Daily Life, Propaganda, Continuities
Colonialism was also part of everyday life for the people of Westphalia. They enjoyed its benefits not only when shopping for and consuming colonial goods, but also at school and in their leisure activities, where the ‘colonial idea’ was ever-present.
People in Westphalia were involved in colonial associations, attended lectures and read newspaper reports. Ethnological collections and human zoos conveyed a stereotypical view of the world and humanity – as can be seen in the exhibition, for example, on historical postcards. Board games, children's books, collectible pictures and a ‘colonial cookbook’ from before the Second World War show how widespread colonialism was, even within the home. Although the colonial era is now viewed critically, the stereotypes that arose at that time form a basis for discrimination and racism.
Biographies and Exhibits
Sussy Dakaro
(approx.1868–1885)
Sussy Dakaro um 1868–1885
At the age of 14, the young woman who would later be exhibited as ‘Sussy Dakaro’, ‘Princess Tagorah’ or ‘Susi Dakara’ was abducted by a human trafficker from an island near Australia. She was forced to appear alongside other Aboriginal people in a racist human zoo as an ‘exotic savage’, ‘living curiosity’ and ‘last cannibal’. Before the group came to Europe, they toured the USA and Canada. In 1885, Sussy Dakaro travelled with the group to Sonnborn in what is now Wuppertal, where she died of tuberculosis.
Around 1868, Sussy Dakaro was born on Palm Island, which belongs to Australia.
In 1882, she was abducted by slave trader Robert A. Cunningham along with eight other people on behalf of ‘circus pioneer’ Phineas Taylor Barnum. The group toured 130 cities in the United States and Canada with Barnum's ‘ethnological congress of strange tribes’.
In 1884, the troupe came to Europe. They were exhibited at the Crystal Palace in London, the Musée du Nord in Brussels and Castan's Panoptikum in Berlin, Cologne and Chemnitz.
In June 1885, Sussy Dakaro and five other Aboriginal people came to Sonnborn in what is now Wuppertal. She was already suffering from tuberculosis and died on 23 June at the age of 17. The following day, she was buried in the cemetery of the Protestant parish of Sonnborn.
Did you know that...
Leue named a place in German East Africa after himself: what is now Leganga in Tanzania was originally called Leudorf.
Mural
Murals like this one were used as teaching aids in many German schools. They propagated the supposed civilisational superiority of white Europeans and conveyed stereotypical images from the colonies. These wall charts were most popular from the last third of the 19th century to the middle of the 20th century. The exhibition shows reproductions in their original size.
