A Chat with Ramah Kudaimi of the Arab American Action Network

During our Alliance Family Day at the Brookfield Zoo, I sat down with Ramah Kudaimi of the Arab American Action Network (AAAN) to discuss what her organization does, its core mission, and its relationship with the Alliance.

The AAAN is a non-profit, grassroots, community-based organization working to improve the social, economic, and political conditions of Arab immigrants and Arab-Americans in the Chicago metropolitan area. Ramah explains that the AAAN works to serve the Arab American community in order to strengthen them so that the members will in turn serve others. Its strategies include community organizing, advocacy, education, providing social services, leadership development, cultural outreach, and forging productive relationships with other communities. Ramah includes that the most rewarding part of her job is that she is able to meet a lot of people both from her community and others and to talk about her own culture while learning about the cultures of others. She loves that she is able to meet her community face to face and therefore get know everyone on a very personal basis.

Ramah believes that belonging to the Chicago Cultural Alliance is important for the AAAN because it helps present a true face of the many diverse communities throughout Chicago. There are many misconceptions about the Arab-American community and the Alliance ultimately helps to overcome these stereotypes and prejudices. The Alliance also has helped the AAAN to build relationships with other communities, which makes it easier to plan cross-cultural events and to bounce ideas off of one another in order to create successful, new events.

As the world becomes more globalized, Ramah points out the importance of an organization like the Chicago Cultural Alliance whose mission is "effecting social change and public understanding of cultural diversity" and introduces people to the many different cultures of the world that are represented here in Chicago. Through events such as the Alliance Day at the Zoo, Ramah is able to expose people to her exciting culture in a very creative fashion. The AAAN's booth was a favorite at the Zoo--children and adults alike were able to get their names printed or tattooed to themselves in Arabic! The AAAN also provided a Dabke (foot-stepping) performance to celebrate the Zoo's 75th birthday a week before! The AAAN is such an exciting organization and one that has and will continue to improve the lives of Arab immigrants and Arab Americans in Chicago.