Dmitry Kapitelman
- The smile of my invisible father
Dmitrij Kapitelman came to Germany at the age of eight as a “contingent refugee”. At that time the family lived in a Saxon home for asylum seekers, Nazis could be recognized by their bald heads. Years later, the father is as little at home in Germany as he was in the Ukraine. After Dmitrij has adopted his father’s Jewish surname at his father’s request, both travel to Israel – a search for identity. Because, he believes, everyone needs identity, even if only “to emancipate themselves from it”.
The conversation for the book, which was published in 2016, also revolves around the language we use today to talk about Jewish issues, which all too often reflects Nazi concepts – due to political extremism or ignorance.
Kapitelman, born 1986 in Kiev, studied political science in Leipzig and graduated from the German School of Journalism, Munich. He is a freelance journalist and publishes music under the artist name Dheema.
In the series Thought – Language – Mind
