Ethiopian Americans

In 1919, an official Ethiopian goodwill mission was sent to the United States to congratulate the Allied powers on their victory during the First World War.[6] The four-person delegation included Dejazmach Nadew, the nephew of Empress Zawditu and Commander of the Imperial Army, along with Blattengeta Heruy Welde Sellase, Mayor of Addis Ababa, Kentiba Gebru, Mayor of Gondar, and Ato Sinkas, Dejazmach Nadew's secretary.

Ethiopian businesses along Fairfax Avenue in Little Ethiopia, Los Angeles.

After his official coronation, Emperor Haile Selassie sent forth the first wave of Ethiopian students to continue their education abroad. Almost a dozen Ethiopian students likewise went to the United States. They included Makonnen Desta, who studied anthropology at Harvard, and later became an interim Ethiopian Minister of Education; Makonnen Haile, who studied finance at Cornell; and Ingida Yohannes, veterinary medicine at New York University. Three other students - Melaku Beyen, Besha Worrid Hapte Wold, and Worku Gobena - went to Muskingum, a missionary college in Ohio, two of them later transferring to Ohio State University. Melaku Beyan, who was one of the two who attended Ohio State, later received his medical degree at Howard Medical School in Washington, D. C.

An Ethiopian restaurant in Hartford, Connecticut.

Overall, approximately 20,000 Ethiopians moved to the West to achieve higher education and conduct diplomatic missions from 1941 to 1974 under the Selassie's rule.[7] However, the net movement of permanent immigrants remained low during this period as most temporary immigrants ultimately returned to Ethiopia with a Western education to near assured political success, while the relative stability of the country determined that few Ethiopians would be granted asylum in the United States.[7]

The passing of the 1965 Immigration Act, the Refugee Act of 1980, as well as the Diversity Visa Program of the Immigration Act of 1990, contributed to an increased emigration from Ethiopia to the United States,[8] prompted by political unrest during the Ethiopian Civil War. The majority of Ethiopian immigrants arrived later in the 1990s, following the Eritrean–Ethiopian War. Immigration to the U.S. from Ethiopia during this 1992-2002 period averaged around 5,000 individuals per year.[9]

Since the 1990s, around 1000 Hebrew speaking, Ethiopian Jewish Israelis have settled in the US, with around half of the Ethiopian Israeli community living in New York.[4]

Ethiopian Americans have since established ethnic enclaves in various places around the country, particularly in the Washington D. C., and Minneapolis-Saint Paul areas. Fairfax Avenue in Los Angeles, California, has also come to be known as Little Ethiopia, owing to its many Ethiopian businesses and restaurants, as well as a significant concentration of residents of Ethiopian and Eritrean ancestry.[10]

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately 68,001 people reported Ethiopian ancestry in 2000.[3] Between 2007 and 2011, there were approximately 151,515 Ethiopia-born residents in the United States.[11] According to Aaron Matteo Terrazas, "if the descendants of Ethiopian-born migrants (the second generation and up) are included, the estimates range upwards of 460,000 in the United States (of which approximately 450,000 are in Washington, D. C.; 96,000 in Los Angeles; and 20,000 in New York)."[7] Unofficial estimates suggest that the Washington, D. C., area has an Ethiopian population of 150,000 to 250,000.[12][13][14]

An Oromo Lutheran (P'ent'ay) church in Minneapolis.

Many Ethiopian Americans are followers of Abrahamic religions, particularly Christianity and Islam. Of these, the majority of Christians belong to the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. It is the largest Christian denomination in Ethiopia.[8] Most Muslim Ethiopian expatriates adhere to the Sunni school. Other Ethiopian immigrants follow the P'ent'ay denomination and Judaism. There has been a general religious revival among Ethiopian Americans, especially in the Orthodox sect. Church attendance in America has also increased relative to that in Ethiopia,[15] and the institutions serve to preserve aspects of Ethiopian culture among American-born Ethiopians. They also act as networks and support systems crucial to the well-being of both recent immigrants from Ethiopia and more established Ethiopian residents. Ethiopian churches in the US are gathering places for the Ethiopian community, where Ethiopian expatriates come together to pray, socialize, stay in touch, and lend support to one another.[8]

For many individuals living within the Ethiopian diaspora, musical performance acts as a uniting social force that allows Ethiopian immigrants in the US to explore their shared culture and identity, while simultaneously partaking in political expression and advocacy.[16] Through public performances (e.g. cultural events on college campuses), these traditions are shown to communities of outsiders who are interested in Ethiopian music and dance within an American context.[16] Such folkloric performances, often based in religion, feature sacred songs performed in various languages of Ethiopia, with instrumental accompaniments and traditional choreographed dances.[16]

• Ethiopia–United States relations
• Little Ethiopia, Los Angeles
• Ethiopians in the United Kingdom
• Ethiopian Australians
• Ethiopian Canadians

• Getahun, Solomon Addis. The History of Ethiopian Immigrants and Refugees in America, 1900-2000: Patterns of Migration, Survival, and Adjustment (New York: LFB Scholarly Pub., 2007).
• Kobel, Paul S. "Ethiopian Americans." Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, edited by Thomas Riggs, (3rd ed., vol. 2, Gale, 2014), pp. 107–118. online
• McVety, Amanda Kay. Enlightened Aid: U.S. Development as Foreign Policy in Ethiopia. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
• Metaferia, Getachew. Ethiopia and the United States: History, Diplomacy, and Analysis (2009) online
• Ofcansky, Thomas P., and LaVerle Berry. Ethiopia: A Country of Study (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, 1993). online
• Shelemay, Kay Kaufman, and Steven Kaplan, eds. Creating the Ethiopian diaspora: Perspectives from across the disciplines. Tsehai Publishers, 2015. Also as: Shelemay, Kay Kaufman and Steven Kaplan. "Creating the Ethiopian diaspora: perspectives from across the disciplines." Diaspora 15, no. 2-3 (2006): 191–395.
• Shelemay, Kay Kaufman. 2009. Music of the Ethiopian American diaspora: A preliminary overview. In Proceedings of the 16th International Conference of Ethiopian Studies: July 2–6, 2007, Trondheim, Norway, ed. by Svein Ege, Harald Aspen, Birhanu Teferra and Shiferaw Bekele, 1153–64. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Web access