We Are Family

Whenever I hear the song “We Are Family” by Sister Sledge, in my mind, I see my mom in front of a park bench singing “I’ve got all my sisters with me” with her sisters in matching red t-shirts with their nicknames on their back at the annual Wells Family reunion.

I also remember how much fun it was to play and catch up with my cousins from around the country who I had not seen since the last family reunion. Of course, I also enjoyed the many wonderful treats made by aunts and uncles that I would often only get to enjoy at the reunion.

A few weeks ago, several of us from the Minnesota Humanities Center (MHC), including two board members, attended the annual Federation of State Humanities Council/National Humanities Alliance Conference (Conference) in Providence, Rhode Island.

All of the states and territories, such as Guam and Puerto Rico, of the United States that have National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) affiliates (Councils) attended the Conference. The event was well attended with nearly 900 people participating in various sessions, local community tours, and the NEH Walter Capps Lecture.

Travelling to the Conference reminds me of the many Wells family reunions that I attended as a kid. I really enjoy catching up many of my colleagues across the United States and sampling the local cuisine in different parts of the country where the host cities are located is always a treat.

Of course, as I got a little bit older I saw a slightly different side of family reunions. Reunions also provided an opportunity to hear about struggles, remind one another about the perseverance of past family members, and provide support to family members in need whenever you are able.

The topic du jour of the Conference was whether the new Administration would once again take steps to substantially reduce or eliminate NEH funding. Many Councils are heavily dependent on receiving funding from NEH; drastic cuts to NEH would therefore propose an existential threat to many Humanities Councils across the country.

The last time that the President-elect was in office, he sought to eliminate NEH, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (a key revenue source for PBS and National Public Radio stations), and the federal Institute of Museum and Library Sciences.

In 2017, President Trump became the first president to submit a budget to Congress calling for the elimination of NEA and NEH. Despite efforts during his first administration and submission of a budget every year calling for the elimination of NEA and NEH, Congress slightly increased its funding to the two agencies.

In providing additional funding to NEA and NEH during the first Trump administration, Congress noted that the agencies provided funding on a wide variety of topics, supported small organizations that would not otherwise receive funding, and that both worked hard to ensure that federal funds touched all areas of the country. What was true about Humanities Councils in 2017 remains true today.

Humanities Councils provide funding and support for a wide range of programming and offerings and deliver them through a wide variety of means. MHC is an example of the breadth and depth of programming offered by Humanities Councils.

Last year, MHC delivered humanities programming on a wide range of subjects through poetry readings, music, drama, improvisational comedy, walking tours, publishing books, and conversations with local and national academic and community scholars.

We also provided a wide range of grants to organizations to support cultural heritage programming, children’s museums, community festivals, and educational grants to support our community scholars. In addition, we awarded capacity building grants to support the growth and development of small organizations and emergency grants to organizations responding to issues of community trauma and harm.

MHC created an outreach program to ensure that members from all racial, ethnic, and Indigenous communities could apply for and more importantly receive grants. The grants we awarded were distributed throughout every corner of the State of Minnesota.

At the Conference, my colleagues and I all left believing that we needed to be prepared to respond if the incoming Trump Administration proposes annual budgets seeking to eliminate NEH. As part of our preparation, we all agreed that we need to ask our friends to tell their legislators about the impact of our work.

The annual Wells reunion rotated between three cities, one of which was Chicago. My mom and my Aunt Shirley served as the ‘permanent’ co-hosts of the Chicago reunion committee. The table that they set for the reunion was so welcoming that there was also a multitude of friends that would always stop by to be a part of the reunion.

I’m excited about the Conference coming to the Twin Cities, with MHC serving as the host Council in 2026. I believe that the conversations at the Conference in the Twin Cities will include many new friends and focus on how we can make use of the additional NEH appropriations being provided to create more wonderful humanities programming that brings us all together around a welcoming community table.