Minnesota Immigrant Oral Histories

Asian Indian

East Indian man and young woman, ca. 1895. MNHS Photo Collection.

As of 2008 Minnesota was home to 28,000 Asian Indians, most of whom have immigrated to the United States since 1950 to pursue educational and employment opportunities. Minnesota continues to receive about 1,000 Asian Indian immigrants each year.

In 1992 the Minnesota Historical Society launched its first oral history project on recent immigration in cooperation with the India Association of Minnesota (IAM). The narrators in that project, chosen with an eye to diversity of birthplace in India and religion, provided remarkable perspective on their lives and on the many facets of adjustment to American life and culture, and to settlement in Minnesota. The success of that project, and the rich historical information it provided, launched a joint effort of the Society and the IAM to ensure ongoing documentation of Minnesota's important and growing Indian community. The Society and IAM completed their fifth oral history project in 2006.

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