Afro-Germans
Afro-Germans () or Black Germans () are people of Sub-Saharan African descent who are citizens or residents of Germany. Afro-Germans are found across Germany, but are mostly situated in larger cities, such as Hamburg, Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Munich, Bremen, Cologne, Mainz and Berlin. Cities such as Hamburg and Frankfurt, which were formerly centres of occupation forces following World War II and more recent immigration, have substantial Afro-German communities. With modern trade and migration, communities such as Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich, and Cologne have an increasing number of Afro-Germans. , in a country with a population of 83,000,000 people , there were an estimated 1,000,000 Afro-Germans. History. African and German interaction 1600 to late 1800s. During the 1720s, Ghana-born Anton Wilhelm Amo was sponsored by a German duke to become the first African to attend a European university; after completing his studies, he taught and wrote in philosophy. Later, Africans were brought as slaves from the western coast of Africa where a number of German estates were established, primarily on the Gold Coast. After King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia sold his Ghana Groß Friedrichsburg estates in Africa in 1717, from which up to 30,000 people had been  sold to the Dutch East India Company, the new owners were bound by contract to "send 12 negro boys, six of them decorated with golden chains," to the king. The enslaved children were brought to Potsdam and Berlin. Africans and German interaction between 1884 and 1945. At the 1884 Berlin Congo conference, attended by all major powers of the day, European states divided Africa into areas of influence which they would control. Germany controlled colonies in the African Great Lakes region and West Africa, from which numerous Africans migrated to Germany for the first time. Germany appointed indigenous specialists for  the colonial administration and economy, and many young Africans went to Germany to be educated. Some received higher education at German schools and universities, but the majority were trained at mission training and colonial training centers as officers or domestic mission teachers. Africans frequently served as interpreters for African languages at German-Africa research centers, and with the colonial administration. Others migrated to Germany as former members of the German protection troops, the Askari. The Afrikanisches Viertel in Berlin is also a legacy of the colonial period, with a number of streets and squares named after countries and locations tied  to the German colonial empire. It is now home to a substantial portion of Berlin's residents of African heritage. Interracial couples in the colonies were subjected to strong pressure in a campaign against miscegenation, which included invalidation of marriages, declaring the mixed-race children illegitimate, and stripping them of German citizenship. During extermination of the Nama people in 1907 by Germany, the German director for colonial affairs, Bernhard Dernburg, stated that "some native tribes, just like some animals, must be destroyed". Weimar Republic. In the course of World War I, the Belgians, British and French took control of Germany 's colonies in Africa. The situation for the African colonials in Germany changed in various ways. For example, Africans who possessed a colonial German identification card had a status entitling them to treatment as "members of the former protectorates". After the Treaty of Versailles (1919), the Africans were encouraged to become citizens of their respective mandate countries, but most preferred to stay where they were. In numerous petitions (well documented for German Togoland by P. Sebald and for Cameroon by A. Rüger), they tried to inform the German public about the conditions in the colonies, and continued to request German  help and support. Africans founded the bilingual periodical that was published in German and Duala: "Elolombe ya Cameroon" (Sun of Cameroon). A political group of Africans established the German branch of a Paris-based human-rights organization: "the German section of the League to the Defense of the Negro Race". Nazi Germany. The conditions for Afro-Germans in Germany grew worse during the Nazi period. Naturalized Afro-Germans lost their passports. Working conditions and travel were made extremely difficult for Afro-German musicians, variety, circus or film professionals. Based on racist propaganda, employers were unable to retain or hire Afro -German employees. Afro-Germans in Germany were socially isolated and forbidden to have sexual relations and marriages with Aryans by the Nuremberg Laws. In continued discrimination directed at the so-called Rhineland bastards, Nazi officials subjected some 500 Afro-German children in the Rhineland to forced sterilization. Afro-Germans were considered "enemies of the race-based state", along with Jews and Roma. The Nazis originally sought to rid the German state of Jews and Romani by means of deportation (and later extermination), while Afro-Germans were to be segregated and eventually exterminated through compulsory sterilization. Some Black Germans who lived  through this period later wrote about their experiences. In 1999 Hans Massaquoi published "Destined to Witness" about his life in Germany under Nazi rule, and in 2013 Theodor Wonja Michael, who was also the main witness in the documentary film "Pages in the Factory of Dreams", published his autobiography, "Deutsch Sein Und Schwarz Dazu." Since 1945. The end of World War II brought Allied occupation forces into Germany. American, British and French forces included numerous soldiers of African American, Afro-Caribbean or African descent, and some of them fathered children with ethnic German women. At the time, these armed forces  generally maintained non-fraternization rules and discouraged civilian-soldier marriages. Around 8,000 of these biracial Afro German children were born immediately after the war, making up about 1% of all births in ethnically homogeneous West Germany in 1945. " Most single ethnic German mothers kept their "brown babies", but thousands were adopted by American families and grew up in the United States. Often they did not learn their full ancestry until reaching adulthood. Until the end of the Cold War, the United States kept more than 100,000 U.S. soldiers stationed on German soil. These men established their lives in Germany. They  often brought families with them or founded new ones with ethnic German wives and children. The federal government of West Germany pursued a policy of isolating or removing from Germany those children that it described as "mixed-race negro children". Audre Lorde, Black American writer and activist, spent the years from 1984 to 1992 teaching at the Free University of Berlin. During her time in Germany, often called "The Berlin Years," she helped push the coining of the term "Afro-German" into a movement that addressed the intersectionality of race, gender, and sexual orientation. She encouraged Black German women such  as May Ayim and Ika Hügel-Marshall to write and publish poems and autobiographies as a means of gaining visibility and. She pursued intersectional global feminism and acted as an advocate for that movement in Germany. Cities with sizeable African and Afro-German communities are Hamburg, Darmstadt, Frankfurt am Main, Bonn, Munich, Berlin and Bremen. Hamburg has the largest absolute number of African-born nationals, whereas Darmstadt and Frankfurt have the highest share of African residents in regard to the population. Immigration. Since 1981, Germany has had immigration from African countries, mostly Nigeria and Ghana, who were seeking work. Some  of the Ghanaians also came to study in German universities. Below are the largest (Sub-Saharan) African groups in Germany. Notable Afro-Germans in modern Germany. Art, culture and music. The cultural life of Afro-Germans has great variety and complexity. With the emergence of MTV and Viva, the popularity of American pop culture promoted Afro-German representation in German media and culture. May Ayim (1960-1996), was an Afro-German poet, educator and activist. She was a co-editor of the book "Farbe bekennen", whose English translation was published as "". Afro-German musicians include: Film. The "SFD - Schwarze Filmschaffende  in Deutschland" ("Black Artists in German Film", literally "Black Filmmakers in Germany") is a professional association based in Berlin for directors, producers, screenwriters, and actors who are Afro-Germans or of Black African origin and living in Germany. They have organized the "New Perspectives" series at the Berlinale film festival. Afro-Germans in film and television include: