Profile
Bärbel Kampmann
Birth:
1946
Death:
1999
Training Location(s):
MSc, Ruhr University Bochum (1986)
BA, University of Cologne (1976)
Primary Affiliation(s):
Government Councillor, Department for Fundamental Issues of Immigration and Integration, Düsseldorf (1996)
Head of Department, Regional Office for the Promotion of Foreign Children and Youth, Gelsenkirchen (1986)
Other Media:
Bärbel Kampmann. Bärbel Kampmann – Gelsenkirchener Geschichten Wiki. (n.d.). https://www.gelsenkirchener-ge...
Deutschlandfunk.de. (2000, December 4). Harald Gerunde: One of us. Born black in Germanyn. Deutschlandfunk. https://www.deutschlandfunk.de...
Gerunde, H. (2000). One of us: Born black in Germany. Wuppertal, Germany: Hammer. ISBN 3-87294-844-X.
Career Focus:
Anti-racist activism, integration, anti-discrimination, anti-imperialism, anti-capitalism
Biography
Bärbel Kampmann was born in Bielefeld, Germany, on March 26, 1946, one year after the end of World War II. She was a psychologist, writer, and a well-known anti-racist, and integration activist in Germany. Bärbel Kampmann was one of the first Afro-descendant children born in Germany after the second World War. Her father, John T. Ballinger, was an African American soldier, and her mother, Ilse Hilbert, was a German woman from Bielefeld. Ilse Hilbert was a Nazi sympathizer who forbade Kampmann to talk about her father and would try to painfully bleach her daughter’s skin with bleaching wax and hydrogen peroxide. Kampmann faced significant racism and social isolation throughout her childhood and youth, including instances of physical violence from her peers.
After graduating from high school, Kampmann completed training as a biology laboratory assistant. She then got a teaching degree in Cologne and worked as a teacher for ten years, and in this time became a trade-unionist and gained first experiences in social activism. In 1986, she obtained a psychology degree from Ruhr University Bochum. She started working as a clinical therapist, mainly for black Germans and migrants, at the regional office for the promotion of foreign children and youth in Gelsenkirchen, where she became head of the department. Ten years later, she was promoted by the Minister of Labor and Health in North Rhine-Westphalia to a government councilor in the ministry of Düsseldorf. As a consultant in the department for fundamental issues of immigration and integration, she was significantly involved in the development of model projects against discrimination. This work pointed the way for future state and federal anti-discrimination laws. It introduced an important conceptual approach and paradigm shift by incorporating the perspectives of those who faced discrimination and racism. Through the vigor in which she did her work, she was promoted again to the senior government councilor after only one year. This was not only a personal success, it also paved the way for equality for ethnic minorities in positions at the ministerial level. The demand to include representatives of ethnic minorities in important, responsible tasks of the state government was put into practice.
Bärbel Kampmann was a central figure in the anti-racist movement in Germany. She took action against exclusion of black people, but without portraying herself or others as mere victims. She gave workshops and is the founder of the Gelsenkichener Tage gegen Rassissmus (Gelsenkirchen Days against Racism). She was also involved with ADEFRA e. V.
(Association of Afro-German Women) and at the Initiative Schwarzer Menschen in Deutschland (Initiative of Black People in Germany). In addition to her engagement with anti-racist and migrant-friendly communities, Kampmann was also anti-imperialistic and anti-capitalistic.
One of her most well-known publications is in the book Andere Deutsche: Lebenssituationen von Menschen multiethnischer und multikultureller Herkunft (Other Germans: Life situations of humans of multi-ethnical and multi-cultural origins) (1994). In it, she wrote a chapter about the reality of living in Germany as part of a minority, called Schwarze Deutsche: Lebensqualität und Probleme einer wenig beachteten Minderheit (Black Germans: Quality of life and problems of a less noticed minority) . Her writing is based on her experiences as a black German in a racist post-war Germany.
Kampmann’s first marriage ended in divorce, partly due to the stigma against interracial relationships at the time. She later married the psychologist Haralt Gerunde, who wrote a biography of Kampmann called Eine von uns: Als Schwarze in Deutschland geboren (One of us: Born as a black woman in Germany) (2000). At the age of 38, Kampmann went looking for her father in the United States. She found him and visited him two years later. After their reunion, and a full 50 years after the liberation of Germany from Nazi rule, the veteran saw men shouting “Sieg Heil” on television and became afraid for his daughter. He fought for a US citizenship for Bärbel Kampmann, but she never emigrated, and instead began traveling to Guinea where she felt particularly at home.
In 1999, Bärbel Kampmann died after falling ill, at the age of 53. In 2020, a street in Bremen was named in her honor.
By Antonia Schlesinger (2025)
To cite this article, see Credits
Selected Works
Kampmann, B. (1996). The Importance of Rituals in the Multicultural Learning Process. ZEP: Journal for International Educational Research and Development Education 19(4), 6–10.
Kampmann, B. (1994). Black Germans. Reality of Life and Other Problems of a Less-respected Minority. In Mecheril, P., & Teo, T. (Eds.), Other Germans: On the living situation of people of multi-ethnic and multicultural origin. Berlin, Germany: Dietz Verlag. ISBN 3320018604.
Bärbel Kampmann
Birth:
1946
Death:
1999
Training Location(s):
MSc, Ruhr University Bochum (1986)
BA, University of Cologne (1976)
Primary Affiliation(s):
Government Councillor, Department for Fundamental Issues of Immigration and Integration, Düsseldorf (1996)
Head of Department, Regional Office for the Promotion of Foreign Children and Youth, Gelsenkirchen (1986)
Other Media:
Bärbel Kampmann. Bärbel Kampmann – Gelsenkirchener Geschichten Wiki. (n.d.). https://www.gelsenkirchener-ge...
Deutschlandfunk.de. (2000, December 4). Harald Gerunde: One of us. Born black in Germanyn. Deutschlandfunk. https://www.deutschlandfunk.de...
Gerunde, H. (2000). One of us: Born black in Germany. Wuppertal, Germany: Hammer. ISBN 3-87294-844-X.
Career Focus:
Anti-racist activism, integration, anti-discrimination, anti-imperialism, anti-capitalism
Biography
Bärbel Kampmann was born in Bielefeld, Germany, on March 26, 1946, one year after the end of World War II. She was a psychologist, writer, and a well-known anti-racist, and integration activist in Germany. Bärbel Kampmann was one of the first Afro-descendant children born in Germany after the second World War. Her father, John T. Ballinger, was an African American soldier, and her mother, Ilse Hilbert, was a German woman from Bielefeld. Ilse Hilbert was a Nazi sympathizer who forbade Kampmann to talk about her father and would try to painfully bleach her daughter’s skin with bleaching wax and hydrogen peroxide. Kampmann faced significant racism and social isolation throughout her childhood and youth, including instances of physical violence from her peers.
After graduating from high school, Kampmann completed training as a biology laboratory assistant. She then got a teaching degree in Cologne and worked as a teacher for ten years, and in this time became a trade-unionist and gained first experiences in social activism. In 1986, she obtained a psychology degree from Ruhr University Bochum. She started working as a clinical therapist, mainly for black Germans and migrants, at the regional office for the promotion of foreign children and youth in Gelsenkirchen, where she became head of the department. Ten years later, she was promoted by the Minister of Labor and Health in North Rhine-Westphalia to a government councilor in the ministry of Düsseldorf. As a consultant in the department for fundamental issues of immigration and integration, she was significantly involved in the development of model projects against discrimination. This work pointed the way for future state and federal anti-discrimination laws. It introduced an important conceptual approach and paradigm shift by incorporating the perspectives of those who faced discrimination and racism. Through the vigor in which she did her work, she was promoted again to the senior government councilor after only one year. This was not only a personal success, it also paved the way for equality for ethnic minorities in positions at the ministerial level. The demand to include representatives of ethnic minorities in important, responsible tasks of the state government was put into practice.
Bärbel Kampmann was a central figure in the anti-racist movement in Germany. She took action against exclusion of black people, but without portraying herself or others as mere victims. She gave workshops and is the founder of the Gelsenkichener Tage gegen Rassissmus (Gelsenkirchen Days against Racism). She was also involved with ADEFRA e. V. (Association of Afro-German Women) and at the Initiative Schwarzer Menschen in Deutschland (Initiative of Black People in Germany). In addition to her engagement with anti-racist and migrant-friendly communities, Kampmann was also anti-imperialistic and anti-capitalistic.
One of her most well-known publications is in the book Andere Deutsche: Lebenssituationen von Menschen multiethnischer und multikultureller Herkunft (Other Germans: Life situations of humans of multi-ethnical and multi-cultural origins) (1994). In it, she wrote a chapter about the reality of living in Germany as part of a minority, called Schwarze Deutsche: Lebensqualität und Probleme einer wenig beachteten Minderheit (Black Germans: Quality of life and problems of a less noticed minority) . Her writing is based on her experiences as a black German in a racist post-war Germany.
Kampmann’s first marriage ended in divorce, partly due to the stigma against interracial relationships at the time. She later married the psychologist Haralt Gerunde, who wrote a biography of Kampmann called Eine von uns: Als Schwarze in Deutschland geboren (One of us: Born as a black woman in Germany) (2000). At the age of 38, Kampmann went looking for her father in the United States. She found him and visited him two years later. After their reunion, and a full 50 years after the liberation of Germany from Nazi rule, the veteran saw men shouting “Sieg Heil” on television and became afraid for his daughter. He fought for a US citizenship for Bärbel Kampmann, but she never emigrated, and instead began traveling to Guinea where she felt particularly at home.
In 1999, Bärbel Kampmann died after falling ill, at the age of 53. In 2020, a street in Bremen was named in her honor.
By Antonia Schlesinger (2025)
To cite this article, see Credits
Selected Works
Kampmann, B. (1996). The Importance of Rituals in the Multicultural Learning Process. ZEP: Journal for International Educational Research and Development Education 19(4), 6–10.
Kampmann, B. (1994). Black Germans. Reality of Life and Other Problems of a Less-respected Minority. In Mecheril, P., & Teo, T. (Eds.), Other Germans: On the living situation of people of multi-ethnic and multicultural origin. Berlin, Germany: Dietz Verlag. ISBN 3320018604.