“Drifting” — screening + roundtable discussion

Join APSI for a special screening of the short film "Drifting," followed by a roundtable with Student Academy Award-winning filmmaker Lei He (candidate, MFA/EDA) in conversation with Dr. Xingming Wang (postdoctoral associate, APSI) and Professor Ralph Litzinger (Cultural Anthropology). The discussion will provide multiple perspectives about current issues in China related to coal mining, environmental and labor justice, eco-media representation and portrayal, public health, urban development and rural preservation, and how local communities respond to climate change.

"Drifting," Lei He, 2026, 25 min, USA, silent: A miner and his sheep drift through the coal-mining landscapes of northern China. Blending observational documentary with poetic cinematic language, "Drifting" unfolds across three intertwined temporalities: geological time embedded in coal and mountains, bodily time shaped by labor and breath, and more-than-human time shared by humans, animals, and the landscape. Moving between reality and dreams, the film reflects on endurance, coexistence, and the different ways life inhabits time.

About the speakers:

Lei He is a student in Duke's Master of Fine Arts in Experimental and Documentary Arts program. In 2026, she won the gold prize in the Alternative/Experimental category at the 53rd Student Academy Awards for "Drifting." Lei's work combines observational filmmaking with visual experimentation, including symbolic imagery, movement and hybrid forms. With "Drifting," she turned her camera toward the coal-mining region where she grew up, creating a silent, black-and-white meditation on labor, memory, dignity and time.

Xingming Wang is a postdoctoral associate at the Asian/Pacific Studies Institute. He received his Ph.D. in comparative literature from Rutgers University, specializing in China, Sinophone studies, and environmental humanities. His research seeks to advance dialogues and collaborations on climate change, with a particular focus on the strategic position and potential of Asia in facilitating the global clean energy transition.

Ralph Litzinger is is an associate professor of cultural anthropology at Duke. His early research focused on ethnicity, nationalism, and post-socialism in China. More recently, he has focused on activism and advocacy work around the environment, labor, and migrant education, protests, environmental NGOs, transnational activism related to Apple, and global media ecologies.