Nijla Mu’min is an award-winning writer and filmmaker from the East Bay Area. Her work is informed by poetry, photography, fiction, and dance. Named one of 25 New Faces of Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine in 2017, she tells stories about Black girls and women who find themselves between worlds and identities. Her debut feature film, Jinn, premiered at the 2018 South By Southwest Film Festival, where she won the Special Jury Recognition Award for Screenwriting. She’s written for the Starz series Blindspotting, the Apple series Swagger, and directed episodes of  HBO’s Insecure, Hulu’s Wu-Tang: An American Saga, Apple’s Swagger, and OWN’s Queen Sugar. She is currently developing her second feature film Mosswood Park, as well as a debut collection of poetry and prose essays. Her poems have been featured in Aunt Chloe: A Journal of Artful Candor, the Temz Review, and Mythium Literary Journal. She is a 2013 graduate of CalArts MFA Film Directing and Creative Writing Programs, and a 2007 graduate of UC Berkeley, where studied in June Jordan’s Poetry for the People Program.