On September 22-24, the 8th Biennial Afroeuropeans Network Conference “Intersectional Challenges in Afroeuropean Communities” took place in Brussels, Belgium.

The MigraMediaActs project team presented the panel “Black Women Cinema” which sought to address audiovisual productions, festivals and the black experience of cinema made by women in Portugal.

Isabel Macedo, Gessica Borges and Kitty Furtado presenting their papers

The researcher Ana Cristina Pereira (Kitty Furtado) presented the paper “The cinema of Black Brazilian women in Portugal: the case of Maíra Zenum“. Making an overview of the presence of black Brazilian filmmakers in Portugal, the author reflected on the influence of black cinema in the creation of alternative artistic expressions.

Isabel Macedo presented the work “Black Women in the International Anti-Racist Film Festival (MICAR). Notes from interdisciplinary research“, focused on the results of the analysis of the festival programme, editions from 2018 to 2021.

The paper presented by Gessica Borges, a co-authored work with Michelle Sales, was entitled “Atlantic and Transatlantic black women artists from Portuguese culture” and dealt with the work and trajectory of the Afrodiasporic artist Vanessa Fernandes, drawing on concepts such as Paul Gilroy’s “Black Atlantic” and DuBois’ “double consciousness”.

Bringing together academics, writers, artists and activists, the conference aimed to consider how Afro-European communities are shaped by the intersections of ‘race’ and ethnicity with other markers of identification such as gender, class, sexuality, ability, age, citizenship status, language, among others. Seeking a multidimensional perspective between activism, policy and research, the conference explored how diverse processes of privilege and discrimination interact, creating complex and dynamic experiences of what it means to be Afro-European.

The keynotes were Kehinde Andrews, Mireille-Tsheusi Robert and Olivette Otele. Dozens of other people from 25 different countries participated in the event by presenting papers and interacting as listeners.