Black Liberators


This new blog series is about the Black Liberators – the African American soldiers who helped liberate Western Europe during the Second World War. We discuss the Black Liberators exhibition at the Dutch Institute for War-, Holocaust- and Genocide-studies (NIOD) in Amsterdam, the graphic novel ‘Franklin – A Dutch Liberation Story’ and interview a number of people who have been involved in these projects.


Mieke Kirkels – The Oral History of the Black Liberators Mieke Kirkels – The Oral History of the Black Liberators    |   By Jonathan Pieterse
  There is one person who has done more than anyone else in the Netherlands to bring the stories of the Black Liberators into the light of day: Dutch oral historian Mieke Kirkels. She is the author of From Farmland to Soldiers Cemetery, From Alabama to Margraten and Children of Black Liberators. I interviewed her […]
April 15, 2020

Marga Altena – Bringing Color to Dutch History Marga Altena – Bringing Color to Dutch History    |   By Jonathan Pieterse
Marga Altena wrote the text for the graphic novel Franklin – Een Nederlands Bevrijdingsverhaal (Franklin – A Dutch Liberation Story). She is a cultural historian who publishes about class and ethnicity like the book A True History Full of Romance. Mixed Marriages and Ethnic Identity in Dutch Art, News Media and Popular Culture (1833-1955). The scenario […]
April 8, 2020

Gloria Wekker – Suppressed Histories Gloria Wekker – Suppressed Histories    |   By Jonathan Pieterse
  Gloria Wekker is an professor emeritus of Gender and Ethnicity at the University of Utrecht. In 2016 Duke University Press published White Innocence: Paradoxes of Colonialism and Race, about racism in the Netherlands. She is Surinamese-Dutch. At the Institute for War-, Holocaust- and Genocidestudies she spoke about the importance of an inclusive history. The […]
April 1, 2020

Kees Ribbens – Comics and Popular History Kees Ribbens – Comics and Popular History    |   By Jonathan Pieterse
  Kees Ribbens is a big comic book fan. He has a large collection of comic books, many of them about World War II and so I interviewed him about his involvement with Franklin – A Dutch Liberation Story. He is also a senior researcher at the NIOD, the Netherlands Institute for War, Holocaust and […]
March 25, 2020

Brian Elstak – Art, Racism and the Black Liberators Brian Elstak – Art, Racism and the Black Liberators    |   By Jonathan Pieterse
  For the first instalment of this blog about the Black Liberators, I interviewed Brian Elstak. Not only did he contribute to the Black Liberators exhibition at the NIOD (temporarily closed), he’s also the illustrator of the graphic novel Franklin – A Dutch Liberation Story. It tells the fictional story of the African American soldier […]
March 18, 2020