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October 12, 1998
Loni Ding, an award-winning independent filmmaker focusing on Asian American history and culture, will give a public lecture at UCSC this fall.
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Loni Ding
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Ding is visiting UCSC as part of the Alumni Association's Distinguished Visiting Professor program, which brings an outstanding scholar or teacher to UCSC each year. This year, two "distinguished lecturers" are expected to visit UCSC. The second lecturer has yet to be named.
During her stay at UCSC, Ding is teaching a five-credit course, The Art, Craft, and Politics of Media Intervention, at Merrill College. In the class, students are learning about the process of creating a multimedia product, from envisioning the idea to planning how to present the chosen subject in an engaging way.
In the class, students are discussing selected films and videos. Ding also plans a "modest" multimedia project that the entire class will work on together.
Ding will present two of her films, Coolies, Sailors, Settlers: Voyage to the New World and The Chinese in the Frontier West: An American Story on Monday, November 16, starting at 7 p.m. in Merrill Dining Hall. The films are part of her three-part series, Ancestors in the Americas.
The presentation will be followed by a panel discussion featuring Ding, UCSC associate professor of history Dilip Basu (who is featured in Coolies, Sailors, Settlers and acted as a key adviser on the piece), UCSC associate professor of American studies Judy Yung, and Cabrillo College history instructor Sandy Lydon, author of Chinese Gold.
In addition, Ding will speak at the Alumni Association's monthly downtown luncheon on Wednesday, November, 11, at India Joze in Santa Cruz.
Ding uses what she calls a "docu-memoir" approach in her productions to create a first-person voice representing thoughts and attitudes common to the people whose history the story reveals. She draws from conventional historical records such as census tracts, newspaper accounts, birth and death registers, and period literature, but also from folklore, archaeological sites, and artifacts. Historical analysis in the films is guided by interwoven commentaries from present-day scholars.
Ding acts as writer, producer, director, and editor of her documentaries. Her credits include Color of Honor and Nisei Soldier, both of which focus on Japanese American soldiers in WWII; With Silk Wings, a three-part series on Asian American women and their work; Bean Sprouts, a series for Chinese American children; and Ancestors in the Americas, which focuses on the history of Asian immigration and settlement in North and South America and the Caribbean.
Major funding for the first two segments of Ancestors in the Americas was provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities. The third will be funded by a grant from the MacArthur Foundation.
The Distinguished Visiting Professor program is supported by an endowment and sponsored by the Alumni Association to enhance academic programs at UCSC's eight colleges. The professorship rotates among the colleges.
For more information about the Alumni Association, call the Alumni Office at (831) 459-2530. For information about the November 16 presentation, call 459-5836.