Indira S. Somani

Introduction (2-3 lines)

Indira S. Somani is an independent documentary filmmaker. After a 26-year career as a TV newscast producer/Broadcast Journalism Professor, she is pursuing her MFA in Directing/Documentary Film at UCLA. Her productions include: Life on the Ganges (2017) and Crossing Lines (2007). Somani earned a Fulbright-Nehru Senior Research Fellowship to India in 2011 where she filmed Life on the Ganges. She has also been a leader of the South Asian Journalists Association (SAJA).

Indira S. Somani, Ph.D. is an Independent Documentary Filmmaker. After a 26-year-career as a television newscast producer and broadcast journalism professor, Somani moved to LA and enrolled in the MFA in Directing/Production, Documentary film program at UCLA. She is currently in post-production with her film, Mom & Me, a personal documentary about her role as a caregiver for her Mom who battles depression and how their relationship has evolved, since 2002. Other films Somani has directed and produced include Life on the Ganges (2017), a 10-minute documentary directed, produced and filmed in Varanasi, India, during Dev Diwali, when people from all over India travel there to bathe in the Ganges River. The film screened in film festivals in the U.S., India and Europe and won Best Short Documentary at the Berlin Independent Film Festival, and the Cannes Short Film Festival. Another film Somani directed, produced and wrote was, Crossing Lines (2007), a 30-minute personal essay documentary about her struggle to stay connected to India after the loss of her father and to maintain and preserve her Indian cultural identity. The film won numerous awards, screened in film festivals nationally and internationally, aired on PBS affiliates through NETA from 2008-2011, and has been used by more than 100 universities as a tool to teach intercultural communication in the classroom. Both films are in distribution through New Day films.

Somani’s doctoral research studied the media habits and effects of satellite television on the Indian diaspora, specifically the generation of the Asian Indians in the Washington, DC metro area, who migrated to the U.S. between 1960 and 1972. She expanded her research to study the media habits, acculturation, and social identity of the same generation in the New York-New Jersey area, San Francisco, Houston and Chicago. For the fall of 2011, Somani was awarded a Fulbright-Nehru Senior Research Fellowship to study the Western influence of Indian programming in India.

While teaching at Howard University’s School of Communications from 2012-2021, Somani’s research shifted to study Black Broadcast Journalists and how race had an impact on their success in the newsroom. She has been published in several academic journalsand has also co-authored two book chapters.

Somani’s academic career was preceded by 10 years as a television news producer, most notably with CNBC and WJLA-TV, the ABC affiliate in Washington, D.C. Somani has also been a leader of the South Asian Journalists Association (SAJA), where she has also won several “Outstanding” awards for her coverage of South Asians in North America. Prior to teaching at Howard, Somani taught journalism at Washington and Lee University (Lexington, VA) and American University’s School of Communication (Washington, DC). Somani earned her Master’s in Journalism from the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University in 1993, and her Ph.D. from the Philip Merrill College of Journalism, University of Maryland, College Park in 2008. Somani is expected to earn her MFA in Directing/Production from UCLA by Dec. of 2022.

New Day Films by Indira S. Somani

Awards & Accolades

Best Short Documentary, Berlin Independent Film Festival 2018
6th Mumbai Shorts International Film Festival 2017
Best Short Documentary, Cannes Short Film Festival 2017
Best Shorts Competition Award, Award of Recognition: Documentary Short 2017
Southern Shorts Awards- “Award of Merit,” 8 categories: Cinematography, Direction, Editing, Music, Producer, Production Design, Screenplay and Sound Design 2017
DC South Asian Film Festival 2017
Long Island International Film Expo 2017
Illinois International Film Festival 2017
The New York Indian Film Festival 2017
Northern Virginia International Film & Music Festival 2017
Twin Rivers Media Festival 2017
Hollywood International Independent Documentary Awards, Award of Recognition 2017
Faculty Juried Screening Honorable Mention, University Film and Video Association Conference, New Orleans, Louisiana, August 2009
Heart of England International Film Festival, Best American Documentary, Tamworth, England, June 2009
Gracie Allen Award, "Outstanding Documentary-- Short Format," American Women in Radio and Television, June 2009
Mexico International Film Festival- "Bronze Palm Winner" Shorts, May 2009
California Arts Association Digital Short Film Festival, Cupertino, California, Winner for the Best Documentary Award, January 2009
The Baltimore Women’s Film Festival, Baltimore, Maryland, Runner Up for the Best Short Documentary Film Competition, October 2008
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