Did you know that Nobel Prize recipient Muhammad Yunus--founder of the Grameen Bank, champion of providing microcredit loans to women, and pioneer in the "social business movement--has at least three ties to Southern California?
- LA filmmaker Holly Mosher* has directed and produced an excellent film on Yunus, Bonsai People: The Vision of Muhammad Yunus, that is inspiring viewers and receiving a lot of critical acclaim. This trailer will give you a sense of the power of the film.
- Muhammad Yunus helped to establish the California Institute for Social Business at California State University-Channel Islands. The institute exposes students to opportunities for learning about and addressing local and far-reaching social ills through the application, study and development of Yunus' notions of social business.
- The Conrad Hilton Foundation awarded Yunus the Conrad Hilton Humanitarian Award in 2009. At $1.5 million, the Hilton Award is the largest prize in the world recognizing extraordinary humanitarian accomplishment. In further recognition of its esteem for Yunus, the Hilton Foundation awarded CSU-Channel Islands a grant of $300,000 to establish the California Institute of Social Business.
Do these ties make Muhammad Yunus a Bangladeshi Southern Californian, we think so!
*Holly is also President of the Social Enterprise Alliance-LA.
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