AANHPI Joy: Navigating Healing, Resilience, and Resistance
Event description
[This in-person event will have free online resources once the event is over.]
By embracing healing, resilience, and resistance, the Asian American, Native Hawaiian,
and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) community can cultivate strength, joy, and empowerment in their identities while collectively working towards overcoming adversity and creating positive change.
Beginning with a focus on healing, participants will engage in mindful practices and share personal stories, fostering a sense of community and emotional well-being. The discussion will then transition to resilience, highlighting the cultural heritage and traditions that sustain the AANHPI community. Participants will explore ways to cultivate resilience through self-affirmation, creative expression, and community-building. Finally, the session will delve into resistance, showcasing inspiring stories of advocacy and allyship within the AANHPI community and encouraging participants to use their voices and actions to challenge systemic oppression and promote equity for all.
Presented by Asha Chai-Chang.
Asha is an Emmy Winning Creative and Two-Time Netflix Writer/Director Fellow. Asha is a Caribbean-Asian female director with disabilities, a Yale graduate in political science & pre-law, former finance professional, and Certified Speaker & Lab Alum for RespectAbility, an organization dedicated to breaking stigmas about disability. Asha is also a Co-Founder & Co-Captain of Slamdance Unstoppable - a film program at the Academy Award and BAFTA qualifying Film Festival dedicated to uplifting films with or by disabled talent and filmmakers. As an invited guest to the White House, Asha has performed as a classically trained Opera Singer 20 years ago and recently attended in celebration of the 32nd Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act in recognition of her dedication to create accessible and inclusive sets for productions and advocate for diverse storytelling. Films she
has written and directed have been recognized by Oscar-qualifying film festivals and the NAACP. Asha is creating a preschool animated TV series, WENDY ON WHEELS, which was a part of the inaugural RespectAbility x Netflix Children's Content Creator Lab, followed by her recent trilingual (Spanish, English, ASL) sitcom proof of concept and film, MARQUE DOS, which premiered at Academy Award Qualifying Film Festivals. Ms. Chai-Chang coins herself as a Writer/Director for Children & Family content and speaks with audiences from pre-school and up about Neurodiversity and Disabilities.
[Image description: Woman, Asha Chai-Chang, with purple hair wearing a red top against a blue background.]
Today, she is honored to represent for the AMBIV Collective which empowers disability and neurodivergent communities to live a meaningful and fulfilling life with research-powered support and community-led solutions.