Cindy Martin is a Filipina-American documentary filmmaker, as well as a film festival and film community organizer based in Chicago, dedicated to amplifying the voices from underrepresented communities, with a particular focus on AAPI, BIPOC, and women’s stories. 
For this fellowship, she will visit the Philippines and Japan, countries connected to her roots, to conduct research on the history of World War II from the Japanese perspective and how Japanese view themselves, how they think, and how they perceive the Filipino people. Additionally, she will explore how centuries of colonization and patriarchy in the Philippines led to a shattered Filipino identity and how scholars and the youth are piecing it back together. Martin hopes that her film will serve as a blueprint for the Filipino diaspora to begin investigating and understanding their own fractured cultural identities, while also healing intergenerational trauma. At the same time, she hopes that her film will reach beyond the Filipino community and be shared with individuals, especially BIPOC and women, who have historically been sidelined.

Profile
Martin lived and worked in London and Los Angeles for over 20 years as a broadcast journalist for Reuters, AP, ABC News, and Sky News.
In 2022, she was selected as a fellow of Kartemquin’s Diverse Voices in Docs (DVID) program and the CNN/Film Independent Docuseries Intensive.
In 2023, she participated in the Filipino Young Leaders Program (FYLPRO) Immersion fellowship, returning to the Philippines to collaborate with local governments, businesses, and nonprofit organizations.