NEIGHBORING ECOTONES
An Intersectional Conversation Between Two Neighbors in Berlin
By Melanie Garland and hn.lyonga
UPCOMING EVENTS:
︎Mon, 25 May 2026— 18–20.30h: Lecture-perfomance in LA PALABRE Space– Unexpected lessons 1 at Radial System Berlin More info HERE
︎ Sat, 08 Aug 2026 —16-22h: Water Walk and Dinner at Barazani Berlin. More info soon HERE
︎Mon, 25 May 2026— 18–20.30h: Lecture-perfomance in LA PALABRE Space– Unexpected lessons 1 at Radial System Berlin More info HERE
︎ Sat, 08 Aug 2026 —16-22h: Water Walk and Dinner at Barazani Berlin. More info soon HERE
This contribution explores the concept of intersectionality through a more-than-human lens, focusing on water–land relations—ecotones—within urban space. Through a multisensorial format comprising an audio walk and a dialogical essay, Melanie and lyonga reflect on their global South situatedness as female, queer, disabled, non-white, non-German subjects living in Berlin—and as neighbors to one another.
The notion of neighboring (hn.lyonga, 2023) as a verb becomes their thread across different narratives in search of ecotones: complex spaces of intersection, tension, and conviviality between human and more-than-human neighbors. Drawing on reflections around gendered care work, water labor, and memory, this contribution reimagines intersectionality as fluid, relational, and continuously becoming—shaped by movement, responsibility, and embodied experience. Inviting the reader and listener to walk with them along three Berlin bodies of water—Weißensee, Plötzensee, and the Berlin canals—the contribution weaves stories of neighboring, belonging, and becoming in a city marked by layered histories of migration, exclusion, and transformation.
This contribution is part of Colab 1: Modes of Intersectional Conversations, which explores how we speak across difference and build solidarities in research connected to postcolonial, anti-racist, and postmigrant struggles. It emerges from the project Postcolonial Neighborhoods, within the DFG Research Unit project Collaborations: Assemblages, Articulations, Alliances at Universität Potsdam, which seeks to develop relational and transformative practices of knowledge production across divisions of power, epistemology, and institutional boundaries.
The start of this research was commissioned by the Postcolonial Neighborhoods project under the umbrella of the Research-Unit Collaborations, which is funded by the German Research Association (DFG)
