Thursday, October 19, 2017, from 6:30pm to 8:30pm
215 Centre Street, Manhattan’s Chinatown
Please join the Asian American / Asian Research Institute for a special screening of the documentary, Snakeheads: Chinese Mafia & the New Slave Trade, on Thursday, October 19, 2017, from 6:30pm to 8:30pm, at 215 Centre Street, Manhattan’s Chinatown. This screening is organized by the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA), and co-sponsored by AAARI and Downtown Community Television Center (DCTV).
In conjunction with the museum’s new exhibition, FOLD: Golden Venture Paper Structures, which presents the story of passengers of the Golden Venture which ran aground in 1993, MOCA is screening the 1994 award-winning documentary Snakeheads: Chinese Mafia & the New Slave Trade (Running Time: 38 minutes).
Filmmakers, including the late Peter Kwong (Distinguished Professor, Hunter College/CUNY), went undercover in Fuzhou Province to capture the activities of slave traders (‘snakeheads’) who bargained their fellow countrymen into indentured servitude to the United States. This lucrative trade resulted in an influx of undocumented Chinese workers across the U.S. After arriving, many workers struggled and failed to compete in the American job market and were tortured by their snakeheads until they located enough money for their payments.
Snakeheads profiles the slave traders and Chinese laborers who were their victims, exploring issues of undocumented immigration, increased tension in communities like New York’s Chinatown, and the human consequences of a race to the bottom in the global economy.
After the screening, Jon Alpert (DCTV, co-executive director/co-founder) and Ying Chan (Journalism and Media Studies Centre, HKU, founding director) will lead a Q&A about the making of the documentary and the state of labor trafficking from China to the U.S. today.
Tickets to the screening (which includes museum admission) are $12 (adult), $8 (student), and FREE (MOCA members).