The Humboldt Forum in Berlin has been a controversial point of discussion for what seems like forever. The debate about this addition to the urban and cultural landscape of Berlin has revolved around a number of issues, including the history of the site, the cost of the project, and not least the objects to be exhibited there. It is this last point that is of particular interest to us at poco.lit., since the Forum is set to be the new home for Berlin’s ‘non-European’ collections.
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Breaking with the much-needed, but often painful plunges into US history of the author’s previous novels, the portrayal of the Harlem Shuffle, and the reading experience as a whole are – as intended by the author – predominantly light-hearted and entertaining. It is a heist novel set in 1960s Harlem.
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In 2019, Yasemin Altınay founded the Literarische Diverse publishing house. In this interview with poco.lit., she offers insights into her work, talks about her motivation and the challenges of the literary industry.
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Schwarzes Herz is the first novel by anti-racism activist Jasmina Kuhnke, and it reads like a diary entry by the protagonist. The first-person perspective, which allows readers to experience the fictional world of the protagonist from her perspective, is a particularly valuable one in the context of racism and domestic violence: it’s the voice of an affected person and readers have to listen.
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In Deep Diversity. Overcoming Us vs. Them, Shakil Choudhury vividly presents his strategy for combating structural discrimination.
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A complex and frank story unfolds set in 1830s London, tracing a series of strange murders in which the victims are beheaded. Amir Ali from India becomes entangled in the happenings and explains his perspective of things.
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Namwali Serpell’s second novel The Furrows: An Elegy is due out next year, and it promises to be a book to look out for. In September, Serpell already presented the novel in an online sitting of the W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute Colloquium Series.
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Anyone who wants to do a quick translation is probably happy to fall back on technological aids once in a while: Google Translate, Linguee or DeepL are widely known by now. But machine translation can prevent linguistic progress or the successful establishment of non-discriminatory language. Translation programmes draw from already existing texts – and these are far from being free of discrimination. That’s why we’re excited that our macht.sprache. project will be able to develop an integration with existing translation websites to support gender-sensitive translation with the help of the Prototype Fund.
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Aminata Touré’s book is part autobiography and part political essay and it is intended to motivate other young people to consider a political career. In addition to her clear political positions, Touré is pleasantly approachable, emotional and creative – not least because her narrative text is peppered with numerous self-written poems about freedom and dreams, being Black and a woman.
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Acknowledging colonial brutality should not be a choice dictated by what additional sins a German person can or cannot “bear” about their past, but rather one that considers the consequences of said brutality in the Global South.
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