Almost 9 million people live in New York City, speaking a total of over 200 languages. Languages are more than just a means of communication - embedded in them are stories, ideas and memories that are unique to the language, and often difficult to translate into English.
"Languages of New York" is an ambitious multi-year project to catalog every single language spoken by New Yorkers. Our primary intention is to celebrate the diversity of people and ideas that is intrinsic to the ethos of New York City. You can find previous episodes of the series on Story Font Studio’s Instagram channel: https://www.instagram.com/storyfontstudio
We aim to raise $22,000 to produce a special series of “Languages of New York” that will focus on interviews with families who immigrated to New York City from post-Soviet states. These countries include Ukraine, Russia and others, and some of these families have been displaced due to the ongoing war. We will interview up to eight families, each interview will include one parent and one child. We will provide an interpreter in case the parent is not fluent in English.
The purpose of this special series is to touch upon the experience of these recent immigrants along the themes of identity, leaving home, assimilation into a new culture, interactions with the people and systems in NYC. While we will touch upon some of the difficulties facing immigrants, our primary aim is to inspire a positive and hopeful conversation so we collectively work towards a more inclusive and vibrant society that has always been the bedrock of New York City.
The funds will be used towards production and distribution of the special series, as well as creating public school programs to showcase new immigrant students’ linguistic and cultural assets in a teaching and learning environment open to all. Currently, we are organizing a peer tutoring language exchange network for high school youth.
$100+ “Friend” gets mention in the video description on social media
$500+ “Supporter” gets mention in closing credit of videos
$1000+ “Benefactor” gets mention in opening credit of videos
$3000+ “Executive Producer” gets Executive Producer credit for the series
Deadline for Fundraising: October 31, 2023
Production Dates: October 21 & 22, 2023
Series Release: November 1 to December 15, 2023
Story Font Studio is a boutique video production company based in Brooklyn, New York. They specialize in documentary style videos that emphasize human stories. Story Font Studio collaborates with mission-driven companies to express their brand’s purpose through video content. They also produce original short-form documentary films.
https://www.storyfontstudio.com
No Limits Learning’s mission is to expand high-quality public school opportunities for all students by providing resources to create academically rigorous, equitable public schools. A plurality of students in New York City public schools speak a language other than English at home. No Limits Learning works to create intentionally inclusive, international language and multicultural programming for these families.