"La Negrada": The recognition of Afro-Mexican communities on the big screen

“La Negrada”, by director Jorge Perez Solano, has been a big deal since its release in Mexico on August 10th. The film that recently premiered in Mexico City has made history as Mexico’s first feature film with an all-Black cast. Solano enlisted locals and non-professional actors to star in the film, contributing to the slow but long overdue recognition of Afro-Latinos communities on the big screen.

In Mexico, Afro-Mexicans represent one percent of the total population, but they are not recognized as an official ethnic group and face racism on a daily basis. These Afro-Mexicans are descendants of slaves, including the most famous of them, Gaspard Yanga, from a royal family in Gabon, who became the first freed slave at the end of the 16th century.He founded the village of Yanga in Veracruz, where traces of this African presence can be found to this day.