Secret Asian Woman

Summary:

Secret Asian Woman is a brief personal history of Mixed Race in America.

Website:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_YyH4oNOqE

Additional Credits and Funding:

Produced by Dmae Roberts. Editorial consultations from Catherine Stifter and damali ayo.

Original music by Clark Salisbury. Additional music by Teresa Enrico and Portland Taiko. Interviews with Velina Hasu Houston, Rainjita Yang Geesler, Julie Thi Underhill and Patti Duncan.


Funded by the Regional Arts and Culture Individual Artist program.

This piece would pair up well with Dmae's "Mei Mei, A Daughter's Song."

Also see a movie based on an excerpt of Secret Asian Woman at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_YyH4oNOqE


Suggested Host Intro:

What to call yourself when you don't have a name? That's what Dmae Roberts grappled with most of her adult life. In a country that likes to think it celebrates cultural diversity, America still has trouble with multiracial people and trying to have them choose one identity to call themselves. When Barack Obama first entered the presidential race, he proudly called himself Mixed Race. Then you hardly heard him speak that term until recently when he made his ground-breaking speech on the complexities of race. Race and identity continue to be a complex topic and as Dmae charts four decades of history, we hear from her perspective what it's like to be a "Secret Asian Woman."

(Promos available)

Timely on:

March: Women's History Month and May for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

Tones:

Engaging, Light-hearted, Thoughtful

Language:

English

Description:

Secret Asian Woman is a personal exploration of identity and Mixed Race by Independent Producer Dmae Roberts, who has to make a daily decision to reveal her ethnicity. Through her personal story, Dmae charts four decades of a search by multiracial peoples for a name. The politics of calling out racism has changed through the years as has identification. In this half-hour radio documentary, Dmae talks with other Mixed Race Asian women with identities not easily recognized and addresses with humor the complexities involved in even discussing race. This piece perhaps creates some understanding of why people seem confused by Barack Obama's Mixed Race identity.

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