Renee Tajima-Peña

Renee Tajima-Peña

Academy-Award Nominated Documentary Filmmaker and Scholar

  About  

  Speeches  

Renee Tajima-Peña is an Academy-Award nominated filmmaker whose work focuses on immigrant communities, race, gender and social justice. She has become a chronicler of Asian America with her documentary films “Who Killed Vincent Chin?,” the acclaimed investigation into the beating death of a Chinese American in Detroit and “My America…or Honk if You Love Buddha,” a feature-length road documentary in search of Asian American identity, and “Asian Americans,” the ground-breaking 5-hour docuseries about the Asian American experience through the lens of immigration, race, empire, identity, and culture.



Renee's other projects on the Asian American experience include the May 19 Project, a series of 14 short videos on the legacy of Asian American Pacific Islander solidarity with other communities of color, produced with the writer Jeff Chang in collaboration with award-winning independent filmmakers, “Labor Women,” a profile of a new generation of young labor activists organizing immigrant workers in Los Angeles and “Skate Manzanar,” a short video collaboration with Giant Robot on the legacy of mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II through the perspective of a young Asian American skateboarder.

Her feature film "No Más Bebés," a collaboration with Virginia Espino, is a documentary about the class action lawsuit, Madrigal v. Quilligan, filed by Mexican American women who were sterilized at Los Angeles county hospital during the 1960s and 70s. 



Renee received acclaim as the 2008 recipient of the Golden Gate Award for best television documentary at the San Francisco International Film Festival for “Calavera Highway.” In an intimate and elegantly crafted work of cinema verité, “Calavera Highway” encompasses familial tensions, Mexican American identity, the responsibilities of fathers (and sons) and the psychic malleability of map-drawn borders. It is a sweeping family saga told against the backdrop of the Mexican American experience, as seven brothers grapple with the meaning of masculinity and fatherhood, and the nature of family ties.



Renee's work has screened at worldwide film festivals and venues such as Cannes, Hawaii, Hong Kong, London, New Directors/New Films, New York Film Festival, Sundance, and the Whitney Biennial. She has been honored with two Peabody Awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a USA Broad Fellowship, and the Alpert Award in the Arts. She is the recipient a some two dozen other film awards and honors.



She is currently a professor of Asian American Studies at UCLA, where she is director of the Center for EthnoCommunications and holds an endowed chair in Japanese American studies. She was founding faculty and graduate director of the Graduate Program in Social Documentation at UC Santa Cruz. She was formerly a cultural commentator on NPR and a film critic for The Village Voice.

History in Real Time: Asian Americans Fight Back in the Age of Covid In this presentation, Renee connects the recent rise of anti-Asian violence with the history of Asians in the U.S. - facing hate, fighting for justice, and shaping the American story.

Renee is also available to show her films and lead post-screening discussions:

“Asian Americans” 5-part docuseries on 150 years of the Asian American experience

"Who Killed Vincent Chin?" (Film run time: 87 mins.) This powerful documentary, nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, investigates the beating death of a Chinese American in Detroit by two white unemployed autoworkers.

"My America…or Honk if You Love Buddha" (Film run time: 90 mins.) Renee's acclaimed feature-length road documentary has her in search of Asian America where she encounters rappers, debutantes, laborers and freedom fighters.

“Skate Manzanar” This short video focuses on the legacy of mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II through the perspective of a young Asian American skateboarder.

“Calavera Highway” (Film run time: 90 mins.) This documentary is a sweeping family saga told against the backdrop of the Mexican American experience, as seven brothers grapple with the meaning of masculinity and fatherhood, and the nature of family ties.

"No Más Bebés"(Film run time: 80 mins.) This award-winning documentary uncovers the coercive sterilization of Mexican American women at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center during the 1960s and 70s, and the landmark civil rights lawsuit challenging the practice, Madrigal v. Quilligan.

Renee can also speak about topics focused on media, film, Asian American studies, immigration and race, media representation of people of color and women, among others.

  Topic Areas

Art/Performance
Asian/Asian American
Filmmakers/Films
Immigration
Media/Communications
Race/Racial Justice/Racism
Reproductive Justice
U.S. History
Sexual Violence & Harassment
Women/Feminism

  Related Links

Play

Asian Americans: PBS documentary series | KQED

Play

Renee Tajima-Pena UCSC Grad Div Videos

Play

Life (Un)Ltd., Rene Tajima-Peña

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POV - Calavera Highway | PBS 2008

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NO MAS BEBES Trailer | 2015 LA Film Fest

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