Leonie Baumgarten-Egemole
She is an activist in various anti-racist movements and is socially involved on several levels for a discrimination-free society. Besides studying law, she organizes demonstrations against racism and for climate justice. Here, an intersectional view of the different struggles is very important to her.
Hamze Bytyci
Born in Prizren / Kosovo in 1982, lives and works in Berlin. Bytyci took his first steps as an activist in the Kirchenasyl in Tübingen in 1991. In Freiburg, he founded the Amaro Drom (Our Way) organisation in 2005. After a one-year engagement at the Zurich Theatre 58, he moved to Berlin in 2006, performing and directing at the Ballhaus Naunynstraße and Maxim Gorki Theatre, as well as at smaller theatres. In 2011 Bytyci resigned his positions in both organisations and founded RomaTrial e.V., an association with similar aims. In April 2018, he co-curated the 1st Roma Biennal, the first self-ofganized Bienal by and with artists from all over Europe.
Peter Donatus
Nigeria
Peter Donatus is a freelance journalist and human rights and environmental activist. He was born in Nigeria and migrated to Germany 31 years ago after enduring several months of captivity and torture.
As an advocate for our sisters* and brothers* on the African continent, especially in Nigeria, he founded Pay Day Africa International among other projects and activities. He is known for his efforts against the Shell company going far back to the 90s, when he also brought the term „ecocide“ into broad knowledge. He is fighting against racism, depletion of natural resources on the African continent and for reparations for transatlantic slavery.
Nangamso ‘Mkutaji’ Gumbe
South Africa/Ghana
In constant search of finding balance between herself, her environment and her community(s); Nangamso spends most of her days trying to restore this equilibrium. She has found much of her recent creative expression in writing and conceptualising ideas that relate to the natural environment and its connection to Afrikan people born across the globe. Nangamso writes for a few online publications under the name Mkutaji. Her work focuses on understanding ecological consciousness through the lens of Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS). Rediscovering the ways in which our ancestors practised environmental balance, and reclaiming the narrative of combatting climate change as an indigenously Afrikan agenda. Nangamso recently completed her MPhil in African Studies at the University of Ghana, and spends the other parts of her days as an artist, space-maker and student of plant-based food and nutrition.
Imeh Ituen
Imeh Ituen is a social scientist, human rights and climate activist. She studied Social Sciences and Integrated Natural Resource Management in Berlin and Perth, Australia and is particularly interested in racism and colonial continuities in the climate crisis. Imeh is part of the BIPoc (Black Indigenous People of Colour) environmental and climate justice collective Black Earth.
Amanda Luna Tacunan
I am Amanda Luna, born in Peru Huánuco – Quechua, an activist for the defence of indigenous peoples’ rights, defender of Mother Nature. I lead the association MamaKiya e.V. and work at the University of Aachen in the field of research. Due to my activism I also continuously lead workshops on social and political issues from the perspective of the affected demographic. My focus is far away from the Eurocentric view, because I never stop strengthening my connection to my country and my social groups in Peru. It is a task that leads me to divide myself into two continents and which allows me to be open to several perspectives.
Loubna Messaoudi
She is founder and managing director of BIWOC * Rising, the first intersectional coworking & social club for Black, Indigenous, Women of colour only, * as well as transwomen and non-binary people of colour in Germany.
She is a former airline pilot, has a degree in media science and philosophy and further education in sound and video design. Before founding BIWOC * Rising, she worked in the media and culture industry, as well as for various non-profit organizations. Her work in recent years has focused on the interlocking of discriminatory structures of women* of colour and the related economic, social and societal participation. With her intersectional empowerment project she creates safer spaces with decolonial and anti-patrical structures for BIW*oC. She also offers mediation and anti-bias training.
Jessica Norales
She is the coordinator of OFRANEH Europa. OFRANEH, the Organización Fraternal Negra Hondureña (Organization of Black brothers and sisters of Honduras), was born in 1978, as a Federation of the garífuna (afrodescendant) people of Honduras, fighting for their cultural and territorial rights, with the purpose of achieving survival as a differentiated culture.
Llanquiray Painemal Morales
She is a Mapuche woman and has been mobilising to save their territory from multinational corporates and Chilean government aggression. Llanquiray is part of a Mapuche collective based in Berlin and has been active with the climate justice struggles for years
Brototi Roy
Brototi Roy is a PhD student at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology, Autonomous University of Barcelona, where she is a part of the Environmental Justice Atlas team. Her research focuses on environmental justice movements in India against coal, using political ecology and ecological economics framework.
She co-founded the Degrowth India Initiative in 2015, with an aim to facilitate discussions and bring together people looking for alternatives for socio-ecological justice and equity in India. She is a member of Research&Degrowth, the Barcelona based association dedicated to research and activism on degrowth, as well as a part of the support group of the international degrowth conferences.
She is also a member of the Executive Committee of the Indian Society for Ecological Economics.
Paalil K’iin
(Son of the sun in Maya)
He was born in Yucatán, México. He uses hip hop as a way to honor his maya heritage, his rhymes are completely in the indigenous language of the mayan people. His songs talk about thanking mother earth for corn and rain, the struggles and everyday life of rural people. He’s also an activist and community organizer against the megaproject of the so-called “Maya Train” in the Yucatan province, which has been promoted by the government as a development initiative, but being completely rejected by the maya communities, as an affront to their way of life and relationship to the land.
