A BREATH OF FREEDOM:
THE CIVIL RIGHTS STRUGGLE, AFRICAN AMERICAN GIs, AND GERMANY

By Maria Höhn and Martin Klimke

“Maria Höhn’s and Martin Klimke’s carefully researched and lucid Breath of Freedom stands for a paradigm shift in our reading of the civil rights movement and deserves to become a classic in the field; not only does it invite the movement’s relocation in a transnational context; it also succeeds in illustrating the innovative potential of this global perspective by its in-depth case study of the specific intersectionality of post World War II Germany and African America.”

Maria Diedrich, University of Münster
Founder and former president of the Collegium for African American Research (CAAR)
Author of Love Across Color Lines: Ottilie Assing and Frederick Douglass

This moving and beautifully illustrated book, developed from an award-winning research project, examines the experience of African-American GIs in Germany since 1945 and the unique insights they provide into the civil rights struggle at home and abroad. Because of the American military occupation after World War II, America’s unresolved civil rights agenda was exposed to world-wide scrutiny as never before. America’s ambitious efforts to democratize German society after the defeat of Nazism also meant that West Germany was exposed to American ideas of freedom and democracy to a much larger degree than many other countries. READ MORE…