Did Chinese people sit in the FRONT or BACK of the bus during Southern segregation?

March 1, 2022

“What did it mean to be Chinese in Black neighborhoods during segregation in the 1930s?” One filmmaker’s documentary journeys through her grandmother’s family history growing up as a young Chinese girl with grocer parents in the Jim Crow era.

Directed by award-winning filmmaker and actor Crystal Kwok, executive produced by W. Kamau Bell, actor Daniel Wu, and journalist Lisa Ling, “Blurring the Color Line” confronts the complex issues of racism, Afro-Asian tensions and white supremacy that still grips communities today.

Executive producers Daniel Wu, Lisa Ling, W. Kamau Bell (from left to right).

When tensions between white and Black neighborhoods in the mid-1900s South ran high, Kwok’s great-grandparents raised a family of mostly daughters and ran an essential business in Augusta, Georgia where friendships between minority groups were unlikely.

Joy Young Family grocery store owner, Charles Yee (right) and young employee (1948). Photo courtesy of June Law.

In a world of arranged marriages, always saving face, conforming or rebelling against the strict Chinese patriarchy, and being pitted against each other with Model Minority myths, discover where the Chinese truly find themselves in this part of America.

WTWOO grocery store and employees (1930s). Photo courtesy of Dorothy Loo.

Watch a virtual screening of “Blurring the Color Line” at the Socially Relevant Film Festival on March 20 — get your ticket here.

“Blurring the Color Line” is presented in partnership with the Center for Asian American Media (CAAM), 127 Wall Productions and NextShark.

This post was created by NextShark with Groovy Peach Goddess Productions

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