Our Dream
Mother Africa feeds the planet today resources wise. Despite exploitation, it is our connection to earth reflective of the Maori we do not seek to conquer others but enhance spirituality. We saw a void in New Zealand TV & Film collectives to understand we need each other despite weaponisation of Identity (Race, Gender & Politics) that occurs in Hollywood. Inclusion (to exclude others) is not inclusive. New Zealand Film & TV has the opportunity spirituality wise to turn a new leaf fern with social impact without deviseness. In turn, this will enhance the lives of thousands of families and youth in the creative arts. Reach one, teach one through ethical progression and direct practice.
The Pacific African TV & Film Collective is here to provide a voice for Pan-African and other marginalised communities for a sustainable future in New Zealand Television and Film. Together, we will facilitate rich story-telling and creative opportunities through workshops, focus groups for career advancement. While fostering relationships with fellow Asia-Pacific collectives and building connections in our local community we can establish more global inclusion of migrants systemic marginalised on-screen. This will provide diverse story telling that is beyond tokenisation of our skin colour, cuisines or sexuality, but also our spirituality. Reflecting our diverse thoughts, stories, families with common unity (Community) that come with any ethnicity from Africa, Europe, Asia, Middle East to Mid-West of North and South America.
What we do
We plan and support amazing projects that help change the lives of disadvantaged communities among various ethic groups globally, with African Spirit. Cinema has influence on communities that need opportunity to show there is enough light for us all. Noam Chomsky stated "He who controls images, controls minds". African's and others 1st impressions have been gate-kept and controlled by the founders of Hollywood from Eastern Europe. For a better tomorrow, we must counteract tell-a-visions mistakes by sharing authenticity with other cultures in mind and in the conversation with who is perceived as local.
Africa & the Image that changed the World
The 1st Image to go global was the appalling treatment of Congo's rubber slave workers under King Leopard in 1904, after the
Berlin Conference of 1884.
The 1st Image to go global was the appauling treatment of Congo’s rubber slave workers under King Leopard in 1904, after the effects of The Berlin Conference of 1884. This was the world’s first photographic human rights campaign by photographer Alec Seeley Harris of a man named Nsala, his wife and 5-year old daughter Boali’s severed hand and foot. This caused outrage in Europe of the grim effects of Colonisation and Europe’s decision to carve up Africa, without any African leaders involved following the horrors of Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.
African American Exploitation
in Cinema
African American culture (Like the American Dream) is creation of Cinema and Jewish Idea's of what African Americans behave like. Social movements are exploited for monetisation.
As a descendant of the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade, this motivated me to understand the positive and negative effects images can have on the mind.
The effects of earlier Minstrel Shows of African Americans at the start of Hollywood deeply affected my people’s confidence and public perception on an international level. Due to this, post-civil rights not being received by African Americans, we were so desperate to humanise ourselves Hollywood Studios ought to exploit our images as they were losing money to Colour Television. A genre called “Blaxploitation” (African American Poverty Exploitation) was invented and marketed the drug dealers as heroes while making prostitution with human trafficking, gambling, alcohol fashionable. Today, my community is suffering from the effects of these tropes being marketed as a the image of my people, that a second wave of “blaxploitation” came with HipHop and my people never recovered.
Today, we are often used for Weaponisation of “Identity” for a racial and sexual agenda. Below is a timeline of our image and the lack of control over our image, the perception that has influenced popular culture and denigration of my community in entertainment. Below is a timeline of exploitation without African American’s financing their image or having a say so on their global portrayal.
Our Oceania numbers that speak
We have numbers that push us to give in our best and make sure records for community and population is reflected on TV Screens. The Jewish community is 0.2% percent globally, but they make sure their voices are heard and do not need to fight for inclusion. This was reminder no matter the size of the community, your voice matters. Sovereignty is a beautiful thing however Tribalism fades where common unity resides. No matter who’s in a position of power or to claim “chosen”, we all get hungry, sleepy and have human needs that were in the arts together. Many ethnic groups in New Zealand were in the same boat less than 10 years ago. So in terms of decolonising the screen, equality may be impossible to ascertain because nothing in nature is equal. However, this does not mean we must take European stories away and call it progress. We desire to match metrics here as a reminder numbers are invaluable to the power of “one” image having uplifting or devastating consequences. The control of that image and making New Zealand a global destination reflective of the progression it advertises requires all numbers matter.
Our Partners
