37th Annual Folk Life Festival: October 8-10, 2010
Tucson Meet Yourself Seats New Board of Directors
Tucson Meet Yourself (TMY), the renowned, three-day celebration of the living traditional arts and expressions of the Arizona-Sonora region’s folk and ethnic communities that takes place downtown the second weekend in October, is pleased to announce a new board of directors. The TMY board, seated in February 2010, represents a broad cross-section of regional leadership and brings experience gathered from academia, business, culture and the arts backgrounds.
The TMY Board will serve with one-year renewable terms. It includes:
* Maribel Alvarez, Ph.D. (Chairwoman), Research Social Scientist/Folklorist -University of Arizona
* Celestino Fernández, (Vice Chair) Ph.D., Distinguished Outreach Professor, University of Arizona
* Robert Shatz (Treasurer), COO, Innovative Technologies Development Center
* James Griffith, Ph.D.,(Secretary) Research Associate, University of Arizona Southwest Center
* Richard Noel, Aerospace engineer
* Carmen Bonillas, Teacher/Tucson Unified School District
* Shiraz Ali Peera, Coldwell Banker Residential
* Ralph Colwell, Commercial Real Estate Investor
* Don Luria, Slow Food Tucson
TMY founder Jim Griffith elaborated on the valuable experience the collective board will bring to the TMY mission of celebrating various dimensions of folk life: “The newly constituted Board is an extraordinary resource for TMY as it works to research, document, interpret and present the living traditional arts and expressions of everyday life of the Arizona-Sonora region’s folk and ethnic communities.
Mia Hansen has been named the first Executive Director of Tucson Meet Yourself. “This is an exciting transition time for our organization and I am honored to work with our Board and our broad base of volunteers and community stakeholders expand the impact of our non-profit organization,” said Ms. Hansen
About Tucson Meet Yourself
TMY is a three-day celebration of the living traditional arts and expressions of the Arizona-Sonora region’s folk and ethnic communities presented free to the public. The 37th Annual TMY will be celebrated on October 8-10, 2010. TMY, conceived by folklorist Dr. James S. “Big Jim” Griffith, features more than 150 folk artists, performance groups and 60 ethnic clubs sharing their foods, heritage and customs. Patterned after the Smithsonian Folklife festival, TMY is recognized as a national leader in identifying, researching, and presenting the living traditional arts of our regions’ folk and ethnic communities. It is known as “Tucson’s favorite festival” (Tucson Home magazine 2009), and has achieved recognition by the European Festival & Events Conference as a leader in community-based arts and coalition building.
Tucson Meet Yourself is a 501(c)(3) organization. For additional information and to donate to its 2010 Campaign please visit: www.tucsonmeetyourself.org, or contact TMY Executive Director Mia Hansen: at 520-370-0588 or mia@tucsonmeetyourself.org