Washington, DC -- on a recent friday evening among coffee and gelato, 15 multiracial adults shared their thoughts on identity, family, and geography.

The discussion occurred onscreen in a new documentary-in-progress titled mergence, previewed recently before an invitation-only audience of interview participants, their spouses, partners, and friends with the film's director and producer, j. Tomiko anders.

Woven among the stories are narratives from local area residents kymberlie quong charles, sean currigan, philippa hughes, and patrick strange, who count significant, though complex, asian heritage and cultural roots in their families.

Anders, who is herself multiracial, collected personal narratives from adults ages 20 to 40, raised throughout the united states as well as the india, united kingdom, tunisia. Participants to date identify at least two or more identities among chinese, korean, vietnamese, white, black, german, jewish, guamanian, irish, scotch, american indian, and arab.

The screening afforded the film's participants an opportunity to meet one another while providing important feedback to the crew regarding how their stories will ultimately be portrayed.

"we all grew up thinking our experiences are unique and isolated," says anders. "sometimes they are. But the documentary shows that there are others with similar experiences-- however distinct, however difficult-- that can relate to one another within a larger context."

kefa cafe, a comfortable downtown silver spring coffeeshop run by ethiopian sisters lene and abeba tsegaye, played host to the screening, accented by collage displays from takoma artist amy kincaid.

"as a resident of silver spring-- arguably montgomery county's own center of diversity-- it was important for us to be here," notes anders. "this multicultural meeting spot invites community and discussion."

currently available as a 37-minute unedited "rough cut", mergence distills over 30 hours of interview footage drawn from a decade of research into issues affecting multiracial adults. Anders is currently securing resources and assistance for additional interviews,
non-interview footage, post-production work, and distribution towards a finished product over the next few months