Master of None Screening & Roundtable

Aziz Ansari's hilarious and incisive new Netflix series Master of None, explores the personal and professional life of the character Dev, a 30-something Asian American actor in New York. Join Asian Arts Initiative for a roundtable with filmmaker/curator Sara Zia Ebrahimi (LTA '14, ACG '13, '09) (Bailout), writer Sameer Rao (Color Lines), critic Peter X. Feng (Univ. of Delaware), and Arjun Shankar (camra, Univ. of Pennsylvania) to discuss social themes raised by the show. Jacqueline Sadashige of the Philadelphia Asian American Film Festival will moderate. At the Asian Arts Initiative (1219 Vine Street) on Thursday, February 18 at 6:00pm.

Panelist Bios:
Sara Zia Ebrahimi is a curator of film, visual art and new media and for over a decade has produced film screenings and exhibits in the Philadelphia area. She has worked as a consultant with Independent Television Service (ITVS) and with individual independent filmmakers on their engagement and outreach campaigns. Currently, she works as a Social Media Specialist at American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). A MFA graduate of Temple University, her own short films have screened internationally and been awarded grants from Chicken & Egg Pictures, Rooftop Films and the Leeway Foundation. In Spring of 2015 she released her first web series, Bailout, which she wrote and directed.

Sameer Rao is a reporter and blogger for Colorlines, focusing on culture news. As a freelance writer, Sameer's work has appeared in Stereogum, VICE's Noisey, Under the Radar, Splitsider, Philadelphia City Paper, WXPN's The Key, PhillyVoice, the Public School Notebook, and Independent Restaurateur. His writing primarily focuses on music, comedy, theatre, film, social entrepreneurship, race, media, gender, critical theory, pop culture, and where all of those things intersect. Sameer is a graduate of Haverford College and Bryn Mawr Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research, and he has also worked as a non-profit marketing coordinator, case worker, and community organizer. He’s on Twitter at @amancalledsrao. 

Arjun Shankar is a teacher, writer, researcher, and mediamaker, unabashedly curious, and intellectually promiscuous. Having recently completed his phD in Anthropology and Education, he is currently on a three-year postdoctoral fellowship at University of Pennsylvania's School of Social Policy and Practice, in "Curiosity: A Transdisciplinary Approach". His research brings together theories in globalization and urban development, literary and digital ethnography, and critical pedagogy. He has collaborated on several participatory film and photography projects and he teaches courses on participatory film, social change, and globalization at Penn.

Jacqui Sadashige received her BA from Amherst College in English and Fine Arts, an MA in English from Indiana University, and her MA and PhD in Classical Studies from the University of Pennsylvania. Jacqui is currently a Senior Lecturer for the Critical Writing Program at the University of Pennsylvania where she teaches writing seminars that address race and popular culture, with an emphasis on film. Her scholarly interests focus on the ways in which popular culture reflects and refracts our views on race, gender, and species. In addition to teaching and writing about popular culture, Dr Sadashige is also a staff member of the Philadelphia Asian American Film Festival, a local fitness professional, and an Elephant Ambassador for the Save Elephant Foundation in Thailand.