On the 20th anniversary of its release, Julie Dash will discuss her film "Daughters of the Dust" following the film's screening at Duke University on Thursday, Sept. 8.
The film, which kicks off the Duke African and African American Studies department film series, will be shown at 6 p.m. at the Nasher Museum of Art. A discussion with Dash and art history professor Richard Powell will follow the screening. The event is free and open to the public.
"With the spirited public conversations about films like 'Precious,' 'For Colored Girls' and, most recently, 'The Help,' it's clear that the moving image continues to be one of the critical sites of interests about the preservation and dissemination of images of black humanity," said Mark Anthony Neal, a professor of black popular culture at Duke and the event organizer. "With our film series, we are hoping to intervene in these conversations by highlighting the expansive range of films that reflect black experiences."
"Daughters of the Dust," released in 1991, was the first feature by an African-American woman to gain national theatrical release and was named to the National Film Registry, a collection of films deemed by the Library of Congress to be national treasures.
The film draws on Dash's South Carolina heritage and focuses on three generations of women with roots in the Sea Islands and Gullah culture. Set in 1902, "Daughters of the Dust" grapples with slavery's legacy, migration, sexual abuse and sexual freedom, and maintaining tradition amid modern pressures.
Dash's visit also will include screenings of her short film "Praise House," a collaboration with the founder and choreographer of Urban Bush Women.
The 2011-12 African and African American Studies film series, curated by Neal and history graduate student Cynthia Greenlee-Donnell, will continue in October with "Handsworth Songs" (1986), an experimental film documenting the 1985 racial unrest in Britain.
For more information, visit Duke's African and African American Studies website.