KISDtalk: Cologne, the Rhineland and (Post)Colonialism

The KISDtalk presents brief highlights of Cologne’s and the Rhineland’s colonial history, searches for visible and invisible colonial tracks in Cologne’s topography and discusses the present and future of a local culture of remembrance.

This KISDtalk can be joined in room 11 or online via Zoom.

Prof. Dr. Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst
is an Africanist, Historian and Cultural Scientist. Her research and writing focusses on the history of people of African origins in Germany, on Germany’s colonial past, colonialism in the Rhineland and the History of the African-German encounter. As curator she presented exhibitions on Cologne’s and Aachen’s colonial past and on clichés, stereotypes and prejudices with regard to Africa in every day culture in Germany.  She was a guest curator of the presentation „The Distorted View: Prejudices“ in the permanent exhibition of the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum – Cultures of the World in Cologne which took a critical look at different stereotypical constructions and representations of the African “other” and drew attention to their origins in the colonial context.

She is the initiator and chairwoman of “Köln Postkolonial – ein lokalhistorisches Projekt der Erinnerungsarbeit“, an expert in the committee „Postkoloniales Erbe der Stadt Köln“, and in the city’s advisory council reviewing street names.

For many years she has been working in the field of Intercultural Communication and Education, as Anti-Racism-Trainer and Critical Whiteness-Coach.

Her latest publications include “Deutschland Postkolonial? – Die Gegenwart der imperialen Vergangenheit“ (with Joachim Zeller) and „Nordrhein-Westfalen und der Imperialismus“ (with Fabian Fechner and Stefanie Michels).