Third World Newsreel Celebrates Preservation of Groundbreaking Audre Lorde Documentary A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL
BROOKLYN, NY, December 16, 2025 — Third World Newsreel announces the preservation of A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL: THE LIFE AND WORK OF AUDRE LORDE, the most comprehensive portrait of the legendary feminist and self-described "Black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet" ever committed to film. In a cultural moment when Black and queer histories face systemic erasure—over 20,000 books banned in the last few years, 403 university DEI programs dismantled, federal agencies have stripped LGBTQIA+ terminology from public documents—this preservation is a political necessity.
In partnership with Black women-led cultural institutions Black Public Media, BlackStar Projects, Black Women Radicals, Firelight Media, and Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project (QWOCMAP), a two-day premiere in January will bring together community and filmmakers Ada Gay Griffin and Michelle Parkerson. On January 28, Gladys Books & Wine, the Black lesbian bookstore and lounge in Bed-Stuy, will host a salon-style conversation on preservation as resistance. On January 29, Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) will screen the preserved film with a Q&A featuring both filmmakers.
"This isn't just about saving a film. It's about demonstrating what it looks like when a community claims its archive as a political act," JT Takagi, Executive Director, Third World Newsreel.
Directed by Ada Gay Griffin and Michelle Parkerson and produced by Third World Newsreel, A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL contains irreplaceable exclusive footage and interviews with Lorde herself, primary source material for understanding one of the twentieth century's most essential voices. What distinguished Griffin and Parkerson's approach was their collaboration with Lorde, who actively participated in shaping how her story would be told. This practice was radical in 1995 but reflects what is now recognized as essential to ethical documentary filmmaking.
Black and LGBTQIA+ communities have always safeguarded their own cultural artifacts in the face of institutional abandonment or active erasure. We've built our own archival methods: oral histories, chosen family networks, underground publications, community centers, and collaborative media-making. A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL is itself a living example of this tradition—filmmakers from within the community documenting history in partnership with the person whose life they honor. This preservation project continues that practice.
Audre Lorde would have turned 92 this coming February, and while she didn't live to see the current wave of censorship, she understood the forces behind it. She wrote about how power maintains itself through silence, through erasure, through making certain lives unspeakable. She also wrote about survival—not passive endurance, but active, defiant continuation. The film's title comes from her poem of the same name.
"Sharing the newly preserved A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL creates momentum for protecting other histories under threat," says Griffin. "One preserved film opens space for more preservation work. One community claiming their archive as a political act ignites other communities to do the same."
"We were thrilled to screen this powerful and beautiful film at BlackStar in 2024, and we're especially excited that it has been newly restored for generations to come." - Maori Karmael Holmes, Chief Executive & Artistic Officer, BlackStar.
The preservation as resistance campaign including the preservation of the film A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL, is presented by Color Congress, through its Elev8Docs Marketing Initiative, and Third World Newsreel. Hosting venues are Gladys Books & Wine and the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). Presenting Partners: Color Congress, Third World Newsreel, Black Public Media, BlackStar, Firelight Media, and Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project (QWOCMAP).
For more information or to schedule an interview with the filmmakers:
Chana Ginelle Ewing, littlebigworld,team@littlebigworld.co |
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CELEBRATION SCHEDULE
Wednesday, January 28, 2026, 6pm: Reception at Gladys Books & Wine (Bed-Stuy), featuring a salon-style conversation on preservation as resistance and the role of art and media in safeguarding Black and queer histories.
Thursday, January 29, 2026, 7pm: Screening of the preserved A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL and Q&A with filmmakers Ada Gay Griffin and Michelle Parkerson at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
ABOUT ADA GAY GRIFFIN
Ada Gay Griffin, co-director of A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL, is an activist working in electronic media and film production. Formerly executive director of Third World Newsreel, she has dedicated her career to ensuring a flourishing future for progressive artists of color. She studied art, political science, and Black feminist writing at Hampshire College, where she encountered the works of Audre Lorde. Griffin previously directed and produced Can't Jail the Revolution and Break the Walls Down, and developed Black in a Small Town, a documentary series exploring issues of race and class in semi-rural areas. She is currently the administrative director for Dreams of Hope: Queer Youth Arts in Pittsburgh.
ABOUT MICHELLE PARKERSON
Michelle Parkerson, co-director of A LITANY FOR SURVIVAL is a writer, independent filmmaker, university lecturer, and performance artist from Washington, D.C. She has served on the faculties of Temple University, the University of Delaware, Howard University, and Northwestern University. Her films include But Then She's Betty Carter and Gotta Make This Journey: Sweet Honey in the Rock (both seen on PBS). In 1992, she received a Rockefeller Foundation Film/Video Fellowship. As a member of the American Film Institute's Directing Workshop for Women, she wrote and directed Odds and Ends, a science-fiction short about Black Amazon warriors. Among her recent short documentaries are Fierceness Served! The ENIKAlley Coffeehouse, archiving a 1980s DC Black LGBTQ+ cultural hub, and Camille A. Brown: GIANT STEPS for PBS American Masters/Firelight Media (Co-directed with Shellée Haynesworth) which was nominated for a 2025 NAACP Image Award.
ABOUT THIRD WORLD NEWSREEL
Since 1968, Third World Newsreel (TWN) has advanced movement storytelling and media arts for cultural and social justice. It champions the self-representation of historically marginalized communities, working in production, distribution, exhibition, preservation and training. It aims to creatively activate audiences and nurture progressive emerging artists. A Litany for Survival is a Third World Newsreel production.
ABOUT COLOR CONGRESS
Color Congress is an ecosystem-builder that is committed to organizations led by people of color that serve nonfiction filmmakers, leaders, and audiences of color across the United States and US islands. Color Congress serves this ecosystem by supporting, resourcing, connecting and championing these organizations to build their collective power. Elev8Docs is a learning initiative supporting research for over two dozen nonfiction films by directors of color, all nominated by our member organization
ABOUT BLACK PUBLIC MEDIA
Black Public Media (BPM), formerly the National Black Programming Consortium, is a nonprofit dedicated to developing, funding, and distributing media about the global Black experience for public television and digital platforms. BPM serves as an incubator for Black filmmakers, storytellers, and diverse voices through training, investment, and strategic partnerships to achieve media representation and cultural equity.
ABOUT BLACKSTAR
BlackStar Projects, founded in 2012 by Maori Karmael Holmes as BlackStar Film Festival, creates the spaces and resources needed to uplift the work of Black, Brown and Indigenous artists working outside the confines of genre. Beyond the annual film festival the organization produces year-round programs, including film screenings, exhibitions, a filmmaker seminar, a film production lab and a journal of film, art and visual culture.
ABOUT BLACK WOMEN RADICALS
Black Women Radicals (BWR) is a Black feminist advocacy organization dedicated to uplifting and centering Black women and gender expansive people's radical political activism. Rooted in intersectional and transnational Black feminisms and Womanisms, BWR empowers Black transgender, queer, and cisgender radical women and gender expansive activists by centering their political, intellectual, and cultural contributions across time, space, and place in Africa and the African Diaspora.
ABOUT FIRELIGHT MEDIA
Firelight Media, co-founded by Stanley Nelson and Marcia Smith in 2000, builds careers for documentary filmmakers of color, advances equity in the film industry, and champions authentic storytelling by and about communities of color. Firelight offers mentorship, funding, and training through programs like the Documentary Lab, connecting filmmakers with opportunities and audiences.
ABOUT QWOCMAP
QWOCMAP-Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project - founded in 2000 by filmmaker Madeleine Lim, whose film Sambal Belacan in San Francisco has been banned by the government of Singapore since 1997 - empowers queer women of color and gender nonconforming/trans people of color to create media through culturally responsive filmmaking and free training, and support, and funding. QWOCMAP challenges stereotypes, builds community, and drives social justice through storytelling and artist-activism, providing professional development, production resources, mentorship, and screening platforms free of charge.
For press and partnership inquiries: team@littlebigworld.co

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