Brenda Avila-Hanna (Director/Producer) is an independent filmmaker born and raised in Mexico City and currently based in the Bay Area. Brenda received a Master’s degree in Social Documentation from UC Santa Cruz where she completed her first documentary short, VIDA DIFERIDA (LIFE, DEFERRED), the coming-of age story of an undocumented teenage girl. The film screened at several film festivals including the San Francisco Latino Film Festival and Lakino Berlin. She has also directed several films in Mexico and the USA, including GÜERITA, a fiction short with the award-winning Mexican actress Luisa Huertas as the lead. Brenda is currently co-producing a short documentary for The Guardian and teaches a course entitled Visualizing Human Rights in Latin America at the University of California, Santa Cruz.