Over the last few years, several European powers and actors have increasingly engaged with political acts of remembering colonial violence, wars, and crimes committed in Africa in their name. Among other examples, Berlin renamed some of its streets which were honouring colonial figures, French President Emmanuel Macron commissioned an official report on the memory of the colonisation and war in Algeria, and some British universities and cultural institutions returned looted Benin Bronzes to Nigeria. But can this truly lead to ‘coming to terms’ with its colonial past? Can reparations, restitutions, apologies, and other symbolic acts ‘fix’ the damage of decades of European colonialism? Who has a voice or who does not in these debates? These are the questions my students and I discussed in a seminar entitled ‘Can Europe Come to Terms with its Colonial Past in Africa?’ taught in Liberal Arts & Sciences at University College Freiburg in the Winter semester 2024/25. These questions were also at the heart of the zines they produced as a final assignment, which are presented in this intervention, showing how creative practices can be used by students to engage with difficult topics of colonial memory.
