Searching for Betty Chen: Rediscovering the Asian American Filmmakers of UCLA in the Seventies

Of the group of filmmakers of color who arrived at UCLA in the late 60s and 70s, as part of an affirmative action initiative called the Ethno-Communications Program, a growing body of award-winning scholarship has been devoted to the black filmmakers now known as the L.A. Rebellion. There is also an important body of work on the Asian American men who founded the nation's oldest and still vibrant Asian American media organization, Visual Communications (VC). This essay aims to expand this scholarship by centering the contributions of the group of Asian American women who trained at UCLA film school during this period, highlighting in particular the activist work of Betty Chen and Laura Ho.