Mmakgosi Anita Tau (Botswana/United States)

Mmakgosi Anita Tau is a writer and award-winning filmmaker from Botswana based in the USA. Tau was born in Botswana in 1989 and holds a Master of Fine Arts in Film from Syracuse University. She completed her undergraduate studies in motion picture medium at AFDA Botswana and also studied journalism, international relations, and criminology at the University of Monash South Africa. Tau founded Mmakgosi Live, a project she undertook in Botswana, Ghana, and later the US, that uses poetry, art, film, dance, and theater to de-stigmatize mental illness and inspire artists to connect. She is a recipient of the British Council/Prince Claus Mobility Fund and was selected by the United States Department of State for the University of Iowa International Writing Program, Women’s Creative Mentorship Program. Tau is a Headlands Center for the Arts Artist in Residence 2023 as well as a recipient of The Donald and Genie Rice Residency – Yaddo Artist in Residence. She is also a recipient of two Creative Opportunity Grants and the Bryan Buckley Award for her short films. Tau was selected by the United States Department of State for the Mandela Washington Fellowship, a flagship program of the Young African Leaders Initiative, Drexel University, USA. 

Tau works in both fiction film and documentary and has made films in Botswana, Ethiopia, the US, and Zambia. She uses cinema to make films that uncover the Motswana woman in mainstream media and protest human rights violations and societal injustices. Her short film credits include Red, Pink and Black (2023), For Them That Prey (2023), Beneath These Walls (2022), Section 82 (2019), The Secret (2020), Moribo (2018), Amme Re Tla Lala Re Nyalane Ka Nako (2017), and Aphala (2017). Her television series credits for script writing include Bokgoba Ba Golegilwe (2018), Botshelo Jo (2021), and Colours (2017). She produced, shot, and directed Sojourner (2023), a meditative experimental piece. She is currently writing her memoir, doing research for her first feature length project and completing post-production on a short film titled Red, Pink, and Black (2023). Her films have screened in Botswana, Zambia, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Turkey, Canada, Cameroon, and the United States. She is also a published poet, has conducted community workshops on poetry and mental health, and as part of her MFA program taught

introductory filmmaking and scriptwriting. Her poetry, essays and flash fiction have been published in the University of Iowa’s Women’s Creative Mentorship Project Anthology, Brittle Paper, Water Stone Review, Kalahari Review, Drum Magazine and others. Tau is currently teaching Screenwriting, Filmmaking Concepts, and Multimedia Storytelling in Digital Platforms at The College of Visual and Performing Arts as well as S.I Newhouse School of Communications.