Photo courtesy of Center for Asian American Media
AAJA mourns the passing of pioneer Chinese American filmmaker, media policy advocate, and teacher Loni Ding. A four-time Emmy Award-winning independent filmmaker, Ding, was the Executive Director of the Center for Educational Telecommunications, a multicultural telecommunications nonprofit. With an extensive history in advocacy and public service Ding was experienced in grassroots community organizing and policy analysis, and was co-founder of several local and national media and arts organizations, as well as a policy advocate and spokesperson for more democratic, public interest art and media resources. Her pioneering efforts effectively helped launch the Neighborhood Arts Program of the San Francisco Art Commission, and she played leading roles in establishing the National Asian American Telecommunications Association (now Center for Asian American Media), the Independent Television Service (ITVS), and San Francisco PBS station KQED's Open Studio. She was Co-President of the national board of the New York-based Association of Independent Video and Filmmakers (AIVF).
"I first met her in 1970 at KPIX, the CBS affiliate in San Francisco that for 20 long years had resisted the obvious – that the local Asian American community deserved a voice on the air, that Chinese Americans, whose capital resided in that quaint gilded ghetto called Chinatown, deserved to be represented if not truthfully reflected in the staff, if not the content of that broadcasting medium. I was there to break into on-air television news reporting, as one of the first in the country. She was there (since the year before) to help organize and produce the first Chinese-English bilingual television programming in these parts: Sut Yung Ying Yee, 65 Emmy Award-winning half-hour shows - practical English lessons in Chinese and English with a Chinese American educator, Larry Lew. She helped translate lesson plans into television scripts complete with viewer guides and packets of audiocassette tapes. It was a co-production of the Chinese Media Committee of Chinese for Affirmative Action and KPIX TV Westinghouse that set the standard for media and community collaboration. While at KPIX she also did one of the first pieces on the International Hotel and the issue of low-cost housing in San Francisco. Her report was the first told in the point of view of the tenants.
"In the 1970s, she pioneered community access to television with the creation of Open Studio on KQED. It was a production unit in which people from the community could come in produce their own shows with professional support and guidance and a broadcast service which put more than 700 programs on the air on a daily basis for seven years, with some going national. As senior producer and director she helped created more than 250 half-hour programs in a multiplicity of styles and formats.
"Loni opened up public broadcasting to Asian American voices and Asian American productions. In 1975 her "How We Got Here: The Chinese", a half-hour historical essay that turned personal memoirs of five immigrant generations into documentary narrative coupled with a radio simulcast in Chinese raised a new standard in broadcasting.
"When the Archaeological Finds from the People’s Republic of China made a stop in San Francisco on its world-wide tour, Loni was in position with the needed credibility, contacts, and chutzpah to go after a major project of diplomatic, technical and creative complexity. By helming 600 "Millenia: China's History Unearthed," a 90-minute documentary for KQED and PBS, Loni became the first Asian American producer-director to land a prime-time national network television special in the U.S.
"It was groundbreaking not only for its content but for establishing the viability of Asian American producers. No one else since has surpassed these kinds of breakthroughs. Perhaps those of us who survive or have learned from her work and her teachings will carry on this and other streams of her legacy. For the good of all. Rest in peace, Loni Ding." --CHRISTOPHER CHOW
CHRISTOPHER CHOW is one of the first Asian American TV reporters in the country (KPIX San Francisco, 1970) and has received Emmy and Dupont-Columbia awards for his work. He has taught at San Francisco State University, served as Chair of the Angel Island Immigration Station Historical Advisory Committee, coordinated the first national Asian American Writers Conference, and co-produced the film "Fall of the I Hotel." He is currently with the California Public Utilities Commission.