Audre Lorde on Art, Poetry, and Feeling: An Investigation into her Berlin Years

The research project focuses on the life and work of Audre Lorde, a black American feminist poet and essayist who spent a significant amount of time in Berlin as a visiting scholar at the Freie Universit?t. I examine Lorde’s understanding of the political significance of art while also examining how Lorde’s time in Berlin with the local Afro-German community shaped her understanding of core concepts of her work. For the research project, I pursue two primary objectives: (1) Study Lorde’s understanding of the political significance of poetry and art and develop an account of the relationship between art and feeling, as discussed by Lorde; (2) Examine how Lorde’s time with the Afro-German community in Berlin influenced her understanding of key concepts—such as identity, race, intersectionality, and solidarity—with an eye for investigating the particular role art played in the interactions between Lorde and the Afro-German community, specifically how these works helped to forge novel ways of conceptualizing Black experience.