Kai Mesman-Hallman

Some Final Thoughts on the Block 4 2017 #FemGeniusesinBerlin

Kai (Dylan)

Photo Credit: Dylan Compton

This podcast—led and produced by Kai Mesman-Hallman—provides some final reflections on the Block 4 2017 section of Hidden Spaces, Hidden Narratives: Intersectionality Studies in Berlin with Professor Heidi R. Lewis. Throughout the block, the #FemGeniusesinBerlin have taken walking tours, visited museums and cultural centers, and met with activists and artists in the city to conduct situated examinations of how the identities of marginalized people and communities in Germany (especially in Berlin)—such as Black Germans, Turkish Germans, migrants, refugees, victims of Neo-Nazi terrorism and police brutality, and LGBTQI communities—are constructed, particularly how these constructions are dependent on racism, heterosexism, colonialism, imperialism, and other forms of oppression. Additionally, we examined how these communities resist, reject, revise, and reproduce these narratives as they construct their own subjectivities.

Kai is a junior at Colorado College majoring in Psychology, and is originally from San Diego, CA. She is especially interested in consciousness and the ways our brains’ processing and collecting information can shape our beliefs and thoughts. She spends her free time with her dog and watching conspiracy theory videos.

Joining Kai in her discussion are Uma Scharf—a Baltimore, MD native and junior at Colorado College majoring in Neuroscience, and Drew Ceglinski—a Bath, ME native and junior at Colorado College majoring in Geology.

 

Block 4 2017 FemGeniuses in Berlin Podcast Index:
Click here to view a slideshow, and follow us on Instagram and Twitter to see even more pictures and videos!

“Jewish History & Culture Walking Tour” by Maggie Mehlman
“Das Verbogene Museum” by Anna Balaguer
“Interkulturelles Frauenzentrum S.U.S.I.” by Bridget O’Neill
“Women’s Perspective Walking Tour” by Caroline Olin
“Jüdisches Museum Berlin” by Britta Lam
“Jewish AntiFa Berlin” by Dylan Compton
“Berliner Unterwelten” by Atiya Harvey
“BlackBox Cold War Exhibition” by Karl Hirt
“Generation ADEFRA” by Maya Littlejohn
“Queer Berlin Walking Tour” by Judy Fisher
“Queer City: Stories from São Paulo” by D. Adams
“A Right to Mourn; A Right to Monument” by Maddie Sorensen
“The Spirit of 1968 Walking Tour” by Anabel Simotas
“Reframing Worlds: Mobilität und Gender aus Postkolonial Feministischer Perspektive” by Elsa Godtfredsen
“Queer@School” by Drew Ceglinski
“RomaniPhen: Rromnja Archiv” by Kendall Stoetzer
“Reflections on the Asian Diaspora in Germany” by Uma Scharf
“Street Art Workshop & Tour” by Wynter Scott

To read and/or listen to the finales and view the indices and slideshows for previous FemGeniuses in Berlin, click here. 

Reflections on the Asian Diaspora in Germany

Scharf

Photo Credit: Bridget O’Neill

“Britta, Kai and I are three students in this program who have enjoyed sharing our experiences as Asian women in Germany with each other. During this podcast, we further elaborated on this discussion as our way of ‘giving back’ to our block and adding a different perspective to the discourse surrounding marginalized groups of people that we have discussed so far. To guide this discussion, we engaged with two texts that we read for class—’Knowledges of (Un)Belonging: Epistemic Change as a Defining Mode for Black Women’s Activism in Germany’ by Maisha Eggers, as well as ‘Neither Foreigners Nor Aliens: The Interwoven Stories of Sinti and Roma and Black Germans’ by Nicola Lauré al-Samarai and Sara Lennox. Using these two texts, we unpacked our experiences here in Germany, and discussed what we have observed on a larger scale regarding the Asian community here.”
—Uma Scharf, Podcast Lead and Producer

Joining Uma in her discussion are Britta Lam—a Hong Kong native who hopes to double major in German and Environmental Science, and Kai Mesman-Hallman—a San Diego, CA native and junior at Colorado College majoring in psychology.

 

Queer@School

Drew

Photo Credit: Britta Lam

This podcast—led and produced by Drew Ceglinski—examines our session with Dome Ravina and Jonatan of Lambda’s Queer@School project. According to the Lambda website, Queer@School is “a group of different people—some of us go to school while others attend university, do an apprenticeship or something completely different. Each of us experiences different forms of discrimination and privilege in our own environment. However, some things connect us. We are all young and we are ready for equality. That’s why every week we meet again and talk together about how we can sensitize and empower young people. In doing so, we focus on homophobia and hostility, but at the same time we think in an intersectional way—so we also try to look at other forms of discrimination.”

Photo II

Photo Credit: Drew Ceglinski

Andrew Ceglinski—who goes by Drew, because Andrew “sounds too serious” and his grandpa’s name was Andy—was born in Beverly, MA to a Quaker family, and moved to Bath, Maine when he was six. He graduated from Morse High School in 2015, and is now a Geology major and German minor at Colorado College. He’s been a swimmer his whole life, and he came out as gay in summer 2014. He is very passionate about two things: paleontology and brightly-colored pants (not pictured).

Photo III

Photo Credit: Drew Ceglinski

Joining Drew in his discussion are Kai Mesman-Hallman—a San Diego, CA native and junior at Colorado College majoring in psychology, and Kendall Stoetzer—a junior from Denver, CO majoring in Sociology with a minor in Art Studio.

NOTE: The featured image photo credit also belongs to Drew Ceglinski.

 

RomaniPhen: Rromnja Archiv

Stoetzer (Lam)

Photo Credit: Britta Lam

This podcast—led and produced by Kendall Stoetzer—examines our visit with Hajdi Barz and Isidora Randjelović at the RomaniPhen: Rromnja Archiv. According to the archivists, “RomaniPhen is a self-organized, feminist Rromani project. A digital and real platform to spread different forms of ideas and knowledge from feminist Rromani perspective: Rromani texts, analysis, perspectives and dialogues from the past and the present, international perspectives, sometimes multilingual, audio and video, with pop cultural as well as activist and scientific contributions. We do events, do research and write about Rrom*nja who discuss their views on the world. We collect writings, sound and images for today and tomorrow, against the denial, slander and gadjé appropriation of Rromani history.”

Photo I

Photo Credit: Kendall Stoetzer

Kendall, a Denver, CO native, is a junior at Colorado College majoring in Sociology and minoring in Studio Art. She is passionate about finding the intersections between visual art and social issues, and is also interested in languages, having taken Mandarin Chinese, American Sign Language, German, and Spanish in her time at Colorado College. In her free time, she enjoys dog spotting and cloud watching.

Photo II

Photo Credit: Kendall Stoetzer

Joining Kendall in the discussion are Kai Mesman-Hallman—a junior from San Diego, CA, who is majoring in Psychology at Colorado College, and Maggie Mehlman—a junior from Denver, CO, who is majoring in Mathematics at Colorado College.

NOTE: The featured image photo credit also belongs to Kendal Stoetzer.