My guest today is the extraordinary journalist, filmmaker, advocate and writer Santilla Chingaipe. Meeting Santi I was immediately drawn into her whip smart, funny and deeply insightful perspectives about the human experience. From her short documentary Black As Me to the TV series Third Culture Kids or Date my Race, Santi explores identity, migration, politics and history with a fresh, warm perspective allowing the watcher to be drawn into her story – building empathy as she goes. You will be absolutely flawed by Santi’s story and the story of her family too. From being bullied in Zambia as a child by her peers to then travelling to Australia on her own as a teenager and creating a new life for herself, to changing careers and hustling her way into a job at the SBS where she quickly became invaluable – what I loved most about this interview was understanding that from that little girl who was bullied for speaking languages that weren’t English and made to feel othered for it (actually causing her to stop speaking altogether for a while as a child) she has become a kick-arse woman who has dedicated her life to sharing her voice with others and also giving voice to those either living or from history who may not otherwise have had a platform to do so. As you will discover, her latest documentary Our African Roots shares stories from Australia’s colonial past that have all but disappeared from our cultural narrative. It is no wonder that she was recognised at the United Nations as one of the most influential people of African descent in the world in 2019.

Santi is currently writing a book called Black Convicts and I cannot wait to read it. Here she is the delight of a human that is Santilla Chingaipe

Just a side note Santi also apparently makes excellent marmalade which of course makes her my favourite kind of human.

For more from Santi you can find her here or you can watch Our African Roots on SBS on demand here

For more from me you can head to my website www.clairetonti.com or find me on instagram @clairetonti

Show credits:

Editing – RAW Collings and Claire Tonti

Theme music – Avocado Junkie

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