CONFERENCES

A central part of the Danish American Heritage Society mission is organizing scholarly conferences that showcase the many ways in which Danish and American culture have shaped each other.

Beginning in Omaha in 2002, the DAHS sponsored four past conferences. Conference themes covered aspects of Danish American and Danish heritage and history. These conferences are listed below.

Danish – North American Relations since World War II (Omaha, Nebraska, 2002)

Conference proceedings appear in The Bridge, Volume 27, Numbers 1 & 2, 2004.

Danish Culture, Past and Present – the Last Two Hundred Years (Des Moines, Iowa, 2005)

Conference proceedings appear in The Bridge, Volume 29, Number 2, 2006.

Innovation – The Danish Way (Minneapolis, Minnesota, 2009)

Conference proceedings were not published.

Innovation – The Danish Way Revisited (Des Moines, Iowa, 2013)

Selected conference proceedings were published in a special issue of The Bridge, Volume 37, Number 2, 2014.

Danish American Fusion: A Blending of Cultures (Schaumburg, Illinois, 2017)

Conference proceedings to be published in upcoming issues of The Bridge.

Traditions & Transitions: Ways of Being Danish (Virtual Conference, 2021)

Replays were made available to members through December 2021.

Ecologies and Ethnicity (Elk Horn, Iowa, 2023)
Coming June 22-24, 2023

Luncheon during DAHS conference

courtesy of Lynette Rasmussen

Held in partnership with the Museum of Danish America, celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2023. Conference concludes on Saturday evening with Sankt Hans Aften (Danish-style Midsummer) on the Museum of Danish America’s grounds.

Keynote Speaker: Morten Kabell, former Mayor of Copenhagen for Mobility, Climate, and Urban Development

Because the Danish American Heritage Society played a seminal role in its founding, the DAHS is planning its seventh international conference in and around Elk Horn, Iowa, on June 22-24, 2023. The focus will be Ecologies and Ethnicity and culminate with the museum’s annual Sankt Hans Aften festivities. Plan to participate, visiting America’s heartland where so many Danish immigrants between 1870 and 1930 found new lives.

Click below to get more information and register.