Actor Benito Bause (“semi-detached house”, “All You Need”) does not get very much out of the term “Afro-German”. “For me, the term “Afro-German” is outdated and “people of color” is contemporary,” said the son of an Italian father and a Tanzanian mother to the German Press Agency in Berlin. “The term “Afro-German” emerged in the 1980s based on the word “Afro-American” and has definitely created an empowering momentum that continues to this day.”
The Berlin actor (32) continued: “However, I personally feel that “People of Color” is more inclusive because it thinks about all people who experience racism,” explained Bause. “What I like better about ‘Afro-German’ is that it’s a German term. ‘PoC’ is still an expression of the transitional phase that we’re in in Germany. In this country, we’re in the middle of looking for terms that reflect the German black reality adequately. A start might be the capital “S” in front of the word black as a political self-designation.”
That means “People of Color”
The English phrase “People of Color” (often abbreviated to “PoC”) is difficult to translate into German, literally translated it means something like “people of color”. It is a self-description of people who have personally experienced racism.
“At the beginning of my career, I was offered almost exclusively stereotypical roles, both in theater and in film and television,” Bause recalled. “In the meantime, however, this has noticeably improved. I’m talking about roles that were thought to be more complex and are not directly related to my appearance, but to my acting quality.”
Bause can now be seen in the second season of the comedy series “Doppelhaushalb”. The new episodes will be available in the ZDF media library from this Friday. On May 9th they will start linearly on the television station ZDFneo. It’s about the coexistence of very different families in a house in Berlin’s commuter belt.
