Signe Karlström Event
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The Signe Karlström Event

Born in Sweden in 1906 and having arrived in the U.S. in 1922, Signe Karlström became a great civic leader and benefactor of numerous good causes in the Detroit area, including among many others the American Red Cross, the American Cancer Society, the Save the Children Foundation, the International Institute of Metropolitan Detroit, the Detroit Grand Opera Association, the Cranbrook Music Guild, and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.  She was one of the founders of the Jenny Lind Club, and for many years she served as the Secretary and Program Coordinator of the Detroit Swedish Council.   King Carl XVI Gustav of Sweden bestowed upon her the Royal Order of Vasa, Knight First Class, in 1975; the Bicentennial Silver Medal in 1976; and a Certificate of Recognition by the Kingdom of Sweden in 1983.  In 1980, she was named the Swedish American of the Year.  The University of Michigan's Center for the Education of Women has called Signe Karlstrom "a woman with outstanding ability to perceive needs and to inspire others."  One year after her death in 1988, the annual Signe Karlstrom Lecture was inaugurated to honor Signe Karlstrom and her family, who have been great benefactors of the University of Michigan's Scandinavian program.  A new format was inaugurated in 2000, when an a cappella singing group from Sweden, the Rilke Ensemble, gave two concerts in Ann Arbor, and thereby inspired the idea of a more broadly defined annual "Signe Karlstrom Event."

We are profoundly grateful to Olof Karlström and Olivia Maynard for their generous gift, which has made it possible for us to endow this annual event in perpetuity.

Signe Karlström Lectures, 1989-1997

1989
Birgitta Steene (University of Washington)
"From August Strindberg's The Son of a Servant to Ingmar Bergman's
The Magic Lantern: The Autobiographical Mode in Scandinavian Literature"

1990
Gitte Mose (University of Copenhagen)
"The Fantastic in the Swedish Novel after 1978"

1991
Rochelle Wright (University of Illinois)
"America through Song: Scandinavian Emigrant Ballads"

1992
Tutti Soila (Stockholm University)
"The Ideological and Cinematic Break of the Swedish Cinema in the 1960s"

1993
Elina Haavio-Mannila (University of Helsinki)
"Friendship, Love, and Sexual Harassment in the Workplace"

1994
Sven Steinmo (University of Colorado)
"Can the Swedish Model Survive?"

1997
J. Svand (University of Lund)
"Swedish Food Customs"

Signe Karlstrom Events, 2000 - Present

2000
Concerts by The Rilke Ensemble

Signe Karlström Event: 2001

Signe Karlström Event: 2002

Signe Karlstrom Event: 2003

Signe Karlström Event: 2004

Signe Karlström Event: 2005 was not held



Signe Karlström Event: 2006