Women Screenwriters: South Africa

Abstract

Emerging from this research undertaken to map the presence of women screenwriters in the South African film industry, are two significant findings: first, an awareness that while a few women of colour have begun to enter the filmmaking sector, they remain at the margins of the mainstream film industry, writing primarily for documentaries and short films and, secondly, the complete absence of black African women screenwriters. The reasons for this are unclear, and suggest that further research is warranted into the structural factors that continue to hamper the participation of women of colour – and black African women, in particular – in the film industry in South Africa, other than as actresses.