These five 10-minutes films will show the ways in which Berlin and Detroit are global from the perspectives of African immigration, and African imaginations of global futures. Berlin helps to elucidate what is distinctive about Detroit and vise versa. These films picture the distinctions between how African futures can be imagined in Europe versus the U.S., in Detroit versus Berlin. They reveal how race, citizenship, and humanitarian projects work in relation to African immigration in these two cities. They ask: What difference do the approaches to urban planning, districting, education, and social versus capital networks make? What kinds of communities can be formed? How do “Africans’’ relate to “Blackness’’ versus “foreignness’’ in both cities? What difference does it make to live in the city when one is a noncitizen?

Following the films showcase will be a Q&A with Damani Partridge, the project lead, and the filmmakers from Freedom House in Detroit: Ajara Hamidatu Alghali, Hawlaane Noor Frances Sarr-Robbins, Whitney Smith, and Fatou-Seydi Singhiam Sarr.

Reception to follow.