Carolina Asia Center organizes film series on Korean diaspora

Throughout her career, Emmy-award winning documentarian Deann Borshay Liem has used her personal experiences to explore Korean identity and history through film.

Two of Liem’s films, “Geographies of Kinship” and “Crossings,” are being screened as a part of the Carolina Asia Center’s Korean Diaspora Films and New Media Series, which started in early September and extends into November. 

After receiving a grant from the Korea Foundation, professor Ji-Yeon Jo, the director of the Carolina Asia Center, organized the four film screenings at the Nelson Mandela Auditorium in the FedEx Global Education Center by three critically-acclaimed artists within the Korean diaspora. 

Each of the films explores aspects of the global diasporic experiences of Korean people, including topics such as transnational adoption and the Korean War and division. Jo said that the diaspora is intricately related to and intertwined with geopolitical history in Korea. 

“If they don't know anything about the Korean Peninsula, Korean War and the armistice agreement, they may be very puzzled, but may be intrigued to learn more,” she said.

The first screening of the series, Soni Kum's film “Morning Dew,” was on Sept. 7. Jane Jin Kaisen's film “The Woman, The Orphan, and The Tiger" was shown on Oct. 3.

At the screenings, attendees have the opportunity to engage with topics that are not necessarily well known, Jo said. 

“I kind of wanted to bring not the conventional filmmakers — filmmakers who position themselves between filmmaker and artist, and I wanted them to kind of represent different kinds of and also contents of film,” Jo said.

The Carolina Asia Center teamed up with the UNC Department of Art and Art History to bring Soni Kum as a guest lecturer alongside her screening on Sept. 7. 

“It's just very valuable for students and the public to hear these perspectives and points of view about the creation of art and the purpose of creating art,” Jim Hirschfield, a studio art professor and an organizer for Kum’s lecture, said. 

The Carolina Asia Center also worked with collaborators such as the UNC Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies and UNC Film Studies for the program. 

There will be two more opportunities to attend the festival and view the screenings, which are happening in November. 

“Geographies of Kinship” explores the historical, political and social context for the adoption of Korean children around the world. “Crossings,” Liem's most recent film, tells the story of 30 women who go to North Korea and cross the Demilitarized Zone into South Korea to call for an official end to the Korean War.

The documentaries tell stories of activism and engagement that people will be able to connect to on a personal basis, Liem said. The films attach specific stories with specific issues through art, which allows for a very engaging form of education, she said. 

“I think it's important through a variety of different art, film, writings, any method to try to challenge what we think we know about these conflicts, because it goes to the crux of who we are as a country, and to avoid further militarization and potential war,” she said.