Africans were limited in what roles they could take in film until the 1950s and 60s, when indigenous Africans began freeing themselves from colonial rule, however few women were given access to the creative process beyond acting. Director Safi Faye is credited as the first African woman to direct a film with the release of her 1975 film Kaddu Beykat, which film scholar N. Frank Ukadike has stated is indicative of a wider struggles by black filmmakers in the African diaspora.[4]:104 Filmmaker and author Tsitsi Dangarembga has cited patriarchal biases in the film industry and African society as reasons why African women in particular struggle as filmmakers.[5] Scholar Nancy Schmidt has further noted in 1997 that at the time there were only recently online platforms, publications, filmographies or bibliographies that acknowledged all the feature films, documentaries, shorts and works in video, television, and digital media that African women have directed over the past several decades.[6]