Julie Dash

Julie Dash

African American Literature Book Club - The #1 Site for "Readers of Black Literature"

AALBC.com Home • Back • Author Home • Up • Next • Author Profiles • Book Profiles • Writer's Resources • Reviews • Events • About Us • Buy Any Book • Advertise

About Julie Dash

Celebrated filmmaker Julie Dash came under the public's eye in 1991 when her feature film DAUGHTERS OF THE DUST won for best cinematography at the Sundance Film Festival. Since then, she has been hard at work. In the past year, she's completed a Grammy-nominated video for Tracey Chapman, a film for Showtime, and a segment for the HBO anthology SUBWAY STORIES, which was produced by Rosie Perez and Jonathan Demme. A former fellow of the American Film Institute, she is presently at work on a new film project as well as a second novel.

Daughters of Dust
Click Title to Order

Pub. Date: September 1997
Format: Hardcover, 336pp.

Read an AALBC review of Daughters of the Dust

Read the transcript of an on-line featuring Julie Dash discussing "Daughters of the Dust"

If the film DAUGHTERS OF THE DUST was an introduction to the remarkable Peazant family, the novel of the same title sits you down at their dinner table. With sharp detail, Julie Dash turns her cinematic eye to literature. Using the same veritas that made her film a success, the book returns to the Sea Islands off the South Carolina coast, and opens as Amelia Peazant travels south from New York to her mother's childhood home. This is no ordinary trip -- Amelia plans to collect family stories for her anthropology thesis. But the story gains momentum as Amelia transforms herself from a bystander to a woman with lore of her own.

Amelia's citified facade thankfully falters as her presumptions about her "backwoods" relatives prove mistaken. In the course of listening to the oral traditions that compose her clan's history, Amelia realizes for the first time in her life that she is home. She turns inward, examines her motives for the study, and remembers the value of family. Watching Amelia's progress is her cousin Elizabeth, who is considering leaving home as Amelia returns to it. The book ends on a lucidly decisive and pleasing note for both women, adding new texture to the phrase "you can never go home again." Julie Dash has created a stunning celebration of family and heritage.