GRAMMY Museum® Mississippi has been named a 2024 grant recipient from the Nissan Foundation. The Nissan Foundation grant will help support the Museum’s ongoing Exploring the Soul of the Movement education program, which seeks to address the need to build a foundation of historical context among today’s youth, using music to help them better address and analyze the critical social issues we are still facing today. The Nissan Foundation supports educational programs that promote a greater appreciation and understanding of America’s diverse cultural heritage.
“We are so grateful to the Nissan Foundation for again supporting our Exploring the Soul of the Movement education program,” said Emily Havens, Executive Director of GRAMMY Museum Mississippi. “During the Civil Rights Movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called songs the ‘soul of the movement.’ Through our Exploring the Soul Movement education program, we seek to educate today’s youth on the critical role music played to inspire, uplift, unify, and even mobilize Americans during the Civil Rights Movement.”
“We’re honored to support the work of GRAMMY Museum Mississippi,” said Chandra Vasser President of the Nissan Foundation and Nissan’s first Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer. “The Nissan Foundation is about building community by valuing diversity, and the Exploring the Soul of the Movement education program from GRAMMY Museum Mississippi brings that mission to life.”
During the Civil Rights Movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called songs “the soul of the movement.” Seeking racial equality in the United States, music played a critical role in inspiring, uplifting, unifying, and even mobilizing Americans during the late 1950s and beyond. Exploring the Soul of the Movement seeks to address the need to build a foundation of historical context among today’s youth, using music to help them better address and analyze the critical social issues we are still facing today.
For the last five years, GRAMMY Museum Mississippi’s Exploring the Soul of the Movement program, with support from the Nissan Foundation, has provided elementary school students with educational workshops that teach them about the history of the Civil Rights Movement and the artists and songs that helped shape various other musical stylings for years to come.
The 2024–2025 program, conducted by GRAMMY Museum Mississippi’s education department, aims to use this critical period in our nation’s history to raise awareness and introduce meaningful discussion about current issues of diversity, inclusion and social equity, with a focus on how music can act as a catalyst for communication, healing, and effecting change.
The Nissan Foundation is awarding a total of $1.2 million in grants to 44 nonprofit organizations for its 2024 grant cycle. The nonprofit recipients are in Atlanta, Central Mississippi, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Middle Tennessee, New York City/New Jersey, Southeast Michigan, and Southern California—all locations where Nissan has an operational presence.
In the 32 years since, the Nissan Foundation has awarded nearly $17 million to more than 150 nonprofit organizations to support innovative programs that break down societal barriers and build inclusive communities through education and outreach. Grant recipients promote cultural diversity across a variety of arts, education, social and public programs in seven U.S. communities where Nissan operates.
