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Milisuthando Bongela

Director: Milisuthando

Milisuthando Bongela is an award winning writer, blogger and editor whose work pivots around the subject of the post-apartheid condition from the perspective of black middle class South Africans and women. She has written extensively about the intersections of race, class and gender in South Africa for publications like the Mail & Guardian, City Press, W Magazine, Dazed and Confused, Aperture Magazine, Elle and Colors as well as having worked across the arts in the fields of fashion, music, art, publishing and cultural activism. For three years she edited the Arts and Culture section of the weekly Mail & Guardian and is the co-creator of Umoya: On African Spirituality, a podcast that seeks to demystify African Spirituality in the 21st Century.

She is currently exploring the post-apartheid condition in South African society, focusing on the psychological effects of racism on Model C educated black South Africans through her first film, a Sundance, Field of Vision and Cinereach supported feature documentary currently titled Milisuthando. The film won the IDFA Most Promising Documentary Award at the Durban Film Mart in 2019 and The Whickers Award for the Best Pitch Award at Chicken & Egg Pitches at Sheffield Documentary Festival. Milisuthando was awarded an inaugural Adobe Women at Sundance Fellowship in 2020.