About Racism, in Germany

I am glad that there are so many books taking frontally racism in Germany, especially the everyday racism. That kind of racism that people not born here and with a different skin colour and obvious religious observance has to deal with every day.

Alice Hasters´ Was weisse Menschen über Rassismus hören wollen aber wissen sollten (in my approximate translation What white people don´t want to hear about racism but should know about) is partly a personal memoir of a woman of colour born and living in Germany but partly is an overview of racism atittudes in the everyday life. Indeed, you don´t have to be a Nazi to be a racist. It´s enough to start with that question: Where are you coming from, originally? Or to address in a broken English a person with a non-German sounding name and a darken skin colour. 

´We are here, in Germany´, sounds the micro-agression in the Kita when one parent insists that pork is part of the German culture therefore he requests in a a kindergarten with a high diversity of children to introduce the aforementioned animal on the daily menu. That´s my experience that I will explain in detail on another occasion, maybe.  

The book is written in a very personal, authentic style creating an open dialogue with the reader. It´s a kind request to try changing the way of looking at people, considering more than their hair and their skin colour, but also taking into account historical perspectives and colonial burried past, acknowledged only in the last decade. It is also a request to reconsider critically not only the Enlightment period - which was far from being enligthened, as it revealed a system of thought that lead to racist mindsets, especially in scientific research - but also symbol thinkers and philosophers, like Kant and Hegel. 

Alice Hasters covers a lot of issues, from the family connections and relating to her white German grandparents and relatives, to school relationships, cultural appropriation and the wrongs of acting white. Through the examples, it serves very well as a kind of guide and orientation for white people helping them to stop being racist. As there is nothing like good racism anyway.

I had access to the book in audio format, in the reading of the author.

Another reliable source of information about what does it mean being a POC in Germany is the book by the journalist Marvin Oppong: Ewig anders. 

Rating: 5 stars