Kheyal Roy-Meighoo – "The year at AUB transformed me into the animator that I am today"

I came to AUB as a Fulbright scholar in order to pursue my interdisciplinary interests in animation and history with the support of an institution that encourages diverse methods of storytelling.

I have spent most of my life in the United States and attended Emory University, where my undergraduate degrees in Film and History helped me realise that filmmaking and social justice are intertwined. It was during this time that I began to make my own animated films. While I was encouraged to do so, I did not have all the necessary resources to produce the work that I would have liked because I was not at an arts institution. This led me to apply for a Fulbright grant to study abroad.

The Fulbright programme fosters international collaboration through grants that allow students to receive degrees abroad, encouraging cross-cultural dialogue and intellectual exchange. I applied to the UK Open Study spot, which is the only Fulbright grant that would have allowed for an artistic project to be completed. It was during the application process that I found AUB. I was attracted to the school because of the focus on the interdisciplinary approach to animation and the degree’s focus on theory, practice, and professionalism. I quickly got in touch with Dr Paul Ward, the leader of the MA Animation Production course, whose work in animated non-fiction scholarship proved to be essential during my MA degree.

I was overjoyed to receive the Fulbright and arrived in Bournemouth in the fall of 2023, with a plan to make a short animated film during the year. Alongside the coursework assigned through the graduate course, I worked to create a film that would further my goals of telling diverse stories. Previously, I have made films that deal with my own family history. I grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, listening to stories about my parents and grandparents when they lived in Canada, India, and Trinidad. My mother’s parents experienced the effects of the British Raj, lived through Indian Independence and Partition, and immigrated to Canada in search of opportunity. My father’s parents, who also immigrated to Canada, are Indo-Trinidadian, descended from indentured labourers who left famine and poverty in India that was caused by the British Raj to work under slave-like conditions in the British Caribbean. As a third-generation Asian American, I am caught between my ancestral heritage and my experiences in America. I want to explore this tension through animation.

With the support of Dr Ward and my classmates, I ultimately decided to create a film that drew from my personal experience of being part of a global Asian diaspora, and specifically about the tension I feel between my ancestral heritage and my lived experience in the global empires of the US and the UK. The goal of the Fulbright program is to engage in cultural exchange between the origin and host country.

I decided to draw these connections through a semi-autobiographical story about an international student who must reconcile her Indian, Trinidadian, and Canadian ancestry with her American and British upbringing. As my own family history reminds me, the British Empire shaped the lives of many Asians in the US, Canada, and the Caribbean. Films about this diverse history are necessary because the violent histories of anti-Asian hate are reappearing in our contemporary lives. The COVID-19 pandemic brought to light anti-Asian sentiments in both the US and UK. Events such as the Atlanta spa shooting in 2021, where six Asian American women were killed in my hometown, not only demonstrated how the pandemic has heightened the racism that Asian Americans experience every day, but also brought the impacts of gendered racism to the forefront. In the UK, there have been ongoing tensions between South Asian immigrants and the previous Conservative government, creating a xenophobic climate that has only been exacerbated in the past years. In fact, during my last weeks at AUB, anti-immigrant mobs were popping up to access the country.

With this context, I wanted to create an innovative film that engages with critical forms of representation and highlights how members of the Asian diaspora experience the tension between their ancestry and lived experience. It was an absolute joy to be able to work on and receive encouragement about this project. I was able to complete the film, and it is currently on the festival circuit in the hopes of reaching audiences who want to engage with diverse ways of storytelling.

While I spent the majority of my time at AUB working on this film, some of my favourite moments during the year were when I had the opportunity to take a break from my more serious story in order to make short, silly animated pieces, which helped me develop both my animation techniques and professional portfolio. For example, I created a short film for an Aardman Academy event, which received the top award in the small competition. I also had the chance to sit in on undergraduate animation courses with Gideon Bohannon, where I created several short animation exercises in walking, dancing, and stillness. The ability to quickly create short films was inspiring and helped me become a more efficient and confident animator.

The year at AUB transformed me into the animator that I am today. I appreciated the freedom to dive into the types of stories that I believe need to be told, and I was given creative licence to bring my own dreams to reality. I am grateful for the support I received, and I have now made it my mission to create stories and characters that will resonate with my audience and show them the possibilities of diverse art.

To explore Kheyal's work and find out more, visit her website.