Ljubljana Author To Visit Milwaukee on April 28th: Slovenian Migrations to America

Milwaukee, WI  The University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee’s Slovenian Arts Program is pleased to sponsor a Milwaukee visit by Ljubljana author and researcher Dr. Mirjam Milharčič Hladnik for an April 28^th book lecture and reception. Dr. Milharčič Hladnik is the co-author of Daring Dreams of the Future: Slovenian Mass Migrations 1870-1945. She will offer a talk on the topic and lead a discussion session afterwards.  The afternoon will also feature a reception and book-signing.

The event will be held on Sunday, April 28^th at 2 pm at the Polish Center of Wisconsin’s Ballroom.  The Center is located at 6941 S. 68^th Street in Franklin. The Counsul General of the Republic of Slovenia, Alenka Jerak, and the Slovenian Union of America (SUA) National President Joe Valencic will both join us in Milwaukee that day.  During a reception following her talk, guests will be able to visit an extensive visual display of Slovenian achievements in the U.S., provided by the Slovenian Union of America.

The Daring Dreams book chronicles the migration of nearly one-third of the population of today’s Slovenia, an exodus who permanently settled in coun­tries around the world. Some traveled back and forth, searching for work to ensure the survival of the family members left behind at home and the prosperity for the families and communities they were creating abroad. From one of the smallest nations in Europe, barely reaching one and a half million inhabitants at the time, people departed in numbers reaching 440,000. This book tells their stories about the “daring dreams of the future,” as the Slovenian poet Oton Župančič—whose words open the book—so beautifully put it. In their new communities, they built homes, churches, and cultural institutions that have survived to the present.

Dr. Milharčič Hladnik is a researcher at the Slovenian Migration Institute of the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Ljubljana and a professor at the University of Nova Gorica. Her research interests include hu­man rights and migrant integration, gender inequalities, and Slovenian women migrants, as well as interdisciplinary approaches and innovative methodologies.

Mirjam is a passionate researcher of “the documents of life”, ranging from oral histories to analyses of correspondence and autobiographic texts. She is the editor of From Slovenia to Egypt: Aleksandrinke’s trans-Mediterranean domestic workers’ migration (2015) and the editor (with Jernej Mlekuž) of Going places: Slovenian Women’s Stories on Migration (2014). She wrote the screenplay for the documentary film 100% Slovenian (2005) and is Editor-in-Chief of the academic journal Dve domovini/Two Homelands.

The reception after the book discussion will offer Slovenian treats and wines and will include the announcement of SUA Branch #43’s annual service awards.

NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. It has not been verified for its accuracy or completeness.