Cineculture: Short Film Program

Short Film Program:Life Between Borders, Black Migrants in Mexico, Jamaica y Tamarindo: Afro Tradition in the Heart of Mexico & After La Nopalera

Discussant: Ebony Bailey (Director)

Life Between Borders: Black Migrants in Mexico by Californian filmmaker and Central Valley native, Ebony Bailey discusses the context in which thousands of Haitians seeking entry to the US are now left stranded at the northern Mexico border after a change in immigration policy. But “Black migration” is not new to Mexico, as people from the African Diaspora have lived here for centuries. In Bailey’s short documentary, we meet Haitians stuck at the border as well as Africans in Mexico City and explore Black migration and identity in Mexico.

In Bailey’s second short film, Jamaica y Tamarindo: Afro Tradition in the Heart of Mexico we learn that the Jamaica flower and tamarind are iconic ingredients in Mexico although but their history comes from a place much further away. To understand this, we meet four people and explore with them what African identity means in the context of Mexico City, an identity that goes beyond the color of one’s skin.

Bailey’s third short documentary After La Nopalera presents daily life in a small village in the state of Morelos in central Mexico after the September 19th, 2017 earthquake as vividly told by a local resident and an earthquake survivor.

https://africa.harvard.edu/event/black-migration-influence

Sponsor: Center for Creativity and the Arts and The Department of Chicano & Latin American Studies