Face Value: Communication on a Human Scale

Presentation by Ayan Omar
Thursday, September 19, 4:30 to 5:30 PM
Quad 264, Saint John’s University

Ayan Omar will discuss the vital importance of face-to-face communication in this age of social media that so often fosters a distorted sense of human interaction and community. Acknowledging the benefits of social media, she will nevertheless explain why we need to replace much of our technologically mediated communication with the kind of interpersonal engagement that better nurtures authentic human relationships, including those between and among people of different cultural and religious communities.

Ayan Omar is an American-Muslim refugee from Somalia who is a language arts educator at St. Cloud Technical High School. In 2017 she was one of only seven refugees to receive an Outstanding Refugee award from the Minnesota Department of Human Services. She was cited for her civic leadership. Ayan has given numerous presentations on Islam and on the traumatic experiences of immigrant students in the United States. “My educational and refugee background inspires my activism both locally and nationally,” she said, and “I enjoy sharing how Islamic teachings and human decency are one and the same.” 

Funding for this program provided by the Jay and Rose Phillips Family Foundation of Minnesota