The purpose of the African Women in Cinema Blog is to provide a space to discuss diverse topics relating to African women in cinema--filmmakers, actors, producers, and all film professionals. The blog is a public forum of the Centre for the Study and Research of African Women in Cinema.

Le Blog sur les femmes africaines dans le cinéma est un espace pour l'échange d'informations concernant les réalisatrices, comédiennes, productrices, critiques et toutes professionnelles dans ce domaine. Ceci sert de forum public du Centre pour l'étude et la recherche des femmes africaines dans le cinémas.

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18 October 2026

Film Africa : African Women and Cinema, centrepiece symposium - 24 October

Film Africa :
African Women and Cinema, centrepiece symposium 
24 October @ 8:00 am - 12:00 pm

Description:

Twende: African Women and Cinema is the centrepiece symposium of Film Africa 2026, presented with BFI Southbank. Filmmakers, producers, curators, archivists and cultural practitioners come together for five public conversations:

-Reclaiming the History: African Women Who Shaped Cinema
-Who Owns the Story? Women, Authorship and Representation 
-From Africa to the World: Funding, Festivals and Power 
-The Archive Is Not Neutral: Preserving African Women's Cinema
-A New Generation: Where Does African Women's Cinema Go From Here?

17 October 2026

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates International Day of the Intangible Cultural Heritage - 17 October

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates International Day of the Intangible Cultural Heritage - 17 October

UNESCO describes the “intangible cultural heritage” as practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills – as well as the instruments, objects, artefacts and cultural spaces associated therewith – that communities, groups and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage. This intangible cultural heritage, transmitted from generation to generation, is constantly recreated by communities and groups in response to their environment, their interaction with nature and their history, and provides them with a sense of identity and continuity, thus promoting respect for cultural diversity and human creativity. For the purposes of this Convention, consideration will be given solely to such intangible cultural heritage as is compatible with existing international human rights instruments, as well as with the requirements of mutual respect among communities, groups and individuals, and of sustainable development. https://ich.unesco.org/en/convention

African women, cinema and cultural heritage
 
African women screen practitioners have played an important role in the promotion and preservation of African cultural heritages. Moreover, their engagement as cultural producers of screen culture ensures the visualization of the vast cultural treasures of the African continent.

Following are relevant articles on practices of cultural heritage on the African Women in Cinema Blog:

Femme, cinéma et valorisation du patrimoine culturel au Cameroun | Women, cinema and the cultural heritage preservation of Cameroon - Conférence
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2021/03/femme-cinema-et-valorisation-du.html

Soussaba Cisse Bogo Ja Mali
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2020/12/recent-films-soussaba-cisse-bogo-ja-mali.html

Sarah Maldoror: Pioneer
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2020/04/pionniere-cineaste-sarah-maldoror-nous.html

Joyce Jenje-Makwenda - Women in Film and Television in Zimbabwe: Modern Storytellers
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2019/08/joyce-jenje-makwenda-women-in-film-and.html

Safi Faye: A song to women
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2019/05/black-camera-safi-fayes-mossane-song-to.html

Words of/La parole à Marthe Djilo Kamga & Frieda Ekotto : Vibrancy of Silence: A Discussion With My Sisters
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2019/03/words-ofla-parole-marthe-djilo-kamga.html

Remembering Khady Sylla: Djia Mambu interviews Mariama Sylla, producer and co-director of “A Single Word” (with the late Khady Sylla)
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2014/10/remembering-khady-sylla-djia-mambu.html

Anita Afonu: Preserving Ghana's Cinematic Treasures
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2013/12/anita-afonu-preserving-ghanas-cinematic.html

Marie-Clémence Paes: “there are treasures that are transmitted from generation to generation by word of mouth”
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/12/marie-clemence-paes-there-are-treasures.html

Women and Intangible Cultural Heritage: The experience of the “creative” documentary film in sub-Sahara Africa
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/09/women-and-intangible-cultural-heritage.html

Rahma Benhamou El Madani: "I try to connect to my roots through my films"
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/01/rahma-benhamou-el-madani-i-try-to.html

Mis Me Binga 2018 – Mireille Niyonsaba : Tresor Tissé | Woven Treasure (Burundi)
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2018/06/mis-me-binga-2018-mireille-niyonsaba.html

Katy Lena Ndiaye's walls of women, women's words
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2014/04/katy-lena-ndiayes-walls-of-women-womens.html

Fatou Kande Senghor: My work my passion
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2011/01/fatou-kande-senghor-my-work-my-passion.html

Hachimiya Ahamada: Dreams from the Comoros
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.fr/2011/12/hachimiya-ahamada-dreams-from-comoros.html

Women and Intangible Cultural Heritage: The experience of the “creative” documentary film in sub-Sahara Africa
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/09/women-and-intangible-cultural-heritage.html

Tsitsi Dangarembga: Critical cultural debate
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2011/12/towards-critical-debate-nyaminyami.html

Rama Thiaw a filmmaker in the Struggle
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.fr/2011/09/rama-thiaw-young-filmmaker-in-struggle.html

Annette Mbaye d'Erneville: Mère-bi
http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2010/09/annette-mbaye-derneville-mere-bi.html

Horria Saihi: A portrait
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2010/01/horria-saihi-portrait.html

Chantal Bagilishya: "Special Tribute to one of Africa’s treasures in the world of cinema" by Seipati Bulane Hopa
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2009/10/seipati-bulane-hopa-chantal-bagilishya.html

16 October 2026

Miu Miu présente Geste de consolation, un projet imaginé par Alice Diop | Gesture of consolation, a project by Alice Diop

Miu Miu présente Geste de consolation, un projet imaginé par Alice Diop

Image: Miu Miu

Description :

« Geste de Consolation » se concentre sur une seule question qui traverse l’ensemble de l’œuvre de Diop en tant que cinéaste, la déployant ici sous la forme d’une scénographie multimédia. « Je souhaite que l’exposition que j’organise en tant que commissaire soit centrée sur les actes de consolation conçus par des artistes femmes noires, chacune dans sa propre discipline, afin de réparer les torts causés par le regard fétichisant auquel des siècles d’histoire de l’art nous ont confinées », déclare Diop. « Geste de Consolation » devient un chœur qui célèbre la créativité noire et s’interroge sur la manière dont le regard s’est constitué à partir des représentations mêmes qu’il affronte, images qui continuent de hanter et de façonner le moment présent.

"Geste de Consolation" focuses on the one question that traverses Alice Diop’s corpus of work as a filmmaker; deploying it here in the form of a multimedia scenography. "I hope that the exhibition that I have curated focuses on the acts of consolation conceived by black women artists, each in their own discipline, in order to repair the wrongs caused by the fetishizing gaze in which centuries of art history have confined us," declares Alice Diop. "Geste de Consolation" becomes a choir that celebrates black creativity and questions the manner in which the gaze was constructed from the very representations that confronts it, images that continue to manifest itself and hence, shape the present moment.


Le Monde: At the Palais d'Iéna, filmmaker Alice Diop showcases the black women artists who have "strengthened" her

From October 21 to 25, the filmmaker Alice Diop will be entrusted with the keys to the Palais d'Iéna, an invitation by Miuccia Prada [head designer of Prada and founder of Miu Miu], as part of the Art Basel Paris contemporary art fair. Intermingling the intimate and the collective, her exhibition is dedicated in large part of black women, such as the sculptor Simone Leigh.

"I turned to the women who have inspired me over the past three years, a pivotal period for me. I had constructed my cinema on the desire to make a case for my formative years growing up as a black woman in France. I needed to be heard, to render justice to this violence, this anger. However’ now, I no longer need to convince. I have been strengthened by the works of these women. To showcase them is for me a gesture that is at the same time very personal and very collective."

Source, translated from French: https://www.lemonde.fr/m-styles/article/2026/10/18/au-palais-d-iena-la-cineaste-alice-diop-met-en-lumiere-les-artistes-noires-qui-l-ont-fortifiee_6797043_4497319.html

15 October 2026

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates International Day of Rural Women - Oct 15

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates
International Day of Rural Women - Oct 15

Achieving gender equality and empowering women is not only the right thing to do but is a critical ingredient in the fight against extreme poverty, hunger and climate change.

Women are responsible for half of the world’s food production while working as environmental and biodiversity stewards.

Under the theme “The Rise of Rural Women: Building Resilient Futures with Beijing+30,” this International Day promoted by UN Women seeks to shed light on the inequalities they still face; advocate for their recognition and participation in decision-making; demand stronger social protection systems; and reduce the digital divide. The commemoration aligns with the spirit of Beijing+30, a global plan for gender equality focused on eradicating poverty, achieving climate justice, and ensuring the full participation of all women and girls in sustainable development. Wherever they live. (https://www.un.org/en/observances/rural-women-day)
 
Safi Faye, ethnologist, cineaste, peasant, mother—she claims these intersecting selves with pride. This simultaneity of identities exemplifies the multiplicity of her life in the same way that she reflects them in her films and their characters. Hence, such a portrait shows the interconnection of her experiences—whether in Africa, the countryside, Europe, while demystifying conceptions of African women as a whole—and in particular rural-dwelling African women. Throughout her life and through her films, empowering, giving voice, has been her leitmotif.

What her films show is that the lives of peasants do matter. They have agency, a voice, stories to tell and ideas about life and living. When Safi went there to study and film in the 1970s, she went as a native daughter, as she proudly states, “je suis paysanne” (I am a peasant). During the film production process she integrates the camera into the scene. The native daughter has come to film, she sits in her place and listens. And so does the camera.

She ends Kaddu Beykat (1975) in this way: “This letter is from me, all the rest is from my farmer family; I want to thank them…These are the words of the peasant, kaddu beykat. I dedicate my film to my grandfather, who was a farmer all of his life and who died eleven days after the shooting. I end my letter with a warm farewell.”

Safi Faye’s films are first and foremost a homage to the peasantry, the rural world, of people whose tool for survival and making a living is the land: to work is to draw from and replenish the earth, the terrain, the soil.

Excerpted from:“I dared to make a film”: A Tribute to the Life and Work of Safi Faye by Beti Ellerson, Black Camera: An International Film Journal 15. 1 (Fall 2023).
 

11 October 2026

UN : International Day of the Girl Child | Journée internationale de la fille - Oct 11



The day aims to highlight and address the needs and challenges girls face, while promoting girls' empowerment and the fulfillment of their human rights.

Cette Journée vise à mettre en lumière les besoins des filles et à répondre aux défis auxquels elles font face. Cette Journée promeut également l'autonomisation des filles et l'exercice de leurs droits fondamentaux.

The girl-child as main protagonist in a selection of recent films by African women  

La petite fille comme protagoniste principale dans une sélection de films récents par les réalisatrices africaines

Source: African Women in Cinema Blog 

[English]

The filmmakers' message of tolerance and universal humanism comes through the children…child characters are represented as the hope for the desirable gender relations. (Sr. Dr. Dominica Dipio)

In the selection of films that follow, the girl-child plays the main protagonist. This representation of the girl character is an empowering practice as she deals with complex issues regarding her family and the world around her: Five-year-old Nadia lives in the slums of Casablanca where she is surrounded by a wall that separates her from the rest of the city; Elikia, is a five-year old with albinism, which is considered a stereotype by her neighbors; nine-year-old Zeinab opposes moving to Canada because she hates the snow; ten-year-old Mouna who copes with the death of her mother, almost never separates from her doll Ashia; ten-year-old Godelive attends a Catholic convent school in the Congo. However, the strict western education collides with her own memories of the traditions of her grandmother; eight-year-old Aida attempts to ease the suffering of her mother after her father brings a second wife into the household; after being accused of being a witch and placed in a "witches camp", 9-year-old Shula longs for freedom. Seven-year-old Aya lives with her Salafist parents, Mariem and Youssef. For fear of being banished by his Salafist community, Youssef is obliged to impose the wearing of Niqab on his wife. One day, Aya commits an act that will disrupt forever the fate of her family. Casablanca of the late 1970s. Eleven-year-old Hiba is fascinated with the cinema at a time in the history of Morocco where this space is still closed to women. Despite her mother’s interdiction, in order to enter the movie house, Hiba is ready to sell the object of her other passion, her books. Eleven-year-old pre-teen Amy discovers in her new elementary school a group of dancers called: “Les Mignonnes”. Fascinated, she begins a sexy dance, the twerk, hoping to join their band and escape a family upheaval.


[Français]

Le message de tolérance et d'humanisme universel des cinéastes passe par les enfants ... les personnages d'enfants sont représentés comme l'espoir des relations de genre souhaitables. (Sr. Dr. Dominica Dipio)

Dans une sélection de films récents ci-dessous, la petite fille joue le rôle principal. Cette représentation cinématographique nous montre une image forte et valorisante de la petite fille, lorsqu’elle confronte des questions complexes concernant sa famille et le monde qui l’entoure : Mouna, 10 ans, qui fait face à la mort de sa mère, ne se sépare presque jamais de sa poupée Aisha ; Elikia, 5 ans, est atteinte d’albinisme que son voisinage considère comme un stéréotype ; Nadia, 5 ans, vit dans les bidonvilles de Casablanca où elle est entourée d'un mur qui la sépare du reste de la ville ; Godelive, 10 ans, vit dans un pensionnat catholique en Congo y recevant une éducation occidentale. Mais le souvenir de sa grand-mère s’interpose ; Zeinab, qui a neuf ans, ne veux pas vivre au Canada parce qu’elle n’aime pas la neige; Aida, 8 ans, tente de soulager la souffrance de sa mère après que le père amène une seconde femme à la maison; Shula, qui a neuf ans, accusée de sorcellerie et mise dans un camp de sorcières, rêve de liberté. Aya, 7 ans, vit avec ses parents salafistes, Mariem et Youssef. Par peur d'être banni par sa communauté salafiste, Youssef est contraint d'imposer le port du Niqab à sa femme. Un jour, Aya commet un acte qui bouleversera à jamais le destin de sa famille. Casablanca, fin des années 70. Hiba, âgée de 11 ans, est fascinée par le cinéma à un moment de l'histoire du Maroc où ce lieu est encore fermé à la gente féminine. Malgré l'interdiction de sa mère, elle est prête à revendre l'objet de son autre passion, ses livres, pour y entrer. Amy, 11 ans, rencontre un groupe de danseuses appelé : « Les Mignonnes ». Fascinée, elle s’initie à une danse sensuelle, dans l’espoir d’intégrer leur bande et de fuir un bouleversement familial.
 

See other Blog posts relating to the empowerment of the girl-child:
 
Rural to city migration and the plight of girls? - Aïssata Ouarma: The Silence of Other
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/10/aissata-ouarma-silence-of-others.html

The girl-child as main protagonist in a selection of recent films by African women
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2018/10/11-october-octobre-2018-international.html

Girlpower: African Black Girl Magic through Cinema & Animation Storytelling
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2022/03/girlpower-african-black-girl-magic.html

The making of: Aïcha Macky, empowering girls through participatory video training | l’autonomisation des filles à travers la formation en vidéo participative
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2023/12/the-making-of-aicha-macky-empowering.html

Aïcha Macky: using the power of the camera to give voice to her community and her country, Niger | se servir du pouvoir de la caméra pour faire entendre des voix de sa communauté et de son pays
https://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2023/12/aicha-macky-using-power-of-camera-to.html
 

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