“There is such a cathartic power in the removal of symbols of past occupation. It is a visceral reclamation of self-ownership and identity independent from the oppressor and his ideology of subjection. Every toppled statue shatters the illusion that the ‘glorious’ era of Empire was anything other than exploitative and drenched in the blood of non-White peoples. It is a forced reckoning of the crimes of the nation.”
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On a cloudy day in June 2018, I went on a tour of Afrikanische Strasse (African Street) in the Wedding neighborhood of Berlin. I had been looking forward to this tour for days, excited at the thought of immersing myself in a more diverse community compared to the homogenous white-German neighborhood I had been living in during the first month with a human rights fellowship. Most importantly, I was hoping to spot some African restaurants where I could get some decent maafe (common West African curries served with rice) for the next few months I was in Berlin.
Though the sight of the large photos of African savannah and wildlife in the U-Bahn (subway) station — the stereotypical imagery of Africa — elicited some eye-rolling, I was nonetheless excited to explore the neighborhood. But as I emerged from the station, all I saw were quiet streets lined with apartment buildings no different than other parts of the city. There was nothing ‘African’ about anything or anyone I saw. There were certainly no African restaurants in sight.
Over the course of the tour, I learned the German histories of the colonization, genocide of tribal peoples, and white supremacist ideologies promoted by the men whose names christened the streets of the neighborhood. I was shocked when I learned from the German university students in the group that this tour was the first time they heard about their country’s crimes against its African colonies. It seemed that the only ‘African’ aspect of this neighborhood was in reference to the colonial horrors committed against Africans by those on the street signs. I remember thinking towards the end of the tour how cruel and ironic that the only acknowledgment of Africa in the city was of savagery and subjugation.
It is absurd and wrong that racists and colonists continue to be honored in our societies while the victims of their hatred are ignored and forgotten.
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Fast forward to today: the calls to decolonize public spaces have been growing stronger and louder in the U.S., Europe, Africa, and around the world. While in the U.S Black Lives Matter activism helped spur a renewed national dialogue on removing and renaming public memorials in the country, the action is by no means a contemporary phenomenon. Since independence from Britain in 1963, Kenya has replaced numerous street names of British colonizers and renamed them after national heroes or their original indigenous names.
The difference now is that more Western powers are being forced to contend with their continued veneration of racist historical figures through a movement of ‘decolonizing’ public memorials. Current calls for ‘decolonization’ are markedly different from the decolonization process in the 20th century. Then, decolonization primarily meant the removal of colonial political dominance and reasserting the right to self-rule by the native populations. Decolonization was a matter of reclaiming one’s country and dignity from generations of violent, extractive, and oppressive rule. Decolonization was an act of physical survival.
Today’s public discourse on decolonization refers more to what Lynne Davis defines as “…working to undo the effects of colonialism…unlearn[ing] habits, attitudes, and behaviours that continue to perpetuate colonialism; and challenging and transforming institutional manifestations of colonialism”. While the system of extractive physical colonies of Western nations have been largely dismantled, remnants of colonial ideology of white supremacy remain everywhere: in our psyches, our education systems, and the monuments that bear the name of colonizers.
As Nna O. Oluocha rightfully notes, to name is to confer existence and honor– anything not named is vulnerable to erasure. Place-names are especially important as they are the reference points to our everyday activities: the corner where our favorite bakery stands, the main avenue we frequent with our friends, the street where we grew up. In naming our public spaces after colonizers, we are once more centering them in our communities and our daily lives.
University students are taking the lead in calling to account the celebration of racist figures in some of the world’s leading educational institutions. In 2015, Black students at the University of Cape Town launched ‘Rhodes Must Fall’ a movement to remove from campus the statue of colonialist and pro-apartheid segregationist Cecil J. Rhodes. As one Black student astutely shared, “Locating the statue at the centre of the most prestigious university in Africa had significance. In many ways, it attested to the ideas that Rhodes himself promoted: the elitism of the white race, his own colonial conquests from Cape to Cairo, and how the land in the Cape should be distributed, to whom and by whom…It was almost as if Rhodes was gazing on his conquest”. Similar campaigns to remove the imprint of racists have occurred at Oxford University, Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School, and Harvard Law School, to name a few.
In all the above examples, it was understood that there is great power and symbolism in statues and the naming of public spaces. Their existence is a testament to what and to whom is deemed important for display and reverence — and it is for this reason that there is such a cathartic power in the removal of symbols of past occupation. It is a visceral reclamation of self-ownership and identity independent from the oppressor and his ideology of subjection. Every toppled statue shatters the illusion that the ‘glorious’ era of Empire was anything other than exploitative and drenched in the blood of non-White peoples. It is a forced reckoning of the crimes of the nation.
Those against decolonizing public memorials argue that doing so is a whitewash of history – an erasure of historical fact to placate modern sensibilities. Some in the U.S. take a unique position in claiming that the removal of confederate monuments is akin to wiping out the ‘heritage’ of the South while conveniently glossing over the fact that Southern heritage flourished through the sale and labor of enslaved human beings.
I find it especially ironic that this fervent rejection or confusion about the importance of symbolism in public memorials is not extended in other contexts. After the fall of the USSR, the toppling of statues of communist leaders was common across newly independent states and was seen by the West as a beacon of a new era of independence. The iconic 2003 toppling of Saddam Hussien’s statue in Iraq after the U.S invasion was celebrated in the U.S media as evidence of the ‘liberation’ of Iraq and the beginning of peace for Iraqis. In these and similar circumstances, it seemed obvious that the removal of past symbols of power was not only to be celebrated but encouraged as a part of the national healing process. So, why are these welcoming attitudes forgotten when it comes to removing memorials of Western occupiers?
Simply put, the weak arguments from opponents of this movement distract from the importance of removing monuments of colonists from our public life. Colonialism is about extraction and obliteration; the total and indiscriminate destruction of native land ownership, rights, thought, identity, and humanity. The theft of indigenous sacred land for the purpose of erecting monuments of slave-owners is a clear statement of which histories are deemed worthy of veneration and which are disposable. Public memorials of colonizers and racists continue the legacy of erasure of non-European and non-White histories. These monuments act as daily reminders for the descendants of formerly subjugated peoples of the crimes committed against their ancestors. These monuments sanitize the national creation myth into one of great heroes and venerable founding figures while omitting the countless bodies upon which those nations were built. These monuments glorify the oppressor while ignoring the oppressed.
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On that cloudy June day, I left Afrikanische Strasse knowing the names of the generals and explorers who thought my ancestors were sub-human. When I returned home, I could search for Carl Peters and Adolf Lüderitz and learn about their lives and contributions and even see their portraits. Years later in writing this I used Google Maps to look up the street markers of these men to refresh my memory. Yet if I want to remember the names of the Namibian tribes the Germans first tested their genocidal terrors against (the Nama and Herero) or the revolutionaries that fought against European colonialism, like Kinjikitile Ngwale, I have to hope that Google’s algorithms can make sense of my vague search terms and lead me to the correct source. There are no street signs or statues I can look up to find these names. Peters and Lüderitz’s legacies aren’t beholden to the limitation of human memory, rather they are immortalized in history books and the spaces that bear their name. But for the likes of Ngwale and the Herero, the survival of their legacy is reliant upon the conscientious efforts of the few who fight to keep their names and stories alive.
In the case of Berlin, there is a growing movement led by local activists and civil society groups to raise public attention to Germany’s colonial past and end the celebration and memorialization of colonialists in Berlin’s public spaces. One of the early victories of this movement occurred in February 2010 when the Gröben Embankment (named after the slave-trader and colonist Otto Friedrich von der Gröben) was renamed to May Ayim Ufer in honor of the Ghanian-German activist and writer. Ironically enough, I spent the latter half of my 2018 stay in Berlin living a few blocks from May Ayim Ufer in the more diverse neighborhood of Kreuzberg. In August 2020 Mohrenstrasse (‘Moor’ street) was renamed to Anton W Amo Strasse in honor of the Afro-German Enlightenment philosopher Anton Wilhelm Amo. Most recently, Manteuffelstrasse, named after anti-democracy Prussian Prime Minister Otto Theodor von Manteuffel, was approved to be renamed after Black activist Audre Lorde. These successes came after decades of advocacy by local groups to decolonize Berlin’s public spaces and recognize the contributions of Africans and other non-White Germans to the country.
It should be noted that changing a few street names and taking down a couple of statues by no means rectifies centuries worth of colonial terror and exploitation and the continued discrimination against Black, Brown, and indigenous communities. However, the removal of signs of veneration for those who participated in and benefited from those crimes is an important and necessary step in the delivery of justice and work towards an equitable society. The removal of monuments to colonists and racists is a powerful symbol of national rejection and condemnation of the white supremacist ideology they engendered, and a reaffirmation of the worth, dignity, and belonging of the communities they once subjugated.
