Sharon Dodua Otoo gave our Goethe Annual Lecture series an impressive inauguration by exploring the structures that have excluded Black feminist authors and talking about their meaning to her, her writing and for the (literary) world. The creative writing of Black feminist authors has revolutionary potential. It challenges dominant assumptions on gender, sexuality and race and expands the horizons of the current literary audience by presenting a more nuanced and radically diverse cultural identity. Yet, Black feminist authors are rarely afforded the patronage, recognition, and critical reception that their white male counterparts have received. ABOUT SHARON DODUA OTOO, AUTHOR & ACTIVIST: Her work includes the English-language book series “Witnessed”, the novellas “the things i am thinking while smiling politely” and “Synchronicity”. She won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in 2016 for the text “Herr Gröttrup setzt sich hin” and her inaugural speech at the Festival of German Language Literature "Dürfen Schwarze Blumen malen?" was published by Verlag Heyn in 2020. Otoo is politically active with the Initiative Schwarze Menschen in Deutschland e.V. and Phoenix e.V. She lives in Berlin. MODERATION: Marcelle Mateki Akita, author and producer of Africa Writes, Tottenham Literature and SPINE festivals. BSL INTERPRETATION: Ali Gordon LIST OF MENTIONED BLACK FEMINIST AUTHORS & ACTIVISTS: - African-American professor, activist & author bell hooks: “Feminism: A Movement to End Sexist Oppression” - African-American theorist, writer and activist Audre Lorde: “There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.” - African American legal expert and activist professor Kimberlé Crenshaw: “intersectionality” - Claudia Jones, who founded the Notting Hill Carnival in 1966 - Nobel-prize winning African American writer Toni Morrison: “Beloved” (novel) - Black German activist in Black German history, academic and poet May Ayim: anthology “Farbe bekennen” & the poem “afro-deutsch I” - Black British academic, editor and award-winning author Bernadine Evaristo: book series “Black Britain: Writing Back” and her novel “Girl, Woman, Other” - Nigerian author, academic and fierce advocate for women’s rights Buchi Emecheta ABOUT THE GOETHE ANNUAL LECTURE: The new series by the Goethe-Institut London focuses on the intersection of culture and politics, and is dedicated to contemporary voices. We invite acclaimed speakers to share their perspective on the topics we explore in our cultural work and on the pressing issues that societies are facing – in the UK, Germany and worldwide!
