Dear ISA members, presenters, guests, partners, and friends,

On behalf of the Executive Committee of the Igbo Studies Association, I warmly welcome you to Chicago for ISA’s 23rd Annual International Conference, held May 14–16, 2026, under the theme “Ọsọ Ndụ Agwụ Ike: Building a Sustainable and Resilient Future.” 

This year’s gathering at Dominican University, River Forest and Chicago Campus, brings together scholars, students, cultural leaders, artists, community builders, and friends of Igbo Studies from around the world. Our theme speaks to the Igbo spirit of endurance, renewal, mobility, creativity, and collective strength.

We are deeply grateful to Dominican University for hosting us and to its leadership, faculty, staff, students, and community partners for their warm welcome. I offer special thanks to Dr. Nkuzi Nnam, our Chief Host and Local Organizing Committee Chair, and Dr. Uchenna Onuzulike, our Program Chair, for their leadership, dedication, and tireless work. I also thank the students of Dominican University who are supporting this conference through their time, energy, and service.

We are equally grateful to the Igbo Association of Chicago for their continued hospitality, friendship, and support. Their welcome reminds us that ISA is not only a scholarly association, but also a community rooted in culture, service, and shared belonging.

I also thank the entire #ISAChicago2026 Organizing Committee, whose work reminds us that ISA grows because people give their time, talent, and heart.

This conference allows us to celebrate our 2026 Madubuike keynote speaker, Dr. Ada Uzoamaka Azodo, whose address invites us to reflect on Igbo cultural values, wisdom, dignity, family, community, and moral imagination.

This has been a year of renewal for ISA. We have strengthened our digital infrastructure, improved membership and conference systems, relaunched our website, expanded access to certificates and communications, renewed our publishing partnership with Goldline and Jacobs Publishing, and released the first two electronic volumes of the Igbo Studies Review. We are also proud to relaunch the ISA Newsletter in electronic format as a new platform for news, scholarship, member achievements, photos, resources, and community updates.

The 2026 program reflects the richness of Igbo Studies, with panels, plenaries, roundtables, lectures, and conversations on language, history, literature, gender, music, AI, diaspora identity, leadership, mental health, economic development, cultural preservation, and sustainability.

As we gather in Chicago, I encourage us to see this conference as more than an academic meeting. It is a space of memory, imagination, dialogue, and renewal. It is where elders and emerging scholars meet, where home and diaspora speak to one another, and where we continue building the future of Igbo Studies with seriousness, love, and purpose.

Thank you to all presenters, moderators, volunteers, sponsors, committee members, attendees, the ISA Executive Committee, Advisory Board, the students of Dominican University, the Igbo Association of Chicago, and the wider Igbo community in Chicago and beyond.

Welcome to Chicago. Welcome to ISA 2026. Welcome to another chapter in the life of the Igbo Studies Association.

Dr. Chidi Igwe
President, Igbo Studies Association