June 5th, 2021 • 45 mins 58 secs • Download (63.2 MB) • Link with Timestamp
This summer and fall we'll be collaborating with Dr. Xiumei Pu in her project "Mountains and Stories." Mountains and Stories is a community-building endeavor among diverse Asian and Pacific Islander refugee and immigrant families living in Salt Lake Valley. Anchored in the theme of mountains, the project consists of a twelve-part podcast and a documentary, a storytelling-conversation cultural event (June 26, 2021), and a group hike in the Wasatch Mountains (October 23, 2021). It is our hope that these efforts will amplify the environmental voices of Asian and Pacific Islander refugee and immigrant communities, and spark more public interest in thinking about the connection between culture, identity, and the natural environment. In this episode, we talk with Ze Min Xiao. When we conducted the interview earlier this spring, she was the Director of the Office for New Americans in Salt Lake County. She has since started a new position as the Director of the newly launched Center for Economic Opportunity and Belonging at the Economic Development Corporation of Utah.