With my mental bar for a good documentary set rather high, (partially down to my lecturer David) I will always have criticisms of my own work. But I am now ready to share this documentary with you all. Constraints regarding the duration of the film having to be 15 minutes did mean many things were compromised, including the depth and details of each issue covered. Please give feedback by commenting on my blog or on YouTube, and if anybody does deem it worthy or more eyes, please share it or tweet it #BeneathTheSurface via @jodylan89.
In case anyone missed previous posts about the documentary’s topic, read ‘Initial thoughts on HK’s ethnic relations‘ and ‘Hong Kong: Racism or Ignorance?’
Credits
Camera/Editor/Producer: Jody-Lan Castle
Sound: Catalin Anton
Colour correction: Aaron Kay
Translation: Elaine Yu, Manjeet Brar and my jaan.
And a big THANK YOU to everybody who helped me make this in small ways or big.
Jody, this is really excellent — you have a keen eye for bringing a compelling story together. Keep it up!
Thanks for sharing my documentary 🙂 Much appreciated!
Just finished viewing. Excellent! I hope you will consider enlarging it in the future. It is interesting how the language problems of Hong Kong resemble the same problems in other “melting pots” such as the US and UK. I especially find it interesting that Cantonese is still the required language in the face of becoming a part of the mainland, with its emphasis on Mandarin. Makes me think that they are really focused on remaining quite separate from the mainland.
As horrendous as England was in its China dealings over the centuries, it’s interesting that minorities were dealt with better than since their abdication. I think it’s a similar situation to Iraq under Saddam Husein. Minorities flourished under his rule, but are now open to much more persecution. Perhaps it gives some credibility to the phrase, “Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.”
I was about to tear into another book on China, when it occurred to me that it would be good to get your take on things. But I hadn’t seen a post from you in awhile. Suddenly, I flip on WordPress, and hear is your spanking new post! I will definitely get feedback to you. In the meantime, the book I’m about to read is “Contemporary China – An Introduction” by Michael Dillon (Routledge, 2009). Are you familiar with it? Looks good, from the intro. I’ll try to get a good summary written when I’m finished. But, as always, I only write from the knowledge of others, and it’s nice to have the perspective of people “on the ground”, like you.
Hi sorry I haven’t written in a while. How did your research go?
Much too busy, lately, with American-made problems. I’m hoping to start some Chinese language blogs soon, but, again, work keeps getting in the way.