(SPOT.ph) Filipino-American model Geena Rocero marked 2021’s Transgender Day of Visibility on March 31 (U.S. Eastern Standard Time) by having a candid, online conversation via TED’s IGTV channel with Isabel Sandoval, acclaimed filmmaker and fellow Filipino-American.
Rocero, who became known to the world when she came out through a TED Talk in 2014, chatted with Sandoval about what it was like growing up in the Philippines. “Growing up, watching mainstream Filipino movies, kind of the predominant image that we have of a trans woman [or] just close to it is a Roderick Paulate type; a super effeminate gay man. And it really took me a while to separate gender identity from sexuality.” Sandoval shared that she didn’t come across the concept of the Babaylan until college, adding, “It really was quite a journey for me, both learning that I was trans and also excavating our very rich and complex history of gender fluidity in the Philippines.”
Sandoval has been hailed by New York’s Museum of Modern Art as a “rarity among the young generation of Filipino filmmakers for her muted, serene aesthetic” and was nominated at the 2021 Independent Spirit Awards for Lingua Franca, her film about an undocumented trans Filipina who marries an American man for a green card. The film debuted at the 2019 Venice International Film Festival. Her next project, Tropical Gothic, will be about a Babaylan priestess in 16th-century Spanish colonial Philippines.
During the course of Sandoval and Rocero’s conversation, they also discussed the rise of violence against Asian-Americans in the U.S., with Rocero describing it as “traumatic to watch.” She shared that it’s made her feel protective of her family in San Francisco, saying it’s “sad that I have to have those conversations with them even in moments when they're just going somewhere.”
Watch the entire conversation at TED’s IGTV channel.
Source: Spot PH
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