— Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

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Sara Bruya is a screenwriter and producer whose work bridges decades of academic expertise in African diaspora studies with cross-cultural lived experience.

 

Recognition & Experience
 

• Grand Prize | The Bitter End | Mystic Film Festival Short Narrative Screenplay Competition 2025

• Finalist | Stowe Narrative Labs 2025

• Producer | Nearly Departed | Missoula, MT 2025

• City Producer | 48 Hour Film Project, Tampa Bay 2024

• Selection Committee | Austin Film Festival, Sunscreen Film Festival, Dunedin International Film Festival, Yes We Cannes (48HFP)

• Event Producer, First Night Missoula, Germanfest, New Zealand Day

• Peace Corps Volunteer, Gabon 2002-2004

• Founding Editor, Sarah Lawrence College Phoenix
   

Current Work
As a screenwriter, Sara creates narrative scripts that amplify untold perspectives and histories. Her projects in development include:
 

• Island of Healing — A multi-season dramatic series following three generations of a family across the U.S., Curaçao, and the Netherlands, exploring identity, family separation, and the global ripple effects of systemic racism.

• Borderlands — A dramatic series, inspired by true events, presenting a revisionist history of Montana's gold rush years through the perspectives of Indigenous, Black, Chinese, Jewish, and Métis communities.
   

Background
For nearly two decades, Sara has worked under Henry Louis Gates, Jr. as Managing Editor of publications for Harvard's Hutchins Center for African & African American Research, where she:
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• Serves as Managing Editor of the Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race

• Served as Managing Editor of Transition: The Magazine of Africa and the Diaspora (2010-2017)

• Initiated collaboration with Jalada Africa that produced the acclaimed "Fear" issue of Transition (2017), forged at the Writivism festival in Kampala, Uganda and launched at the British Library in London. This issue, under Sara's leadership, was the first to be printed and distributed on the African continent since the 1970s

• Created an ongoing issue launch event series at Harvard Book Store

• Built deep relationships with African diaspora writers, scholars, and artists across continents

• Gathered editors across Harvard University for networking and skill-sharing
   

Education
 

• MTS, Harvard Divinity School | Critical Pedagogy

• MA, Emerson College | Intercultural Communications & Citizen Diplomacy

• BA, Sarah Lawrence College | Liberal Arts