Kiana Rawji

I am a Calgarian filmmaker and student at Harvard College majoring in Film and History & Literature. I strive to harness the capacity of both fiction and nonfiction film to amplify social justice issues and drive cultural change. As a Muslim woman and daughter of East African Asian immigrants, I am particularly interested in telling stories about diasporas, migration, and identity. I have created several short films. My 2021 documentary, LONG DISTANCE, about migrant workers at an Albertan meat plant won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Alberta Short Film at the 2021 Calgary International Film Festival, in addition to screening at several other festivals across Canada and the US. I recently finished JE SUIS, a scripted short about a Muslim-American college student facing Islamophobia in the classroom. I am currently editing another short doc, MAMA OF MANYATTA, about an extraordinary woman fighting HIV/AIDS and gender-based-violence in a slum in Kisumu, Kenya. Other projects in development include a short film. about an Indian housewife and a Black domestic servant in 1960s East Africa, as well as a feature about a college student who moves back in with her South Asian immigrant family in Canada.