Like Dolls, I’ll Rise

Between 1840 and 1940, anonymous women in the United States made large numbers of beautiful children’s dolls out of black fabric. Few of these dolls have survived. The film focuses on the dolls in Debbie Neff’s private collection. The 200 handmade black dolls weave together a poetic and political film that gives voice, from one century to the next, to the struggles of African American women. The narration in the film was pieced together from texts by black women, authors and activists from this period and beyond.