Stories and Hopes of the Arrivals to Rhine-Main Archipelago

Since the 1990s, millions of people from North and Central Asia, the Caucasus, Eastern Europe, and Southeastern Europe have immigrated to Germany. Their life stories are often oversimplified by political categories, with their qualifications being devalued and their identities being reduced to a single language.

In the case of post-Soviet migrants, some of these stories are disparagingly subsumed under labels such as 'Russians', with their multiple affiliations being rendered invisible. However, if we look closely at these stories, we realise that they defy such categorisations. They are multilayered, contradictory, and characterised by transitions between places, systems, and memories. Since 2020, the term 'PostOst' has developed a vocabulary that highlights these differences. "Stories and Hopes of the Arrivals to the Rhine-Main Archipelago" is an attempt to map this multifaceted landscape of experiences – an archipelago of stories, hopes and lived realities. The project’s goal is to develop a deeper and more nuanced understanding of the groups that have migrated to Germany since the 1990s—including those who have arrived since 2022—and to make their significant presence visible. Three interactive workshops are at the heart of the research. They create a safe space where people from diaspora communities can share their stories, memories, favorite places, and other personal archives. Active participation and creative methods of expressing complex issues will be brought together in the final public project, Leseraum.

The de_colonialanguage collective and Ani Menua (X3 PostOst Agency, PostOstCafe) bring together expertise in the fields of art, activism, and research within the context of migration processes and alternative knowledge production. They conduct transcultural work with diaspora communities and develop formats that combine public space, collective, and artistic practice.