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Welcome to everybody with Angela Williamson and innovation, Arts, education and public affairs program.

Everybody, with Angela Williamson is made possible by viewers like you.

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And now your host, doctor Angela Williamson.

I'm delighted to welcome award winning documentary filmmaker and cinematographer Lindsay Chang to our conversation tonight.

Lindsay, thank you so much for being here.

It's an honor to be here.

And you.

I love documentary filmmakers, but I extremely love educators who are documentary filmmakers in your both.

How did you end up, you know, as an educator and a documentary filmmaker?

Well, I think looking back on my creative work, as an architect and filmmaker and as an educator, I see there's a strand of social justice that kind of runs through all three things.

As educators, architect.

And, I actually worked in architecture for about a decade.

And, at that time that, I guess that work would be at that time was deemed, socially conscious architecture.

I worked for a community based organization in San Francisco called Asian Neighbor Design, Asian neighbor design, community based organization that was actually started by, UC Berkeley architecture students in the 70s.

There were these, architecture students, like, I guess, coming out of the ethnic pride movement in 70s, you know, and all that was happening.

And these architecture students, wanted to use their burgeoning skills to help their community.

So they created they created this organization, to help, like, start specifically to help Chinatown.

And, so I worked for work for that, for that organization.

I guess ten years after its formation and the work we were doing there was, I guess I would say it's actually beyond socially conscious.

It was actually social justice architecture because the work we're doing there.

Working with other community based organizations.

I was designing buildings, for communities that were essentially marginalized.

And I'd say if you don't mind being a little political, you know, oppressed by American society.

We designed low income welcome housing and community facilities, and that was all part of a body of work that was trying to address the inequities in American society.

So that was that was the first part of my creative work, but that had this, this important component of trying to, address the inequities in American society.

It was a real honor to work for that.

And the people we work with, you know, with the Chinese Community Housing Corporation, the Mission Housing Corporation, and those, those kinds of, organizations.

So it was yeah, it was like a very kind of like special or specific, architecture.

Specialized, but it's specialized in a way, because it's addressing social issues associated with housing.

And, I mean, you're taking such a different look at that.

And it at that point, I know that you worked with them for ten years.

How do you start to look at these issues and change the way that you use your craft and get into documentary filmmaking?

Does that happen for you, or do you move into education?

Well, I went into filmmaking.

Like literally as a result of having an epiphany in my head at my architecture drawing desk one day where it was like, if I'm being completely honest.

Yeah, it was.

It was like this motion graphic thing.

You know, how those things start at the beginning of like, which is where the things fly into themselves and create kind of like a puzzle out of this thing.

It was kind of like that for me.

Like, you're over this.

I just, I just stand and like all these things, like fluent I had, and assemble themselves like a puzzle where it seemed like one of my many different interests that, like photography and architecture, but also sound and music and also social issues that perhaps all those things could come together in this, in the medium of film or cinema and so it's kind of this is this kind of this moment where I thought that might be a good place to, to, to take my work.

So I started researching in the field of filmmaking and, and, it's interesting at the same time, one of my friends had had come with an idea for, for a film, and he asked me if I'd like to co-directed and also edited it with him.

And since I was, you know, having in this period of my life where I was thinking about, going into that medium, I said, yes, sure of.

Great.

So even beforehand and training in filmmaking, I got this, this wonderful opportunity to, to make a film.

And, so that was even before I went to graduate school.

I went to graduate school at USC after that, but that but that film was called Stolen Ground, which I made with, with, my friend seminar.

And that was, a documentary, about, a group of Asian American men who come together, come together for a dinner.

And at that dinner, they share with each other, in a very kind of deep emotional way, how racism has affected, has impacted their lives and their family's lives.

So it's a very, like a very personal look at racism and the impacts of racism through the lens of these Asian American men.

It's now came and now it doesn't work anymore.

You never has.

You know, it's it's like for me, denial is not an option anymore.

My, one of my friends used to make jokes and call me chink in Stephanie.

Oh, yeah.

You know, and it's this whole thing about, you know, you are not American unless you're white.

Recently, I had a Caucasian man tell me that I don't see you as an Asian person.

I just see you as a human being.

In front of us is.

Is karma white?

Very white kids.

White kids younger than us.

We get out on the freeway and they turn on us next.

They also go like this.

And we're all sitting in the car, and I could just feel everyone just freeze and get really rigid.

And nothing was said and nothing was said.

It's so ingrained, it's so degrading.

It's so insulting.

And I don't want my son to grow up like through that process, I learned about the power and importance of of what editing is, especially for documentary films is, is is.

Yes.

Is, you know, for from your experience and, and, and filmmaking, and the kind of confirmed that I did want to go into this field, you had four subject matters discussing, you know, deep emotional issue problems in there having with racism.

And it seems like that would have been difficult to get the four men together to do that.

And, yeah, that's right.

That's that's a good point.

I mean, that you were able to do that sounds groundbreaking.

I mean, yeah, I was thinking that.

Yeah, perhaps.

Yes, perhaps.

Yes.

Because I think that's a really good, thought you had.

I mean, and these men were kind of special, I guess you could say, because actually, I guess all of them were, part of a men's group.

And so they were already, I guess, comfortable or interested in that kind of level of discussion and sharing to, and, and revealing that aspect of their lives.

So that's a good point you make.

I mean, and that that that was probably one of the things that made, the film special in that regard.

But it also to you, in your mind, you were having this experience at the I mean, like an out-of-body experience at the drafting table.

You get this opportunity and stolen ground, ground.

You get this opportunity to, you know, co-direct and edit stolen ground.

At that point, have you found your niche like you want to focus on social issues impacting the Asian American community, or do you just that's it just happened.

Yes, in a way, because part of it of those those building blocks that kind of flew in my head that day was social issues and, you know, was working as an, as an architect.

And also it was of decent graphic design at the time, too.

It seemed like film or cinema could be a more direct way to address or investigate.

So this is more directly, as an architect, you know, I felt very strongly that what I might, colleagues were doing was important work in this, in the kind of social justice area.

But it wasn't it wasn't as direct as when you have, like a medium that where you're telling stories or you're, you're, you're presenting things, for life.

And so that was, that was part of that part of the appeal.

And I think, too, as documentary filmmakers, when we want to address these issues, being able to address them to a mass audience.

Yeah.

I mean, now in one, you know, on the small screen or the big screen, and if we do it for 30 minutes or or or, you know, 60 minutes or 2 hours, we've been able to address these issues to a larger audience to make it known.

Yeah.

So, so at that point you get the bug and you decide to go back to film school.

Yep.

And it's just that I go to graduate school.

And so, so I was in San Francisco living there, but and so that's why I came to Los Angeles to go to graduate school at USC.

Yeah.

And after USC, how do we get to the Lindsay that we're seeing now?

Because you have such a vast variety of work.

So how do we get from graduate school to the lenses we see today?

Well.

Well, I was in graduate school, I did another, another film.

That was kind of, in some ways like an outgrowth of Stolen Ground.

One thing to say about Stolen Ground is that it was sometimes I think of this as a kind of, unknown history of, like, a forerunner to reality TV, which I don't say that with pride, but.

You know, mine was idea about filming a dinner and, but with it, with a specific topic for discussion is kind of, it's kind of a, like it was this is, this is at a time before, reality TV.

So it's a, it's a kind of documentary where you're not.

If it's not, it's not it's not cinema verité.

Like you're not going to see people's houses.

Hey, can I follow you around and see what you do with.

So you're you're you're the filmmakers are creating a situation and then and then then you're filming what actually happens unprompted.

But they're watching.

This.

But there's this kind of a guide inside of it, right?

Yeah.

Which, which we then saw exposure of in the 90s, you know, with less altruistic or, or goals.

But, but after that still ground, I thought it was there's, I don't know if there's a need is the idea, but, taking this, kind of similar format and applying that to, Asian American woman.

And so, with Kathy, Kathy Lim co, we made it.

We made a film called Impossible Choices with the, a similar kind of format where we took a group of Asian American women, most of them activists, to, I guess, to bring them together to discuss, and this is kind of the beginning of the time because it's the 90s intersectionality of racism and sexism, because women of color, of course, have extra, should we say, burdens or extra challenges that come from, come from being not just first person of color, but also also woman?

And so, that was that was that was a very interesting project to do.

And that falls still on Brown.

Wow.

Well, that was a great way to get to know Lindsay and to see your journey of how you you really have just fit your whole entire career, even if it was in architecture or as a filmmaker addressing social issues.

And so thank you so much for that first segment.

When we come back and I talk about Saigon, USA and how that comes to being and share that with our audience, because I think that's a very great documentary for us to know about.

Hang on.

We'll be right back.

Come back to hear more from Lindsay When I came here in 1975, I was not told that I would come to the United States to live here for the rest of my life.

The idea of going down to Orange County, and driving and all you see at a strip malls, then it seems really boring because you keep driving and that's all you see.

But then when you start to recognize the stores with Vietnamese names on it, like a grocery store or a bakery or a shoe shop or hair place, when you see all those Vietnamese names, then it starts to get exciting because then you realize you are in the largest Vietnamese community in America.

We were politicians, lawyers, doctors, artists were journalists.

We're musicians.

We're all these things.

We're all these things that other Americans are.

But we are also refugees.

I think forever, forever.

That's going to be our connection.

Welcome back.

That was incredible for segment.

Thank you so much.

Before we left that segment, we teased to our audience that we want to talk about Saigon USA because that is one of your your award winning documentary.

It really explores the social issues.

I want you to take us through how one gets this idea and take us through the entire process of the production.

Yeah.

Second USA, which is probably still after after you hear is actually, probably the the main documentary that's exists, about which is about the Vietnamese-American community in Orange County, specifically Westminster and Garden Grove.

What's, what's referred to quickly as Little Saigon?

And I came into the project because at the time, there was this big brouhaha going on in Little Saigon, where a video store owner, who owned a store called High Tech Video, had posted a picture of Ho Chi Minh, and had sent out a challenge to community leaders.

I guess, take it down an ad, spread it, spread it, and, unprecedented, demonstration and protest that we had never seen in that community before.

I mean, it made me the news, and that's that's the that's how that's how I heard about it.

And and seeing, Asian-Americans, involved in, overt political action is not something that we've seen both and that can be viewed as a community or other, more traditional Asian-American communities.

Asian-Americans are not known for being, publicly out front.

Right.

as we talked to people in the community about what this issue was and what effect is having on them, we we realized that there was an opportunity for, making of film, not just about this, this, kind of incendiary political event in the community, but also, something that that uses that as a, as a, as a springboard for examining the issues of the Vietnamese-American community itself.

So that's, that's kind of how it came about and how it kind of grew into something larger than just examination of, of the protests.

see what's happening on the news, you get you contact your partner and decide, we're going to go out, go down there and see what's going on.

How did your story or maybe it didn't, but how did your story change from the time you saw what was happening in the news?

You went down and started recording and getting interviews to what we're seeing in this final documentary film?

as we talked to more and more people, with the TV, we would see how.

I guess the challenge of of presenting community with, with, image, the memory of trauma, Well, we can't allow for people.

That's why.

That's why the protests that we realized with that, then to understand why they were so, inflamed by this, we triggered.

Yeah, it's a fact.

Like, psychologically.

Right, that there is there's this like the I guess essentially the back story of the community was it was incredibly important.

And and so really so the so, so teasing out those issues created like a larger story.

And it made us understand that the film that that in terms of narrative that the high tech incident was actually the inciting incident to bring us backward to the whole story of the Vietnam Vietnamese American community experience.

what do you think that we learned from that incident by hearing the stories from people in the community?

although it seems like a very specific experience by the Vietnamese Americans, and it is, connected to the Vietnam War and, as it is, but it also is essentially American story, not just from like, okay, America is formed by people who come here, immigrants who are homeless, but actually the trauma.

Because what I thought about that's more like, so the Vietnamese have this trauma of, of losing the war and to some degree, the ethnic Chinese, the trauma of being driven out by Vietnamese people, which is something that a lot of people don't, don't think about when you think about the American experience.

But what do you think about everybody else who came here before them?

There is trauma, right?

Like for African-Americans.

Right.

Trauma to, to to beat Trump.

But even the pilgrims.

Right.

You know, because there's some traumatic, traumatic incident spurs, to find a better, better place.

Right.

And with the trauma from what I'm understanding, because now because we're both educators.

So we'll talk about from the educator standpoint, from the trauma, we've seen groups of people get past a trauma to try to move forward, but don't necessarily address the trauma until something triggers it.

And then we realize we should have addressed it back, back.

You know, when it first started, I mean, did you see something like that or.

Well, I mean, I found it interesting was just was that that that.

Well, so and someone else is the film is that although it was the, the high tech and it felt like a, like a, like a modern day trauma to the community, but also as an opportunity for the community to talk about why.

Why are the old people so upset?

Why?

Why are they hurt so bad by this?

And at that point in the history of the community, people were realizing that they, they hadn't talked about that much, you know, you know, there's this thing, that could be in, I don't know, I've seen it in other Asian communities, you know, where.

Sometimes the parents don't want the children to their know about that, the pain that they've had or in some in some cases, there is this this thing about where they like, they don't want the they don't want their children to speak the original language because they want them to fit in better, you know, and, they don't want to burden them with that.

So all that was kind of like playing, I think, into this, like, do you know why we're so worth you know why you're saying that?

Okay.

Well, you you don't know why.

Here's the why.

And I guess we never talk about these kids, but then this this stuff went down, and it was it was bad, right, for us.

So, I want to continue to talk about this, but I want to make a transition because as you're bringing this social issue, this larger social issue to a mass audience, and you're learning the generations, so how it impacts generations coming after us.

Let's talk about how Lindsay takes these documentary films and how you use that to educate students so they can be social conscious when they go out there.

Because you spent how many years at Pasadena City College?

Yeah.

So that's that's not.

Looked at there over 21.

Plus.

You see, my child.

Well, yeah, I was just reflecting about the social conscious, the social justice thread going through the baby, three disparate, like professional worlds.

And, regarding education.

Well, I was lucky.

Because kind of like, going back, like, when I was devising my statement of purpose for graduate school.

Yes.

One of the things I put, put, put in there was that I was imagining if someday I could create an institute like the Sundance Institute.

But it would be an institute that would be to specifically develop and nurture the voices of people who have been traditionally underrepresented in American society.

People of color, sexual minorities, women.

If there was something that could support and strengthen their ability to make films and put them into American society.

I just I guess I'd looked up because I did look at, I got this position at Pasadena City College, where I was given the opportunity to build a program there, the summer program.

And the community college level is, you know, the most egalitarian, of, of higher education in America, right?

And I realized that I got this chance because this is where everyone is welcome to, to learn and grow.

You know, it's increasing because of, earlier in my life.

I mean, I always, I always felt like I wanted to teach, and teach at the college level.

And I originally kind of imagined myself, honestly, I'd feel a little embarrassed, but, maybe teaching at a at a top tier.

University and influencing the artists that would come through there.

But, you know, community college, that's where it's at, man.

I mean, it's if you're if you're concerned about, you know, educating all people and especially those people who are going to be would be ordinarily left out, that's the place to be.

And, so I feel like I was just so lucky to, to, to get that position, to have that opportunity.

from a fellow colleague.

I'm so honored that you chose to spend your career at community college or California, and community colleges are phenomenal.

And so that you spent that time there, I appreciate that.

I can't believe our entire episode is almost done, but before we end our episode, Lindsey, can you tell our audience how they can keep in touch with you?

Okay.

Are you out there on social media?

I'm trying to catch up to the modern world, but you.

But you you.

Someone could find me on Instagram, actually, with my actual name, Lindsay Chang.

I love it, okay.

And and and Facebook also.

We'll make sure to share that with our audience.

Lindsay, thank you so much.

You spent your entire career, even if you you made some changes along the way, but you spent that making sure underrepresented people have something better.

And I so appreciate you for that.

And that's why I wanted you on the show.

Thank you so much, Angela.

And thank you for joining us on everybody with Angela Williamson.

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