Audre Lorde – The Berlin Years 1984 to 1992
Thursday, Jul 6, 2023, 6.30 pm
In conjunction with the n.b.k. Billboard by Carrie Mae Weems, Queen B (Mary J. Blige). With Dr. Tiffany Florvil (Professor of 20th-century European Women’s and Gender History, University of New Mexico) and Dr. Dagmar Schultz (sociologist, filmmaker, publisher, and lecturer, Berlin)
Audre Lorde – The Berlin Years 1984 to 1992 (2012, 81 min) documents a long unknown chapter in the life of writer and activist Audre Lorde (*1934 in New York, †1992 in Saint Croix / USA): her influence on the political and cultural scene in Germany amidst a decade characterized by profound social transformation, including the fall of the Berlin Wall. The film conveys Audre Lorde’s contributions to the German discourse on racism, xenophobia, anti-semitism, class oppression, and homophobia. It tells how Lorde both empowered Black German women to write and publish their work, and challenged white German women to recognize their privilege and expand their understanding of feminism beyond the prevailing white-centric discourse.
Free admission
Venue: n.b.k., Chausseestrasse 128/129
Program
6:30 pm
Film screening Audre Lorde – The Berlin Years 1984 to 1992 (2012, 81 min)
Director: Dagmar Schultz
Writers: Dagmar Schultz, Ika Hügel-Marshall, Ria Cheatom, Aletta von Vietinghoff
Editor: Aletta von Vietinghoff
8:15 pm
Conversation between Dr. Dagmar Schultz and Dr. Tiffany Florvil on the feminist movement documented in the film, its protagonists, and their enduring influence that continues to shape the present day
Participants
Dagmar Schultz is a sociologist, filmmaker, publisher and lecturer. Her teaching and research focus on intersectional feminist studies, women’s movements, anti-racism, and women’s healthcare. Schultz is co-founder of Feministische FrauenGesundheitsZentrum e.V. in Berlin and was the publisher of Orlanda Frauenverlag, a book publisher specializing in feminist literature. She published the first translations of Audre Lorde's writings (Macht und Sinnlichkeit. Ausgewählte Texte von Audre Lorde und Adrienne Rich, Berlin: Orlanda, 1984) as well as other works by Audre Lorde and books by Black German women authors. In 2011, she received the Margherita von Brentano Prize in recognition of her longstanding efforts to further equal rights and opportunities for women in academia. The prize money contributed to the production of her film Audre Lorde – The Berlin Years 1984 to 1992 and the establishment of the Audre Lorde Archive at Freie Universität Berlin.
Dr. Tiffany N. Florvil teaches 20th-century European Women’s and Gender History at the University of New Mexico. Her research focuses on histories of Europe after 1945, the African diaspora, Black internationalism, gender, and sexuality. Her book, Mobilizing Black Germany: Afro-German Women and the Making of a Transnational Movement (Urbana/IL: Univ. of Illinois Press, 2020), is the first comprehensive study of the Black German movement from the 1980s to the 2000s. Florvil is the founder and co-editor of the Imagining Black Europe book series (Bern: Peter Lang International Academic Publishers).
