{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/129397"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/129397","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"The representation of biracial occupation children","abstract":"Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2025-10-19 without embargo terms","abstract_html":"Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2025-10-19 without embargo terms","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Ayanbode, Felix"],"institution":"University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"German","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Hilger, Stephanie","Pinkert, Anke","Mehta, Rini","Reynolds, Felisa"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2025,"date_issued":"2025-04-17","date_published":"2025-04-17","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:05Z","subjects":["race","racism","migration","nazism","discrimination","identity","memory studies","Afro-Germans"],"languages":["en","eng"],"rights":["Copyright 2025 Felix Ayanbode"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129397","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Hilger, Stephanie","Pinkert, Anke","Mehta, Rini","Reynolds, Felisa"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Ayanbode, Felix"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2025-04-17","2025-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text","Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["German"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["race","racism","migration","nazism","discrimination","identity","memory studies","Afro-Germans"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en","eng"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2025 Felix Ayanbode"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129397"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2025-10-19 without embargo terms","The student, Felix Ayanbode, accepted the attached license on 2025-04-14 at 12:56.","The student, Felix Ayanbode, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2025-04-14 at 12:59.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2025-04-17 at 16:19.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #21762 on 2025-10-19 at 18:18:14","The First World War marked a turning point for several European nations that participated in the war. Two of those nations are France and Germany. The events that took place during and after the war were critical to a small community of mixed-race children who were born as a result of relationships between black French soldiers, who were stationed in Germany after Germany lost the First World War, and white German women. These children were perceived as a shame and humiliation to the German nation. While research has been done on the racialized experiences of these children as well as the inhumane treatment they endured in the Third Reich, little research has been done on how these children have been represented in works of literature and how they represented themselves through oral and written histories. My dissertation investigates how these biracial occupation children are represented by others and how they decided to represent themselves to reclaim their agency. My dissertation, The Representation of Biracial Occupation Children, examines how these individuals grappled with matters of representation, nationality, identity, and belonging during the Third Reich. After Germany lost World War I, the Rhineland was occupied by French troops, including Black soldiers from France’s African colonies, primarily from West and North Africa. These soldiers were part of the “tirailleurs sénégalais,” a corps recruited from Senegal and other French colonial territories. Some of these soldiers engaged in relationships with white German women. Children born from these relationships were called “Rhineland Bastards” by the Nazis and suffered immense hardships at their hands, ranging from exclusion from public spaces to forced sterilization. In order not to perpetuate Nazi terminology and ideology, I choose to call them “biracial occupation children.” In four chapters, my dissertation delves into how these biracial children were portrayed by Nazi discourse and how they navigated fluid spaces and embraced multiple identities. Through three texts by and two interviews with surviving biracial occupation children, written in French, German, and English, I examine the relationship between race, space, and place in the Third Reich: Hans Massaquoi’s Destined to Witness (1999), Didier Daeninckx’s Galadio (2010), Esi Edugyan’s Half-Blood Blues (2011), and two interviews, one of Hans Hauck and Fasia Jansen. While Destined to Witness is an autobiographical work, Galadio and Half-Blood Blues are novels. Both types of works try to give a voice to these excluded voices. My project is part of the broader effort to decenter not only German but European studies more broadly. I aim to recenter the experiences of black individuals – those who were biracial occupation children and those who were perceived and treated as such like Hans Massaquoi—by exploring questions of nationality, citizenship, and belonging relevant not only to the Nazi period in Germany but also to the time when and the place where these texts were written, including the US, Canada, France, and Germany. Drawing on postcolonial theory, critical race theory, and memory studies, this dissertation argues that biracial occupation children operated in realms of fluid identities due to the racialization of space and the spatialization of race. This dissertation explores the triangulated and transatlantic nature of their experiences."]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["The representation of biracial occupation children"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Hilger, Stephanie","Pinkert, Anke","Mehta, Rini","Reynolds, Felisa"],"dc:creator":["Ayanbode, Felix"],"dc:date":["2025-04-17","2025-05"],"dc:description":["Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2025-10-19 without embargo terms","The student, Felix Ayanbode, accepted the attached license on 2025-04-14 at 12:56.","The student, Felix Ayanbode, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2025-04-14 at 12:59.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2025-04-17 at 16:19.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #21762 on 2025-10-19 at 18:18:14","The First World War marked a turning point for several European nations that participated in the war. Two of those nations are France and Germany. The events that took place during and after the war were critical to a small community of mixed-race children who were born as a result of relationships between black French soldiers, who were stationed in Germany after Germany lost the First World War, and white German women. These children were perceived as a shame and humiliation to the German nation. While research has been done on the racialized experiences of these children as well as the inhumane treatment they endured in the Third Reich, little research has been done on how these children have been represented in works of literature and how they represented themselves through oral and written histories. My dissertation investigates how these biracial occupation children are represented by others and how they decided to represent themselves to reclaim their agency. My dissertation, The Representation of Biracial Occupation Children, examines how these individuals grappled with matters of representation, nationality, identity, and belonging during the Third Reich. After Germany lost World War I, the Rhineland was occupied by French troops, including Black soldiers from France’s African colonies, primarily from West and North Africa. These soldiers were part of the “tirailleurs sénégalais,” a corps recruited from Senegal and other French colonial territories. Some of these soldiers engaged in relationships with white German women. Children born from these relationships were called “Rhineland Bastards” by the Nazis and suffered immense hardships at their hands, ranging from exclusion from public spaces to forced sterilization. In order not to perpetuate Nazi terminology and ideology, I choose to call them “biracial occupation children.” In four chapters, my dissertation delves into how these biracial children were portrayed by Nazi discourse and how they navigated fluid spaces and embraced multiple identities. Through three texts by and two interviews with surviving biracial occupation children, written in French, German, and English, I examine the relationship between race, space, and place in the Third Reich: Hans Massaquoi’s Destined to Witness (1999), Didier Daeninckx’s Galadio (2010), Esi Edugyan’s Half-Blood Blues (2011), and two interviews, one of Hans Hauck and Fasia Jansen. While Destined to Witness is an autobiographical work, Galadio and Half-Blood Blues are novels. Both types of works try to give a voice to these excluded voices. My project is part of the broader effort to decenter not only German but European studies more broadly. I aim to recenter the experiences of black individuals – those who were biracial occupation children and those who were perceived and treated as such like Hans Massaquoi—by exploring questions of nationality, citizenship, and belonging relevant not only to the Nazi period in Germany but also to the time when and the place where these texts were written, including the US, Canada, France, and Germany. Drawing on postcolonial theory, critical race theory, and memory studies, this dissertation argues that biracial occupation children operated in realms of fluid identities due to the racialization of space and the spatialization of race. This dissertation explores the triangulated and transatlantic nature of their experiences."],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["https://hdl.handle.net/2142/129397"],"dc:language":["en","eng"],"dc:rights":["Copyright 2025 Felix Ayanbode"],"dc:subject":["race","racism","migration","nazism","discrimination","identity","memory studies","Afro-Germans"],"dc:title":["The representation of biracial occupation children"],"dc:type":["text","Thesis"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["German"],"thesis:degree_level":["Dissertation"],"thesis:degree_name":["Ph.D."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:25:05Z"}