echo aus Afrika, a Catholic periodical, was used for the fight against slavery and the Catholicization of Africa. Founded in June 1889, this Catholic monthly appeared continuously until 1917. In the first two years of its publication (1889–1890), Echo aus Afrika existed as a column in St. Angela-Blatt, the newspaper of the “Apostolat der christlichen Töchter” (Apostolate of Christian Girls) published by the Austrian Priest Anton Schöpfleuthner (1845–1921).6 The articles Ledóchowska published in that column review facts related to the mission of Christianization in general and the Catholicization of Africa in particular. They are written by Ledóchowska as well as European priests and clericals serving in different parts of Africa. The subjects of the articles from this early period can be gleaned from the titles, which include “Österr. Antheil an dem RettungsWerk in Afrika” (Austria’s Contribution to the Work of Salvation in Africa), “Afrika und Antisklaverei-Vereine” (Africa and Anti-Slavery Associations), “Nachrichten aus den Missionen/Correspondenz” (News from the Missions/Correspondance), “Gesellschaft der Echo-Förderer und Förderinnen” (Society of the Male and Female Supporters of Echo), “Bücherschau” (Review of Books), “Negerjagd und Sclavenhandel in Sudan in den letzten Decennien von Franz Geyer” (Hunting of N* and Slave Trade in Sudan in the Last Decades of Franz Geyer), “Die Glaubensverbreitung im Togo-lande” (Diffusion of the Faith in Togo), “Originaltelegramm des Echo aus Togo” (Original Telegram of Echo from Togo), and “Bei den Brüdern der Sahara” (With the Brothers of the Sahara). Depending on the availability of publishable material, Echo, which consisted initially of only four pages, reached 24 pages before stabilizing at 20 pages per issue. The number of copies per print run was 25,000 until 1900, reached 40,000 starting in 1901, and peaked at 44,000 copies in 1913. Until 1892, Echo aus Afrika appeared only in German; but starting in 1900 it was also published in several other European languages to extend its reach in Europe, including Polish (1893), Italian (1895), French (1899), Bohemian (1900), Slovenian (1904), Portuguese (1907), Hungarian (1908), English (1912), and Spanish (1921). This broadening of the linguistic field of the journal formed an integral part of a strategy designed to reach large sectors of the European population, but above all to allow Catholic missionaries settled in Africa and coming from various linguistic spheres, to have direct access to the information and directives contained therein and, wherever possible, to act accordingly. In this way, the journal became an organ of international

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Catholicism as well as a venue of propaganda and a vector of a unified force in the battle against slavery and all other obstacles to the Catholicization of Africa: fetishism, Islam, and Protestantism. The magazine’s pricing policy likely promoted and facilitated its dissemination in the countries where it was sold. Echo aus Afrika could be obtained by direct purchase or by annual subscription.7 Prices were within the reach of all social strata: five guilders at a kiosk in Austria. The subscription fees differ depending on whether it was obtained in Austria or in the other member countries of the World Postal Union. In Austria, the subscription fee was 40 guilders if purchased at the delivery center or 50 guilders by mail. In Germany, it cost one mark and 20 pfennigs; in other countries, the subscription fee was two guilders. Ledóchowska remained the sole editor of the journal. For 23 years (until 1911), she published under the pseudonym Alexander Halka. As editor, she had control of all issues, thereby assuming full responsibility for the newspaper. Throughout, she promoted arguments designed to persuade her readership on subjects that served her own cause. As the main enunciative body, Ledóchowska relied on various journalistic and rhetorical devices, including the informative, explanatory, persuasive, as well as capture and seduction, in her effort to promote Catholicism across Africa.8 The information and reportage that the magazine offers are provided by correspondence and news from Africa written by missionaries settled in Africa. Indeed, since Ledóchowska never visited Africa herself, such missionaries were the main sources of information for the magazine. These missionary informants did not limit themselves to delivering information in a strictly professional manner, as journalists would (although the latter’s reporting is not devoid of subjectivity either). Rather, they comment on the facts they relate. Much of their correspondence can be classified not only as opinion pieces, but also as a reservoir of knowledge about Africa. For the purpose of our analysis and in view of Ledóchowska’s objective, these editorials and correspondence provide a representative sample, precisely because the missionaries express their personal opinions. Relying on such a sample is necessary because of the large number of issues; it is, however, justifiable because all texts emanate from the main communicators: Catholics, Ledóchowska, and missionaries. From 1890 to 1917, Ledóchowska published 2,050 missionary missives in Echo aus Afrika. These missives address the two main themes displayed in subtitles on the front cover of the magazine: the fight against slavery in Africa and the promotion of Catholic activities in Africa. At the beginning, Echo focused on the anti-slavery battle, then, progressively included missionary activities. The respective subtitles read “Echoes of Africa: Catholic Monthly for All Friends of the Anti-Slavery Movement, Especially for Austrian Associations, Sympathizers of This Movement”

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(1890–1891); “Catholic Monthly for the Promotion of the Anti-Slavery Movement and Catholic Activities in Africa” (1892–1893); and “Catholic Monthly for the Promotion of the Anti-Slavery Movement and Mission Activities in Africa, at the Same Time Organ of the Congregation of Mary for Africa” (as from 1894). Indeed, the missionaries’ missives depict their struggles against slavery in Africa on the one hand and their actions to promote Catholicism in colonial Africa on the other. The missionaries describe, often in great detail and with much emotion, the actions they carry out in order to eliminate slave ownership and all kinds of obstacles to the deployment of Catholics and the promotion of Catholicism. Among the obstacles to the Catholicization of Africa, missionaries stationed in Africa cite and denounce slavery as well as non-Catholic religions, in particular, the African religion they called “Fetishism,” Islam, and Protestantism. Consequently, the targets of the anti-slavery movement were the followers of these religions. In other words, Ledóchowska sought to free women and children from slavery, Fetishism, Islam, and Protestantism and to convert them to Catholicism. She addressed all these themes in missionary conferences all over Europe. The “St. Peter Claver Publishing House,” which was established in 1894, played a key role in the dissemination of this ideology all over Europe and the world. Its headquarters were in Salzburg, Austria. It published all kinds of media related to the Catholic religion and the Catholicization of Africa. These publications included three news media: the magazine Echo aus Afrika (from 1894, circulation of 100,000 copies in 1922), the illustrated newspaper Kleine Afrika-Bibliothek (popular in France under the French name of Le Négrillon, circulation of 140,500 copies in 1922) and Mission Propaganda (published 1914).9 The Kleine Afrika-Bibliothek was created for a young readership and designed to draw attention to the issue of the Catholicization of Africa. In 1911 (till 1939), the Kleine Afrika-Bibliothek was renamed Das Negerkind (The Negro Child). It reached 17,000 copies per print run in 1907 and around 38,000 copies in 1913, only two years after its name changed; from 1954 to 1971, it was titled Junge Afrikaner (Young African) and from 1972 to 1984, it was published under the name Du und die Mission (You and the Mission). St. Pierre Claver also published biographies of the clergy with an emphasis on missionaries working in Africa, including a biography of Father Max Ryllo, the founder of a mission in Central Africa in 1894. Similarly, an article on Cardinal Lavigerie was published in the first issue of the 1893 edition of Echo aus Afrika entitled “Schreiben des Card.[inal] Ledóchowski anlässlich des Hinscheidens Cardinal Lavigerie” (Address of Cardinal Ledóchowski on the occasion of the death of Cardinal Lavigerie). Papal statements or briefs find a privileged space in Echo aus Afrika. For example, the “Dekret der Seligsprechung oder Erklärung als Martyrer der

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ehrw. Diener Gottes Karl Luanga, Matthias Murumba und ihrer Gefährten aus Uganda” (Decree of the beatification or elevation to martyrdom of the most honorable servants of God Karl Luanga, Matthias Murumba and their companions in Uganda).10 In the repertoire of this edition, there are also literary and dramatic works by Ledóchowska and other writers, including missionary poems and plays. The NGO St. Peter Claver Sodalität (Sodality of St. Peter Claver) is a suprastructure set up to coordinate programs and measure the extent and impact of European Catholicization on Africa. It was founded on April 29, 1894 in Salzburg in Austria-Hungary, that is to say in the same year as the publishing house St Pierre Claver and five years after the establishment of the magazine Echo aus Afrika. St. Peter Claver Sodality is the secular arm of Catholicism; it operates as a hub for the fight against slavery in Africa. Its purpose is to mobilize all means and energies to achieve this end. Its headquarter is in Salzburg (Austria) with branches in six countries in Europe and the United States. From 1894 to 1917, there were six national power stations and 103 subsidiaries in various cities. The parent company in Salzburg supervised the work of 24 branches, including Vienna, created in 1894, Graz (1913), Klagenfurt (1913), and Wels (1917). The German Central Office (1894), based in Geistingen and Munich (1894), controlled the activities of 28 subsidiaries in the country, including Wolznach (1894), Augsburg (1900), Berlin (1913), Aachen (1913), Bonn (1914), and Lorch am Rhein (1916). A Polish branch opened in 1894 in Krakau; its 14 subsidiaries included Breslau (1906), Nagybecskerek, Schwientochlowitz, Gleiwitz (1913), Rodzin, Myslowitz, Danzig, Rosenberg, Zabrze, Pitschen, Teschen, Oppeln, Beuthen (1914), and Ratibor (1916). A French subsidiary was established in 1899 in Paris with subsidiaries in Nice, Elsace, Lyon (1901), Metz, and Colmar (1913). In Switzerland, the society was headquartered in Zug (1901) with subsidiaries in Luzern, St. Gallen, Solothurn, Schwyz, MariaEinsiedeln (1901), Bremgarten, Zurich, Hägendorf, Basel, Altdorf (1913), Bern (1916), Lausanne, and Lugano (1917). The Italian branch opened its doors in Rome (1902) with subsidiaries in Padua (1902), Lombardy (1903), Triest (1905), Venice (1906), Bozen, Florence, Pistoia (1913), Bologna, Naples, Genua, Lucca (1914), Turin (1915), and Pisa (1916). In the United States, the society found a home in St. Louis, MO and in New York City in 1914 with subsidiaries in Chicago, Dubuque, Milwaukee (1914), and New Orleans (1916). The donations collected by subsidiaries were sent to Africa through their national headquarters and the parent company in Salzburg. Public Lectures and Dramas to Catholicize Africa In addition to her deep involvement with publishing and distributing information about Africa, Ledóchowska’s activities for the Catholicization

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of Africa also include missionary lectures and literary and theatrical works. Between 1891 and 1922, Ledóchowska gave a total of 28 lectures on the subject. These lectures began slowly in 1891. After a six-year pause, she gave six more talks between 1898 and 1901. A three-year break from lecturing provided the time to prepare and hold nineteen more lectures until 1913. The First World War suspended her lecture tour. But at the end of hostilities, she gave a talk in 1918 and one more, her last, on June 15, 1922, less than a month before her death. These public speeches took place in twenty-five locations in six European countries: Austria, France, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, and Poland. In Austria, Ledóchowska gave 16 talks, that is, more than half of these public lectures took place in her country. She spoke four times in Switzerland (1905, twice in 1906, and 1909), twice in France (1899 and 1900), Italy (1905 and 1906), and Germany (1910), and once in Poland (1908). At the heart of these direct communications are themes related to the fight for the Catholicization of Africa: the fight against slavery and all the agents and factors that contribute to it, ranging from financial means to human resources; she also addressed the infrastructures of struggle, the tools of soft power, the obstacles to the work of missionaries in African countries and the strategies of their eviction, etc. The talks are always aimed at specific demographics: young men and women, the clergy, Catholic Christians, royal luminaries and princes, and politicians of all nationalities. For example, the first lecture to the Austrian public in 1891 was devoted to the topic of “Kardinal Lavigerie: Der große Negerapostel des 19. Jahrhunderts und das Werk der Antisklaverei” (Cardinal Lavigerie: the great apostle of the negroes of the 19th century and the work of anti-slavery). It revolves around four main themes: the ravages of slavery in Africa; Islam as a danger for Africa; money for the anti-slavery struggle; and mobilization for the Christianization of Africa. Her public lecture on Africa in front of young French people gathered in Paris in 1899 drew the attention of its audience to the misery of the African people, highlighting slavery and the deplorable state of African women, while singling out money as a means of combating obstacles that stand in the way of the dissemination of Catholicism in Africa, in particular, other forms of belief, such as Islam, Protestantism, and Hinduism. Finally, she also discussed the role of the NGO St Peter Claver as an instrument to raise awareness of and fight against these dangers in Africa. In addition to the literary and theatrical work, there are 19 poems published between 1899 and 1916 (11 of them in 1915), in which Ledóchowska put her genius at the service of the Mission. Eight plays were written and staged between 1884 and 1915, including Zaida das Negermädchen (1889; Zaida, the N* Girl)11 with 11 performances between 1889 and 1916 and Von Hütte zu Hütte (1912; From Hut to Hut), which

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depicts Islamic activism in Africa, denouncing the Islamization practices of Africans. It too was a successful play with five productions, including two in February 1910 in Vienna at the Kleiner Musikverein (on the 2nd) and at the Festsaal des Kaufmännischen Vereins by Le Groupe Réunion (on the 20th). The same ensemble returned to the latter theater with the same play in 1911, then performed at the St. Binzenhaus theater in Breslau on April 8, 1913. Two months later, on June 1, 1913, the play was performed at the Katholische Vereinshaus in the Silesian town of Rosenberg. Like the lectures, the performances of these dramatic works are part of a larger public relations effort. Ledóchowska applied public relation techniques before the term came into use. Carl Hundhausen explains the mechanisms that characterize such work: Aus diesen Spannungen zwischen Gesamtinteressen und Teilinteressen ist das Phänomen Public Relation zu erklären und zu begreifen. Public Relations haben die primäre Aufgabe eines Adjustement, d.h. einer Angleichung oder Anpassung dieser unterschiedlichen Interessen; Public Relations haben die Aufgabe eines Engineering of consent, d.h. einer Herbeiführung von Übereinstimmungen. Die Ausgangsbasis für Public Relations ist damit deutlich gekennzeichnet. Nach Bernays umfasst dieser Begriff weiter Information der Öffentlichkeit, das Bemühen, die Öffentlichkeit davon zu überzeugen (to persuade), dass Verhaltensweisen und Handlungen von Einzelpersonen, Gruppen oder Gesellschaft geändert werden müssen und dass Anstrengungen zu unternehmen sind, Verhaltensweisen und Handlungen dieser Personen oder Gruppen mit der Öffentlichkeit und solcher der Öffentlichkeit mit ihnen zu integrieren. [The phenomenon of public relations can be understood and explained from these tensions between general interests and particular interests. The primary task of public relations is that of an adjustment, that is to say, of a levelling or adaptation of these different interests; public relations deals with consent engineering, that is, bringing the parties to a consensus. Thus, the starting point of public relations is clearly marked. According to Bernays, this notion also includes informing the public, efforts to persuade the public that the behaviours and actions of individuals, groups and society need to be changed and that efforts must be undertaken with the aim of integrating the behaviour and actions of such persons or groups with the public and those of the public with their own.]12 This excerpt discusses three main aspects of “public relations”: information is given to an audience; attempts are made to persuade them to change attitudes and actions; the aim is to match the aspirations of this audience with those of an institution or organization and vice versa. How did Ledóchowska

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use these technics of manipulation to encourage the public to share her vision of the conquest of Africa by Catholicism? One of Ledóchowska’s strategies is that she effectively evoked hatred against Islam to reach her goal. Ledóchowska’s Anti-Islam Activism In her public talk Über die Wichtigkeit der Missionen (On the Importance of the Missions), given in 1907 to an audience of mission sisters in a boarding school in Vienna, Ledochówska spoke with passion about the battle against Islam in Africa: Sorgen wir noch für eine angenehme Nachbarschaft, indem wir Afrika die wahre Zivilisation und den wahren Glauben vermitteln. Entweder wird Afrika mohammedanisch oder es wird christlich! Und wer soll bei diesem hl. Kreuzzuge an der Spitze marschieren? [ … ] Mohammed oder Christus! Luther oder Rom! [Let us also ensure a pleasant neighborhood by transmitting to Africa the true civilization and the true faith. Either Africa becomes Muslim or it becomes Christian! And who should march at the head of this holy crusade? [ … ] Muhammad or Christ! Luther or Rome.]13 As noted above, for Ledóchowska Islam represented a clear threat and major obstacle to the deployment of Catholicism in Africa. Thus, eradicating Islam in Africa was seen as a real challenge for Catholics if they wanted to win souls on this continent. The stakes were high and demanded the utmost commitment. Africa aroused the greed and envy of Muslims, Protestants, and Catholics alike. The Holy Crusade of which Ledóchowska speaks is directed against Islam. She incites all Europeans, and particularly all Catholics, to hate Islam and seeks to enlist them in a merciless war intent on ousting Islam from Africa. Ledóchowska’s aversion is all the greater, as the Islamic presence in Africa created serious difficulties for Catholic missionaries. These select declarations of war against Islam showcase the Catholic view of Islam. Clearly, Catholics were convinced that Islam needed to be eradicated in Africa in order to give free rein to Catholicism. This position is stated explicitly and vehemently in the magazine, in the colonial missionary theater, in missionary conferences, and by the missionaries and Ledóchowska herself. To denounce the presence of Islam in Africa, Ledóchowska relied on the reports of missionaries stationed in Africa, which she published in Echo aus Afrika. In relying on missionaries’ reports, Ledóchowska was able to gather data that attest to the presence of Islam in Africa. In various issues of the magazine, Islam is shown to hinder the implantation of Catholicism in Africa. There are two fundamental reasons for this choice. First, in showing that the missionaries attacked

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Islam in Africa in their correspondence, the articles reveal a competition between Muslims and Catholics regarding the conquest of souls in Africa. Second, the missives present a clear picture of specific territories in which Catholic action must be further strengthened. Such designations of specific areas by the missionaries allow readers to gain insights into the precise locations where Catholicism struggled against Islam in Africa. It is noted that Islam has gained a foothold in several countries, specifically in 28 regions, on African soil. It is present along all African coastlines: the northern coast (Egypt, Tunis, Algeria, and Tripoli); the west coast (Senegambia, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Guinea, Benin, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Togo); the east coast (Abyssinia, Zanzibar, German East Africa, Somalia, and Eritrea), and the southern coast (South Africa, Madagascar, Rhodesia, Mozambique, and German South-West Africa). Islam has also expanded inland and is found in Congo, Rwanda, Uganda, and Niger. The great reach of Islam created serious difficulties for Catholic missionaries. In these localities, they took strong and unanimous positions against the presence of Islam. In their letters to Ledóchowska, they expressed their hatred of Islam in Africa. In Echo aus Afrika, Ledóchowska printed the reports of the missionaries detailing their difficulties in stemming the tide of Islam. For example, in 1893, missionary Xaverius Geyer of the Congregation of the Missionaries of Africa expressed his aversion to Islam in these terms: “Später kamen noch viele andere Schwestern hinzu. Der Widersacher aller Guten konnte nicht ruhig mit ansehen, dass sich hier eine katholische Kirche erhob. Musulmänner sahen den Bau mit Eifersucht” (Later many other mission sisters joined. The sworn enemy of all those on the side of good could not bear to watch quietly that a Catholic chapel was being erected here. Muslims regarded the construction with jealousy).14 In 1898, Father Bricet, of the Lyon Mission in Dahomey (present-day Benin), was animated by similar sentiments against Islam. He writes: Denn, selbst wenn der Anhänger Mohameds, sei es aus Unwissenheit oder aus Charakteranlage, nicht fanatisch ist, bleibt er doch stets ein geschworener Feind des Christentums und der Civilisation, ja überhaupt alles europäischen Einflusses. Es wird einst der Tag kommen, da er sich stark genug fühlen wird, diese seine Gesinnung nicht mehr verbergen zu müssen, als dann werden Europas Nationen, die dem Islam in ihren Besitzungen jetzt nur allzu große Zugeständnisse machen, mit dieser verderblichen Macht zu rechnen haben. [Indeed, even if the disciple of Muhammad, either out of ignorance or natural disposition, is not fanatical, he still remains a sworn enemy of Christianity and civilization, indeed of all European influence in general. A day will come when he will feel strong enough and will no

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longer have to hide his intentions; then, Europe’s nations, which are now making all too big concessions to Islam with respect to their property, will have to reckon with this ruinous power.]15 The report of the Vicar General of the Congregation of the Fathers of the Holy Spirit, Father Jalabert, concerning Senegambia is also unfavorable to Islam. He explains that “außer den schon vorhandenen zahlreichen Stationen, in welchen meine tapferen Missionäre der Last der Arbeit fast erliegen, bieten neue Volksmengen, die noch frei vom Islamismus sind, z.B. die Tereres und Djolas, ungefähr 300000 Seelen, ein weites Feld für apostolische Werke dar” (Beyond the many stations that are already present, in which my valiant missionaries almost succumb to the burden of work, new ethnic groups still free of Islam, e.g., the Tereres and Djolas, approximately 300,000 souls, constitute a vast field for apostolic work).16 In the same vein, missionary Strub of the congregation of the mission of Lyon in Nigeria adds: “Nach menschlicher Voraussicht wird ganz Nigeria über kurz oder lang muselmännisch sein. Das ist für wahr keine übertriebene Behauptung, wenn man sieht, wie rapid der Islam sich ausbreitet. Es braucht Jahre und Jahre, um aus einem Neger einen rechten Christen zu machen. Und überlässt man ihn zu früh sich selbst, so fällt er gar zu leicht in den wilden Fetischismus zurück. [ … ] Einem Volk aber, das vom Geist des Islam unterjocht ist, wird der Weg zu den höheren Idealen des Christentums für immer versperrt sein” (According to human estimation all Nigeria will become Muslim in the short or long term. This is truly not an exaggerated statement when one observes how quickly Islam is spreading. It takes years and years to turn a black person into a true Christian. And if we abandon him to himself too soon, he all too easily reverts to wild fetishism. [… … ] To a people, however, that is subjugated by the spirit of Islam, the path to the highest ideals of Christianity is forever blocked).17 These declarations of war against Islam, far from being exhaustive, elucidate the Catholic view of Islam and the perceived urgency of eradicating Islam in Africa in order to give free rein to Catholicism. Ledóchowska not only published the letters she received, but also took a stand herself, expressing her rejection of Islam. She wrote a four-page editorial for the 1898 edition devoted to this topic. Here, she characterizes the Muslim religion as warlike and expansive in nature. According to Ledóchowska, this religion of a “false prophet” cannot coexist with Catholicism because its presence in Africa lacks a legal foundation and was not preceded by negotiations with the European colonizing powers of Africa: Eines der wichtigsten Ereignisse der letzten Hälfte unseres Jahrhunderts ist ohne Zweifel das Vordringen der europäischen Nationen in das Innere des sogenannten dunklen Erdtheiles, die Besitznahme und Vertheilung Afrikas

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von seiten Europas. Als man jedoch nach langen Verhandlungen, Congressen, diplomatischen Conflicten, peinlichen Opfern und selbst blutigen Kämpfen zu einem endgültigen Resultate gekommen zu sein schien, stellte es sich heraus, daß man bei dieser Vertheilung eine gar mächtige Concurrentin übersehen hatte, eine Macht, die keine genau definierten Grenzen, keine diplomatischen Vertreter, kein Nationalbanner, aber nur ein religiöses Abzeichen besitzt, den Halbmond. Diese übersehene Concurrentin, diese vergessene und doch so einflußreiche Macht ist die Religion des falschen Propheten, der Islam. [One of the most important events of the last half of our century is undoubtedly the penetration of European nations into the interior of the so-called dark continent, the occupation and partition of Africa by Europe. When, however, it seemed that, after long negotiations, congresses, diplomatic conflicts, painful sacrifices and even bloody fighting, a final result had been achieved, it turned out that in this division a rather powerful competitor had been overlooked, a power that possesses no precisely defined borders, no diplomatic representatives, no national banner, but only religious insignia, the crescent moon. This overlooked competitor, this forgotten and yet so influential power is the religion of the false prophet, Islam.]18 While legitimizing the European enterprise in Africa, Ledóchowska took it upon herself to remind her fellow conquerors of the urgency of forcing Islam out of Africa. To achieve this goal, she championed shortcuts, which she considered justified because of Islam’s harmful effects: er [der Islam] hatte sich darin [in Afrika] festgesetzt gleich dem verderblichen, zernagenden Wurme inmitten einer köstlichen Frucht. Woher kamen jene grausamen Niedermetzlungen ganzer Expeditionen, woher jene häufigen Aufstände, welche die europäischen Nationen nöthigten ihre scheinbar völlig unterworfenen Besitzungen mit heroischen Muthe zurückzuerobern? Der Islam hatte sie herausbeschworen, die Anhänger Muhameds waren theils Anstifter theils Ausführer derselben. Mit dem Islam giebt es keinen Frieden. Zwar hat man ihm jetzt bestimmte Grenzen angewiesen, ihn genöthigt die europäischen Besitzungen zu respectieren, dadurch sind ihm jedoch nur leichte, kaum fühlbare Wunden beigebracht worden; Afrika bleibt nach wie vor ein fruchtbarer Boden, ein ergiebiges Erntefeld für ihn. [It [Islam] had taken root in it [Africa] much like the destructive, gnawing worm inside a delicious fruit. Whence those cruel massacres of entire expeditions, whence those frequent uprisings that force the European nations to reconquer with heroic courage territories that were seemingly utterly subdued? Islam had conjured them,

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Muhammad’s followers were partly their instigators partly their leaders. There is no peace with Islam. Although it has now been confined within certain borders and forced to respect the European possessions, this has inflicted only light, hardly noticeable wounds; then as now, Africa remains a fruitful ground, a field for a favorable harvest for Islam.]19 Ledóchowska’s hatred of Islam is so relentless that she does not hesitate to define it as the main source of evil and the only agent destructive of morality in Africa: Er [der Neger] äfft seinen muhamedanischen Nachbarn oder Herrn nach, Heiraten und Schulen thun den Rest. Wir dürfen uns über die großen Erfolge der islamischen Propaganda nicht wundern, enthält ja doch die Religion Muhameds alles, was immer die Einbildungskraft eines unwissenden Naturvolkes zu fesseln vermag, sie schmeichelt seinem Geschmack und seine sinnlichen Neigungen. Dem Neger gilt die Polygamie als Glück, eine Ehre, Gewalt ist für ihn Recht, Sclaverei—Gesetz. Das Recht des Stärkeren, die Erniedrigung der Frau, Aberglaube und Fanatismus, das alles sind Pole, wo der heidnische Neger und der Sohn Muhameds einander begegnen. [He [the Negro] apes his Muslim neighbors or lords, marriages and schools do the rest. We must not marvel at the great successes of Islamic propaganda, for the religion of Muhammad contains everything whatsoever capable of capturing the imagination of an ignorant people of nature, it flatters its taste and sensuous inclinations. The negro sees polygamy as happiness, an honor, to him, violence is a right, slavery—law. The right of the strongest, the humiliation of woman, superstition and fanaticism, all these are poles, where the heathen Negro meets the son of Mohamed.]20 Based on these observations, Ledóchowska asks for the support of Germany and Austria’s European peers for the total eradication of Islam from Africa. She stresses the need for European countries to unite as one force to contribute to the Catholicization of Africans. In this battle, the missionaries must remain on the front line: Im Gegentheile sind die Missionäre aller Gegenden Afrikas darüber einig, daß man wohl selbst die rohesten, auf der aller niedrigsten Stufe stehenden Heiden zu Christen machen kann, niemals aber die zwar geistig viel höher stehenden Anhänger Muhameds. Exurge Europa, Quare obdormis! [On the contrary, missionaries from all regions of Africa agree that one can turn even the most primitive heathens who are at the very lowest level into Christians, but never the followers of Muhammad although they are spiritually much more advanced. Get up Europe! Why Do You Sleep So Much!]21

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Even though Ledóchowska recognized here the spiritual stature of the Islamic religion, she dismissed it because of its ineffectiveness in “civilizing” Africa compared to Catholicism. Thus, for the sake of elevating African civilization, driving Islam out of Africa is a crucial task for Catholicism. By disseminating these positions in Europe, the journal Echo aus Afrika sought to mobilize public opinion, creating and solidifying sympathy for Catholic values in Africa. In the hegemonic struggle for Catholic supremacy in Africa, Ledóchowska spared no expense. She used all three aforementioned institutions, the journal, the publishing house, and the NGO to disseminate her thinking. This gigantic infrastructure constitutes an important vehicle that allowed her to marshal the forces of Catholic Europe against Islam. Ledóchowska contributed personally to this anti-Islam campaign through her missionary lectures and her literary, journalistic, and dramatic works. In order for Catholicism to thrive in Africa, Ledóchowska calls on Catholics to carry out a religious cleansing: Islam, like other competing faiths, must disappear from African soil so that the Catholicization of Africa can be successful. Notes 1 The concept of “religious colonization” concerns all religions: islam, Christianity, etc. as formulated by Dorine Mbeudom in her dissertation Maria Theresia Ledóchowska et la colonisation religieuse de l’Afrique. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Dschang (2017): 3. See the definition cited by Thomas J. Salerno on September 22, 2021 in his article “Evangelization Is Colonialism”: Are We Sure About That?” “To send missionaries to Africa and Asia to convert the native people to Christianity is religious colonialism,” see www.wordonfire.org/articles/evangelization-is-colonialism-are-we-sure-aboutthat/ (Last accessed on 2.3.2023, 16h20). 2 Another such form is linguistic colonization or colonization by a foreign language, such as German. In Cameroon, for example, the German colonial administration prohibited national languages. Cf. Esaïe Djomo, “Kurzgeschichte der Sprachpolitik Kameruns oder der lange Weg nationaler Sprachen aus der Verbannung,” Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics PLUS 38 (2009): 19–25. 3 Béatification de quatre Serviteurs de Dieu: Mgr Charles-Joseph Eugène de Mazenod, le P. Arnoldo Janssen, le P. Giuseppe Freinademetz et Maria Theresia Ledochowska (October 19, 1975) https://w2.vatican.va/content/paulvi/fr/homilies/1975.index.2.html (Accessed on December 16, 2015). 4 On Ledóchowska, see Clarie Fredj, “Contre l’esclavage et au service des missions africaines,” in L’église des laïcs: Le sacré en partage (XVIe-XXe siècle), eds. Ariane Boltanski and Marie-Lucie Copete (2021). http://books.openedition. org/cvz/266552021; Vera Brandl, Zwischen Anti-Sklaverei und Bekehrung: die Missionsideologie der Gräfin Ledóchowska unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Berichte in der Zeitschrift Echo aus Afrika. Phil. Magister, University of Vienna, 2010; Cindy Brewer, “Christianity, Race, and Colonial Discourse in the Dramatic Works of Maria Theresia Ledochowska (1863–1922),” Modern

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Austrian Literature 40, no. 1 (2007): 19–40 and “Fantasies of African Conversion: The Construction of Missionary Colonial Desire in the Dramas of a Catholic Nun, Maria Theresia Ledochowska (1863–1922),” German Studies Review 30, no. 3 (Oct. 2007): 557–578; Jakob N. Jarvis, “Mission Propaganda: A Study of Form, Colonial Attitudes, and Feminism in Maria Theresia Ledóchowska’s Newspaper Publication” (2007). Undergraduate Honors Theses 6. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/studentpub_uht/6. Named after the Jesuit Pierre Claver (1580–1654), missionary in New Granada, who devoted himself to African slaves disembarked in Cartagena. Canonized in 1888, he was proclaimed patron protector of African missions in 1896. See https://www.geschichtewiki.wien.gv.at/ (last accessed on 21.12.2022). Subtitled: Katholische Monatsschrift für alle Freunde der AntisclavereiBewegung, insbesondere für österreichische Vereinsfreunde (1889–1891). Ligia Stela Florea, “Nouveaux regards sur les genres de la presse écrite: critères pour une typologie opérationnelle,” Conference Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Languages, E-learning and Romanian Studies 1986. https://journals.lub.lu.se/index.php/elears/article/view/5446/4799 (Last accessed on 21.12.2022). Kleine Afrika-Bibliothek. Illustrierte katholische Monatsschrift zur Förderung der Liebe zu unseren ärmsten schwarzen Brüdern (Salzburg: Verlag der St. Petrus-Claver Sodalität, 1893–1911); Mission Propaganda (Salzburg: Verlag der St. Petrus Claver-Sodalität, Oktober 1914 – Januar/Februar 1948). For more informations about these two magazines, see Claire Fredj, “Contre l’esclavage et au service des missions africaines,” in L’église des laïcs. Le sacré en partage (XVIe-XXe siècle), eds. Ariane Boltanski and Marie-Lucie Copete, 2021. http://books.openedition.org/cvz/26655. Maria Theresia Ledoschowska, Echo aus Afrika, 12/1912: 225. For a complete analysis of this play see Esaïe Djomo, “Literatur, Mission und Kolonialismus. Konstruktion des afrikanischen Machthabers und Putschsimulation im kolonialen Missionsdrama. Am Beispiel von Ledóchowskas Zaїda,” in Koloniale und postkoloniale Konstruktionen von Afrika und Menschen afrikanischer Herkunft in der deutschen Alltagskultur, eds. Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst and Sunna Gieseke (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2006), 103–114; see also Esaïe Djomo, Imperiale Kulturbegegnung als Identitätsstiftungsprozess. Studien zu Literatur, Kolonialität und Postkolonialität (St. Ingberg: Röhrig Universitätsverlag, 2011), 167–180. Carl Hundhausen, Public Relations. Theorie und Systematik (Münster: Lit. Verlag, 1969), 128. Ledóchowska, Missionarische Konferenzen, 1891–1907 (Salzburg: Missionsschwestern vom St. Petrus Claver Verlag, 2009), no. 16/1907: 10. Geyer, Echo aus Afrika, (1893): 20. Bricet, Echo aus Afrika, (1898): 20 Jalabert, Echo aus Afrika, (1911): 106. Strub, Echo aus Afrika, (1913): 141–142. Ledóchowska, Echo aus Afrika, (1898): 1. Ledóchowska, Echo aus Afrika, (1898): 2. Ledóchowska, Echo aus Afrika, (1898): 4. Ledóchowska, Echo aus Afrika, (1898): 4.

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From Colonialism to Contemporary Racism Retelling (Male) Master Narratives from the Perspective of Marginalized Women in Sharon Dodua Otoo’s Fictional Texts Martina Kofer

“meine heimat/ist/heute/der raum zwischen/gestern und morgen” (my homeland/today/is/the space between/yesterday and tomorrow), AfroGerman poet May Ayim proclaims in the first line of her poem “Auskunft” (Information).1 The space—or spaces—between yesterday and tomorrow, and their decisive influence on the present moment and on individual subjectivity, are also central to the texts of Sharon Dodua Otoo, a Black British writer who lives in Berlin and was the first Black author to be awarded the renowned Ingeborg Bachmann Prize for her short story, Herr Gröttrup setzt sich hin (Herr Gröttrup takes a seat) in 2016. The use of creative and at times surreal narrators is one, but by no means the only, literary device Dodua Otoo experiments with. Particularly her 2021 novel, Adas Raum (Ada’s Realm) works with complex temporal strategies and juggles multiple storylines, interweaving characters and historical events. While colonialism and its legacy in colonial and racist mindsets and power structures are central themes of Sharon Dodua Otoo’s longer prose texts such as Adas Raum and the things i am thinking while smiling politely…, relations between the sexes and depictions of patriarchal power also remain at the foreground of her work. Through her protagonists, she tells stories from the perspective of colonized and marginalized women who have largely been absent from the dominant narratives of European literary and cultural history. If at all, they appear there only as voiceless and dehistoricized minor characters. These female characters’ agency is constrained by discrimination and reductive identity categories, and their attempts at resistance are quashed by representatives of white, patriarchal power. This does not mean that they are paternalistically portrayed as victims; rather, Dodua Otoo’s narratives focus on moments of female empowerment and self-determination.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-17

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Her literary texts thus offer a Black feminist perspective on the continuity of white and male power structures in European societies that links back to the Black feminist theory developed in parallel to mainstream white feminist theory in the 1970s and 1980s. Texts such as Angela Davis’s Women, Race and Class (1981), bell hooks’ Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism (1982) and Audre Lorde’s “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” (1984) were milestones in the intersectional understanding of the political and social situation of marginalized and racialized women. In her 2014 essay, We Should All Be Feminists, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie gives an example of how Black women are impacted by multiple and interdependent forms of discrimination based on gender, race, and class: “The automatic assumption is that a Nigerian female walking into a hotel alone is a sex worker. Because a Nigerian female alone cannot possibly be a guest paying for her own room.”2 For Black women, the space they inhabit affects the way in which they are categorized. Sharon Dodua Otoo expresses this in a scene in Adas Raum set in the 2020s: “In Ghana wurde Ada schleichend zur Frau und bekam es kaum mit. In Deutschland wurde Ada schlagartig zur Schwarzen und spürte es sofort” (In Ghana, Ada had tiptoed her way to womanhood and scarcely noticed the transition. In Germany, Ada had suddenly become Black, and she felt it immediately).3 It becomes clear here that social categorizations, such as race and gender, are determined by geopolitical context and corresponding power structures. In Ghana, the differentiating category of gender is of greater relevance for the protagonist, since being Black does not represent a marker of difference there. In contrast, in Europe, race, especially blackness, takes center stage as a crucial category of differentiation and makes gender appear less relevant. As a result, the protagonist is aware of her multiple oppression as a woman and a black woman. Against this background, I am interested in the ways in which the esthetic forms chosen by Dodua Otoo work to decolonize both Black and women’s histories. The city of Berlin, an important center of imperial power in the colonial era, presents a starting point for reexamining (personal) history in the things i am thinking while smiling politely … and in Adas Raum. In both texts, a line is traced from Berlin to London, which serves, as the former seat of the British Empire’s colonial power, as a stopover and site of familial migration, back to Ghana, as one of the departure points for the enslavement of Africans. A remark on history made by Sharon Dodua Otoo in her keynote at the occasion of the opening of the German Colonialism exhibition at the Deutsches Historisches Museum in Berlin is illuminating for a better understanding of her literary texts. For Dodua Otoo, the decolonization of history entails above all a telling of the stories behind history and

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centering on diverse perspectives other than those reflecting a white male version of history: Wenn wir die Zerwürfnisse der heutigen Zeit verstehen wollen, reicht es nicht, einfach Geschichte zu erzählen. Wir müssen uns selber herausfordern und genauer hinschauen: Wessen Geschichte wird erzählt? Aus welcher Perspektive? […] Ohne Mehrperspektivität fehlt einfach mehr als die Hälfte der Geschichte.4 [If we want to understand the conflicts of our time, simply recounting history is not enough. We need to challenge ourselves and look more closely: Whose (hi)story is being told? From which perspective? […] Without a multiplicity of perspectives, more than half of history is simply missing.] In Adas Raum, in particular, Sharon Dodua Otoo has achieved this multiplicity of perspectives by presenting the history of European “modernity” not from the heroic viewpoint of the supposedly superior white male aggressor, but rather from the perspectives of those construed as his Others. The novel offers a narrative from the perspective of the marginalized, who have vanished from Western collective memory and are usually not included in the dominant Eurocentric historical and literary traditions. Thus, the conception and configuration of her characters comprise a shift in perspective similar to what Toni Morrison identified as central to her analysis of canonical literature: “My project is an effort to avert the critical gaze from the racial object to the racial subject; from the described and imagined to the describers and imaginers; from the serving to the served.”5 Exploring these perspectives, this chapter begins with a literary interpretation of moments in which Dodua Otoo’s female protagonists experience racism in present-day Berlin; it then highlights the narrative devices that link these episodes to Europe’s colonial history and thus to the process of re-storying. The focus then shifts to the narrative construction of time and space in Adas Raum and to the novel’s understanding of the workings of history and memory. Recounting and Retracing the Roots of Present-Day Racism In Sharon Dodua Otoo’s novella, the things i am thinking while smiling politely … (2012), the unnamed Black female first-person narrator recounts her painful separation from her white German husband, Till. The narrator is a doctoral student of German studies who has been living for many years in Berlin with her (ex-)husband and their twins, Beth and Ash. An immigrant from Great Britain, her daily life in Berlin is dominated by

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the difficult task of reconciling family life and childcare with the demands of academia. Confrontations with racism and worry about her children’s traumatization by racist humiliations are constant themes. Situating the story in multicultural Berlin highlights the ambivalence of the city’s cosmopolitan aspirations on the one hand and an unwillingness to interrogate Germany’s colonial history on the other. These unreconciled contradictions manifest in a continuity of racist and colonial traditions of thinking and acting: Berlin is a place where anything goes, and you can wear whatever you like, but if you are a Black woman in the underground, be prepared to be looked up and down very very slowly. I cannot tell you how many times I have glanced down at myself in horror during such moments to check if my jeans were unzipped or if my dress was caught up in my underwear. White people look at me sometimes like I am their own private Völkerschau. Staring back doesn’t help. It counts as part of the entertainment. Where else can a tourist make you feel like you—the resident—are actually the one who does not belong? Welcome to the Kreuzberg district of Berlin.6 The narrator of this passage describes the racializing effect of the white gaze and the way in which it objectivizes others. The white gaze represents the ideology of white supremacy, the judgment that “there is ‘something’ wrong with ‘these people.’”7 The white gaze expresses the conviction that the white observer belongs to the more civilized and more intellectually developed segment of humanity. Moreover, this everyday experience is linked to colonial and racist intellectual traditions by the narrator’s comparison with the colonial practice of human zoos, the Völkerschau, a popular form of entertainment in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Germany, which presented African people as primitive and animal like. In referencing the Völkerschau, Dodua Otoo shows how present-day experiences of quotidian racism are connected to colonial ideas, images, and structures in German society. In both the novella and the novel, Berlin is important for its significant role as the site of Imperial Germany’s power, an often-neglected fact in German collective memory that turns out to be highly relevant to Dodua Otoo’s narratives. From November 15, 1884 to February 26, 1885, Imperial Chancellor Otto von Bismarck invited the colonial powers to what came to be known as the Berlin Conference, or the West Africa Conference. Representatives of 11 European states, as well as Russia, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, met in Berlin to discuss their plans for the African continent. No African representatives were present. One of the results was the General Act, which laid down the ground rules

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for the division of African land and peoples among the colonizers. Berlin’s Colonial Expo of 1896 and the exhibition of human beings in Berlin’s zoos until 1952 are further key historical events that illustrate the ubiquity of colonial beliefs and actions in Germany.8 Only tenacious efforts by Afro-German communities and people of color over the past decades, and their persistent demands for restitution and for a process of coming to terms with Berlin’s colonial past, have led to recent first steps toward a recognition of colonial and racist practices and discourses in politics and society. Sebastian Conrad has identified four areas that define contemporary Germany’s negationation of its colonial history: First, the trials held in New York in 2001 and 2019 in which the descendants of the Herero and Nama people, the victims of the 1904–7 genocide, sought restitution from Germany. Second, debates in many German cities on changing colonial street names. Third, the conflict surrounding the rebuilding of the Hohenzollern Castle at the site of the East German Palace of the Republic and its redesignation as an ethnographic museum, and, finally, the debates on returning looted art objects brought to Germany during the Imperialist era.9 Let us return for a moment to the passage cited above on being inspected in the subway, a description of the experience of non-belonging. The white gaze is only one of the many ways in which white Europeans construct Blackness as incompatible with Europeanness. There are also repeated questions about where one really comes from, humiliating and hurtful for the protagonists in both the things I am thinking while smiling politely… … and Adas Raum. Such practices instill in those who are othered a discomfort with their own names, which also come to signify foreignness and not belonging to a constructed “natio-ethno-cultural” “us”10: “I didn’t even quite know how to bend and squash my Ghanaian name to suit English tongues—and leaving it to freely expand across my lips in its full tonal glory would simply underline even more how much I really did not belong.”11 The narrator in the things I am thinking while smiling politely… rejects her surname, which the narrator does not explicitly mention in the novel, not only because the hegemonic culture has marked it as a sign of not belonging, but also, and perhaps more importantly for her, because it is literally a patronym: “And yeah the other reason, that I mistreated my name was because I did not want to be associated with my father any second longer than strictly necessary.”12 In Dodua Otoo’s text, the surname facilitates racial categorization, but it also allows for a critical interrogation of patriarchal structures that subsume a woman under a man’s name, marking her as lesser than him. The patronym illustrates the way in which the concept of the nation-state is linked to that of the (ethnically unambiguous) family and the idea of a paterfamilias, as Anne

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McClintock has shown and as becomes clear elsewhere in the novel.13 The narrator’s marriage to Till offers a chance to create a greater sense of belonging in the new country as she states somewhat ironically: So it was a matter of great inspiration to me, meeting Till on my year abroad in Germany. Someone with a surname so unambiguously of the country he was born, raised and lived in that I thought: how sexy is that? And I knew I had to make it my own. This, however, didn’t stop other officially suited white ladies in cold offices from saying “Wie bitte?” and asking me to repeat myself—like they were disappointed because they had been expecting me to be called something resembling Umdibondingo or whatever.14 Only after the marriage does the narrator learn that her “new” German surname, “‘Peters,’ was also the surname of a German colonial aggressor,” and she “stopped adorning myself with it, like it was some magnificent fur coat.”15 As a result, Till is no longer just her husband, but the narrator becomes aware that he represents, albeit unintentionally, white German society and its colonial past. The surname Peters symbolizes the continuity of colonial and patriarchal structures of power.16 The divorce from Till along with the renunciation of his German family name is thus not only a personal loss but also a loss of privileges. In Adas Raum too, European identity papers play a key role. While the narrator’s papers show that she was born in Great Britain, she must prove her European roots repeatedly. Ada’s search for an apartment in Berlin in 2019 illustrates the privileges associated not only with the “right” passport, but also with the “right” surname. She is not invited to a viewing until she uses her sister Elle’s “German” surname. As soon as the owner sees Ada, however, she becomes structurally disadvantaged, a process that Obioma Nnaemeka describes as follows: “The most pervasive and insidious stigmatization, stereotyping, and prejudice derive from the visual because they forestall contact-race or gender-based, for example. A racist does not have to make contact with a Black to know that he/she is Black. He sees the Black and avoids him/her.”17 This is clear to Ada as soon as she arrives in Berlin. At passport control, “hatte ein älteres Ehepaar auf die Schlange für ‘Nicht-EU-Bürger’ gezeigt” (an elderly couple had pointed Ada towards the queue for “Non-EU Citizens”).18 In Afropean: Notes from Black Europe, Johny Pitts recounts that “‘European’ was still being used as a synonym for ‘white.’”19 For him, the term “Afropean” opens a space for a new concept of self: “Here was a space where blackness was taking part in shaping European identity at large. … That being black in Europe didn’t necessarily mean being an immigrant.”20 In Adas Raum, the passport testifies to the power of

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dividing the world into superior and inferior countries, an asymmetrical power structure along an economic axis behind a cultural and ideological appearance. People who, through the pure luck of birth, own the “right” passport are privileged. But the narrator (the passport itself) knows that national belonging is only a construct and is not identical with a subjective understanding of identity: “Denn ganz gleich wie viele Lebende es behaupteten, war ich nicht ihre Identität. Ich dürfte [sic] lediglich zu dieser absurd gewordenen Zeit einen Teil ihrer Identität nach außen vertreten” (Because no matter how many of the living claimed it would be so, I was not her identity. In these increasingly absurd times, I could represent only one external piece of this identity).21 Links to the Colonial Past Sharon Dodua Otoo constructs in Adas Raum multiple symbolic connections between the varying temporal dimensions in her novel, demonstrating a connection to Europe’s colonial past and to patriarchal and matriarchal power. The strongest connecting line between various narratives of oppression in different historical periods is the protagonist Ada herself. The various protagonists, who all bear the name Ada, are one and the same Ada. This Ada is reborn several times in different epochs. Just like Ada, Wilhelm is also reborn several times. He is the Guilherme on the Ghanaian coast in 1459, the jealous husband of Lady Ada in nineteenthcentury London, the SS man Wilhelm in the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp, and finally his son in twenty-first-century Berlin. Another of these links is a bracelet embedded with 33 golden beads, which accompanies readers on their journey through Ada’s history. The bracelet first appears in Ada’s story in 1459 in Totope, a fishing village on the Ghanian coast that is violently occupied by the Portuguese. Ada is about to put it around the wrist of her dead newborn baby when she is sighted by a Portuguese man, Guilherme, who, pretending to help her, robs the newborn and the bracelet. When Ada realizes that the Portuguese man wants to steal her baby along with the bracelet, she tries to stop him, but Guilherme shoots Ada and flees to the ship. Ada’s dead infant drifts away with the bracelet, which is eventually fished out of the sea by the ship’s crew and returned to Guilherme, who later sells it in Lisbon. The reader encounters the bracelet again in the London parish of Stratford-le-Bow in 1848. It is now the property of Lord King, Ada’s husband; through a series of events it ends up in the hands of the Irish maid Lizzie, who secures her survival by selling it to a fishmonger. In 1945, Linde, a forced prostitute in a brothel at Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp, is given the bracelet by a john who stole it from the property room. When the SS discovers the bracelet, it costs Ada, who does

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not inform Linde, her life. In Berlin in 2019, a pregnant Ada discovers the bracelet, now captioned “fertility beads,” in a “Pre-Colonial West Africa” exhibition catalog. Its appearance here serves to explore the issues of restitution and the return of cultural treasures to the African countries they were stolen from. And, finally in 2019, the former Nazi Wilhelm wants to give Ada the bracelet to save his soul. She, however, rejects the gift with the words: “Wie wollen Sie mir etwas schenken, das Ihnen gar nicht gehört?” (“How are you going to give me something that doesn’t belong to you at all?”).22 The significance of the bracelet exceeds the reference to political demands for restitution and the provenance of stolen artifacts in European museums or private collections. The term “fertility beads” suggests a symbolic meaning, referring to both Ghanian mythology and the motifs of birth and reincarnation—which can also be read as a retelling of history—that permeates the novel and which I shall discuss below in greater detail. The bracelet symbolizes the interconnectedness of all womankind, made evident when Ada and her sister Elle meet two older Ghanian women in Berlin and show them the picture of the bracelet in the exhibition catalog: “Eh-eh! Das ist diese Ausstellung!” “Ja, genau!”, nickte Elle. “Haben Sie sie gesehen? Oder gehen Sie dahin?” “Wer, ich? Nein! Ich zahle doch nicht, um mein eigenes Eigentum anzuschauen.” “Das Armband gehört Ihnen?” “Nicht mir, uns. Dir und mir. Und meinen Schwestern. Und Müttern. Und Vormüttern.” [“Eh-eh! It’s that exhibition!”/“Yes, exactly,” Elle said, nodding. “Have you been to it? Or are you planning to go?”/“Who, me? No! I won’t pay money to look at my own property.”/“The bracelet belongs to you?”/“Not me: us. To you and me. And to my sisters. And mothers. And their mothers before them.”]23 In addition to the recurrence of objects, Adas Raum also establishes a continuity of patriarchal power in its interconnected narratives of oppression, which remain similar throughout the centuries, changing only to fit the cultural context. For instance, the male protagonists at Ada’s side, who often become her murderers, all carry some iteration of the name Wilhelm. The first is Guilherme, the so-called discoverer of Ghana in 1459, whose full name, Guilherme Fernandes Zarco, establishes him as a representation of Christopher Columbus. Dodua Otoo references a theory by Mascarenhas Barreto, who in a 1992 study argued that Columbus was

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a Portuguese-born “bastard” whose real name was Salvador Fernandes Zarco.24 Simply mentioning this unproven theory deconstructs Columbus’s status as a hero. “William” is Lady Ada’s husband in nineteenth-century London; he kills her after discovering her affair. SS-Obersturmbannführer Helmut Wilhelm is responsible for Ada’s execution in Mittelbau-Dora, and his son, Wilhelm, gives the bracelet (back) to Ada in Berlin. The name Wilhelm carries a multitude of potent political implications. It refers to the central historical figure Kaiser Wilhelm II, the emperor who shaped Germany’s colonial policy. It also evokes the seventeenth-century Elector Friedrich Wilhelm, who sold thousands of slaves from Brazil to North America and founded the first German colony on the Atlantic Coast of Ghana, Groß Friedrichsburg, but has largely been erased from cultural memory. SS-Obersturmbannführer Helmut Hermann Wilhelm Bischoff is also a historical figure. Adas Raum introduces him as the “Führer des Einsatzkommandos 1 der Einsatzgruppe IV im deutsch besetzten Polen und Abwehrbeauftragter beim Bau von V2-Raketen im Konzentrationslager Mittelbau-Dora” (“commander of Task Force I of the Special Ops Unit IV in German-occupied Poland and counterintelligence representative tasked with the production of the V2 Rocket in Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp”).25 With this, Dodua Otoo defines the Nazi period as yet another historical era whose genealogy of oppression, violence, and deception by whites persists into daily life in Berlin today. The paternalistic, authoritarian Wilhelm represents the so-called German Leitkultur (defining/leading culture) of everyday racism that determines the lives of people of color and other marginalized groups in Germany. A reference to the terror attack in Halle on October 9, 2019 underscores the fact that the legacy of National Socialism, much like that of colonialism, has not been sufficiently confronted, and that racism and antisemitism are expressed not only in everyday acts of discrimination, but also in extremist structures that represent a clear and present threat to those defined as “not-white.”26 Contending with the past and mourning its losses is, the author holds, a moral and political imperative in Germany. As the narrator comments near the novel’s end: “Dabei bot Wilhelms Vergangenheit ausgiebig Raum für gemeinsames Trauern” (Although Wilhelm’s past offered ample grounds for collective mourning).27 It should be noted that none of these Wilhelms, in contradiction to official histories, is portrayed as particularly heroic. They are “schlecht gelaunt” (ill tempered), “in Konkurs gegangen” (insolvent), and “am Leiden” (suffering).28 The novel’s men are “hager” (haggard) and “erschöpft” (depleted).29 In this manner, Dodua Otoo’s re-storying of white male heroics reads like a parody of Eurocentric master narratives. This strategy of re-storying is also employed through the narrative device of multiperspectivity.

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Re-storying In his 1965 essay, “The Novelist as Teacher,” Chinua Achebe speaks about the necessity of retelling history: “What we need to do is to look back and try and find out where we went wrong, where the rain began to beat us.”30 Achebe’s metaphor of rain, together with Walter Benjamin’s famous metaphor of the wind or storm of history, are employed by Dodua Otoo as motifs of temporal transition. Rains and storms break out whenever Ada’s tragic history is interrupted and a new orbit begins, in which Ada’s process of learning and becoming continues. At the end of the novel, it becomes clear that remembering and dealing with the past is important not only for (the descendants of) the oppressed, but also for the perpetrators. Both Ada and Guilherme/William/Wilhelm, the representative of the white perpetrators, are reincarnated again and again: Ada because she needs to link her identity in the present with the history of her African roots and colonial power; Wilhelm because he needs to comprehend the need for reparations. The process of restorying is chiefly linked to a change in perspective, or the introduction of multiple perspectives, adding differing views to the one-dimensional “single story” of the dominant white, Eurocentric master narrative.31 One example of Dodua Otoo’s use of multiperspectivity is her description of the Portuguese seizure of the Ghanian coast and enslavement of its residents. The raid is told from the point of view of the subaltern Ghanian women watching the approach of the Portuguese: “Sie schauten Guilherme mit großen Augen und offenen Mündern an. Mami Ashitey hielt mich, mitten im Schwung, hoch über ihren Kopf, ihr Blick auf dem [sic] weißen Mann gerichtet” (“They stared at Guilherme with huge eyes and open mouths. Mami Ashitey held me in mid-swing, high above her head, her gaze fixed upon the white man”).32 The women are clearly angry about the white men’s presence. This is expressed by their objectification of and contempt for Guilherme: “Und er wurde gründlich gemustert, der Guilherme. Wenige Zoll vor seinen Füßen landete der Rotz, von Mami Ashitey auffällig ausgespuckt” (“And he was inspected thoroughly, this Guilherme. A wad of spit flew conspicuously from her mouth and landed a few inches from his feet”).33 A section in the chapter, “Unter den Betrogenen” (Among the Deceived), presents the group of colonizers from the perspective of the colonized, in particular the viewpoint of Alfonso or, as he was originally named, Damfo, who was enslaved as a boy and escapes from the Portuguese in Totope. Importantly, Dodua Otoo focuses on his reidentification with the Black Ghanaians at his arrival in Totope: Die dunklen winzigen Locken auf ihren Köpfen glichen seinem eigenen Haar! … Die leuchtenden Augen der Männer hätten seine eigenen sein können. Ebenso die schimmernde Haut, die glänzenden Zähne, die

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markanten Handflächen. An der Küste einer kleinen afrikanischen Insel wurde Afonso mit zahlreichen zwanzig Jahre älteren, glücklichen, vor allem selbstbewussten Ichs konfrontiert. Er war versucht, sich ihnen zu Füßen zu werfen. [The tiny, dark ringlets on their heads were like his own!… The bright eyes of the fishermen could also have been his own. Just like their gleaming skin, their bright teeth, the prominent palms of their hands. On the shoreline of a small African island, Afonso had found himself confronted with any number of incarnations of himself—only they were twenty years older and carefree, brimming with self-confidence. He had been tempted to throw himself at their feet.]34 Up to this point, the young boy had identified with the white heroes of the dominant master narratives, much as Frantz Fanon describes in Black Skin, White Masks.35 Narrating the arrival of the Portuguese and the atrocities they committed from the point of view of Ghanaian women brings a Black presence to the narrative that is missing from master narratives about white discoverers and traders. Obioma Nnaemeka makes the following observation of literary accounts of the “discovery” of Africa: The indigenous people (the ‘Other’) do not tell the reader who they are; rather the observer/narrator/author creates who they are through what they did or do. The indigenous people to be ‘Othered’ are homogenized, a-historized, normalized, naturalized, decontextualized, fixed in a timeless present, and maintained in an immutable form to be evoked at will to produce the same meaning. The ideology that homogenizes, herds contradictions into the same battlefield, normalizes, and names, creates, its mythology by inscribing unchanging ‘subjects’ that can transcend neither time nor space.36 In the scenes set in Imperial England, the multiperspectival approach undermines characters who reinforce imperialist worldviews. In contrast, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak has elaborated on British literature of the age of imperialism that literature played a crucial role in the cultural representation of imperialism. Using the novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë as an example, she shows that the emancipative outburst of the protagonist is closely connected to imperialist thought patterns and figures.37 In Ada’s Raum, the initial perspective is white and feminist, embodied by Lady Ada King, a first-person narrator who resembles the historical figure of Countess Ada Lovelace, a passionate mathematician now recognized for writing the first computer programming language, but in her day ignored and looked down upon as a bluestocking. Ada comments on the threat to

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white men’s privileged position posed not only by the end of slavery, but also by growing demands for gender equality: Männer, die sich eigentlich für “die Guten” hielten, doch—zwischen den Schwarzen auf der einen Seite und den Frauen auf der anderen— nicht mehr wussten, woher die nächste Anfechtung ihrer gottgegebenen Autorität kommen würde und deswegen vorauseilend an allen Fronten kämpften. Seine Gewissheit, dass er mir irgendetwas Gescheites zum Thema Wahrscheinlichkeitsrechnung sagen konnte, war denkbar lächerlich. [Men who actually considered themselves to be “the good ones,” and yet—between the Africans on one side and the women on the other— never knew where to expect the next challenge to their God-given authority, and therefore fought pre-emptively on every front at once. The confidence with which he had presumed to tell me something of probability theory was actually quite comical.]38 Ada, clearly superior to the men around her in terms of knowledge, intelligence, and self-control, deconstructs the master narrative of the white male “Übermensch.” At the same time, she holds back so as not to offend their male egos. Despite her strength, the figure of Ada is constrained by the asymmetrical power relations of the sexes. Ada cannot present her knowledge or her skills in public and is thus unable to gain recognition as a female scientist. Countering Lady Ada’s feminist, but still white and privileged perspective is the viewpoint of the Irish, one of England’s subaltern groups, represented by Lady Ada’s maid, Lizzie, and her brother, Alfie.39 While Lady Ada and Lizzie have a specious “friendship,” Alfie gives voice to the marginalized view of the King family: Wie Alfie sie [die Kings, M.K.] hasste. Nicht nur, weil sie aus England waren—obwohl das Grund genug gewesen wäre—, sondern vor allem wegen ihrer Verlogenheit. Als Adelige hatten sie Blut an ihren Händen, gleichzeitig hielten sie sich für zivilisiert. Und sie handelten, als bestünde darin kein Widerspruch. [How Alfie despised them [the Kings—MK]. Not just because they were English—although that would have been reason enough—but most of all because of their hypocrisy. As nobility they both had blood on their hands, and yet they regarded themselves as highly civilized. And acted as though there was no contradiction there.]40 Alfie’s character thus serves to expose the perpetrator role of the whites. An object narrator also deconstructs “fine English society”:

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Sie trugen mit Stolz ihre makellosen Westen, obwohl ihnen bewusst war, dass die Baumwolle, aus der diese gefertigt waren, von unfreien Händen geerntet wurde. Glücklich waren diejenigen, die Handelsbeziehungen quer durch das britische Empire pflegten. Am glücklichsten waren allerdings diejenigen, die die menschlichen Kosten anderer durch erhebliche Gewinne, selbstverständlich nur für sich, ausgleichen konnten. [They wore their immaculate vests with pride, although they knew that the cotton from which they had been made was harvested by unfree hands. Those whose business relations stretched from one end of the vast British Empire to the other considered themselves lucky. The luckiest of all were those who could write off the human cost against their own enormous profit margins.]41 Here, the intersectionality of different identity categories is perhaps the most obvious. Lady Ada is disadvantaged as a woman and objectified by white men, while also privileged in terms of race and class; she retains her position of power over Lizzie despite their ostensibly close relationship. Interweaving Narratives of Oppression and Retellings of History Die Zeit war jedenfalls gekommen, um Ada daran zu erinnern, dass alle Wesen—vergangene, gegenwärtige und zukünftige—in Verbindung miteinander sind, dass wir es immer waren und immer sein werden. [In any case, the time had come to remind Ada that all beings—past, present and future—are connected to one another. That we always were and always will be.]42 Sharon Dodua Otoo’s understanding of history as expressed through the narrative strategies in Ada’s Realm can perhaps best be comprehended through Shalini Randeria’s concept of “entangled histories.”43 Randeria looks beyond the one-dimensionality of national historicization to focus on the interconnection of European and non-European worlds through the framework of imperialism, which links metropolis and colonies in a reciprocal relationship.44 In this way, “national” space is reinterpreted as a product of transnational entanglements.45 In Ada’s Realm, the impact of imperialism in the metropolis and the colonies is illustrated by London and Totope, Ghana; narrative spaces that link the histories of the central figure, Ada. Thus, Dodua Otoo achieves a literary “postkoloniale Perspektive auf die globalisierte Gegenwart” (postcolonial perspective on the globalized present) while remaining insistent that present global developments are still permeated with and influenced by colonial structures and concepts.46

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Narrating Adas Raum in “orbits” rather than chapters in chronological order helps anchor the author’s understanding of entangled history on the macro level, eschewing the idea of a beginning and an end. The first section of the novel, entitled “Die ersten Schleifen” (The First Orbits), is divided into the chapters “Ada,” “Unter den Zahnlosen” (Among the Toothless), “Unter den Betrogenen” (Among the Deceived), “Unter den Glücklichsten” (Among the Luckiest), and, again, “Ada.” Set in 2019, the chapter “Zwischen den Schleifen” (Between the Orbits) acts as a transition to “Die nächsten Schleifen” (The Next Orbits), in which the chapter order is reversed: “Ada,” “Unter den Glücklichsten,” “Unter den Betrogenen,” “Unter den Zahnlosen,” and, finally, “Ada.”47 The narrative perspective alternates between the first-person narrator, Ada, who moves through time and space almost effortlessly in the chapters bearing her name and varying supplemental object narrators. These object narrators, all linked to Ada, take varying forms: a brushwood broom in Totope in 1459, a golden doorknocker on the front door of Lady Ada’s house in Stratford-le-Bow in 1848, the brothel room in which Ada was confined at Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp in 1945, and, finally, the passport cited above in Berlin in the 2010s. All of these objects symbolize thresholds, calling attention to the relation of the dominant structure of oppression to a certain place and time. The broom, for example, stands for the expulsion of people, the golden doorknocker for the closed door of male privilege, and the passport for the opportunity to cross borders as well as the constriction of human movement. Through this narrative structure, all of the histories (times and places) are simultaneously present within the figure of Ada, while Ada is also present in all of the stories and times recounted. Ada herself embodies a “komplexes Geflecht von ‘geteilten Geschichten’” (complex web of “shared histories”) that mirrors the figures’ uneven playing fields.48 In this way, Adas Raum aims to illustrate the entanglements of narratives of oppression that can also be defined using the concept of intersectionality. Intersectional thinking draws out the concomitance and difficult reciprocities of discriminating social categorizations. The figure of Ada, who metamorphizes in time and place, can be read as a synonym for the Other of the white male European, continually presenting itself in new yet familiar guises. The Other is the colonized indigenous woman, the dehumanized woman of the Imperialist era, the marginalized Polish forced prostitute, and finally, the Black immigrant woman in Europe. The orbital structure of the novel’s chapters and events deconstructs the European model of time and space that posits Europe as the hub of modernity and, in doing so, seeks to cement the cultural superiority of Western Europe. This Eurocentric model, as Fatima El-Tayeb has noted, is based on the idea of a linear evolution of human history whose locus and motor are always Western

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Europe.49 The ideological claim of Europe’s cultural superiority, with which Europeans have justified their violent and predatory land grabbing and enslavement of peoples, is coupled to a Eurocentric concept of space as consisting of “here” and “there,” alongside a whole slew of dichotomies such as “civilized” and “uncivilized,” etc. In her telling of the colonization of Ghana’s coast, the Ada narrator describes this as follows: Hier? Anfangs hatte ich kein Gespür für das Wort, zumindest nicht bei den Zahnlosen. Das hätte eine fest umrissene, lückenlose Abgrenzung zu “dort” dargestellt. Aber den Hang, Sachen zu durchschneiden und voneinander abzuspalten haben erst Die-Mit-Den-Großen-Schiffen mitgebracht. Rasend entwickelten sich die Umstände so, dass das “hier” nicht nur vom Standort “dort” räumlich getrennt war, sondern dass das “hier” über das “dort” platziert wurde. [Here? At first I had no sense of the word. At least not among the toothless ones. The word should have provided an uninterrupted and clearly delineated boundary from “there”. But the inclination to divide and separate one thing from another first arrived along with ThoseWith-The-Big-Ships. And the circumstances escalated quickly, so that soon this “here” was not merely divided spatially from the position “there,” soon “here” was also elevated above this “there.”]50 Nuanced understandings of space–time in diverse cultures and religions are subsumed under the Eurocentric model: Das scheinbar neutrale Modell objektiver oder universeller Zeit, das der Kapitalismus globalisierte, ist ein historisch und geographisch spezifisches Konstrukt. Universelle Zeit war direkt mit der Säkularisierung judeochristlicher Zeitvorstellungen verbunden. Das heißt, ein Konzept, in dem lineare Zeit gemessen wurde an der Erlösungsgeschichte einer bestimmten monotheistischen religiösen Gemeinschaft, wurde ersetzt durch ein Modell, das den Menschen, in seiner spezifischen europäischen Variante, zentrierte: Zeit gemessen an klaren, aufeinander folgenden Phasen, von Geburt über Kindheit und Adoleszenz zu Reife und schließlich Tod.51 [The seemingly neutral model of objective or universal time, globalized under capitalism, is a historically and geographically specific construct. Universal time was directly connected to the secularization of Judeo-Christian concepts of time. This means that a concept in which linear time was measured according to the redemption story of a specific monotheist religious community was replaced with a model that put human beings, in their specific European variation, at its center: time measured in discrete, sequential phases: from birth to childhood, adolescence, maturity, and, finally, death.]

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Ada deconstructs the universal claim of this concept by marking it as no more than one interpretation by one religious group: “die Zeit, die die Christen 1451 nannten” (the time the Christians called 1451).52 This evolutionary model goes hand-in-hand with an anthropological and political imagining of the “family of man,” a patriarchal concept that puts the civilized European father at the head of the family, responsible for the development of his “children” further down the evolutionary ladder. Anne McClintock commented on the national import of the trope of the family: After 1859 and the advent of social Darwinism, Britain’s emergent national narrative took shape increasingly around the image of the evolutionary family of man. The family offered an indispensable metaphoric figure by which national difference could be shaped into a single historical genesis narrative.53 The Eurocentric temporal model of human evolution must therefore be understood as both racist and representative of patriarchal control. Stuart Hall has defined time and place—in literature and other media—as “basic coordinates of all systems of representation.” Consequently, as Hall notes, “the shaping and reshaping of time–space relationships within different systems of representation have profound effects on how identities are located and represented.”54 Both the racist and the patriarchal impetus of this time–space model is deconstructed in Adas Raum. The circular narrative structure and the endless transformations of the human and non-human narrators can be understood as dismantling linear conceptions of individual and national history. The idea of circular and entangled vs linear histories is explored explicitly in dialogues between Ada the subject and her construed Others (the changing object narrators). But Ada and the object narrators are in the end one and the same, as becomes clear in the chapter “Zwischen den Schleifen” (“Between the Orbits”), which symbolizes the space of white power, in which the subject Ada continually dissolves and is made invisible. Sie [Ada] wolle nicht ein weiteres Mal erleben, wie sie aus dem Geschehen herausgerissen und woanders hingepflanzt wurde. Ginge es nach ihr, wäre sie endlich ein endliches Wesen geworden: es gäbe einen Anfang, eine Mitte und—vor allem—ein Ende. Ihr Verhalten wunderte mich, denn eigentlich hatte Ada schon gelernt, dass wir alle immer hier gewesen sind und dass wir immer hier sein werden; bis das, was wir ‘Zeit’ nennen, sich um sich biegt und fast zerbricht; bis das, was wir ‘Geschichte’ nennen, sich umdreht und die sogenannte Zukunft noch einmal von vorne anfängt. Ihre Vergesslichkeit war mir unerklärlich.

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Gott kreischte. Es hieß so viel wie: Du bist nicht besser! Erinnern und Vergessen gehören zusammen. Wie oft muss ich dir das noch erklären? Bis ich ein Mensch werden darf, sagte ich. [She did not want to have to live through another experience of being torn away only to be replanted somewhere new. If she could have had it her way, she wanted finally to be a finite being: one with a beginning, a middle and - most importantly - an end. Her behaviour surprised me, for Ada had already learned that all of us have always been here and that all of us will always be here. Until that which we call “time” folds in upon itself and all but shatters. Until that which we call “history” turns in on itself, and the so-called future begins anew. I found her forgetfulness inexplicable. God squawked. It meant something along the lines of: You’re no better yourself! Remembering and forgetting go hand in hand. How often do I have to remind you? Until I get to be human, too, I said.]55 In this dialogue between Ada, the object narrator, and God—a shapeshifting figure who speaks in varying languages—it becomes clear that Ada has no choice but to orbit as a colonized and objectified person until she has dealt with the past. In the end, this entails tracing the history of her mothers. Only then is it possible to become a subject who can free herself from the white culture’s power of definition and, newly empowered, define herself. This process begins by naming her mother and recounting her history in the first “Ada” chapter of “The Next Orbits.” The stories of the mothers, Farida, Annabella, and Ila, are stories of women, who were subject to extreme male violence, but nevertheless found a path toward empowerment, in the process deconstructing male hero and savior narratives. Ada, for example, has this to say about the man who ostensibly “saved” the Ghanaian mother Farida: Aber die Tatsache, dass er in dieser Nacht doch Hilfe bekommen hatte, dass der Atem meiner Mutter ihn am Leben gehalten hatte, das verdrängte er. Wie sein kaputtes, nutzloses Bein passte sie in seiner Heldenerzählung nicht. [Kodjo never mentioned how he had received some help during that night: how my mother’s breath had kept him alive. Just like his broken, useless leg, she did not fit within his hero’s tale.]56 For Lady Ada, her mother is the person who leads her to math and does everything to ensure that her daughter gets a good education. And Ila saves her children from the Nazis by sacrificing herself, taking at least one Nazi with her. Only when Ada remembers the heroic tales of her mothers,

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the stories that men have hidden in order to make themselves look heroic, is she able to find her way back to herself? Until then, she is defined by the men at her side; she is “die Frau, die sie alle Ada nannten” (“the woman they all called Ada”).57 In fifteenthcentury Ghana, the colonizers call the main female figure “Ada Foah,” after the coastal area they have taken; and in Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp, a john calls her “Ada.” At first, the link to the Nazi era seems somewhat problematic, as if Dodua Otoo were perhaps challenging the singularity of the Holocaust. While Berlin—London—Totope are linked through their colonial past, and the attendant stories of “gendered race” and “racialized gender,”58 the storyline in a concentration camp would appear to trouble this narrative cohesion. But I do not read this as an attempt to equate colonial and Nazi genocide or to relativize the Holocaust. Rather, I see here a link to W.E.B. Du Bois’ Black perspective on the Holocaust. In his article “The Negro and the Warsaw Ghetto,” first published in 1952 in the communist newspaper Jewish Life, du Bois recounts how a trip to Poland made him rethink his understanding of the “race problem,” expanding the concept to include a new, global definition of the category: The result of these three visits, and particularly of my view of the Warsaw ghetto, was not so much clearer understanding of the Jewish problem in the world as it was a real and more complete understanding of the Negro problem. In the first place, the problem of slavery, emancipation, and caste in the United States was no longer in my mind a separate and unique thing as I had so long conceived it. It was not even solely a matter of color and physical and racial characteristics, which was particularly a hard thing for me to learn, since for a lifetime the color line had been a real and efficient cause of misery. … No, the race problem in which I was interested cut across lines of color and physique and belief and status and was a matter of cultural patterns, perverted teaching and human hate and prejudice, which reached all sorts of people and caused endless evil to all men.59 Drawing on Du Bois’s understanding of the race problem, Sharon Dodua Otoo, too, presents colonialization and the racialization of Black people as both similar to and different from other systems of race and caste. The core of racism lies in the idea of a white male Übermensch who believes himself superior to the constructed “Other.” Defined through its negative pole, this concept is clearly related to the antisemitic construct of the superior “Aryan.” Michael Rothberg’s reading of Du Bois provides a deeper understanding of the interweaving of race, history, and memory that Sharon Dodua Otto attempts in Adas Raum. Rothberg sees Du Bois’ essay as “a multidimensional performance that walks a line between and

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across a series of overlapping spaces.”60 Du Bois “demonstrates how the other’s history and memory can serve as a source of renewal and reconfiguration for the self—granted one is willing to give up exclusive claims to ultimative victimization and ownership over suffering.”61 In Adas Raum, the Other is also always a woman, so that this renewal is linked to the reclaiming of a female genealogy. This is symbolized at the end of the novel through the birth of the daughter and the mother’s return, which carves out a space for a new self-understanding in the present, between yesterday and tomorrow. Importantly, the newborn baby affects a transformation of the preceding series of object narrators into the longdesired subject. The literally objectified narrators have become human, opening a path to a tomorrow. And so the novel’s final paragraph begins with Ada’s words: “Denn endlich hatte ich verstanden, wer ich bin” (For I finally understood who I was).62 Conclusion Die, die marginalisiert werden, haben Wissen, haben eine Expertise. Wir kennen die Geschichte hinter der dominanten Geschichtserzählung. Überhaupt sind unsere Perspektiven unerlässlich, um deutsche Geschichte wirklich zu verstehen.63 [Those who are marginalized possess knowledge and expertise. We know the history behind the dominant historical narratives. In fact, our perspectives are essential to a true understanding of German history.] Sharon Dodua Otoo, as I have shown, employs myriad creative narrative devices to present alternative perspectives and deconstruct histories written by and about white male “heroes” and “saviors.” One of these is the disempowerment of the omniscient narrator, used all too often in literary history to marginalize and objectify women and colonized peoples, among others. At the character level, historical male heroes, the “enlightened” “discoverers” are cast in an unfavorable light. In contrast to their heroic portrayal in history books, in Dodua Otoo’s novel they are exhausted men who are plagued by fears and failures and unsuitable as figures of identification. Instead, without ignoring the violent power given to men in society, the text casts women as heroes, who save themselves, resist their inferior status, and contribute to social progress. It is also notable that in her presentation of a variety of women characters, white women do not benefit from the oppression of Black and other marginalized women. White women are neither saviors nor role models for emancipation, and white male “saviors” are unnecessary. Instead, within the multiple perspectives, each woman is valued and the ability of all women to be proactive is stressed, and their dignity preserved.

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Individual female characters are taken seriously and given a place in the narrative, while at the same time, dominant historical frameworks are dismantled, particularly on the temporal and spatial narrative level. Rather than using a linear timeline—in accordance with a Eurocentric understanding of the time–space model—Dodua Otoo’s narrative orbits reveal the entanglements of histories on a global scale, deconstructing narratives that focus only on individual (European) nations. In so doing, she shows that the history of the Berlin metropolis extends far beyond its borders and is connected to the history of colonialism and to National Socialist oppression, which, because they remain unexplored, continue to impact German society. At the same time, she shows how narratives of oppression are interwoven—invariably shot through with racism and patriarchal disempowerment—and have persisted since early modernity in spite of, or rather as an integral element of, Enlightenment narratives of equality. Adas Raum and the things i am thinking while smiling politely… demonstrate that a new (self-)perception on the individual and the societal level will be possible only when we embrace the past as part of the present, and when white Europeans look beyond their own viewpoints to embrace a multidimensional perspective of history. In Germany, this means including Black perspectives that have been all but left out of history and the sciences and which for a very long time were not recognized as “German” voices. In the literary establishment, these perspectives are percolating into the institutions, where they will hopefully contribute to a reckoning with the disadvantages created by past and present hierarchizations and constructs of inequality. translated by Laura Radosh Notes 1 May Ayim, “Ankunft,” in Grenzenlos und unverschämt (Berlin: Orlanda, 1997). All translations by Laura Radosh unless otherwise noted. 2 Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, We Should All Be Feminists (London: Fourth Estate, 2014), 182. The essay was first presented as a TED talk in 2012. 3 Sharon Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum (Frankfurt a. M.: S. Fischer, 2021), 203; Ada’s Realm, trans. Jon Cho-Polizzi (London: Maclehose Press, 2023), 186–87. 4 Sharon Dodua Otoo, Eröffnungsrede der Ausstellung ‘Deutscher Kolonialismus’, S. Fischer Verlag, accessed October 16, 2022. https://www.fischerverlage.de/ magazin/extras/eroeffnungsrede-deutscher-kolonialismus. 5 Toni Morrison, “Disturbing Nurses and the Kindness of Sharks,” in Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination (New York: Vintage Books, 1993), 90. 6 Sharon Dodua Otoo, the things i am thinking while smiling politely… (Hamburg: Edition Assemblage, 2012), 85–6.

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7 Obioma Nnaemeka, “Bodies That Don’t Matter: Black Bodies and the European Gaze,” in Mythen, Masken und Subjekte. Kritische Weißseinsforschung in Deutschland, ed. Maureen Maisha Eggers, Grada Kilomba and Peggy Piesche (Munster: Unrast, 2009), 102. 8 Şeyda Kurt, “Koloniale Völkerschauen: ‘Es war und ist der rassistische Blick auf nicht-weiße Menschen,‘“ ZEIT online, 29.09.2019, https://www.zeit.de/ zett/politik/2019-09/koloniale-voelkerschauen-es-war-und-ist-der-rassistischeblick-auf-nicht-weisse-menschen 9 Sebastian Conrad, “Erinnerung im globalen Zeitalter: Warum die Vergangenheitsdebatte gerade explodiert,” Merkur 867 (August 2021): 75–81. https://www.merkur-zeitschrift.de/2021/07/26/erinnerung-im-globalen-zeitalterwarum-die-vergangenheitsdebatte-gerade-explodiert/ 10 Paul Mecheril. “Migrationspädagogik. Hinführung zu einer Perspektive,” in Migrationspädagogik, ed. Paul Mecheril, María do Mar Castro Varela, İnci Dirim, Annita Kalpaka and Claus Melter (Weinheim and Basel: Beltz, 2010), 13. 11 Dodua Otoo, the things i am thinking while smiling politely…, 10. 12 Dodua Otoo, the things i am thinking while smiling politely…, 10. See also Martina Kofer, “Deutschland als Schwarze Heimat in der postmigrantischen Gegenwartsliteratur. Literaturdidaktik aus rassismuskritischer Perspektive,” in Heimat in der postmigrantischen Gesellschaft. Literaturdidaktische und interdisziplinäre Perspektiven, ed. Renata Behrendt, Söhnke Post (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2022), 179. 13 See Anne McClintock, “’No longer in a Future Heaven’: Gender, Race and Nationalism,” in Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nation and Postcolonial Perspectives, ed. Anne McClintock, Aamir Mufti, Ella Shohat (London / Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), 89–112. 14 Dodua Otoo, the things i am thinking while smiling politely… …, 10. 15 Dodua Otoo, the things i am thinking while smiling politely… …, 10. Carl Peters is considered the founder of German East Africa, today Tanzania. Peters’ brutality earned him the name Mkono Wa Damu, the man with the bloody hands. 16 See Kofer, “Deutschland als Schwarze Heimat,” 180. 17 Nnaemeka, “Bodies That Don’t Matter: Black Bodies and the European Gaze,” 91. 18 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 190; Ada’s Realm, 174. 19 Johny Pitts, Afropean. Notes from Black Europe (London: Penguin, 2019), 4. 20 Johny Pitts, Afropean. Notes from Black Europe, 1. 21 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 187; Ada’s Realm, 171. 22 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 310; Ada’s Realm, 291. 23 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 257; Ada’s Realm, 239. 24 Mascarenhas Barreto, The Portuguese Columbus: Secret Agent of King John II (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992). 25 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 283–4; Ada’s Realm, 265. See also https:// artsandculture.google.com/entity/helmut-bischoff/m0jwtf6w?hl=de. 26 On October 9, 2019, the armed right-wing extremist Stephan Balliet attempted to break into the synagogue in Halle in order to massacre Jewish congregants. His plan failed because he could not breach the door. He then shot and killed a passerby and a patron of a kebab shop, severely injuring two others. The attacker’s stated goal was to kill as many “anti-whites” as possible. See https:// www.bpb.de/kurz-knapp/hintergrund-aktuell/316638/der-anschlag-von-halle/.

From Colonialism to Contemporary Racism 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39

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Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 283; Ada’s Realm, 265. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 34; Ada’s Realm, 23. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 72,73; Ada’s Realm, 60. Chinua Achebe, “The Novelist as Teacher,” in Chinua Achebe, Hopes and Impediments. Selected Essays 1965–87 (London: Heinemann, 1988), 29. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. “The danger of a single story,” video, 18:32, TED Talk Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The danger of a single story | TED Talk. 2009. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 39; Ada’s Realm, 28. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 41; Ada’s Realm, 30. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 79; Ada’s Realm, 67. Frantz Fanon, Black Skin White Masks (New York: Grove Press, 2008). Nnaemeka, “Bodies That Don’t Matter: Black Bodies and the European Gaze,” 94. See Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, “Three Women’s Texts and a Critique of Imperialism,” Critical Inquiry 12, no. 1 (Autumn, 1985): 243–261. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 21; Ada’s Realm, 10, emphasis in the original. Tamara L. Hunt shows that Irish women in the 19th century were stereotyped as “wild” and “uncivilized” and used as a foil to the white, “civilized” English woman. She also notes the connection between gender and the “colonization” of Ireland by the English. See Tamara L. Hunt, “Wild Irish Women: Gender, Politics, and Colonialism in the Nineteenth Century,” in Women and the Colonial Gaze, ed. Tamara Hunt, Micheline R. Lessard (Houndmills / Basingstoke / Hampshire: Palgrave, 2002), 49–62. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 69; Ada’s Realm, 57. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 97; Ada’s Realm, 83–4, emphasis in the original. Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 127; Ada’s Realm, 113–4. See Shalini Randeria, “Entangled Histories of Uneven Modernities: Civil Society, Caste Solidarities and the Post-Colonial State in India,” in Unraveling Times: From Social Cohesion to New Practices of Connectedness, ed. Yehuda Elkana, Ivan Krastev, Elisio Macamo and Shalini Randeria (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 2002), 284–311. Sebastian Conrad, Shalini Randeria, “Geteilte Geschichten—Europa in einer postkolonialen Welt,” in Jenseits des Eurozentrismus. Postkoloniale Perspektiven in den Geschichts- und Kulturwissenschaften, ed. Sebastian Conrad, Shalini Randeria and Regina Römhild (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 2013), 33. Shalini Randeria, Regina Römhild, “Das postkoloniale Europa: Verflochtene Genealogien der Gegenwart—Einleitung zur erweiterten Neuauflage (2013),” in Jenseits des Eurozentrismus: Postkoloniale Perspektiven in den Geschichtsund Kulturwissenschaften, ed. Sebastian Conrad, Shalini Randeria and Regina Römhild (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 2013), 10. Shalini Randeria, Regina, Römhild, “Das postkoloniale Europa,” 9. The rather unusual phrase “Unter den” is, I believe, inspired by W.E.B. Du Bois’ article “The Negro and the Warsaw Ghetto” (1952), in which he recounts how, on a journey to Galicia, he was asked whether he was going to stay “Unter den Juden.” “Unter den” marks an individual as belonging to a certain social category. See Sharon Dodua Otoo’s opening speech at the German Colonialism exhibition, Oct. 13, 2016, in which she names Du Bois as a thinker who has influenced her own work. https://www.fischerverlage.de/ magazin/extras/eroeffnungsrede-deutscher-kolonialismus.

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48 Shalini Randeria, “Geteilte Geschichten und verwobene Moderne,” in Zukunftsentwürfe: Ideen für eine Kultur der Veränderung, ed. Jörn Rüsen, Hanna Leitgeb and Norbert Jegelka (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 1999), 17. See also Randeria, Conrad, “Geteilte Geschichten—Europa in einer postkolonialen Welt,” 40. 49 Fatima El-Tayeb, Undeutsch: Die Konstruktion des Anderen in der postmigrantischen Gesellschaft (Bielefeld: transcript, 2016), 50. 50 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 111; Ada’s Realm, 97, emphasis in the original. 51 El-Tayeb, Undeutsch. Die Konstruktion des Anderen in der postmigrantischen Gesellschaft, 51. 52 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 112; Ada’s Realm, 98. 53 McClintock, “‘No longer in a Future Heaven’: Gender, Race and Nationalism,” 91. 54 Stuart Hall, “The Question of Cultural Identity,” in Modernity and its Futures, ed. Stuart Hall, David Held and Tony McGrew (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1992), 301. 55 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 138; Ada’s Realm, 123–4. 56 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 158; Ada’s Realm, 143–4. 57 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 15; Ada’s Realm, 5. 58 Judith Butler, Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of ‘Sex’ (New York / London: Routledge, 1993), 182. 59 W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Negro and the Warsaw Ghetto,” Jewish Life (May 1952): 14–15, here 15. 60 Michael Rothberg, Multidirectional Memory: Remembering the Holocaust in the Age of Decolonization (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009), 121. 61 Michael Rothberg, Multidirectional Memory, 132. 62 Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum, 317; Ada’s Realm, 297. 63 Dodua Otoo, Eröffnungsrede.

14

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging Literary and Essayistic Interventions by Otoo and Yaghoobifarah Helga Druxes

What strategies do German writers of non-European descent deploy to queer sexism and chauvinism? Humor and satire are legitimate weapons in any public intellectual’s arsenal. When these are wielded by women of color, however, essentializing projections all too often take on the function of suppressing their voices. Sharon Dodua Otoo delineates the throughlines of sexism and racism from slavery to fascism to contemporary urban culture through satire and magical realism, while Hengameh Yaghoobifarah’s journalism targets public shaming of non-normative bodies. These writers portray women as active in a number of social roles besides motherhood, drawing attention to the physical and emotional costs of battling multiple forms of oppression, but they also create a looping herstory of acts of resistance, claiming a space of their own. Returning to the past can free up new knowledge about the workings of oppression and histories of resistance that allow these writers to transform their present, and these loops make readers aware of intersectional continuities of discrimination between different epochs. By contrast, on the far-right end of the contemporary political spectrum, influencers like Naomi Seibt and the journalist Ellen Kositza advocate vociferously for a return to traditional women’s roles, within a patriarchal white nationalist frame. In the middle but skewing conservative, we find popular film representations of failing white mothers and their fractious children. Overtly, the director Nora Fingscheidt, whose film System Crasher (2019) won the Alfred Bauer Prize and was selected by Germany to compete as Best International Feature at the 2020 Academy Awards, promotes an overarching politically progressive aim when she points to a lack of domestic social services for so-called system crashers: children with explosive disorder who are shunted from one institution to the next. However, when we take a closer look at her filmic representations of transgressive behavior, and especially the mother–daughter dyad, normative narratives about femininity and conformity come to the fore.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003378990-18

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The white biological family is seen as failing, with unreliable, overextended mothers and absent fathers or abusive father substitutes. This crisis is depicted as catastrophic, with its overfocus on social units like the couple and state institutions at the expense of occluding a larger, more diverse support network of social actors outside these institutions. Creating a moral panic about the failing white family suggests that social transformation hinges primarily on it, thereby avoiding a broader systemic critique of who has a voice in building community for the future, and whose needs and contributions continue to be ignored. Unlike Seibt, Kositza, and Fingscheidt, Yaghoobifarah and Otoo create a refreshing new understanding of such mental and emotional constrictions by showing them to be historically contingent. These writers imagine that their female protagonists might liberate themselves according to their needs and desires, supported by a sisterhood of women with utopian visions despite decades and even centuries of racist and sexist violence directed toward them. These diverse voices encourage a wry selfunderstanding as participants in a cosmopolitan, urban community. To fully understand what regressive political trends these writers are up against, let us first take a look at mainstream gender norms and their mirroring in recent popular film, then turn to New Right constructions of gender and whiteness. Reinscribing Gender Norms in Popular Film The current rise in sexism and various kinds of xenophobia (Islamophobia, antisemitism, anti-migrant prejudice) in Germany pushes back against the urgent imperative to rewrite a forward-looking narrative of national belonging. The right-populist political spectrum—ranging from right conservatives among the Christian Democrats (CDU) to the more extreme Alternative for Germany (AfD), to elements of the New Right—mirrors and amplifies what gender studies expert Jasbir Puar terms homonationalism.1 Sexism, homophobia, and xenophobia can be multiply linked, for example, someone’s identity as a gay person, or as a Christian, may function as an alibi for uttering racist views held in the mainstream. Echoing conservative views on motherhood, popular films may amplify moral panics over negligent mothers and unmanageable children. Mothers are the node where New Right discourse and conservative mainstream beliefs meet. In a recent interview, the philosopher Judith Butler stated that: “Antigender politics have been bolstered by the Vatican and the more conservative evangelical and apostolic churches on several continents, but also by neoliberals in France and elsewhere who need the normative family to absorb the decimation of social welfare.”2 By insisting that binary gender

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 285 norms are natural, not socially created, these groups desire to uphold hierarchies that exclude politically divergent needs of those who do not conform. Moreover, the contemporary German workplace still disadvantages women, with a gender pay gap of 26% and women in upper managerial positions or in the boardroom only in one out of three companies. We can unequivocally state that the reason for this is ingrained sexism, with men promoting other men rather than women or minorities. There is no consensus in the government or among corporate CEOs on how to address this inequity. Even some high-achieving women in science and industry, for example, the biologist and Nobel Prize winner Christiane NüssleinVollhard, reject quotas as self-defeating tokenism. In contrast, ARD editor-in-chief Juliane Leopold states: “Quota and qualification complement each other. For a quota only goes into effect once someone did obtain the required qualifications.”3 The gender quota introduced in 2016 is 30%, but it only applies to firms with 2,000 or more employees. Most German firms are small or mid-size, and thus exempt. The stark reality is that overall only 4% of German CEOs are women. In the media, career women are often blamed for delaying childbirth or rejecting motherhood in favor of work. Moreover, popular entertainment films profit from moral panics over “bad mothers” and fractious offspring. A recent family melodrama, the prize-winning feature System Crasher, focuses on a difficult traumatized child. At age nine, Benni (Helena Zenge) has already exhausted her options in social services: special needs school, foster care, and youth psychiatric ward. While the director claims that she tried to avoid a rush to judgment, the film subtly assigns blame to Benni’s unemployed mother, with three young children by different men, living with an abusive boyfriend. Benni’s mom habitually misses appointments with social services where her daughter’s future is to be decided, or makes promises that she does not intend to keep. All Benni wants is to return home to her mother. On an outward-bound adventure in the woods, Benni screams the word “Mama” with increasing desperation to see if the mountains will echo her words. There is only silence. In another scene, the mother is not home in the evening; her young children watch TV. On the lam from the children’s home, Benni hitches a ride to the family’s apartment in a distant town, takes care of her siblings, and attempts to feed them dinner. The fridge is not well-stocked, “dinner” consists of hot dog buns and sauce packets. In a physical altercation between Benni and Sven, the abusive boyfriend, the mother wails as he locks the aggressive Benni in a closet, and he then demands that her mother call the police. The film suggests strongly that a good mother would stay home to mind the children, and a good marriage is one where the man provides. The education specialist Micha, Benni’s mentor, fulfills this traditional masculine

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role, while also showing himself capable of unconventional ideas. When Benni fails in yet another group home, he offers to take her to his cabin in the woods to teach her some survival skills. Benni begs him to break the rules by letting her stay at his home for one night. We see her begin to open up and relax in a loving, attentive family. Micha’s wife, who has a baby and is pregnant with a second, spontaneously extends mothering behavior toward Benni. Clearly, this character is showcased as an ideal mother in contrast to Benni’s own “Rabenmutter” (raven mother). When Micha’s baby son touches her face, Benni does not wild out as viewers have come to expect; instead, she makes him a bottle and holds him carefully. Despite such promising moments, Benni is highly unstable, liable to explode in anger or defiant behavior. Her outbursts originate from physical abuse when Benni was a baby, and a history of neglect and inconsistent crisis management by her overwhelmed mother and social services. An empathetic social worker, Mrs. Bafané, reveals that Benni cannot stand physical touch on her face because an abusive boyfriend pressed a diaper in her face to silence her cries. Once more, Benni’s mother is blamed for not being vigilant. In addition to the film’s sexist depiction of parenting, there is an implied white nationalist element that creates a drama over endangered white reproductivity: the failure of a white family is seen as catastrophic to the system as a whole. The casting underlines the racial coding of very Aryanlooking characters as the ones who are in distress. I would call this neocolonial, because it ignores the diversity of contemporary Germany: who needs saving, who merits saving? Helena Zengel (Benni Klaaß) is naturally so pale that her skin seems translucent, her hair white-blond. The actor Lisa Hagmeister (Bianca Klaaß) is styled to look physically similar. The mom Bianca’s girly clothes and uncertain demeanor create a painfully feminine impression, whereas her daughter is stereotyped as an overly assertive tomboy. At various points in the film, the mother is blamed for being unreliable and weak, overtaxed by raising three children on her own. It is insinuated that they have different fathers. An assertive male social worker is suggested as the right kind of father surrogate, somebody who wields authority tempered by kindness. He succeeds where other female social workers and a foster mother fail, which implies that a return to more traditional gender norms would be beneficial to reinsert Benni into society. Even though Fingscheidt wished to avoid stereotyping urban minority youth as troublemakers by choosing a preteen girl, she creates a moral panic over the “failure” of a white mother as an educator of her children. Benni fights and curses like a boy. Benni’s episodes of explosive rage shock viewers even more than institutional shortcomings do. Nor does the film invite viewers to question whether strict gender norms (girly girls versus rough boys) might be harmful constructs as such. The other

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 287 children in System Crasher do embody traditional gender norms, further demonizing Benni’s androgyny as aberrant and scary. Micha eventually gives up his role as Benni’s fatherly mentor because he becomes overinvolved. By the end of the film, Benni has exhausted all available options for German social services. She must now live on a working farm for juvenile delinquents in Kenya, a continent away from her family. The underlying assumption is that it is permissible for Europe to export its dysfunctional elements to an African country, thus advocating for a highly problematic return to colonialist practices. This “solution” is a one-way street, since immigrants from African countries are kept out of Europe at all cost, remaindered in prison camps or routinely deported from border zones, for example, the vicinity of the Spanish enclaves of Melilla and Ceuta in Morocco. At the airport, the child breaks free from her new minder at the security checkpoint and runs at full tilt, exiting onto an outdoor platform. She pretends to fly as she runs, eyes closed. The final shot shows cracked glass, then the screen fades to black. We assume that Benni cracked her skull on the window and died. Fingscheidt alternates between showing Benni as exasperating and lovable, while proposing her reinsertion in a heteronormative nuclear family as the remedy. Return to the Land and Heteronormativity: The New Right Romanticizing life in the woods, and muscular, somewhat foul-mouthed white men as authority figures or even rescuers, dramas like System Crasher and others4 use the same ideational elements that white nationalists in Germany use for their political and social legitimacy. Their utopian alternative advocates a retreat away from technocratic consumer society back to the land, with a nuclear family and clearly defined gender roles, for white people only. Organic gardening, keeping chickens, and a large family are picturesque scenarios that far-right ideologues like the blogger and journalist Ellen Kositza know to present to their own advantage. On the surface, these lifestyle choices echo middle and uppermiddle-class women’s hobbies without seeming overtly political. By refusing to entertain a broad spectrum of gender affiliations, including girlish men and female tomboys, the New Right5 nostalgically harks back to a bourgeois gender binary that arose with the cult of domesticity. However, unlike their predecessors, they are politically invested in fomenting a (transitional) anarchic phase in which the state, professional elites, and pluralistic democracy are overthrown. Subsequently, borders would be closed, and immigrants deported to recreate Eurocentric nation-states according to ethnic belonging. There is no elaboration of economic policies in a global framework; globalism is

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rejected wholesale. The return to the soil is pre-eminent. Presumably, these extremist groups believe that traditional farming practices would slow down climate change, insofar as this phenomenon is acknowledged as actually happening. Their emotional cathexis on “man the builder” conflicts with a realistic view of man-made practices leading to environmental disaster and planetary extinction. Women are offered participation as political soldiers on the New Right. Moreover, within the apocalyptic scenario of the “Great Replacement,” their childbearing ability elevates them into guarantors of future white dominance. The aging demographic in Germany creates governmental pressures to increase the birth rate beyond the 1.7 babies necessary for intergenerational reproduction or to reform immigration laws to admit vastly more migrants to fill vacancies in many sectors of the economy. Moral panics over women as sexual prey for immigrants and asylum seekers or sex education in schools are fomented by the far right to “prove” the degeneracy of a pluralistic society. The “construction of ‘abnormal sexuality’ serves mainly to demarcate sexual practices that are acceptable to the idealized ‘Volksgemeinschaft,’” argue Claus and Virchow.6 Homosexuals are ostracized as a threat to traditional ideas of manliness and masculinity, while desirable forms of femininity extend a promise of caring within the family. The concept of malleable gender identity is seen as dangerous; in alt-right propaganda, feminism leads to the abolition of men and ultimately ethnic death. What values do New Right icons such as blogger Naomi Seibt and journalist Ellen Kositza promote? Kositza has seven children, runs a political salon with her husband Götz Kubitschek, and authors selfpublished books against Islam and feminism. On the Far Right, capitalism is the enemy, to be countered by an autarchic family model organized according to an economic model of subsistence farming. Kositza’s vignettes about daily life on the farm/manor house promote the fantasy of existing outside of the modern state. This regressive Romanticization of rural living is characteristic of both the New Right and the Identitarian Movement (IB). While Kositza tries to normalize her extreme views by embedding them in an idyllic family farm setting, Seibt is an influencer who markets herself as a climate crisis skeptic. In May 2019, the 18-yearold started a YouTube channel called “Thinking Differently,” where she amassed 46,000 followers in a short time. She represents cultural racism and, since February 2020, has been sponsored by the Heartland Institute, a climate-skeptic think tank in the U.S. financed by the Koch brothers. Seibt avers that “we” ought to think, rather than panic when faced with media stories or government mandates on climate change. At the same time, however, she urges her followers to react with what Marc Jongen calls “thymotic” emotion, that is, righteous public displays of rage.7 She

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 289 states: “The goal [of climate scientists] is to shame humanity. Climate change alarmism at its very core is a despicably anti-human ideology and we are told to look down at our achievements with guilt, with shame and disgust, and not even to consider the many major benefits we achieved by using fossil fuels as our main energy source.”8 Gesturing back to widely held feelings in defeated Nazi Germany as the allies imposed democracy and tried to denazify the occupied zones, Seibt introduces a specious parallel between foreign powers then and the global science community now. Her perspective is nativist and nostalgic: she wants to celebrate past achievements of the parent and grandparent generations, because, she argues, it can’t all have been bad. This stance corresponds to what feminist media philosopher Joanna Zylinska calls “a conservative politics of maintenance and preservation.” Zylinska interprets the “resurgence of right-wing populism across the world as a (perhaps unwitting) response to the impending planetary cataclysm.”9 The return to the local, romanticization of the soil under the umbrella of an imagined (and entirely mythical) common Judeo-Christian Occidental culture whose values have come under attack combine into a denial of rights for groups that are ejected from the tight circle of white belonging. These ideological concepts take on an appearance of natural law among racists and xenophobes who perform frequent microaggressions, if not bigger hate crimes, in the streets and shops where they come into contact with a more diverse community.10 The New Right’s Refusal of Contingency In characterizing the New Right worldview, I find Stanislaw Lem’s notion of encystment particularly useful. When a civilization overfocuses on Man as an end and origin in himself, rather than admitting that our lifeworld is shaped by a complex interplay of interspecies entanglements, then, “receiving too much feedback from Nature, such a civilization may become encysted: It will construct a ‘world within a world,’ an autonomous reality that is not directly connected with the material reality of Nature.”11 The New Right’s retreat to provincialism, territorial separation of different cultural groups, and invocation of white men as powerful culture warriors can all be understood as avoidance tactics to forestall “the necessary task of recognizing that entanglement with others is not just a matter of our acceptance or good will, because it precedes the emergence of the human sense of the self.”12 Expanding upon Lem’s concept, Zylinska argues that acknowledging our precariousness as global humans begins with “the figure of a vulnerable human who both threatens my sense of security and places a demand on me. The Other’s demand is a form of accusation because it requires a justification

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of my relative comfort and stability when that other is facing a political or even existential threat. It thus introduces precarity as a shared condition of being human while also highlighting the fact that under particular sociopolitical circumstances, different people experience precarity in different ways.”13 Acknowledging that the propertied classes, too, may experience precarity in the future is, for some, deeply unsettling and drives them into the arms of isolationist New Right political figures, such as Björn Höcke, Beatrix von Storch, and Alexander Gauland, all with the AfD. After the 2019 antisemitic attack on the synagogue in Halle, Seibt commented that Jews are “at the top” of groups widely acknowledged as discriminated against, whilst “Der Otto Normalverbraucher Deutsche steht da ganz unten sozusagen, dann kommen irgendwo so dazwischen die Moslems und ganz oben steht eben der Jude. Das ist so das Unterdrückungsmerkmal schlechthin” (1:462:09; the ordinary German is at the bottom, so to speak, and then come Muslims somewhere in between, and at the very top is the Jews. That is the suppression characteristic as such).14 Her remarks express and promote a sense of white grievance. Her antisemitic and Islamophobic views transform groups who are targeted by violence into unfair “winners” in the media attention circus. Seibt’s views are underpinned by scientific racism. Scientific racism not only validates white supremacy, as the sociologist Cynthia Miller-Idriss details in Hate in the Homeland, but also “supports calls for white protection, separation, and segregation. Preserving the uniqueness of racial and cultural diversity thus becomes a justification for the white ethnostate. If each racial group is unique, it must be protected from endangerment through race mixing. Keeping racial groups separate, of course, requires that each has a homeland of its own.”15 Unsurprisingly, Seibt’s antiscience stance also includes her recent denial of COVID deaths, which she explains during her public lecture at an AfD hearing in the German Parliament on the supposedly random origins of the PCR test: “Erstens, die Panik macht uns krank, die Suizidrate ist rapide angestiegen, Komorbiditätsfaktoren oder Menschen in hohem Alter” (17:47–18:72; first, panic makes us sick, suicide rates climb rapidly, comorbidity factors or advanced age).16 A young woman with long blond hair presenting her slides in a high-prestige public setting, Seibt is highly photogenic, and her media appeal underlines her value to the New Right intellectual class. Ellen Kositza writes for the far-right magazines Sezession and Junge Freiheit, and, like Seibt, she, too, has a Youtube channel, Kanal Schnellroda, where she markets Antaios authors, the far-right publisher she runs with her husband. The opening scenes of her self-produced videos feature a quick establishing shot of a bucolic setting with the publisher’s name and logo on the right (!), then the camera zooms in on a cozy room filled with bookshelves and finally on a glamorously made-up Kositza

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 291 typing at her computer. Her silky long blond hair and slightly off-theshoulder red top suggest that a New Right woman can be sexy. Then Kositza’s face turns to a light source on the right, which illuminates her blue eyes and light hair. In a March 9, 2021 segment, she praises a book by the far-right journalist Walter van Rossum claiming that the COVID pandemic is a hoax. She also derides the international group Healthmap as founded by two Jewish scientists, Braunstein and Freifeld. She makes fun of the epidemiologist Christian Drosten, whom she sees as an alarmist,17 and speaks of “ein gigantisches Netzwerk von Katastrophenwächtern, die über 20,000 Websites permanent überwachen und sozusagen rotes Licht zeigen, wenn irgendwo eine Krankheit aufflammt” (4:43–4:53; giant network of catastrophe pundits who constantly monitor over 20,000 websites to detect a possible outbreak).18 She claims that the panic in the media is completely detached from the reality of the pandemic. This video had 10,532 views. The only other interview with van Rossum about his book, also titled Meine Pandemie mit Professor Drosten: Vom Tod der Aufklärung unter Laborbedingungen (2021; My pandemic with Prof. Drosten: the death of reason in the lab) aired on RT.de, a Putin-financed disinformation outlet that has repeatedly run into trouble with German federal watchdogs. Familial Authority and the New Right Kositza singles out 1968 as the watershed year for heteronormative masculinity. She claims that positive qualities like heroic courage, protective instinct, authority became socially devalued.19 She goes so far as to state that Protestant majority Northern European countries emasculate men to a greater extent than Southern European Catholic majority countries, reducing them to stereotypes as “potentieller Vergewaltiger, Krimineller oder kompletter Vollpfosten” (potential rapist, criminal or total loser/jerk).20 She further observes that parents do not interact attentively with their children when she encounters them in public: “Das Ausmaß, wie Eltern ihre Kinder als störende Belastung empfinden, das sehe ich immer, wenn sie zum Supermarkt mitgeschleppt werden oder im Wartezimmer des Arztes. Reden sie nett mit ihnen, erzählen ihnen Geschichten oder spielen? Nicht im geringsten. Das Kind hält ein elektronisches Ding, das Kind wird ermahnt, das Kind wird nicht beachtet. Ein Kind ist ein Klotz am Bein” (The extent to which parents see their children as an annoying burden, I witness it whenever they are dragged along to the supermarket, or in a doctor’s waiting room. Do they chat with them nicely, tell them stories or play with them? Not at all. The child holds an electronic device, the child is disciplined, the child gets ignored. A child is a dead weight).21 Anecdotes about her everyday life on the farm focus on

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Darwinian survival: a fox eats the hens; if you have a gun, you shoot the fox. She describes herself as an involved mother who carefully selects the kinds of books her children may read, with an emphasis on out-of-print, right-wing authors. She is proud of the fact that her daughters wear modest skirts and grow their hair to waist length. Much of her venom is unleashed against sex education in German schools. Urban schools, she avers, educate children about sexual practices and sex toys. Her defense of parents who cane their children in a Christian sect elsewhere in Germany is troubling, because she downplays the severity of the beatings. She chastises urban crowds as “people far removed from my way of life.” In the city such people are everywhere, and I have “keinerlei Handhabe” (no control over them). “Zuhause umgeben mich im Normalfall maximal acht Menschen, und ich kann sie maßregeln” (At home, I normally live with eight people, and I can keep them under control).22 Such words fit with her general praise of strictness and top-down discipline. Her daughters parrot this vision in school when asked about their own career plans. One replies that “vielleicht bekomme ich eine Schar Kinder und bleibe zu Hause” (maybe have a bunch of kids and stay at home), for which she gets lots of criticism; another daughter argues with a girlfriend who does not want children: “Stell dir doch vor: deine eigenen Kinder! Die gehören dir! Du kannst voll und ganz bestimmen, was sie dürfen! Wo sonst gäbe es so eine Chance?” (Just imagine: your own children! They’re all yours! You can decide completely what they do! Where else would you get that chance?).23 The unquestioned dominance the daughter anticipates as the most desirable role for her in her future family is troubling. Once a year, Kositza takes her children to a regional museum in Hesse, where they enjoy a documentary about the last Catholic wedding in traditional local garb in 1965: “Wie schön die Braut gekleidet ist und wie kunstreich ihr Haar aufgesteckt ist! Wie sie zur Kirche geleitet wird, wie die alten Einwohnerinnen zu Hauf kommen—es ist ein Eintauchen in Nostalgie. So war es einmal! So wird’s nie mehr sein!” (How beautifully the bride is dressed and how elaborately her hair is styled! How she is led to church, how the old townswomen arrive in droves—it’s immersion in nostalgia! This is how it used to be! It will never again be thus!).24 On the New Right, nostalgia for elusive traditions is based in a rejection of urban elites and cosmopolitanism. Misrepresenting Muslims as sexist oppressors of Muslim women and as sexual predators toward German women allows female agitators of the New Right to foment a generalized moral panic over women’s safety in the public sphere. Collateral benefits are the shoring up of white males as protectors and the reinvention of the white home as a safe haven from the demands of diversity. New Right advocacy of a return to rural living, motherhood, and organic gardening does not fall on deaf ears in a country

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 293 where only 42% of women work full-time and 47% work part-time, compared to 84% of men in full-time employment versus a mere 11% of men who work part-time. These ideological points may resonate with the affluent classes’ retreat to the suburbs to raise their children, and to have second homes in the country. Educated women like Seibt and Kositza lend a pseudo-intellectual veneer to racism, by holding intellectual salons and recommending farright books (“Ellen Kositza empfiehlt Literatur,” Youtube), or opining on matters of public health during the COVID-19 pandemic (Seibt). It is ludicrous that neither of them has a science background, and yet both proclaim themselves experts on epidemiology or the PCR testing process. As co-owners of Antaios, their right-wing publishing house, Kositza and her husband Götz Kubitschek republish racist segregationists like Julius Evola and Jean Raspail. Kositza cultivates the traditional values of motherhood and domesticity by referring to her children or having them appear at the beginning of her broadcast. At times, they are glimpsed in an idyllic courtyard setting with chickens. Cushioned by her traditional role as mother, Kositza then discusses the intellectual value of books she advertises. The sociologist Johanna Sigl emphasizes that some right-wing women play with the movement’s strict gender traditionalism, claiming the mantle of the intellectual or the activist. Sigl states: “The prototypical male is usually scripted as an elite political cadre with seeming intellectualism rather than a street fighter. Identitarian femininity moves between the poles of the traditional and the modern image of women and manages to appear open and relatable to the outside, while continuing to abide by reactionary constraints on the inside.”25 In their outreach to disgruntled mainstream voters on the right, these women form part of the New Right rather than the traditional extreme right. Moreover, women like Kositza and Seibt signal upper-middle-class belonging. Kositza is a property owner and businesswoman as well as a farmer and stay-at-home mother. She and her husband market themselves as educated book lovers in the tradition of the Bildungsbürger. Seibt is being marketed as a child prodigy. She skipped first grade at the age of five, finished an elite Catholic high school in her hometown of Münster at the age of 16 with a perfect GPA, briefly studied first economics and then psychology online, dropped out of both programs, and is now being groomed by the New Right as an influencer. She votes for the AfD and speaks at their events, but purports to be a libertarian. This way, she can attract voters in the FDP and AfD. Women like Kositza and Seibt, as well as Frauke Petry and Alice Weidel of the AfD, suggest to female voters that a range of different forms of professional activism and traditional alliances (e.g., as Catholic conservatives and digital natives) are open to them if they join the New Right.

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The 2015 Cologne New Year’s Eve attacks by a mob of drunk men, including refugees of color, on women partygoers was a bonanza for those who agitate for the white ethnostate, like Kositza. She hews to the belief that German men are “zu verweichlicht” (too domesticated) by feminism and by what she refers to as “drohende Gender Diktatur” (impending gender dictatorship) that negate man as a category.26 At the same time, she inveighs against refugee males being diagnosed with PTSD, depression, or other forms of trauma, suggesting that their suffering as war victims is not genuine. It would appear that her obsessive sorting of people into manipulative victims (Opfer) and evil rapists is informed by a eugenicist view of mental health (Gesundes) as intrinsically German but under threat. According to Kositza, “real men” demonstrate “Heldenmut, Beschützerinstinkt, Autorität” (heroic courage, protective instincts, and authority), but these qualities are systematically discredited by third-wave feminists. Kositza dismisses female rape victims of nonconsensual sex with a white man as manipulative cowards who change their story after intercourse. Queer and trans-people are dismissed as weaklings who would further emasculate men. Kositza recycles Weininger’s racist theories that cast the western hemisphere as “die Sphäre des Weibischen: hier leben Friedensschützer, Erdulder, Geber, Weichlinge [… …] Die anderen, die nicht-Westlichen bilden den männlichen Gegenpol: sie sind kriegerisch, impulsiv, Angreifer und Eroberer; sie sind die Entscheider, die Beherrscher” (the realm of the feminized: here live pacifists, endurers, givers, softies [… …] The others, the non-Occidentals make up the masculine polar opposite: they are warriorlike, impulsive, attackers and conquerors; they are the deciders, the masters).27 She closes her essay Die Einzelfalle with two iconic images: LGBTQ people celebrating during a Christopher Street Day parade are dismissed as feminized and submissive, while heavily armed IS fighters in Syria with black facial disguises are stylized as virile, threatening barbarians. Marshaling the rhetorical device of fallacy (Weininger is a madman, but I quite like his views on gender and nation), Kositza launders corrupt thinkers into quotable experts. As with Seibt’s pandemic denialism, personal conviction takes the place of expertise. The New Right project depends on these distortions of real social relations to gain ground. On the opposite end of the political spectrum, in the radical queer feminist camp, Hengameh Yaghoobifarah is an outspoken defender of diversity and the need to question gender norms to create a more equitable society. De-Naturalizing Gender and the Racialized Gaze: Yaghoobifarah and Otoo In her essay “Blicke” (Looks), the queer journalist and writer Hengameh Yaghoobifarah, who uses the pronoun “they,” deploys humor and irony to protest visual aggression they encounter in the street. Strangers

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 295 exoticize their appearance, often taking their photographs without their permission. While the restrictive esthetic of our culture of slenderness may regard them as “too heavy,” they adore fashion and campy outfits that draw attention to their body shapes. Yaghoobifarah is not a shrinking violet in the way they dress and use make-up, as their Instagram feed proves. They write about “ein paar Annikas (… …), die ohne meine Erlaubnis Fotos von mir machen, als wäre ich ein Bansky-Graffiti” (a couple of Annikas … who take my photo without my permission as if I were a Banksy graffiti) and lament that “nun ist meine Haut genauso Mayo wie die von Annika” (now my skin is as mayonnaise-pale as Annika’s) countering racist, body-shaming stares and remarks with humor.28 They point out that downtown you run into people dressed up as clowns or painted to look like statues, not to mention bachelorette parties in costume, so that they feel almost like a plain Jane in comparison (“graue Maus”).29 They argue that not all white Germans conform to the stereotype of the blonde, blue-eyed Nordic giant either, doing so with a comparison that shows up such categories as silly and unrealistic: “sehen nicht alle weißen Deutschen aus wie das Kind auf der Rotbäckchen-Saftflasche” (Not all white Germans look like the child on the Red Cheeks juice bottle).30 Growing up German-Iranian but never having lived in Iran, they were all too often asked to explain political developments in Iran or the Near East. Again, they ironize being shunted into the model minority by initially labeling it “flattery,” only to then question such an appellation in subjunctive mode: “Oder sagen wir, es wäre schmeichelhaft, würde es nicht zugleich implizieren, dass ich als junge_r Deutsch_Iraner_in bereits in der Mittelstufe ein Allgemeinwissen vorweisen musste, das nicht einmal den meisten weiß-deutschen Erwachsenen abverlangt wird” (Or let’s say, it might be flattery, if it did not simultaneously imply that a young GermanIranian like myself ought to display a level of general knowledge in junior high that most white German adults are never asked for).31 As an adult they are belittled as a tantrum thrower when they finally call out racists, while they were taught to be stoical about such incidents as a child and youth. Drawing on insights from US American black activists, Yaghoobifarah speaks eloquently about the white gaze. They show up the tyranny of white beauty norms, empathize with People of Color who change their appearance to approximate them, and the affirmative potential of posting their own selfies on Instagram. A nose ring, colorful nails and eyeshadow, graphic optical prints, and midriff-baring tops are consistent choices. In a nod to younger fashion-forward consumers with the slogan “All things to everyone” (Alles allen!), the Berlin luxury department store KadeWe displayed their life-size black and white portrait in a Marni brand leather coat and kitten heel boots in September 2020. The

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mainstream media criticized Yaghoobifarah for allowing themselves to feature in an ad campaign, given that they often criticize capitalism. However, I think it is important that non-normative bodies are represented in photographs because such practices challenge prevalent beauty norms; besides, their pose was not demure but authoritative. Their June 15, 2019 taz column “All cops are berufsunfähig” was a satirical polemic against structural racism in the German police force which caused an outsize reaction by state authorities: 382 complaints were filed, there were three attempts to sue Yaghoobifarah for defamation and incitement (Volksverhetzung), two of which were initiated by police departments, and one by conservative Homeland Minister Horst Seehofer.32 All had to desist because their text is protected by the freedom of speech clause. Seehofer called their column “unsäglich” (unspeakable) and “menschenverachtend” (hate speech).33 It is sexist that Yaghoobifarah is being vilified for their strong opinions, whereas millennial author Max Czollek is celebrated for his polemical pieces about German antisemitism and often selfserving memory culture. Czollek’s political essay collections Desintegriert euch! (2018) and Gegenwartsbewältigung (2020) are praised as “furios” (furiously energetic), “wütend” (angry), “ein wildes Zeugnis der jüdischen Szene” (a wild testimony of the Jewish scene), “gellende Dissonanz, die sich nicht aus der Welt schaffen lässt; ein ernst zu nehmender Weckruf” (a clarion call that cannot be silenced; a wakeup call we have to take seriously)34 and reviewed in the New York Times. A review in the liberal weekly Die Zeit lauds Czollek for his decisiveness in refusing to talk with far-right populists: “Es ist diese Entschiedenheit, die Czolleks Polemik einen geradezu leichten Charakter verleiht—bei aller Schwere des Gegenstands” (It is this decisiveness that endows Czollek’s polemics with an easy-going quality, in spite of the heaviness of the subject matter).35 Yet while German-Jewish men are respected for their polemics, a queer woman who does the same is seen as strident, and attempts are made to silence them. Even though they are a rising star journalist at age 29, Yaghoobifarah needs to fight against the misperception of extra pounds as slothful: “das harmoniert wunderbar mit dem Vorurteil, dass ‘Ausländer’ faul und schmutzig sind und sich auf Kosten deutscher Steuerzahler_innen ein bequemes Leben machen. Wie Dicke. … Ich wäre nicht mit 23 Jahren Redakteur_in bei einem zwar prekär aufgestellten, jedoch unter Feminist_innen extrem begehrten Blatt geworden, wenn ich in meinem Leben viel gechillt hätte. Hinter jeder erfolgreichen Person of Color steht mühevolle Arbeit—auch die fordernder Eltern” (This [fat shaming] goes hand in hand with the stereotype that ‘foreigners’ are lazy and dirty and enjoy the good life paid for by German taxpayers. Like fat people. [… …] I would not have been promoted to editor at age 23 at a newspaper that is precariously positioned

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 297 but extremely popular with feminists if I had spent my time chilling. Behind every successful Person of Color lies a lot of hard work, also that of demanding parents).36 In a recent blog for International Non-Binary People’s Day, they describe that they are often misgendered and/or asked to justify why they present as feminine, if they are not a woman.37 They criticize the lack of public celebration of non-binary identities and joke that they have so many clothing styles that they would really appreciate coupons for nonbinary people: “Knielange Basketballshorts mit weitem Sportshirt und Tennissocken an einem Tag, einen Juicy-Couture-Anzug am nächsten und direkt danach Kleidung im Stil von androgynen Kunststudis, also so beigebraune Stofffragmente mit nach außen gedrehten Nähten, die wie unfertige Schnittmuster aussehen. Um dem gerecht zu werden, braucht es einen großen Kleiderschrank und ein noch größeres Budget” (one day, it’s knee-length basketball shorts with a large athletic shirt and tennis socks, the next day, it’s Juicy Couture leisurewear, and right after that, clothes in the preferred style of androgynous art students, that is, beige-brown textile fragments with the seams turned inside out which look like unfinished dressmaker’s patterns. To do justice to all that, I need a large wardrobe and an even larger budget).38 While consumer society is always pushing new looks on us, Yaghoobifarah recycles fashion creatively and has forged their own unconventional visibility. In parallel to the shaming of non-conventional bodies and sexualities that Yaghoobifarah calls out, Afro-Caribbeans and Afro-Germans protest their othering by Germans in many everyday life situations, which exposes them to a barrage of microaggressions that are harmful. Sharon Dodua Otoo comments on racist remarks about Blacks as “dirty” that her school-age son Tyrell had to confront, making readers aware of the colonial history of this stereotype. Tyrell shaved his afro because White people constantly touched his hair. If anybody made racist remarks in school, teachers would tell him to take it easy and try to understand where the White person was coming from. Tyrell did not get the support he needed from teachers, he started cutting school, which meant he could not graduate. Dodua Otoo’s younger sons also encounter racism at school, including a handout for math class that shows a caricature of a Native American. Otoo writes: “Ich weiß, dass es keinen Zauberspruch gibt. Rassismus wird zu meinen Lebzeiten nicht verschwinden, auch nicht zu den Lebzeiten meiner Kinder. Daher ist es für mich wichtig, den Rassismus dort zu identifizieren, wo er ist: in den Strukturen, in den Institutionen, in den Individuen, die ihn ausüben” (I know there is no magic formula to make racism disappear. It will not vanish in my lifetime, nor in my children’s. For this reason, it is important for me to identify racism where it lurks: in the institutions, inside the individuals that practice it).39 She also lists Black self-help organizations as resources that promote community. Tyrell finds meeting other Black Germans empowering. They listen at moments when White Germans do not.

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Otoo’s novella “Synchronicity” belongs in the Black tradition of Afrofuturism, blending elements of science fiction and fantasy with imagining a world where Black people create alternative communities. Cee, or Charlie, is part of a lineage of women seers who are able to give birth without men. They cultivate their gifts by living alone and separate from their daughters when the latter become adults. The story is set in the time of advent, so the Christian belief in redemption and rebirth through faith is also highly relevant. The text traces the transformation of a Black woman from a harried freelance graphic designer whose living space and job depend on a White man into a self-confident artist with “polyvision.” This trajectory is metaphorically expressed by the agonizing loss of her sense of color, followed by the colors’ glorious return. Each regained color is accompanied by taste sensations and a heightened sensitivity to human interactions and intentions. Cee realizes that she is free to assert herself and extend an ethic of care to friends and family from whom she does not need to shut herself off anymore. The loss of each color forces Cee into an awareness of how colors enhance her perception of the world around her. First, she loses the colors of the sun and the sky. Then the colors red and green and finally brown, the color of her skin. Her mother raised her to internalize a defensive pride. The first generation of African immigrants to Europe had to be self-reliant to the point of not needing help from the White majority culture: “people like us were born to live alone, love alone and die alone. We were destined to rely on nobody. I imagine that by now, I have come to accept this fully.”40 This state of resignation is visualized as everything graying out. In a phone call to her mother, Cee “did not want to admit how many colors I had already lost” (Synchronicity, 169). Her employer asks her to design interiors for new building projects, while persistently calling her by a derogatory nickname (“Boney”) instead of her last name (Frau Mensah, Synchronicity, 168). Cee begins to confront her boss after she loses her ability to see pink. We may interpret this as a refusal to behave in a feminine and submissive manner. After Herr Welker writes her a formal letter of eviction because, he now claims, he or his family want to live in the space she rented, she thinks: “If I had not known in the deepest depths of my motherboard that he needed me more than I needed him—I think, I would never have spoken with him again” (Synchronicity, 175). Cee turns the tables on Herr Welker, demanding that he withdraw the letter in exchange for her work presentation. We find the trope of refusing people a home both in the biblical story of Bethlehem and in the contemporary reality of People of Color being rejected as renters and job applicants, purely out of fear of diversity. The novel resonates with the sociologist Naika Foroutan’s treatment of Hannah Arendt’s concept of pluralism: “Humans actively demonstrate their diversity, through labor as well as language, rather than merely being

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 299 different,” Foroutan quotes Arendt, “these modes reveal the essence of humanity.”41 A 2018 study by sociologists from Mannheim University, widely known as “Max und Murat Studie,” investigates teacher bias in elementary school.42 It shows that pupils with a Turkish first name received worse grades for the same work than those with a German name (21:00). Similarly, in another study, applicants for a traineeship were disadvantaged based on their Turkish or Arab name, despite identical grades. Yet another study documents structural discrimination among job applicants by combining identical headshots with different names. If the applicant wore a headscarf and had a Turkish name, she was 4.5 times less likely to get a call back (23:17). Acceptance of migrants does not improve even if they advance professionally. Foroutan mentions Özlem Türeci, the co-inventor of the BioNTech COVID vaccine, which is instrumental in stopping the pandemic. Türeci’s commitment to Germany was questioned because online users doubted that he would sing along to the German national hymn. His colleague Uighur Sahin remembers that his elementary school teacher wanted him to attend Hauptschule despite his good grades until a German neighbor became actively involved to support his ambition to attend Gymnasium (25:41). Racism against children of immigrants is most pronounced if they hail from a Muslim background. Germans in East and West were asked whether they would feel threatened if more Muslims were to advance professionally; 33.8% in the former West and 47.6% in the former East agreed (27:16). Similar numbers in East and West Germany agreed that if Muslims were to get better educated, this might adversely affect educational advancement for the rest of the population. In “Synchronicity,” Otoo fictionalizes experiences with racism, imagining a protagonist who speaks out and gets support from others in the migrant community, such as an artist and a policeman. Once she protests her exploitation in Herr Welker’s morally corrupt business deals, she becomes open to artistic collaboration and gains clarity about important relationships in her life, relaxing her hypervigilance toward others. In Dodua Otoo’s novel Adas Raum (2021), four different eras and spaces collide and overlap: European colonialism in Ghana in March 1459, the invention of the first computer algorithm by Ada Lovelace, a scientist in London in 1848, the dehumanization of women prisoners as prostitutes in the Nazi camp Dora Mittelbau in March 1945, and a recent Afro-British transplant to Berlin apartment hunting in 2019. These narratives are bound by a valuable, mystical object that reappears in all of them: a bracelet made of shimmering golden beads. It is a Ghanaian artifact that is forcibly taken by colonizers until it ends up in a Berlin anthropological museum collection. Besides the bracelet, other ordinary objects, a broom, a door-knocker, the walls of a room, become witnesses and narrate acts of violence. All narrative strands share the subordination of women within an oppressive colonialist

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patriarchy, ending in the violent death of the female protagonist in the three earlier eras. In the London section, Ada Lovelace has an affair with Charles Dickens and is shot to death by her jealous husband. One of her inventions was a code that created looping, allowing the computer to work on repeated instructions. This code resembles the loops in the structure of the novel, which relies on a certain amount of repetition: there is always an Ada, a minor character named Alfons reappears, Ada dies by shooting in three chapters, and throughout, the present is permeated by the vast realm of the otherworld, which encompasses the inchoate before and after sphere from where transhistorical actors re-enter other time periods in new guises. The otherworld boasts a polyform female Deity who assigns fates to humans and sends objects as sentient messenger witnesses. Precolonial Ghanaian society is described as a matriarchy, and some women have same-sex relationships. A similar close bond is recreated in other sections where women are best friends, confidantes, or sisters. Otoo emphasizes that the sources of oppression are multiple and intersectional. The first Ada is prevented from mourning her dead baby both by other women in her home culture and by a greedy colonialist Portuguese invader whose only thought is to steal the golden bracelet off the child’s body. He struggles with Ada and shoots her dead. Similarly, Ada Lovelace’s home culture oppresses the Irish, while Ada herself alternately exploits and confides in her Irish maid. The theme of a woman’s basic humanity being disrespected echoes through the ages and social classes in the novel. While the maid Lizzie is treated as chattel by her employer Lady Ada, Lady Ada is treated no better by her husband, once he finds out about her infidelity and gambling debts. Otoo routinely employs lower-class characters as social commentators on the corruption of those in authority. Here, her critical stance echoes the Cameroonian Africana Studies scholar Nathalie Etoke, who succinctly analyzes the legacies of slavery and colonization that Whites falsely relegate to the past. Etoke states: The republican discourse in France and the democratic promise in America were both perfectly compatible with slavery and colonization. The legacy of these two oppressive systems lives on, but when the oppressed bring it up, they are criticized for wallowing in victimhood: ‘an interpretation of oneself and the world as a series of fatalities’ stemming from the encounter with the West. They are expected to take themselves in hand and to bear on their frail shoulders the paralyzing consequences of 245 years of slavery followed by systems of segregation and alienation.43 Humor and irony become useful teaching tools in Otoo’s narrative to drive home the dreadful persistence of racial and gender discrimination

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 301 since the early colonial period. The segment of Adas Raum that describes the sexual abuse of Eastern European women in the Nazi labor camps is as poignant as the brutal killing of the first Ada in Ghana over her dead child’s golden bracelet. The circulating stolen heirloom serves as a tangible reminder of White greed and dominance. In the final section of the novel, the son of the Nazi officer in the camp scene meets Ada and offers to give her the bracelet but she replies: “How can you gift me something that is not yours?”44 Ada’s claim that together with the Ghanaian community she will find a way to get their cultural property back may refer to lawsuits against the German government for restitution of stolen cultural objects. For example, bones of captured Herero and Nama who were killed in the German colonial genocide in then German South West Africa were stored as trophies in Berlin museum collections, but under pressure from descendants some have since been returned.45 As of 2022 the German government has still not officially apologized for the Nama and Herero genocide out of concern about requests for restitution. The Sankofa motto of Otoo’s novel stands in stark contrast to German officialdom’s avoidance of a shameful past: “Kehr’ um und hole es dir! Es ist nicht verboten umzukehren, um zu holen, was du vergessen hast. Lerne aus deiner Vergangenheit” (Turn back and fetch it. It’s not forbidden to go back to retrieve what you forgot. Learn from your past). The novel’s epilogue is titled: “Mir. Wir” (Adas Raum, 315; For me. For us). Ada’s daughter is born and welcomed by Elle, Ada’s sister and Cash, Ada’s boyfriend and the baby’s father. Unlike all the babies of the Adas in previous eras who died or were killed, this baby will experience a supportive community. Ada learns about her father’s and mother’s past as unwelcome Ghanaian immigrants in Britain, and she reconciles with Elle, her sister from her father’s subsequent relationship with a German woman. She also gives Cash a piece of her mind, because he forced her to have sex even though she was not ready and caused her to fall pregnant. The theme of sisterhood in times of crisis ties the beginning and the end of the text together. The final iteration of Ada can live her life as an independent woman abroad, getting more educational qualifications, supported by aunties from an older immigrant generation and by her mixed-race family. At the same time, Otoo delineates the through-lines of sexism and racism from slavery to fascism to contemporary urban culture. Readers are urged to reflect on the enduring dual legacies of racist dehumanization and sexist subjugation. White readers learn to confront the truth that these legacies are structural and that therefore they have benefitted from them knowingly or unknowingly. Etoke states: “Centuries of oppression and domination by white people have forged a colossal and narcissistic white ego that has clothed the Black person in a bereaved humanity. [… …] In imperialist democracies, Black identity remains the depositary of a

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diminished humanity.”46 For this reason, it is crucial that the last iteration of Ada finds a welcoming home as an immigrant, and gives birth to a child that lives, without necessarily raising her in a traditional family. Both Yagoobifarah and Otoo express a resilient individuality in their writing, expanding the scope of who is seen as a person, while also teaching Whites about intersectional histories of oppression. Many Germans do not consider the lens of Critical Whiteness relevant to their lives, not least because Germany’s colonial forays into Africa and German industrial support of British expansion in Iraq are not commonly taught in school. Raising community awareness about the shared colonial history of the German and British Empires, the people they subjugated and exploited, and the repercussions of this racism in the present is thus still an ongoing urgent task. As the German New Right tries to turn back the clock on the rights of women and People of Color and advocates for a return to authoritarianism, progressive writers call out attempts to marginalize these groups. Not everyone is equally welcome to be out and loud in print, as the response to Yaghoobifarah’s anti-police column suggests. Still, those who wanted to penalize her did not get their way. Decolonizing understandings of gender and race is a project still in process for white Germans in the mainstream, while their Afro-German and Muslim sisters have resolved this for themselves and moved on to build solidarity across these arbitrary divides. These communities allow them to oppose racism and genderism more forcefully, as I have shown with the examples of Yagoobifarah and Otoo. On the far right, the stridency of white nationalist ideologues like Kositza and Seibt attempts to turn the clock back on a diversity they refuse to recognize. The moral panic over motherhood seems to re-emerge periodically since the 1980s, as women delay childbirth, or opt for careers. There remains feminist work to be done if even liberal filmmakers like Fingscheidt and Schalenec catastrophize the role of women as mothers in their recent films. Moral panics such as these attempt to distract from the pressing ethical issues of inclusion and equitable participation. Authors like Hengameh Yaghoobifarah and Sharon Dodua Otoo no longer question their own place at the table, in fact they set the agenda as to what urgently demands community-wide engagement. Notes 1 Jasbir Puar, Terrorist Assemblages: Homonationalism in Queer Times (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2017), 38. 2 Judith Butler and Jules Gleeson, “We need to rethink the category of woman,” The Guardian, 7 September 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/ 2021/sep/07/judith-butler-interview-gender

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 303 3 Anne Wizorek, Weil ein #Aufschrei nicht reicht: Für einen Feminismus von Heute (Frankfurt: Fischer Taschenbuch, 2014), 83. 4 The highly mannered family drama Ich war zu Hause, aber… … (2019, dir. Angela Schalenec) posits a family excursion in nature as the idyllic counterpoint to repeated failures of communication between a grieving, distracted mother, her children, and others she encounters in Berlin. The dark comedy Finsterworld (2013, dir. Frauke Finsterwalder) uses the wanton destruction of a loner’s cabin in the woods as the catalyst for describing dysfunctional family relationships. Healing immersion in nature occurs both in Kenya and in a German park at dusk. The zombie film Endzeit (2018, dir. Carolina Hellsgård) opposes the figure of a mystical earth goddess Gardener who generates new life in a greenhouse as an alternative to the zombie apocalypse that consumes the cities, offering refuge to two young women survivors. 5 See Robert Claus, Esther Lehnert, Yves Müller, eds., “Was ein rechter Mann ist… …”: Männlichkeiten im Rechtsextremismus (Berlin: Karl Dietz Verlag, 2011); Andrea Röpke, Andreas Speit, eds. Mädelsache: Frauen in der NeonaziSzene (Freiburg: Herder, 2015), 17–29. See also Johanna Sigl, “Identitäre Zweigeschlechtlichkeit: Über männliche Inszenierungen und Geschlechterkonstruktionen bei den Identitären,” in Das Netzwerk der Identitären, ed. Andreas Speit (Berlin: Christoph Links Verlag, 2018), 160–172. An excellent overview of the political groupings that cling to heteronormative views of gender is provided by Simone Rafael, “Die Mitte und der ‘Genderwahn’,” in Wut, Verachtung, Abwertung: Rechtspopulismus in Deutschland, eds. Andreas Zick and Beate Küpper (Bonn: Karl Dietz Verlag, 2015), 78–94. 6 Robert Claus and Fabian Virchow, “The Far Right’s Ideological Construction of ‘Deviant’ Male Sexualities,” in Gender and Far Right Politics in Europe, eds. Michaela Koettig, Renate Bitzan, Andrea Petö (Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2017), 305–19. 7 Jens Bisky, “Die Unterversorgten,” Süddeutsche Zeitung, June 6, 2019. 8 Naomi Seibt cited in Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Emily Holden, “Naomi Seibt: ‘anti-Greta’ activist called white nationalist an inspiration.” The Guardian, February 28, 2020, 1. 9 Joanna Zylinska, The End of Man. A Feminist Counter-Apocalypse (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2018), 35. 10 For a catalog of daily microaggressions against POC in Leipzig in Saxony, see Ali Schwarzer, “Eine unversöhnliche Abschiedsrede,” in Unter Sachsen: Zwischen Wut und Willkommen, eds. Heike Kleffner, Matthias Meisner (Berlin: Christoph Links Verlag, 2017), 276–280. 11 Zylinska, The End of Man, 31. 12 Zylinska, The End of Man, 57. 13 Zylinska, The End of Man, 57. 14 Cited in Kirchgaessner and Holden, “Naomi Seibt,” 2. Original German in Nemi El Hassan, “Nach dem Anschlag in Halle,” https://www.zdf.de/politik/ frontal/nemi-el-hassan-journalistisch-zu-antisemitismus-100.html. 15 Cynthia Miller-Idriss, Hate in the Homeland: The New Global Far Right (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2020), 136. 16 Naomi Seibt, “Junge Blogger und die freien Medien,” AfD Fraktion im Bundestag, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aq7ryGkapuE. 17 “Meine #Pandemie mit Professor #Drosten,” 4:38. 18 “Meine Pandemie mit Professor Drosten: Ellen Kositza empfiehlt Walter van

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34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42

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Rossum,” March 2021, Kanal Schnellroda. https://open.spotify.com/episode/ 71wee7qAXr1U4btuxLnAZ7 Ellen Kositza, Die Einzelfalle (Schnellroda: Edition Antaios, 2016), 133. Ellen Kositza, Die Einzelfalle, 136 Ellen Kositza, Das war’s (Schnellroda: Edition Antaios, 2017), 99. Kositza, Das war’s, 73. Kositza, Das war’s, 79–80. Kositza, Das war’s, 181. Johanna Sigl, “Identitäre Zweigeschlechtlichkeit,” in Das Netzwerk der Identitären: Ideologie und Aktionen der Neuen Rechten, ed. Andreas Speit (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2018), 160–172, here 172. Kositza, Die Einzelfalle, 125. Kositza, Die Einzelfalle, 147–148. Hengameh Yaghoobifarah, “Blicke,” in Eure Heimat ist unser Albtraum, eds. Fatma Aydemir and Hengameh Yaghoobifarah (Berlin: Ullstein, 2019), 69–81, here 69–70. “Blicke,” 69. “Blicke,” 70. “Blicke,” 72. Christian Rath, “Nicht strafbar,” Tageszeitung, September 2020 https://taz.de/Umstrittene-taz-Kolumne-zu-Polizei/!5712672/. Quoted in Jost Müller-Neuhof, “Horst Seehofer warf taz-Autorin Straftat vor ohne rechtliche Untersuchung,” Der Tagesspiegel, September 18, 2020, https:// www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/polizei-kolumne-von-hengameh-yaghoobifarahhorst-seehofer-warf-taz-autorin-straftat-vor-ohne-rechtliche-untersuchung/ 26197252.html. Sebastian Engelbrecht, “Desintegriert euch!” Deutschlandfunk, October 1, 2018, https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/max-czollek-desintegriert-euch.1310. de.html?dram:article_id=429191 Ann-Kristin Tlusty, “Gegen das deutsche Wir,” Die Zeit, August 23, 2018, https://www.zeit.de/kultur/literatur/2018-08/desintegriert-euch-max-czollekmigranten-juden-deutschland “Blicke,” 80. Yaghoobifarah, “Gender ist eine Horrorshow,” Die Tageszeitung (Taz), July 14, 2021 https://taz.de/Zum-Tag-fuer-nichtbinaere-Personen/!5781360/ Yaghoobifarah, “Gender ist eine Horror-Show.” Sharon Dodua Otoo, “Liebe,” in Eure Heimat ist unser Albtraum, eds. Aydemir, Fatma, Hengameh Yaghoobifarah (Berlin: Ullstein, 2019), 56–68, here 67. Sharon Dodua Otoo, Synchronicity (Frankfurt: Fischer 2017), 167. Further references appear in the text as Synchronicity and page number. Naika Foroutan, “Gemeinsam gegen Rassismus,” March 15, 2021, Landeszentrale für politische Bildung Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0J4trmAkWA, here 12:03. Meike Bonefeld, “Max versus Murat: schlechtere Noten im Diktat für Grundschulkinder mit türkischem Hintergrund,” Pressemitteilung vom 23. Juli 2018, Universität Mannheim, https://www.uni-mannheim.de/newsroom/ presse/pressemitteilungen/2018/juli/max-versus-murat-schlechtere-noten-imdiktat-fuer-grundschulkinder-mit-tuerkischem-hintergrund/ Natalie Etoke, Shades of Black, trans. Gila Walker (London: Seagull Books, 2021), 53.

De-Naturalizing Gender and National Belonging 305 44 Sharon Dodua Otoo, Adas Raum (Frankfurt: S. Fischer, 2021), 310. All further references appear in the text as Adas Raum and page number. 45 Christiane Habermalz, “Ärger im Vorfeld der Rückgabe-Zeremonie,” Deutschlandfunk 23 August 2018, https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/ geraubte-gebeine-aus-namibia-aerger-im-vorfeld-der.862.de.html? dram:article_id=426332. 46 Etoke, Shades of Black, 8.

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Index

Africa 4–11; images of 58, 134–138, 140, 193 Alternative for Germany (AfD) 284, 290, 293. See also New Right in Germany anti-conquest 70, 78 anti-Islamism 246, 253–258, 284, 290; in literature 73 antisemitism 237, 238, 268, 277, 284, 290, 296; in literature 175, 178 anti-slavery 122, 201, 204, 247–251 assimilation in literature 226, 227, 234, 238 Berlin Colonial Exhibition 20 Berlin Colonial Week 10 Berlin Conference 9 Black Shame on the Rhine campaign (Schwarze Schmach am Rhein) 164, 174 Blackness 44–45, 173, 237, 261, 264–265; hypersexualization 19–20 Bruggen, Carry van 76 Bülow, Frieda von 14–15, 17–18, 145–149, 151–157, 159, 187, 193–194, 198 colonial ideology 52, 145; and racism 10; and nationalism 52, 197–198; and national socialism 12, 162, 167, 232. See also religious colonization colonial literature 16, 66, 74, 78, 80, 144–145, 162, 165, 175; contemporary 187

colonial memory 5, 163, 199–201 colonial myth 9, 200 colonial philology 3, 221 Columbus, Christopher 267–268 contact literature 111, 113–115, 123–124 contact zone 113–115, 123 Cramer, Adelheid (Ada) 17, 31–45 Cramer, Ernst Ludwig 32, 42, 44 Cramer, Ludwig; case 31, 33, 38, 43 Cramer, Otto 37, 38 Czollek, Max 296 Daum, Paulus Adrianus 74–75, 77–78, 80 decolonization 5, 6, 7, 30, 261–262 Dekker, Eduard Douwes 78 Deutsche Kolonialgesellschaft (German Colonial Society) 10, 16 Deutsche Kolonialzeitung (German Colonial Newspaper) 33 Deutscher Frauenverein für Krankenpflege in den Kolonien (German Women’s Association for Nursing in the Colonies) 15 Deutscher Frauenverein vom Roten Kreuz für die Kolonien (German Women’s Red Cross Association for the Colonies) 15 Deutscher Kolonialverein (German Colonial Club) 10 Deutsches Kolonialmuseum (German Colonial Museum) 33 Deutschkolonialer Frauenbund. See Frauenbund der Deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft

Index Deutschnationaler Frauenbund (German National Women’s League) 15 Dinglreiter, Senta 8, 162–163, 165–178 domestic and cultural duties of colonial women 53, 131, 151; Christmas 49–51; nationalism 50, 167–168 Douglass, Frederick 120–121 Du Bois, W. E. B. 277–278 du Perron, E. 68 Dutch East Indies 6 Dutch language and African Americans 115–116 Dutch Studies 111, 113–114, 123–124 Falkenhausen, Helen von 16, 49–50, 55–60, 62 family 14, 32, 166, 275, 284, 286; heteronormativity 287–289; marriage 166, 192 Farmersfrau 29, 31–33, 36, 40–41, 43 femininity: and colonialism 14, 52–53, 128; and nationalism 165; toxic feminine 43; maternalism 14, 32, 40, 131. See also domestic and cultural duties of colonial women feminism, imperial 155, 158–159, 190–192; contemporary 198; vegetative 218 Fingscheidt, Nora 283–284, 286–287, 302 Forster, Georg 208–209, 219–222 Francis, Gijsbert 72, 79–80 Frauenbund der deutschen Kolonialgesellschaft (FDKG, Women’s League of the German Colonial Society, also GermanColonial Women’s League, Women’s Association of the German Colonial Society) 49–50, 128–131, 139, 226 gender, and colonialism 19; and German nationalism 30, 32, 165; and labor; and race 19, 43–44; in Netherlands; in Indonesia 97; in Africa 18; theory 51

331

German colonial empire 9, 29–30, 163 German East Africa 4, 9, 12–13, 16 German Southwest Africa 49–50, 55–56 German Studies 3–4, 33, 69, 111–112, 200 Gesellschaft für deutsche Kolonization (Society for German Colonization) 9 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von 207, 215, 218–219, 222 Haugen, Mariette 147, 150–151, 154–156, 158 Heimat 50, 52, 138–139, 167 Herder, Johann Gottfried 207, 216–219, 222 Herero. See Ovaherero (Herero) and Nama resistance and genocide Herfurth, A. 29 Hochstetter, Emma von 16 Holocaust 3, 6, 277 Hong Kong 7 Humboldt-Forum 200 intersectionality 30, 33, 261, 302 Islamophobia. See anti-Islamism Jones, William 208–210 Koloniale Zeitschrift (Colonial Magazine) 29 Koloniales Jahrbuch (Colonial Yearbook) 33 Kolonie und Heimat in Wort und Bild 54, 131–132 Kopper, Simon (!Gomxab) 40 Kositza, Ellen 283, 287–288, 290–294 Leitkultur 268 Liliencron, Adda von 130, 194, 226 Lovelace, Ada 270, 299–300 Maji-Maji rebellion 13, 37, 197 marriage. See Families masculinity: and colonialism 12, 29, 33, 154, 187; and nationalism 165, 228 Meinecke, Gustav Hermann 33–36 Migeon, Madeleine 147

332

Index

Multatuli 78 museum collections 200, 264, 267, 299, 301 Nama. See Ovaherero (Herero) and Nama resistance and genocide Netherlands Indies 6 New Right in Germany 284, 287–294, 302 Nooke, Günter 201 Novalis 207, 217–218 orientalism, German 222 Ovaherero (Herero) and Nama resistance and genocide 13, 18, 37–39, 162–164, 169, 175, 195, 200, 228, 232–234, 238, 240, 264, 301 Pabarang, Daeng 94–95 pan-Germanism 130, 138 paternalism 8, 194–195, 231, 268 Peters, Carl 12, 17 polyglossia 113 postcolonial: perspectives 3–5, 68–69; on colonial literature 78; postcolonial gaze 195–196 Prince, Magdalene von 16, 37, 49–50, 59–62 race: interracial mixing 14, 49, 138–139, 156, 142, 227–228; and class 11, 149, 229; and gender 19, 192; völkisch ideology 228–229, 236, 238–241

racialization 2, 8, 30, 49–51, 263, 277 racism 277; historical 10–11; contemporary 262–266, 268, 290, 297, 299, 302; xenophobia 284 religious colonization 246–253 reparations 5, 105, 200 Schlaffer, Heinz 112–113 Schlegel Friedrich 215, 220 Schlegel, A. W. 214 Schnee, Heinrich 164 Seibt, Naomi 283, 288, 290, 293 Sinophobia 176–177 St. Petrus-Claver Sodalität 245 Sultan Mpangire 59–60 Toer, Pramoedya Ananta 69–70 Togo 31, 171 transnational approach 4, 111–114, 272 Treaty of Versailles 3, 10 Türeci, Özlem 299 Völkerschauen 20, 263 Washington, Booker T. 4 white gaze 263 whiteness 41, 44, 45, 62, 237; and femininity 31, 167, 197, 227–228, 239 Witbooi, Hendrik 36 xenophobia 284 Yaghoobifarah, Hengameh 283