“Hafu” an AMAZING Start But We Need to Go Deeper |
“Hafu” an AMAZING Start But We Need to Go Deeper
Multiracial Asian Families
2014-05-20
About a week ago I had the chance to do something I’ve been wanting to do (and bugging the filmmakers about for a long time)—finally go to a local screening of the documentary Hafu, meaning “half,” which represents 5 stories of mixed heritage Japanese folks navigating their multi/identities in Japan today. The film was made by a production team of mostly mixed-race Japanese themselves many either having been raised, born and raised, or with very close ties to the country. The movie shares with us the lived lives of: Edward (Venezuelan/Japanese), The Oi Family particularly their son Alex (Mexican/Japanese), David (Ghanaian/Japanese), Fusae (Korean/Japanese), and Sophia (Australian/Japanese)…
…Overall I think this documentary is a must-see. But (and you knew there was gonna be a “but”)—I would like to see the conversation go deeper. To me it felt like there was the proverbial elephant-in-the-room that never quite got called out. A missing critique of the systems and institutions of state, nation and global race politics that press against mixed heritage peoples, intrude upon, limit, and often direct their ID construction…
Read the entire review here.
Tags: Japan, Multiracial Asian Families, Sharon Chang, Sharon H. Chang