Thank you to everyone who made our inaugural February event series, Exploring History and Culture in Central Minnesota, a success. We had a great time of learning and sharing about an important piece of Central Minnesota’s heritage, the history and culture of Somalia.
We want to thank our project partner, The Somali Museum of Minnesota, for bringing programming to four central Minnesota county historical societies – the Somali Museum Dance Troupe to the Stearns History Museum, the Somali Mobile Culture Show to the Benton County Historical Society, the Somali Lecture 101 to the Sherburne History Center, and Somali Kebed Weaving to the Morrison County Historical Society. Thank you to the weavers – Amina Shire, Ardho Ismail, Hawa Aden, and Halwo Duale; the dance troupe performers – Ramadan Mouhomed, Maliamed Ahmed, Awale Abdi, Samire Dhaqane, Muna Ahmed, Yasmin Cilmi, Naredin Dahir and Mohamoud Osman Mohamed, program director for youth & performance; Khadijah (Zahra) Muse, development director; Osman Mohamed Ali, founder and executive director; and especially Adan Dirie, program director for public programs.
A special thanks to our event sponsors – Wells Fargo, Five Wings Arts Council, Doris Duke Foundation, Association of Performing Arts Professionals and the Paramount Center for the Arts. Solveig Anderson, director of outreach and education at the Paramount, and Habso Mohamud, author of It Only Takes One Yes!, made the series extra special through their participation.
We also wanted to extend our thanks to Professor Michael Schwartz, Educational Linguistics, and Professor Chuks Ugochukwu, Geography & Planning, at St. Cloud State University for their help, as well as to Abdirizak Abdi, Assistant Principal at Apollo High School in St. Cloud, and Abdifetah Farah, a senior at Apollo High School, for their help with translation.
Watch for the next event series in 2020!
