Being, Becoming and Belonging
摘要
This empirical chapter explores the multifaceted lived experiences of AfroczechsAfroczechs within a predominantly white Czech society that largely lacks critical discourse on racerace and postcolonial legacies. Drawing from ethnographic fieldwork, interviews and social media content, this study examines how Afroczechs navigate identityidentity formation through the themes of being, becoming and belonging. It delves into identity making, which is influenced by racialisationracialization, cultural hybridity and societal othering, paying particular attention to elements such as fashion, hairhair, languagelanguage, travel and digital self-representation. This chapter highlights the psychological toll of racial othering, microaggressionsmicroaggressions, paradoxes of representation and complicated in-group dynamics within the AfroczechAfroczech community. It engages with the concept of restricted affiliationrestricted affiliation—the ambivalent relationship Afroczechs have with Czech vis-à-vis their African background which fails to make them embrace their Czech identity. Employing Du Bois’s notion of double consciousness,double consciousness we describe the multiple and idiosyncratic negotiation of mixed identitiesidentities in a post-socialist European country. We challenge the monolithic approach to BlacknessBlackness vis-à-vis Whiteness which most Czech people have and instead reaffirm the fluid, contested and creative ways in which Afroczechs assert their presence and agency in current Czechia.