Julie Dash’s rapturous vision of Black womanhood and vanishing ways of life in the turn-of-the-century South was the first film directed by an African American woman to receive a wide release. Set in 1902, it follows a multigenerational family in the Gullah community on the Sea Islands off the coast of South Carolina—former West African slaves who carried on many of their ancestors’ Yoruba traditions—as they struggle to maintain their cultural heritage and folklore while contemplating a migration to the mainland, even further from their roots. Awash in gorgeously poetic, sun-dappled images that are at once dreamlike and precise, Daughters of the Dust forges a radical new visual language rooted in Black femininity and the rituals of Gullah culture. 

Tickets

• $9 general admission; $7 MFAH members, students with ID, seniors (65+)

Plan Your Visit

• This screening takes place in the Brown Auditorium Theater in the Law Building.
• Parking Information | Museum Hours | MFAH Campus Map

Print courtesy of the UCLA Film & Television Archive