Kathleen Collins

For other people named Kathleen Collins, see Kathleen Collins (disambiguation).
Kathleen Collins
Born
Kathleen Conwell

(1942-03-18)March 18, 1942
Jersey City, New Jersey, U.S.
DiedSeptember 18, 1988(1988-09-18) (aged 46)
New York City, New York, U.S.
Other namesKathleen Conwell Collins;
Kathleen Collins Prettyman
Alma materSkidmore College; Harvard University; Paris-Sorbonne University
Occupation(s)Writer, playwright, author, filmmaker, educator
SpouseAlfred Prettyman
Children2
Websitekathleencollins.org/about

Kathleen Collins (March 18, 1942 – September 18, 1988) (also known as Kathleen Conwell, Kathleen Conwell Collins or Kathleen Collins Prettyman) was an American poet, playwright, writer, filmmaker, director, civil rights activist, and educator from Jersey City, New Jersey. Her two feature narratives – The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy (1980) and Losing Ground (1982) – furthered the range of Black women's films. Although Losing Ground was denied large-scale exhibition, it was among the first films created by a Black woman deliberately designed to tell a story intended for popular consumption, with a feature-length narrative structure.[1] Collins thus paved the way for Julie Dash's Daughters of the Dust (1991) to become the first feature-length narrative film created by a Black woman to be placed in commercial distribution. Influenced by Lorraine Hansberry, she wrote about "African Americans as human subjects and not as mere race subjects" [emphasis in the original].[2]

  1. ^ Bobo, Jacqueline (1998). black women film and video artists. Routledge. pp. 8–9. ISBN 0-415-92041-8.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference Nelson2005 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).