The trip was part of our project "Social work as a colonial knowledge archive?", which is based at the Alice Salomon Archive at ASH Berlin. Fallon Tiffany Cabral, Rut-Lina Gonçalves Schenck, Maex Kühnert and Dayana Lau are working together in the team and we are asking how social work was historically entangled in colonial orders of power and knowledge and which resistant perspectives and practices can be found in history; but also who is remembered as a relevant actor in the history of social work and who is not. Because we are also concerned with tracking down and thinking about hidden - previously excluded - resistant Black (German) people, non-white people and people with a history of migration or colonization as actors in the broader context of social work in Germany when we work historiographically. We see it as a necessary task to make visible so-called "hidden figures" and resistant organizations that are often only portrayed as "passive", "in need of help" or as "victims" in dominant narratives of social work - a field of work that is usually imagined as white. In this way, we want to specifically interrupt such powerful narratives.
From a postcolonial-feminist perspective, we examine how social, pedagogical and caring practices move between affirmation and subversion: Where were colonial narratives stabilized, but where were they also critically irritated or subverted? To this end, we follow the traces of historical, white German social workers who, during the period of German colonial rule and also in the following decades, became colonially entangled in German-speaking countries and all over the world and initiated projects that we can regard as colonial civilizing missions and some of which continue to exist today (cf. Castro Varela i.E.). Some of them, for example, traveled in the Americas and, in close cooperation with local, post-colonial elites in the context of social work schools, laid the foundation for today's development cooperation with the Global South (cf. Cabral/Lau i.E.). Others, however, have critically examined the consequences of colonization/colonialism for indigenous populations and the environment and developed anti-colonial initiatives. However, they failed to self-critically reflect on their own role in maintaining colonial power relations.
As (former) members and associates of the research team "Social work as a colonial knowledge archive?", we - Francis Ramírez Cervantes, Fallon Tiffany Cabral and Dayana Lau - flew to Mexico, where Gertrude Duby Blom - a person from our sample of white social workers from German-speaking countries - dedicated herself for around 50 years from 1940 to the "preservation" and "protection" of the Lacandon selva and its inhabitants, primarily through documentary-activist photography. Our trail led us there with questions such as: Which colonial orders of knowledge, power asymmetries and paternalistic logics are reflected in or brought forth by Duby Blom's image productions, writings and documented interventions? What tensions arise between solidarity-based engagement and the danger of reproducing colonial narratives and perpetuating power relations? What (counter)narratives or reactions emerged on the part of those who were portrayed at the time?
This trail quickly led us to the artistic-activist project "Mujeres Indígenas Fotógrafas" (MIF) and to the participants Juana López López, Martha López López and Antonia Girón Intzín, who are active in San Cristóbal de las Casas and the surrounding villages. The project sees itself as an association of indigenous women who use photography to open up new, unique perspectives on their living environment, cultural identities and collective history. With their artistic work, they show the everyday life, traditions and challenges of their communities, document local struggles for autonomy and advocate for the visibility of female, indigenous voices and narratives. The group organizes workshops and exhibitions and develops photographic educational formats, often in cooperation with the Chiapas Photography Project (CPP). Here, image archives are built up, memory work is carried out and local actors are empowered to make their own stories and struggles visible.
We would like to thank the activists and artists of the MIF for their trust, exchange and time, as well as our colleagues at the Na Bolom Research and Cultural Center in San Cristóbal de las Casas for their access and support in the Duby Blom photo archive. We would particularly like to highlight the contribution of Francis Ramírez Cervantes, who was central to the success of the research trip to Chiapas. The research in the archives, especially the interviews in San Cristóbal de las Casas, would not have been as successful without the expertise and critical analysis of our former colleague and associate Francis Ramirez Cervantes. Her intersectional knowledge of Latin American history(ies), local politics - especially in the Mexican-Peruvian comparison - as well as her native Spanish language skills were of great importance for this. This was all the more relevant as the differences in experiential and navigational knowledge within the travel group varied considerably, particularly with regard to the Latin American context. Theoretical knowledge and reflections on our own whiteness or our own experiences of racism - for example as white (Lau) or South Asian-diasporic (Cabral) people born and socialized in Germany - represent necessary analytical resources. Nevertheless, they mark our limited access to the complex, historically situated experiences of coloniality and racism in Latin America. We will have to take these limitations into account as epistemic conditions of our positionalities when analyzing the data and reflecting on our experiences on the trip.
As a research team, we are aware that our search for traces of Gertrude Duby Blom not only harbors the danger of renewed centering, but that we ourselves - as a diversely positioned team of researchers, the majority of whom are based in Germany - are integrated into colonial orders of knowledge, academic power asymmetries and global inequalities. Our perspectives, choice of language and methodological approaches are not neutral, but shape what is made visible and how it is framed. This entails the risk of (re)producing colonial narratives - even in the mode of critical analysis - or (re)superimposing our own interpretations on indigenous voices and experiences. This ambivalence raises questions about the purpose of our research: Whose interests and struggles does our knowledge production serve? What effects does it have on those about whom, with whom or for whom we speak and write? Our aim is to make spaces for counter-narratives visible and to strengthen solidary connections - knowing full well that this also remains inscribed in hegemonic discourses.
At the same time, we also see our debate as part of an educational research process. Critically reflecting on our own entanglements and ambivalences is not only central to our current research, but also holds potential for the training and professionalization of future social workers: It opens up spaces to start thinking about colonial continuities, epistemic inequalities and the political dimension of social work. In this sense, the research serves not only the academic production of knowledge, but also the development of an attitude that recognizes and questions power asymmetries and considers practical consequences for solidarity-based action in social work and "helping" professions in a broader sense.
This results in a plea for historical-power-critical learning and remembrance-political reflection on historical entanglements in colonial and racist power and domination relations in the profession as a central foundation in social work studies. This ties in with our teaching research courses, in which students can develop their own approaches to the question of how social work as a "colonial knowledge archive" can be critically questioned and linked back to current fields of action as part of their basic training. From the winter semester 2025/26, this track will be further deepened over four semesters in a project seminar entitled "Decolonial and feminist perspectives on theory, resistance and practice in social work" (BA Social Work with Maria Fernanda Sarmiento Castano and Dayana Lau). Such connections between research, teaching and practice can open up opportunities for further cooperation both with local projects such as MIF and with students and practitioners who work at the interface of social work, art, activism and postcolonially informed, (self-)critical knowledge production.
Contact: kol-lab@ ash-berlin.eu
