Chinese people in Mississippi? We don’t usually associate the two. A new documentary, however, tells the gripping story of Chinese immigrants in the Deep South through one family’s history.
“City Lights” host Lois Reitzes was joined by the filmmakers of “Far East Deep South,‘ Larissa Lam and Baldwin Chiu. The film will premiere on the WORLD Channel documentary series “America ReFramed,” at 8 p.m. May 4.
Interview Highlights
What inspired the creation of the film:
“It wasn’t until the birth of my daughter when I saw how my father would hold her and realized that was the first time I saw in our immediate family a grandchild/grandfather relationship. I really started wondering ‘Hmm, why didn’t I ever have that relationship with my grandfather? Why didn’t I ever know him?’ That really prompted our desire to really find out where our family history and lineage came from,” said Chiu.
WORLD Channel, which shares the best of public media in news, documentaries and programming, will celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month with a series of featured documentary films in May sharing the culturally significant stories that represent the more than 20 million Asian or Pacific Islander Americans in the United States, according to the U.S. Census. The films will be broadcast on WORLD Channel and stream on WORLDChannel.org.
How a Chinese American family discovered their roots in Mississippi
Baldwin Chiu, a Chinese American from California, knew his grandfather was buried in Mississippi. How he ended up in the Deep South, Chiu did not know.
With his father and brother in tow, Chiu traveled to Mississippi to learn his family’s story. What he discovered was a little known history of Chinese immigrants in the Deep South. The family’s journey became “Far East Deep South,” a documentary directed by Chiu’s wife, Larissa Lam.
“Far East Deep South” premiers on PBS’s WORLD Channel on Tuesday, May 4 at 8 p.m. EST / 7 p.m. CST. The documentary will also be streaming throughout May on WORLDchannel.org, PBS.org and the PBS Video App.