The increasing movement of individuals in recent decades through migration is a global phenomenon. There are different reasons for migration, such as economic, demographic, socio-cultural, political and other individual factors. In addition to that, also postmodern political conditions are emerging, as well as the socioeconomic developments of globalization, which has led to an increase in the number of multicultural families.

Like many other countries in Europe, Germany is characterized by increasing cultural pluralization. The question arises of what is German and who can legitimately add to it and who cannot. This specifically includes topics such as inclusion and exclusion and also stigmatization features in the definition of ethnic German, which also concerns ethnicity and social belonging. Another widespread characteristic of inclusion in Germany is being White. However, there are parts of the population that do not fit this description, such as the group of Afro-Germans. This research is therefore dealing with the issues of identity and aims to make an advance to Afro-German studies.

The aim of this qualitative study is to understand how Afro-German women are constructing their racial and cultural identity and how life experiences are contributing to their identity development. The term Afro-German describes women who grew up in Germany and have one German parent and one parent from an African country. For that purpose, in-depth interviews were conducted with six women of Afro-German heritage. A case study design was mainly used as a research design, while a grounded theory approach was additionally used both as a research design and for the data analysis.

The analysis shows, that there are a number of factors that influence the racial and cultural identity of Afro-German women and highlights the complexity of its construction. Four main categories, which build on each other, emerged from the interview material: (1) growing up in Germany, (2) experiences based on physical appearance, (3) experiences in different spaces and (4) self-perception of racial and cultural identity.

In result, racial and cultural identity is first strongly connected to how the interviewees grew up and the influence of how the parents passed on their culture. In most cases the German culture was the dominant experience. The racial and cultural identity of Afro-German women is also general strongly shaped by the experiences they have because of their skin color and the othering; they experience in the German society. All interviewees had to come to terms with their ethnic minority status in a majority White environment. Another essential finding is hereby the political process of the interviewees, which started to play an important role leading to the search for identity on the one hand and to an empowerment process of accepting and embracing their Blackness in a dominantly White society on the other hand. Almost all interviewees have started the search for the other culture, which was usually not necessarily associated with the other nationality but with a collective Black culture. Furthermore, through connecting to multiracial and/or Black communities and exchange with like-minded people with whom one shares common experiences that one makes in German society the own biracial identity was developed and consolidated.

This qualitative study thus makes an important contribution to understand Afro-German women's lived experiences and the associated construction of racial and cultural identity. In addition, this research adds to the growing body of work on biracial identity and Afro-German studies, with much more to be explored.

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