Please sign this about the Leipzig Book Fair and its inability to include any Black or PoC finalists in their book prize this year. Structural racism in Dland remains. #AllzuWeiss https://twitter.com/fuwolff/status/1385212764772257800

This prize speaks to a variety of structural issues in Germany that deal with publishing, intellecutalism, literary culture more broadly. While the jury had some gender parity, there was not one Black or PoC jury member to be found. Germany must deal with its racisms. 2/

Germany's racisms include anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, anti-Asian, anti-Black, anti-Roma, and on and on. Germany has not fully interrogated how these racisms formed during its informal and formal forays into colonialism. 3/

But even before Germany was unified in 1871, it still participated in scientific expeditions and missionary work. The construction of German identity was predicated on descent and biology. This logic still pervades today. 4/

Look many scholars have written about this. I am not sharing anything new per se. But the issue that still remains is why the practice of blackface and the whiteness of academic institutions and literary prizes exist in a country that allegedly dealt with its racism after WW2 5/

This is because the country still remains racist in overt and covert ways. Hanau, Rostock, etc. happened because whiteness is privileged, managed, and affirmed in Germany. Change needs to happen. Activists on the ground there are doing the work, but damn it is exhausting. 6/

This is why discussions about George Floyd and others in Germany bother me because it tries to absolve them from their complicity in systems of inequality and discrimination in their own country. The mainstream news points a finger at the US, but it should look in the mirror. 7/

Germany needs to fix its racist consciousness in the now if it ever wants to do improve and be better in the future. Ok, let me hush and go do yoga. 8/

#Allzuweiss and down with Germany's super whiteness. 9/

And one more thing: white allies in Germany do better too. 10/

If you are offended by this mini-thread, then you can unfollow. Be well!