About the Project: Becoming Minnesotan

In 2009, the Minnesota Historical Society received a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to digitize and make available oral histories of recent immigrants to Minnesota which already existed in the collections of the Society.  The goal of this project is to extend the reach of these materials to a broader audience, to support community building, and to help sustain cultural identity.

This collection of oral histories represents a unique source of contemporary history through the experiences of the newest Americans, in their own words.  The content of the collection covers themes common to all of the groups, as well as the perspectives unique to each one. 

This site, Becoming Minnesotan, presents excerpts from these oral history interviews, along with supporting information about each narrator, the communities, and immigration in general, in a format designed to be of greatest use to teachers and students in grades 4-12.

The full interviews and transcripts for each of the oral history projects from which the excerpts in this site are drawn are available online through our Immigrant Oral Histories web resource.  They can also be accessed on cassette tape or CD at the Minnesota Historical Society Library.

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