As we’ve been learning all semester, Audre Lorde impacted women in many ways. Her teaching strategies, writing techniques and ability to empower women traveled with her everywhere she went. Lorde’s impact in Berlin was monumental. Her influence on “Afro-German” (Opitz, Showing Our Colors) women sparked inspiration for many organizations, such as the Initiative of Black People in Germany. While teaching a course on African women poets in Berlin, Lorde noticed the oppression faced by African diaspora and women of color. She pondered the questions “where do our paths intersect as women of color?” and “where do they diverge?”(Lorde, Showing Our Colors). Lorde set out to give these Afro-German women a name and to have their stories heard. She encouraged these women to raise their voices and share their stories through writing and publishing. During her time at the Free University in Berlin, Lorde’s effect on these women was astonishing. She had a way of making women want to stand up for their rights and fight for what they believe in. Lorde’s influence on colored women in Germany led to inspire many Black activists, such as May Ayim Opitz, Helga Emde and Katharina Oguntoye. These women went on to be strong influences in the Afro-German movement.
In Lorde’s time in Berlin, she created many influential works, such as Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls. This poem’s acknowledgment of the dangers women of color faced in a xenophobic Germany was chilling. The breaking of the first stanza into the second can symbolize the divide that was taking place in Berlin at the time. By Lorde breaking the poem into two stanzas, she is describing the split between West and East Berlin, without actually speaking of the Berlin Wall (Farber, 153). Instead, she uses words such as “borders” and “guards” (Farber, 153) to represent the division. Lorde specifically uses the word “perhaps” several times, six to be exact. Her use of this word seems to be insinuating her own uncertainty about living in Berlin. It is said that the placement of each “perhaps” is used to portray the exact crooked structure the wall was built in. Her use of nighttime in the poem was included to undermine the authority of the Berlin border guards because people from West Berlin were told to be out of East Berlin by midnight (Farber, 153-155). She wrote this poem to show the discrimination faced by women of color in Berlin.
Through her teachings, Lorde encouraged her students to break the silence and join together to overcome their prolonged isolation. She wanted these women to find their true selves. Many of these Afro-German women did not know their African fathers well and were disconnected from this part of their roots. They were often called derogatory terms such as “half-breed”(Opitz, Showing Our Colors). Lorde asked these women “What does it mean to be defined negatively from birth in one’s own country because of a father whom one may never see or know?” (Lorde, Showing Our Colors) Lorde believed every person deserves to know themselves and give themselves a name. She said that if you do not name yourself, the world will name you. Instead of being given a name, Lorde encouraged these women to find a name for themselves. This is where Lorde helped coin the term “Afro-German”. Lorde said “It is very, very difficult to survive and to create as a Black person in a situation where you are not only discriminated against but wiped out in terms of your message and your identity and your consciousness.”(Lorde, Showing Our Colors) Lorde said this statement to the Afro-German women in the hopes to invoke a sense of empowerment in them. She was successful in her encouragement because this led to the writing of Farbe bekennen, which May Ayim and Katharina Oguntoye were a part of. Being that this was the first published work by Afro-Germans, Lorde’s influence on these women sparked the start of the Afro-German movement.
- Were there any parts of the poem, Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls, that stood out to you that I didn’t touch upon? Did you face any confusion on the meaning or logic behind her words?
- Did you see any connections between Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls and the other readings about Lorde’s time in Berlin?
Works-Cited
Farber, Paul. “I Cross Her Borders At Midnight.” Audre Lorde’s Transnational Legacies, edited by Stella Bolaki and Sabine Broeck, 1984, pp. 151-155.
Lorde, Audre. “Berlin is Hard On Colored Girls.” The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde, New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Opitz, May, et al. “Showing Our Colors”: Afro-German Women Speak Out. Univ. of Mass. Press, 1992.
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Hey Keira, I thought you did a really great job in your blog post deciphering crucial aspects of Lorde’s time in Berlin. I especially liked how you used an outside source to help contextualize “Berlin is Hard On Colored Girls.” I found myself having to do the same. To answer your first question, I spent a lot of my time looking into the imagery of the poem. The yellow phone booths, so I found, are staples of Berlin and I wondered if this had anything to do with the reoccurring banana image. It was a really disorienting poem and I found her use of animals “lizards, kittiwakes, gray whales, nightingale” especially interesting (Lorde, lines 6,7,12,31). The lizards and birds seemed to be expressive of her Caribbean heritage but I couldn’t decipher the “gray whales praying” (Lorde, line 12). I also looked in to the “ice-saints” following that reoccurring “perhaps” (Lorde, line 23). It is a reference to a series of feast days in German, Swedish, Dutch, etc. culture that takes place in May.
Hi Keira! Great job on your blog post and connecting last week’s “teaching skills” to Lorde’s time in Berlin to magnify the important role she plays all over the world with so many different people. She is always encouraging everyone around her to show who they truly are, as she explains in the book, Showing Our Colors. As I was reading, it mentions in the forward once again the description of how Lorde looked at life and what she wished upon all African Americans, but specifically here, Afro-Germans. It says, “Let us be ourselves now as we define us. We are not a figment of your imagination or an exotic answer to your desires.” She wants them to define themselves and finally live in the truest forms. She wants everyone to be seen as they really are and not how they are perceived to be different or not be at all. This relates to what you said about making a name rather than being given one, because then you have your own expectations to live for, no one else’s.
Hi there Keira! I loved your analysis of Audre Lorde’s impact on women in Berlin. Subsequently to watching the documentary of Audre’s time in Germany I also found that she made women find the desire to stand up for themselves. Her influence was ultimately quite overwhelming to the different women in Berlin. I found it particularly interesting that most of her work focuses on black women, yet managed to reach such a wide cultural variety of women. No matter what, females are always able to identify with Audre’s work because she is able to capture feelings and strengths that perhaps we were not aware of or aspire to withhold. Although Audre’s work can be directed toward women of color or lesbian women, women of all kinds can ultimately connect to her encouraging poetry, which is why she had such a strong influence in Berlin.
Hi Emily, I appreciate your comment! I also think it’s amazing that, although her work centers around black women, her inspirational words and teachings reached so many different types of women, in all shapes, sizes and colors! Her work is very relatable to a variety of people, which is what makes her so special and inspiring.
Hi Keira! I loved your blog post! I thought it was very well written and organized. I feel like Audre Lorde’s work has always been intended to teach people something. Even if she is not intending to but it opens many peoples eyes to different things, because of this it creates a community for these women. Lorde says, “Let us be ourselves now as we define us.” I think this is breaking the stigma of having to be defined as one thing to society. Instead she taught these women that they can be anything they want to be.
Hi Kelly! Thank you so much for your comment. I agree, Audre Lorde’s way of influencing people is remarkable. Her words and experiences connect to so many different people around the world. Lorde’s encouragement of women to open themselves up and dive deep into their inner selves is truly a gift.
Hi Keira! I really enjoyed your blog post and thought you brought up some excellent points.I think one thing that truly stood out to me in the poem was the repetition of the word “perhaps”. This suggests that the speaker is viewing, in my mind, an Afro-German but does not know the Afro-German directly. So therefore, I feel as though Lorde, while writing this poem, was trying to emphasize how we look at and observe people without getting to know them. This is important because many of the Afro-Germans, as Lorde explained in her documentary were isolated from the other people of Germany. The one line that I find interesting containing the word perhaps is the line “perhaps/ she is speaking my tongue/ in a different tempo” which to me suggests that the accent could be thick but that the speaker judges that as her language by stating “my tongue” suggesting that this Afro-German is not really truly a part of the country when in reality Afro-Germans are just as much Germans as anyone else.
Hi Alaina, thanks for your comment! I like how you also noticed the repetition of the word “perhaps”. It immediately stood out to me and struck me as something important because of the way it was strategically placed throughout the poem. The isolation Afro-German women faced in Germany was awful. I think it was monumental that Lorde dedicated her entire life to helping those who don’t have a voice to speak out against injustices.
Hi Keira,
Thank you so much for your interpretation and compelling ideas of this source as a new way to analyze Lorde’s Berlin documentary. Using Lorde’s poem to strengthen the verification of the work she has done for Afro-German women beyond one generation is powerful. What I love about studying Lorde is that her creative literature and published research work hand in hand, reflecting on her ideas. “Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls” was a piece that exposed the ugliness of Berlin’s racism. The discrimination happening towards Afro-Germans took away the ability for this group to have pride, a strong sense of identity, and full freedom—the terms used for Afro-Germans stuck with me, in the documentary and the poem. Labels are proven to be extremely powerful to a directed group, politically, and socially. Lorde proved that it is difficult to live a full potential when intersecting identities exist, such as race and ethnicity, when it is discriminated against. These marginalized groups need resources and support to build a new name for themselves. “Perhaps a strange woman… she is speaking my tongue in a different tempo… she is a stone” (stanza one). The slight ambiguity of this poem leaves enough room for readers to interpret the role of color and how it shapes readers’ view of the meaning of Lorde’s words. The poem has so much to do with culture and familiarities to Afro-Germans. Lorde is able to highlight the common experienced shared with Afro-Germans through her literature.
Hello everyone! Thank you all for your comments and opinions. I appreciate you all taking the time to read my post and share your thoughts. Each of you brought up something new in Lorde’s works that I hadn’t noticed while doing my blog post. The imagery in Lorde’s poems and other works is always so unique and is filled with underlying messages. Her use of imagery in “Berlin is Hard On Colored Girls” such as the “lizards”and “kittiwakes”, relates back to her roots. Something Lorde always preached about is how crucial it is to discover your roots and be your true self, whoever that may be. Her encouragement of finding your inner self is reflected in the book “Showing Our Colors”. This was the first book published by Afro-German women. These women were inspired by Lorde to dive deep into their hearts and minds and finally share their stories and experiences. Lorde taught these women that they must give themselves a name, before the world labels them.
Although I am a relatively privileged white woman, Lorde’s teachings inspire me to want to share my story and life experiences. Lorde had a way of opening people’s minds to see others for who they really are, instead of labeling them by race, religion, gender, etc. Her work inspired many different types of women, not just black or lesbian women. She makes me want to express my opinions and help those who do not have a voice in this world. Having the option to speak your mind and raise your voice is something that I take for granted. After reading all about Lorde’s time in Berlin, it really makes me feel like I can make a difference too. As Kianna said, labels can be very powerful. It is so important that women get the chance to give themselves a name and to share their story before it is done for them. Lorde emphasized that we are not just our race, or our gender, or our appearance. We get to decide who we want to be. It is our duty as independent, young adults to give marginalized groups a voice and to continue on Lorde’s way of teaching and inspiring. As women in America, we are already at an advantage. As Kelly said, there isn’t one thing that society can define as by. We are allowed to be who we want to be. Lorde wanted this advantage for all women around the world and fought hard for it to happen.
Hi Keira! Great blog post! I especially liked the way that you highlighted the connection between the African diaspora and women of color. It is this concept that is further explored in Audre Lorde’s poem, “Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls”. The symbols given within the first stanza, such as “she is eating half- ripe bananas / with brown flecks in the shape of a lizard” (Lorde, lines 5-6) evokes images of the island tropics that exist beyond the melancholic borders of the United States and Berlin. After reading the poem for the first time, I was very surprised that Lorde never directly mentioned the Berlin Wall as a means of signifying the ways in which women of color are ostracized within German society. But any skilled poet will tell you that subtlety is part of the art form of poetry. The image that really stood out to me was “Mother Columbus”. If it wasn’t for European explorers like Christopher Columbus, who ravished African countries and exported millions of thousands of African slaves all across the globe, the African diaspora would have ceased to exist. Don’t get my wrong. I am in no way glorifying or condoning the Europeans heinous acts of genocide and exploitation disguised as imperialism. However, like Lorde I understand that the similarity within all of our differences as Black women is Mama Africa.
Hi, Keira! This was a very insightful and well developed post-great job! While I was reading “Berlin is Hard on Colored Girls”, I did have to do some outside reading to fully understand the context and imagery that Lorde wrote about and used. However, I think you helped me even further understand what Lorde was doing, and how, as I should have guessed, it was all designed specifically that way. I enjoy that you and I both picked up on Lorde’s urge to push the Afro-German women out of their comfort zone and name themselves, because if not the world will name them. That is such a powerful image, that I never really noticed until learning about Lorde. With a name comes expectations of how that person or thing will be, or act like, or say. I also think that this ties in well with some of these women not knowing their roots or where they came from as they no longer, if they did at all, have a connection with their African fathers. I think that by reaching deep within yourself and understanding yourself and setting expectations for yourself to follow rather than expectations projected on you by another person is so vital for a human being, and reading how Lorde was able to help do that with the Afro-German women was so heartwarming to read about.