Past Forward

Jaime L. Jacobsen is an Assistant Professor of Journalism and Media Communication and the Director of the Center for Science Communication at Colorado State University. She is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker who has over a decade of experience collaborating with diverse communities across the globe to craft and share compelling social justice, human rights, and scientific stories. Jaime has worked in a variety of cross-cultural contexts across the globe, including leading Documentary and Photography expeditions for National Geographic Student Expeditions in Australia and Tanzania, producing films for Engineers Without Borders in Kenya and Pathfinder International in Mozambique, teaching documentary filmmaking at Notre Dame University-Louaize in Lebanon, and completing a professional fellowship with Rotary International in Brazil. Jaime has a Master of Fine Arts in Science and Natural History Filmmaking from Montana State University. She lives in Fort Collins, Colorado with her husband and two young children.

Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on the Environment and Building Resilient Futures is a series that explores how natural, social, and political climates both shape and are changed by institutions and social structures. We engage with artists, educators, activists and authors to examine where we live and how we live in our surrounding environment and what it takes to build a resilient future.

Guest: Jaime L. Jacobsen
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.
Date recorded: October 8, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Ann Burroughs is the President and CEO of the Japanese American National Museum. She is an internationally recognized leader in the field of human rights and social justice. She is the Chair of the Board of Directors of Amnesty International USA and was formerly Chair of Amnesty International’s Global Assembly. Her life-long commitment to racial and social justice was shaped by her experience as a young activist in her native South Africa where she was jailed as a political prisoner for her opposition to apartheid. For over 25 years, she has worked with leaders, organizations, and networks in the US and abroad to promote diversity, racial justice and a rights-based culture. She has previously served as Executive Director of the Taproot Foundation and as the Executive Director of LA Works, and has worked as a consultant to the Omidyar Network, the Rockefeller Foundation and the government of South Africa.

Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.

Guest: Ann Burroughs
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: October 29, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Kathryn Bannai was lead counsel in Gordon Hirabayashi's coram nobis case from 1982 to early 1985. Among other critical work, she successfully defeated the government’s effort to dismiss Hirabayashi’s case and persuaded the court to grant an evidentiary hearing. That hearing led to overturning Hirabayashi’s convictions for resisting the curfew and exclusion orders promulgated under E.O. 9066. 

In addition to practicing law, she adjudicated cases for the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal and Seattle’s Public Safety Civil Service Commission. She has served as president of the Seattle Chapter JACL; president of the New York Chapter JACL; member of the Board of Trustees of Eastern Washington University; member of the Board of Directors of Little Tokyo Community Council (Los Angeles); and Advisory Council member of Kizuna (Los Angeles). She was also co-chair of the committee that nominated Mitsuye Endo Tsutsumi for recognition that led to her receiving posthumously the Presidential Citizens Medal.

Kathryn is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Japanese American National Museum (JANM)

Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.

Guest: Kathryn Bannai
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: October 15, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Tamiko Nimura, Ph.D., is an award-winning Asian American (Sansei/Pinay) creative nonfiction writer, community journalist, and public historian. She writes from an interdisciplinary space at the intersection of her love of literature, grounding in American ethnic studies, inherited wisdom from teachers and activists, and storytelling through history. Her work has appeared in a variety of national and international outlets, including San Francisco Chronicle, Smithsonian Magazine, Off Assignment, Narratively, The Rumpus, SFMOMA Open Space, and Seattle’s International Examiner.

A two-time VONA Voices fellow, she has received awards from the Ford Foundation, Artist Trust, City of Tacoma Artists Initiative, the Tacoma Arts Commission, and the Tacoma Historical Society. Her commissioned work includes a California permanent exhibit, a co-authored graphic novel titled We Hereby Refuse, and a 10+-year series of essays for the Japanese American National Museum. She is a board member of the Tule Lake Committee. Her forthcoming memoir is titled A PLACE FOR WHAT WE LOSE: A DAUGHTER’S RETURN TO TULE LAKE (University of Washington Press). As the direct descendant of Japanese American World War II incarcerees, Tamiko has worked to keep this history alive through her writing and public speaking.

Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.

Guest: Tamiko Nimura
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: September 10, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Soji Kashiwagi has been the Executive Director and Playwright of the Grateful Crane Ensemble since its founding in 2001. As a playwright, Soji's works such as "The Camp Dance: The Music & The Memories" and "Nihonmachi: The Place to Be" have been seen nationally at JACL conventions in Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Chicago, and most recently at the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Other works include "The J-Town Jazz Club," "Misora Hibari: A Tribute to a Legend," "Natsukashi no Kouhaku Uta Gassen" and the JA dysfunctional family comedy, "Garage Door Opener." Soji also wrote the scripts and Grateful Crane performed special presentations for the Go For Broke National Education Center's "Evening of Aloha" in 2013, and the Tuna Canyon Coalition's luncheon in 2017.

Internationally, Soji led Grateful Crane's Goodwill Tours to Tohoku, Japan in 2014 and 2016, where the group sang songs of hope for tsunami survivors living in temporary housing. Under his leadership, Grateful Crane has been recognized with a Bravo Award from the Asia America Symphony Association in 2010, the Daniel Inouye Leadership Award from the Cherry Blossom Festival of Southern California in 2011 and the 2016 Heritage Award from the Aquarium of the Pacific.

Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.

Guest: Soji Kashiwagi
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: June 30, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

John Mills has changed the way we live with fire through his 501c3 non-profit organization Watch Duty. John spent many years in Silicon Valley focusing on underserved markets that had been overlooked by technologists. In 2012 he founded Zenput as CTO, focused on retail food services operations which was acquired in 2022. 

After living in San Francisco for 16 years, he moved off-the-grid to Sonoma County in 2020 where he was faced with the terrifying reality of life in the wildlands without the information needed to make informed decisions. Having developed software for over 30 years beginning at age 8, John found himself with a life or death problem he had to solve not only for himself, but for his community. 

He spent more than a year understanding the problems and then together, with his team, created Watch Duty in just 80 days. Today Watch Duty has a team of over 200 active and retired wildland firefighters, dispatchers, first responders, and reporters supporting millions of citizens and first responders who rely on the Watch Duty App across the American West to stay safe.

The Fire Problem is an education program that considers unresolved symptoms of The Fire Problem. This special podcast series will examine and explain underlying challenges and vulnerabilities with our climate, environment, politics, and vegetation. Conversations with conservationists, first responders, historians, politicians, scientists, technologists, tribal leaders, and more will help diagnose our situation with opportunities for treatment. Human influence is at the heart of The Fire Problem and our goal is to learn from past neglect and failure and plan for a future of education and prevention. 

Produced with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University with support from the Orange County Community Foundation.

Guest: John Mills
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: July 17, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Chessie Thacher is a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California, where she devotes her time to First Amendment issues, government transparency, criminal justice reforms, and voting rights litigation.   Prior to joining the ACLU, Chessie worked as an attorney at Keker, Van Nest & Peters LLP, a San Francisco-based law firm that focuses on high-stakes litigation and trials. While at the firm, Chessie developed a dynamic pro bono practice, partnering with the ACLU on several amicus briefs that advocated for criminal justice and immigration-related reforms. 

A graduate of Stanford Law School, Chessie won the school’s Deborah L. Rhode Public Interest award and was a Levin Center Public Interest Fellow. Chessie Thacher has provided additional resources below:

Know Your Rights - Free Speech at California Colleges and Universities

Know Your Rights - Campus Protests and More: Student Discipline at California Colleges and Universities

Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.

Guest: Chessie Thacher
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: June 25, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Dr. Adwoa Opong is an Assistant Professor of History at Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University. Dr Opong earned a BA in history in the study of religions from the University of Ghana. She continued at the University of Ghana to pursue an MPhil in History, focusing on women’s organization and the nationalist struggles in Ghana. Adwoa received her PhD in History and also received her graduate certificate in the women, gender and sexuality studies program at Washington University. In addition to women and gender history, Adwoa has interests in the area of sexuality, postcolonial history and transnational feminism. She plans to broaden her study beyond Ghana in her examination of the professionalization of social work in post-colonial Africa.

Justin de Leon, Ph.D. is the director of the Ethnic Studies program at Chapman University and is a Senior Advisor for the Mediation Program for University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. De Leon earned his Ph.D. in international relations with a focus on feminist theory and indigeneity and is completing a book project entitled Resurgent Visual Sovereignty (University of Nebraska Press). His research focuses on Indigenous sovereignty and ontological security through storytelling and filmmaking. De Leon is exploring relational approaches to community-based filmmaking.

Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on Gender and Sexuality is a series that explores how culture, power, institutions, and social structures shape our understandings of gender and sexuality.

Guests: Dr. Adwoa Opong and Dr. Justin de Leon
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.
Date recorded: June 18, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Takeo Rivera is a specialist in performance studies with a focus on race, sexuality, and gender in U.S. American cultural production. He is currently an Assistant Professor of English at Boston University.  His current project, Model Minority Masochism: Performing the Cultural Politics of Asian American Masculinity (Oxford University Press, April 2022) is focused on masochism and techno-orientalism in Asian American cultural production across multiple media, including theater, literature, graphic novels, historical archives, and video games.

Dr. Rivera is also a playwright whose plays have been staged in New York City, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay Area. His creative work explores race, masculinity, and sexuality at length. His play Goliath has been recognized by the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival, the New Works of Merit Playwriting Contest, and the Planet Connections Theater Festivity. He has also worked with Poetic Theater Productions, CompanyONE Theater and PlayGround San Francisco.

Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on Gender and Sexuality is a series that explores how culture, power, institutions, and social structures shape our understandings of gender and sexuality.

Guest: Takeo Rivera
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.
Date recorded: May 08, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Abdi Soltani has served as the executive director of the ACLU of Northern California since 2009. During his tenure, he has pursued long-term priorities to deepen the ACLU’s presence in the California Central Valley and elevate the ACLU’s voice on state policy at the California state capitol. Through 2015, he co-chaired the Blue Ribbon Commission on Marijuana Policy with then Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom, where he helped draft the blueprint for safe and equitable legalization of marijuana in California. He has also worked on campaigns for racial justice, criminal justice reform, voting rights, and immigrants’ rights.

Abdi is a graduate of Stanford University. He was awarded the John Gardner Public Service Fellowship in 1995, the Gerbode Foundation Fellowship in 2002 and the Levi Strauss Foundation Pioneer in Justice Fellowship in 2010. He also serves on the Advisory Board of Pars Equality Center, the Statewide Leadership Council of the Public Policy Institute of California, and the Board of the San Francisco Foundation.

As an Iranian-American, Abdi is a champion of the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution, educating the public about its origins in the movement to abolish slavery and its impacts for equality and freedom for all of us.

Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.

Guest: Abdi Soltani
Host: Jon-Barrett Ingels
Produced by: Past Forward
Date recorded: April 04, 2025

Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.