Film Screening: "Invisible Nation" (Vanessa Hope, 2024) + panel discussion

​Together with the department of Asian & Middle Eastern Studies, APSI is hosting a screening of "Invisible Nation" (看不見的國家), a 2024 documentary from award-winning filmmaker Vanessa Hope that shines an urgent spotlight on Taiwan as it fights for autonomy and freedom from fear.

About the film:
With unprecedented access to Taiwan's sitting head of state, director Vanessa Hope investigates the election and tenure of Tsai Ing-wen, the first female president of Taiwan. Thorough, incisive and bristling with tension, Invisible Nation is a living account of Tsai's tightrope walk as she balances the hopes and dreams of her nation between the colossal geopolitical forces of the U.S. and China.

Hope's restrained observational style captures Tsai at work in her country's vibrant democracy at home, while seeking full international recognition of Taiwan's right to exist. At a time when Russia's invasion of Ukraine has demonstrated the ever-present threat of authoritarian aggression, Invisible Nation brings punctual focus to the struggle of Taiwan as it fights for autonomy and freedom from fear.

About the panelists:
Carlos Rojas (moderator) is a Professor of Chinese Cultural Studies in the department of Asian & Middle Eastern Studies; Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies; and Arts of the Moving Image. His research focuses on issues of gender and visuality, corporeality and infection, and nationalism and diaspora studies.

Eileen Cheng-yin Chow 周成蔭 is Associate Professor of the Practice in Chinese and Japanese Cultural Studies at Duke University, and one of the founding directors of Story Lab at Duke. She is currently the Director of Graduate Studies for Duke Asian Pacific Studies Institute's East Asian Studies graduate program, and a founding/core faculty member of Duke Asian American and Diaspora Studies.

Guo-Juin Hong, Associate Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, specializes in film historiography, film theory, sound studies, postcolonial theory and theories of culture and globalization; film and other media of Taiwan, Hong Kong and China.

Gareth Price, a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Linguistics Program, is a sociolinguist and political sociologist who completed a jointly-supervised PhD at the University of Essex. At Duke, his teaching includes the core course Introduction to Linguistics, as well as courses in language policy, language and culture, language and migration, language and media, and critical discourse analysis.