Dear people,
we wish you a happy new year 2021 and would like to report about our three projects in the past year:
1. 2020 Training Series on Anti-Racism and Decoloniality
Our training series on anti-racism and decoloniality for development policy organizations and groups has successfully concluded. We received a total of more than 300 registrations and, unfortunately, were unable to accept everyone.
The series consisted of five online seminars on anti-racist and power-critical approaches and enabled participants to engage with decolonial issues within development policy contexts and structures. Due to the overwhelming demand, we will try to offer the series again in 2021.
You can find more information HERE.
2. KlimaDeSol: Decolonial and Solidarity-Based Climate Action 2020–2022
What results has the KlimaDeSol empowerment series achieved?
• There is a video recording of an action by part of the group featuring screenings of photos of Black women and activists on Alexanderplatz on October 12, 2020 http://decolonize-your.net
• On October 24, 2020, Dominique O., on her own initiative and in consultation with Greenpeace Germany, organized a panel discussion titled “Racism, Colonialism, and Environmental Protection,” at which Paola Reyes, Imeh Ituen, Peter Donatus, and Salomón Derreza—representatives from the Global South and BIPoC—were able to present decolonial perspectives from the Global South. Video HERE [https://youtu.be/TV-CsQj4sOk]
• On November 15, 2020, the KlimaDeSol empowerment series was presented at the First BIPoC Climate Conference and is now part of the BIPoC network.
• Saadya W. shared information with us on Twitter, including details about the action on November 15, 2020, stating: “136 years ago, colonialists cemented the civilization-destroying division of the African continent at the Berlin-Congo Conference. Their decisions are still in effect today.” Artistic intervention. LINK
#déchainé draws attention to a product of colonial consumption.!B http://decolonize-your.net
#decolonize
• A chat group has been set up. We have sown a seed, and now we should look to the future together to determine what fruits we want to harvest from that seed. There’s the idea of founding a collective and that of an independent network under the name and logo of KlimaDeSol.
What’s next for KlimaDeSol?
We want to ask ourselves these questions in a joint reflection as a group:
– What have we learned or taken away from this?
– What would we like to do differently in the future?
– What’s next?
Given that we’ve already received several requests to present the project and the workshop’s results, we find this all the more important. In early January 2021, there will be an online wrap-up meeting for collective reflection with the participation of several members. It is primarily up to the BIPoC participants to decide how to proceed.
3. Global Erinnern
In May 2020, we launched our project Global Erinnern, a collaborative initiative with ISD—Initiative Schwarze Menschen in Deutschland—and recherche international. As part of the project, we are developing digital maps of local global history(ies) in Berlin and in collaboration with many local stakeholders in four other cities. This year, we have already held workshops on critical cartography in collaboration with the Orangotango Collective and Dekoloniale, as well as on colonial continuities. We also conducted workshops for museums and activist groups on decolonization and global history, as well as training sessions for facilitators on designing digital workshops.
If you/you are interested in educational opportunities in 2021, please feel free to contact us!
If your city, municipality, or county offers interesting points of interest for our digital map of global history, please feel free to contact us at geschichte[AT]glokal[DOT]org.
In terms of content, this could include (as illustrated by the example of Berlin): the resistance of Black people in Berlin during the Nazi era; the participation of people with ties to Berlin in the Spanish Civil War; Berlin locations that illustrate the concept of transnationalism in the Ottoman Empire; or events that took place in Berlin and demonstrate the global interconnectedness of history.
We would be delighted to find partners, initiatives, groups, and individuals in various cities who would like to contribute to research in their local communities. In early 2021, we plan to submit a grant proposal for this research so that a small honorarium can be provided for the research work.
We wish you all the best for 2021!
Best regards,
the glokal team